Defining the LDP, was; RE: HOWTO gatekeeper?

[User one account <rwschul@smart.net>]

On Sat, 11 Mar 2000, Gregory Leblanc wrote:
> 
> I believe that the response telling them to "take their astronomy elsewhere"
> was sent privately, because I never saw it.  The original poster DID
> respond, and explain further what they had in mind.  I believe that we do
> need a "gatekeeper", but the role isn't clearly defined.  However, as we
> consider this question, we need to remember that this is a Bazaar, and not a
> Cathedral, from the way that most of the people here feel about it.  Right
> now, we don't have any policies on what gets accepted, at least nothing
> formal.  These are just another part of the things that need to be defined.
> If you want to work on that, start a new thread and propose some ideas, I
> don't have time to come up with a proposal, I'm still working on getting CVS
> sorted out a little better.
> 	Greg
> 

OK, I don't exactly where to go with it but I'll start a thread.   If there
is sufficient response, maybe we can merge everything into an LDP Charter or
statement of purpose so at least newcomers will have some idea of the ground
rules...

Here are a couple of ideas to start with...

While the Bazaar/Cathedral analogy is good for the authors and creators of
works, it doesn't seem to fit all that well for volunteers who, while they may
also be authors, are acting in a role as maintainer or custodian of
other peoples works.

If you have a gate keeper or do any filtering of information submitted by others,
don't you incur a set of legal and ethical responsibilities kind of like an ISP
that censors certain words/authors or whatever, as opposed to an AT&T that just
provides bandwidth and never looks at content?  

So far all the howto's, guides, and FAQs have been relatively innocuous.  What
happens when someone submits one that is intentionally destructive or
pornographic or in some other way objectionable?

What kind of individual responsibility comes along with being a volunteer?  Can
anyone who volunteers speak with authority for the LDP?  Is there any such
thing as "authority" in the LDP?


Bob




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