Date sent:          Tue, 5 Aug 2003 03:58:46 -0600
To:                virus@lucifer.com
Subject:            virus: Assistance in evaluating assertions
From:              "Hermit" <hidden@lucifer.com>
Send reply to:      virus@lucifer.com

>
> Most of what has been said in the last week is, in my opinion, so
> woolly-minded, logically flawed and addle-pated as not to deserve a
> response. Certainly this is the case for the personal viturpuration,
> all of which has been dealt with ad nauseam before. As but one example
> of what I mean, mentally competent people do not need to fight with
> idiots and bigots for a platform. So when we defend the right of
> idiots and bigots to take over our forums, we don't get discussion and
> "balance" (mythical though that may appear to be in the United States
> these days), instead we get "one truth", that of the idiots and
> bigots, because the intelligent don't like to be seen providing
> legitimacy, even through disagreement, to such podiums and either
> shut-up or move elsewhere.
>
Actually, the real idiot (who likes to call others names like 'racist', 'bigot',
'insane', in a failed and futile attempt to pre-emptively discredit them)
was provisionally prevented from dominating the forum with his 'one
truth' by intelligent people, or at least more fair-minded people, 
furnishing balance.
>
> But some of the assertions made may be tested for the cost of a few
> minutes of time if you know where to look. As testing asserions is
> generally a good idea, so here are some quick pointers to save your
> time.
>
> Hermit
>
> PS I promise to be scrupulously honest when rating Bill Roh and Joe
> Dees. On their past and current behaviour, I think they should be
> banned, and will certainly vote that way for so long as this remains
> the case. So the "concerns", "reservations" and "suggestions of
> hypocricy" are completely misplaced.
>
Meaning that he'll rate every post that issues from those on his enemies
list as low as possible, regardless of its merit.  I expected nothing more
from the likes of him, nor should anyone else.
>
>

---

> Any member's posting record may be evaluated by simply clicking on the
> member's name wherever it appears as a link. This will take you to
> that member's profile, and at the bottom of the screen, you will be
> able to view their previous posts. This facility is enabled on the
> evaluation page in order to assist you in assessing what kinds of
> things people write for yourself, rather than being told what to
> think. Numbers don't, of course, tell the whole story, after all, a
> post or article written for the CoV, or selected and formatted to make
> it attractive, takes a little more effort and thought than simply
> copying text; but you need to decide for yourselves how significant
> that effort is.
>
> But numbers can tell, at least, a partial story.
>
> The "Serious Business Forum" is now available only to congregation
> members, meaning that assertions about it are to an extent unprovable.
> However, the statistics page
> (http://virus.lucifer.com/bbs/index.php?board=;action=stat) will give
> you a means of estimating what may have happened on that board. Note
> in particular, the "Top 10 Topics (by Replies)" and "Top 10 Topics (by
> Views)" which are self-explanatory when you realize that. with the
> sole example of the "Current News" thread, which you can see now holds
> a total of 198 posts, and to which I and others (including e.g. some
> by Bill Roh) posted a total of 184 items in the course of a year (or
> about half a post a day) before I decided that posting there only
> provided credibility to a forum with which I no longer wished to be
> associated, the vast majority of posts made to that board were made by
> Joe Dees. You might find it  interesting to compare the numbe of
> people reading the "Current News" thread (2103 reads/198 posts or !
> about 10 reads per post, and it had about 50 a day while I was
> contributing to it before the board was flooded with those containing
> material predominantly cut and pasted by Joe Dees. The same comparison
> works on the main list.
>
Is it my fault that I could find far more responsible, credible,
distinguished and mainstream articles than Hermit could find hare-
brained, crackpot fringe drivel conducive to his extremist views??
>
> Subsequent to closing the Serious Business forum for public access,
> Joe Dees, apparently in a hairbrained attempt to continue propagate
> his virulent memeplex, has taken to posting on the "Test Area"
> (http://virus.lucifer.com/bbs/index.php?board=9).
>
I began posting articles  in the 'Test Area" only after Hermit began to do
so, and I informed David that, unless Hermit's political posts were
moved to the 'Serious Business" section where I have been repeatedly
told that such posts belong, I would consider it acceptable to follow
Hermit's suit - before I began posting there (you can check with him on
that).
>
> When you consider
> that this has been happening for only a week (since 2003-07-28), you
> should be able to imagine for yourself why the "Serious Business"
> board needed to be removed from public view. Joe Dees averaged over 20
> posts a day over the period it was public, as he has almost equalled
> to achieve his 3882 posts this year (vs Hermit's 1126). It being day
> 217 of the year, this averages to 17.89 posts per day by Dees, versus
> 5.2 for Hermit (and the next high level posters are Jake Sapiens and
> Rhinoceros at about half of Hermits.
>
> And convenient shortcuts to the 50 most recent posts by Hermit and
> Dees:
>
> Hermit:
> http://virus.lucifer.com/bbs/index.php?board=;action=usersrecentposts;
> userid=3;user=Hermit Joe Dees:
> http://virus.lucifer.com/bbs/index.php?board=;action=usersrecentposts;
> userid=9;user=joedees@bellsouth.net
>
>

---

> On Copyright and Material inclusion
>
> Metahuman/Demon, a 17 year old male (and this may be relevent in your
> assessments) with all of 17 posts to his avatar (many yesterday), made
> a large number of assertions, one of which caught my eye. "I should
> mention that many articles are protected under US Copyright Law and
> readers are legally prohibited from posting the articles in their
> complete form unless permission is granted by the author." It seems
> that metahuman, in common with some others, has not heard of the
> constitutionally protected doctrine of "fair use" which balances
> "copyright" - the only reason for which being to encourage the
> widespread access to material. When posters adhere to the rules
> established when we founded the BBS, the doctrine of fair use
> undoubtedly applies. The forum being locked, I quote it in full below:
>

---

>  [ Hermit, "Notice to BBS Posters for consideration and comment",
>  2002-09-19 ]
>  (http://virus.lucifer.com/bbs/index.php?board=7;action=display&thread
>  id=26663)
>
> Notice to BBS Posters for consideration and comment
>
> Attribution and Citation
>
> Please ensure that all articles posted to the CoV Bulletin Board
> (http://virus.lucifer.com/bbs) are appropriately attributed and that a
> source URL (or other suitable attribution) is provided. This facility
> is to enable CoV members to study and comment on material, to create a
> means for non-members to evaluate us, and to ensure the continuous
> availability of references on the all too ephemeral web. Not as a
> podium for plagiarism. So articles not meeting this minimum standard
> will be removed.
>
> Cutting and pasting the following will provide an appropriate
> template. <cut below here> TITLE
>
> SUBTITLE
>
> Source: URLDESCRIPTION (http://URL)
> Authors: AUTHORS
> Dated: YYYY-MM-DD
>
> ARTICLE
> <cut above here>
>
I have copied and printed out this section, and will scrupulously adhere
to it.
>
> Further information on quotation and citation is available on the FAQ
> board in Notice to BBS Posters for consideration and comment[/b]
>
> Attribution and Citation
>
> Please ensure that all articles posted to the CoV Bulletin Board
> (http://virus.lucifer.com[b) are appropriately attributed and that a
> source URL (or other suitable attribution) is provided. This facility
> is to enable CoV members to study and comment on material, to create a
> means for non-members to evaluate us, and to ensure the continuous
> availability of references on the all too ephemeral web. Not as a
> podium for plagiarism. So articles not meeting this minimum standard
> will be removed.
>
> Cutting and pasting the following will provide an appropriate
> template. <cut below here> TITLE
>
> SUBTITLE
>
> Source: URLDESCRIPTION (http://URL)
> Authors: AUTHORS
> Dated: YYYY-MM-DD
>
> ARTICLE
> <cut above here>
>
> Further information on quotation and citation is available on the FAQ
> board in FAQ: Hermitish mail mark-up and citation V2.1.
> (http://virus.lucifer.com/bbs/index.php?board=31;action=display;thread
> id=11526)/bbs/index.php?board=31;action=display;threadid=11526]FAQ:
> Hermitish mail mark-up and citation V2.1.
>
> Moderation
>
> Moderation decisions are made solely at the discretion of the
> moderators who will use as light a hand as possible, while attempting
> to maintain the usability of the forums and preventing  their abuse.
>
> Posters are strongly advised to examine any content or links for
> attempted insults to anyone or any material relating to member or
> non-member private individuals, which may be defamatory, and edit or
> remove such posts from the boards, as such posts may otherwise be
> edited, redirected or deleted by the moderator(s) at the discretion of
> the moderator(s).
>
> Related posts should, as far as possible be made to single threads,
> and the number of threads created in a period kept within reasonable
> limits. Posts to inappropriate boards will be redirected or deleted
> for topic spamming.
>
> People objecting to the contents of articles, or to the moderation of
> particular articles, or to the actions of moderators, should write
> privately to the moderator(s)* concerned. Complaints about moderation
> or calling for moderation posted to boards other than "Free for All"
> (http://virus.lucifer.com/bbs/index.php?board=1) will simply be
> ignored and probably removed from the boards.
>
> If after attempting in good faith to resolve an issue over moderation
> with the responsible (or rascally irresponsible) moderator(s), you are
> still unhappy, please contact Lucifer
> (http://virus.lucifer.com/bbs/index.php?board=;action=imsend;to=admin)
> , who will discuss it with the moderator(s) involved and make a final
> decision. Contacting Lucifer without attempting to make a good faith
> effort to resolve an issue, or taking a complaint public, may result
> in the complainant being ignored.
>
> Please bear in mind that everyone working towards the aims of the CoV
> is an unpaid volunteer, and that moderators are human too. We have to
> fit in our CoV activities between earning a living, experiencing life
> and making our own contributions. You can make our lives much easier
> (and our task here more rewarding) by adhering to these guidelines.
>
In cases of moderator abuse of the BBS, I will take my complaints to
David, as I and others have had to do with Hermit more than once
before.
> ----
> This message was posted by Hermit to the Virus 2003 board on Church of
> Virus BBS.
> <http://virus.lucifer.com/bbs/index.php?board=54;action=display;thread
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