wharvey

I have a question for the Talkboard.

I saw recently a post by the Talkboard President in this public forum:

Quote: "Yes, we have one TalkBoard member who likes to wait until the last minute to vote. (Once, she waited too long and missed voting entirely!) I have no idea why she does that, but obviously, it's her right to vote whenever she gets the urge. I'll observe that she posts constantly, more than 20 posts just today, but never seems to find the time to vote. Meanwhile, the motion has certainly passed. Maybe the powers that be are starting to set up the new forum. I hope so.

Bruce "

I was under the impression that who votes when is not to be disclosed in the public forum unless disclosed by the actual Talkboard Member. Of course, whether a TB member actually votes is public once the vote is publicized.

This comment felt like a violation of the TB rules I understood were in place for the private forum.

WE, as general members, are not privy to the fact this one member always votes last... and feels like a violation of expected privacy.

Have guidelines on TB members not discussing private forum discussions other than their own comments and actions changed? If so, can the general membership be informed of those changes?

SkiAdcock

They've not changed to my knowledge, but IMO you should have PM'd the individual or the CD to discuss rather than start a public thread, and of course if you thought TOS was being violated PM the mods of the forum or the CD for them to review.

Cheers.

bdschobel

I did not identify the TalkBoard member, but in any case, FlyerTalkers should be able to know what's holding up implementation of a motion that has been announced as "will pass." Remember that FlyerTalkers elect TalkBoard members, and such elections devolve to mere name recognition without this kind of knowledge.

In any case, the slow voter identified herself eventually, so the matter is moot.

Bruce

wharvey

This was NOT a TOS violation but guidelines I thought were in place for the Talkboard. If TB members want to publicly have those discussion, why can we not have the same discussions publicly?

bdschobel

Nothing would please me more. I would open up all TalkBoard communications to ordinary FlyerTalkers. I have nothing to hide, and FlyerTalkers need to vote for TalkBoard members based on some knowledge of how we behave, in public and private.

Bruce

wharvey

If that is the belief, then the Talkboard Guidelines should be amended to state that "Once a motion received enough votes to pass or fail, then that information will be posted publicly with the names of the members who have voted so far."

And, how is the matter moot? Because a TB member acknowledged being "outed"?

I personally think that the actual vote on motions should just happen in the public forum.... that way we know at all times where a vote stands.

bdschobel

She wasn't outed by me. She posted publicly that she hadn't voted yet, thereby identifying herself. I did post that eight people had voted, but that was in response to a reasonable question that deserved an answer.

I'm happy to debate what I did to bring this to a happy conclusion, but at this point, the matter is moot because the vote is complete, and everyone's votes will soon become public. We're just waiting for jason8612 (TalkBoard VP) to make the formal announcements.

And, as I already said, I would make all TalkBoard activities completely transparent, if I had that power.

Bruce

bdschobel

By the way, along those lines, we have all seen people who behave very differently in public than they do in private. It's not a pretty sight. TalkBoard is not immune from that phenomenon. Eliminating the private forum would mitigate that problem.

I'm absolutely the same guy in public and private, so I support total transparency. I get no benefit at all from the private forum's privacy.

Bruce

wharvey

I would support that wholeheartedly!

hhoope01

There you go. It looks like there is the core of a motion with someone to second it.

And I suspect there is at least one other TB member who would probably be very much in support as well.

SkiAdcock

I've always had a problem w/ people thinking that because there is a private TB forum that it's because TB members have something to "hide" or that they're not being "transparent". That is not the case & speaking only for myself as a former TB member, I strongly resent the implication.

Cheers.

MSPeconomist

I agree with you and I should point out the pointed use of the pronouns "she" and "her" from someone who has argued elsewhere against saying he or she rather than just he in cases where the gender is unknown or undetermined. IIRC there were some deleted posts [I don't know who deleted them or why, perhaps this dentate by the author(s) of those post(s)] that did contain my username. Unfortunately I didn't print or otherwise save them before deletion but I suspect that I know who posted my username.

I should also point out that comments about how much, where, or when someone posts feel almost like stalking, even though AFAIK someone can easily click on the "find recent posts by" line in one's profile to get this information. [BTW, does anyone know whether this feature can be disabled?]

If the private TB forum were to become public, I would worry that certain moderators would first clean it up to delete personal attacks without leaving evidence that posts have been edited or deleted.

bdschobel

I haven't seen any personal attacks in the private forum.

Bruce

SkiAdcock

FWIW - if there have been any personal attacks IMO in the private TB forum, they have occurred more in the last year & in response to votes going on longer than perhaps they needed to. However, I don't think that TB member(s) expressing frustration with another TB member(s) for dragging things out is actually a personal attack vs. just expressing frustration. There IS a difference.

My first few years on TB, TB members pretty much stuck to the discuss the idea & not the person, even when TB members were divided (& in some times passionately divided!) on issues/motions. I would hazard a guess, that frustration on votes aside, that's pretty much still the case.

Cheers.

bdschobel

"Perhaps"?

Bruce