What Has TB Become?
 

First things first. Not voting is not doing TBers' job, whether it's a deciding vote and/or with good reason/s. To be fair, this is not the first time it happened during the last 15 months.

(bolding mine)

May I raising both my hands & feet and say "+4?" :)

I am all for transparency, TB or FT-wise. I especially admire all TBers who took time sharing their thoughts & opinions outside the private TB Forum. I am just not so sure if I ever see so much TB laundry, out in the open in the name of "transparency", especially aiming at such a wide personal angle.

Let's all take a big step back and sleep on it: if this type of "exchanges" took place in other fora on FT, how long would it take for the forum mod to step in and redirect the discussion? A few weeks? A couple of months? Or simply shorter?

Don't get me wrong. I am not saying nor implying TBT Foum MODs should intervene. I am just airing out my frustration and disappointment reading TBT Forum in the last couple of months. I wonder more and more if there's a new TBT, aka TB Tabloid, Forum on FT. I find out I am reading and learning more about TBers feeling toward each other. I see some TBers taking strong defensive positions or self-assertion when flaws and/or oversight spotted in motions. Disagreement in opinions seems to only encourage disparities, rather than finding common ground among members. It becomes exceptions when some TBers take in different opinions and/or say, "I am listening."

There's no way to please everyone. I only expect a TB with a much open mind to discuss what FTers really care and produce well-thought through motions.

People demand transparency. When they get transparency, they don't like what they can now see. You can't have it both ways. As I said before, TalkBoard members are going to disagree, as anyone would, about tricky or controversial issues. We could be superficially polite, as in Congress ("...the gentleman from Virginia, blah, blah, blah..."), or we can speak frankly. I prefer speaking frankly, but on that issue, too, people are going to disagree.

Bruce

As do I so frankly isn't the private TB forum the place for such personal exchanges?

Sure it is, but on the other hand, people demand transparency, so a lot of the discussion leaks over to the public forum. Some TalkBoard members insist on posting their every thought to the public board. I tend not to be quite so open, but once part of the discussion becomes public, all of it inevitably will.

Bruce

There's frank, but civil, and then there is pettiness, bickering, and nastiness. Unfortunately, there seems to be a lot of pettiness, bickering, and nastiness from TB members towards each other and towards some FTers who post differing opinions.

lin821 referenced that this isn't the first time a TB member missed a vote. In the last occasion I found, no one from TB posted publicly criticizing that TB member. Granted, the motion in question passed 8-0, but still. Where was the criticism then? That there was none from TB suggests to some that perhaps, the criticism in this case is more of a personal nature.

I think that's ridiculous. Missing a vote that cannot possibly affect the outcome is worlds apart from forgetting to cast the deciding vote.

Bruce

It's still missing a vote, and there was no criticism from TB then.

First of all, that's not true, but "missing a vote" can matter a little, a lot or not at all. The reaction will vary accordingly. Why do you believe it's personal? Just speculating?

Bruce

As I have no “axe to grind” with anyone — TalkBoard member or not — here are a few objective thoughts by me which I hope will be taken into consideration:

• Although I absolutely do not condone her action — or lack thereof — the member of TalkBoard in question was honest in publicly admitting what happened. She could have easily conjured a fabrication of what happened — such as she was on a delayed flight and had no access to the Internet; or that she was suffering from an illness and was in the midst of fighting it — but instead she told the truth and also provided an explanation. She was clearly embarrassed by what happened.
• She apologized not once, but three times — twice in this discussion as highlighted by me; and once in the private forum.
• What is done is done. If there is to be any discussion pertaining to this issue, it should be how to prevent it from happening again.

I am not sure why anyone would have the audacity to selectively choose which rules of FlyerTalk do not apply here — as well as negatively contribute to the culture and community of FlyerTalk in general — but in my opinion, it is time to move on to the next item on the agenda.I agree with kipper.

Any animosity which members of TalkBoard may have for each other should not be public fodder. That is not transparency — that is what is known colloquially as a “soap opera.” Perhaps some members of FlyerTalk feed off of that and prepare their popcorn for the latest episode; but that is not what TalkBoard is supposed to be about.

Speaking for myself, I decided to run as a candidate for a seat on TalkBoard for this primary reason: to attempt to do even more for FlyerTalk than I already have — both in my roles as a moderator and as a general member. Frank vociferous debates should absolutely be encouraged if that is part of what it takes to reach the ultimate goal of creating sound recommendations which could potentially improve FlyerTalk — perhaps even significantly.

I would like to think that my colleagues on TalkBoard share a similar mantra to mine...

...so in that regard, I am politely requesting that the hindsight discussion and public admonition end from this point forward; and that we attempt to venture forward with a clean slate and open minds.

In other words, let us all do what we can to work together to help further improve FlyerTalk — starting now.

That's certainly my intention.

Bruce

I'm with Canarsie. It's important to know how to make an apology, but it's even more important to know how to accept one. If you can't accept apologies you won't get many of them!

There is a very simple answer to correct this situation. MSPeconomist, now that you are awake, are you in favor of the motion?

If you would vote "No" or abstain, that ends the debate. There are not enough members in favor to pass it.

On the other hand, if you would vote "Yes", then the member who made the motion should resubmit it. Presumably, everybody would vote the same way they did the first time, and the motion will pass.

This way, your having fallen asleep will have made no difference beyond the minor one of delaying the motion from being passed,

Yup.

Bruce

Not necessarily as MSPeconomist also mentioned abstaining so there were actually two outcomes which would've seen the motion fail to pass, her voting against it or her abstaining.

I've served on TB several times over the past two decades. And while the current TB is indeed 'rambunctious' at times, it is all sweetness and light compared to some of the TBs I have served on. It's the nature of bringing disparate but passionate people together to address issues: sometimes folks are going to butt heads. @:-)

As for other votes, there is often quite a bit of discussion in the private forum about that sort of thing. After all, missing votes in one of the enumerated causes for Censure and Removal from the TB.

Not to speak for her, but my impression was that she was leaning no or abstain anyway. Either of which would have had the same effect as her not voting, ie, to kill the proposal.

So the status quo prevails and it's on to other things...like Uber.