Enforcement, Selection, and on-the-fly policy making

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3 total messages Started by Elizabeth Schwartz Thu, 08 Oct 1992 17:25

#164

Author: Elizabeth Schwartz
Date: Thu, 08 Oct 1992 17:25

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  There's another thing about these threads that is bothering me; the
implication that policies can't be made or modified on the fly, that
only written-in-stone policies are fair.
  I am a manager. I make policy decisions all the time, often standing
on one foot. This is what I get paid to do; someone has to make
decisions. Trying to write every small policy down can lead to the
situation where you have rule books which are hundreds of pages long
and where even the most trivial situations are covered by masses of
rules. 
  Keeping rules simple has the consequence that interpretation of the
rules falls to the management more frequently. A rule of "no
interfering with other users" leaves room for interpretation;
itemizing possible ways of interference could run into the dozens of
pages. 
  Take this plan thing. Right now we have no written rule on .plan
files, and an unwritten policy that they not be obscene and that they
not interfere with others. If we itemized this, we could run on for
pages and pages about flow control, ascii sequences, buffer overflow,
obscenity trials...and end up with a much less comfortable situation
where instead of a few extreme cases, every user was under scrutiny.
It might be "fair" in the sense that BANNING .plan files would apply
equally to all users. It might be enforceable, if I said "plan files
must contain only a subset of the following categories of information
appropriate to a telephone service....")
  But Yecccch! Who wants to live with that many rules? As it is, we've
asked three students in two years to change their .plan files, out of
about 500. Everyone is happy (at our site anyway; not everyone on the
net is pleased that we are happy.) I don't have tenure; if the
university is unhappy with my management style they could ask me to
modify it and/or they could fire me and replace me with someone else. 
  Meanwhile, I don't think we are confusing management with
"benevolent dictatorship."
--
System Administrator                  Internet: betsys@cs.umb.edu
MACS Dept, UMass/Boston               BITNET:ESCHWARTZ%UMBSKY.DNET@NS.UMB.EDU
100 Morrissy Blvd                     Staccato signals
Boston, MA 02125-3393                      of constant information....

Re: Enforcement, Selection, and on-the-fly policy making

#165

Author: Olaf Titz
Date: Fri, 09 Oct 1992 14:09

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In <BETSYS.92Oct8122503@ra.cs.umb.edu> betsys@cs.umb.edu writes:

>    There's another thing about these threads that is bothering me; the
>  implication that policies can't be made or modified on the fly, that
>  only written-in-stone policies are fair.

I agree, but you have to consider the limits of on-the-fly decisions,
however. I assume you would not justify the ad-hoc taking out of
entire services with this reason. (I suspect you wouldn't *do* that in
the first place.)

>...
>    Keeping rules simple has the consequence that interpretation of the
>  rules falls to the management more frequently. A rule of "no
>  interfering with other users" leaves room for interpretation;

It even leaves room for discussion between managers and users...

>...
>    But Yecccch! Who wants to live with that many rules? As it is, we've
>  asked three students in two years to change their .plan files, out of
>  about 500. Everyone is happy (at our site anyway; not everyone on the

And you have settled with them? You seem to have exactly the thing
many sites lack most: a good climate of the management-user
relationship.

>...
>    Meanwhile, I don't think we are confusing management with
>  "benevolent dictatorship."

Makes me happy to read that there are still people that reasonable. I
fully agree.

MfG,
        Olaf
-- 
    o     Olaf Titz - comp.sc.student - univ of karlsruhe - germany
 _ /<_    s_titz@iravcl.ira.uka.de - uknf@dkauni2.bitnet - praetorius@irc
(_)>(_)   +49-721-60439 - did i forget something?
He thinks too much, such men are dangerous. - Shakespeare, Caesar

Re: Enforcement, Selection, and on-the-fly policy making

#168

Author: Carl M. Kadie
Date: Sat, 10 Oct 1992 02:55

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betsys@cs.umb.edu (Elizabeth Schwartz) writes:

>  There's another thing about these threads that is bothering me; the
>implication that policies can't be made or modified on the fly, that
>only written-in-stone policies are fair.
[...]
>  Take this plan thing. Right now we have no written rule on .plan
>files, and an unwritten policy that they not be obscene and that they
>not interfere with others.
[...]

My main criticism of the .plan policy is not that it is unwritten and
vague but rather than it bans things that it shouldn't be banned.
Specifically, it bans not just legally obscene material but also
offensive, but constitutionally protected, material.

- Carl
--
Carl Kadie -- kadie@cs.uiuc.edu -- University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

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