🚀 go-pugleaf

gl8f@astsun7.astro.Virginia.EDU (Greg Lindahl) writes:

>#  Stuff about virtual journals and refereeing by statistical consensus -                     
>#  Followed by various strong comments and discussions as to whether 
>#  said comments are offensive
>#

>This is known as a "dictionary flame". The person who was talking
>about statistical concensus obviously has a different definition. It's
>constructive to ask him what it is, but it isn't constructive to call
>it crap.

>Fair has nothing to do with being constructive. Why do Usenet posters
>sometimes find it necessary to be twits?

Sorry, I'm new to this.  I was trying to be brief and assumed people
would get the point rather than carrying on about what was or wasn't
polite.  I wasn't meaning to "flame" but was expressing STRONG
disagreement.  Is that constructive?  Should it be?

I interpret the argument as going something like this:
 "We can use the net to 'publish' in a way that avoids the delays and
  the restrictions and biases of god-editors of conventional journals.
  But much discussion in present news groups is random, undirected and
  of low standard.  So how do we referee the virtual journal?
  By collecting comments from the group and somehow statistically
  analysing the results to define 'group knowledge'"

This seems to be an example of trying to solve a political or social by
defining it away - by finding some measure or technique which we call
"objective" then using that measure because it is there - even although
it may have nothing to do with our original values.  In the case of a
journal it might be "establishing truth through market research". (why not?)

It seems to me that groupware will be more useful if it supports quite a
different model of discussion.  Draft articles would be criticised,
supported, provisionally amended and otherwise discussed by named persons.
(Named so that regular contributors would get an idea of each other's
views and values).  Eventually a small subgroup would form which would
"run" with the article and beat it into its final form.  Other subgroups 
might produce opposing articles.  From time to time the discussion group
would split and completely independent groups form.  Other groups might 
merge.  Of course it might be hard for authors to "own" ideas, but that's
another problem.

The trouble with statistical or any other automated form of moderation
(the expert system editor?) is that they objectify the relationships
among the group members, and these relationships are exactly what makes
the group work.

Bulletin boards already seem to have most of the technology to support 
this type of interaction but a quick browse through the newsgroups 
shows that it is not happening.  Is it lack of interest or lack of 
attitude?

This newsgroup seems an excellent place to continue this discussion
and maybe develop some guidelines to encourage the process.
It just seems to me that hey need to be developed by trial and error,
not imposition.

P.S. I use the dictionary because it usually describes things in about
a tenth (or in this case a hundredth) of the words I can.

______________________________________________________________________________
  Jim Underwood                         University of Technology, Sydney
  (jim@ultima.socs.uts.edu.au)          PO Box 123, BROADWAY
  Systems Theorist                      N.S.W.      2007
  School of Computing Sciences          AUSTRALIA
______________________________________________________________________________