Re: We are ALL guests (except Eric)

[tcmay@netcom.com (Timothy C. May)]

Samuel Kaplin wrote:

> With the recent furor over the possibility of mandatory key signing on
> this list, I think we all are forgetting something. We are all guests here.
> Eric is our host. I've seen proposals for voting on the issue, I've seen
> posts saying "I'm not going to do it, wah wah wah." This list is analogous
> to Eric's home. We are his guests. If a host asks his guests to do

I think this analysis is misleading. I leave it to readers to analyze
the history of the list, the role of the early members, and the
contributing contributions of the hundred or so active posters to
decide if this analysis is correct.

As to characterizing the posts here as "I'm not going to do it, wah
wah wah," this is too insulting to comment on.

> comply to leave. This is Eric's house and I think we need to play by his
> rules while we are here.

Funny, I don't recall Eric ever claiming it was "his house" to do with
as he wishes. Seems to me that the list is an emergent entity,
presently being centrally distributed off a machine owned by John
Gilmore (is the list then his house?), being maintained by Hugh Daniel
(his house?), and generally managed to the extent management is needed
by Eric Hughes (his house?). 

But a lot of others have contributed. No, we are not making "demands,"
nor are we calling for "a democratic vote."

I happen to think Eric is quite wrong in thinking that "behavior
modification" is needed, or practical. The list has done very well for
the past 26 months without rigid rules, and has never even had a
person kicked off the list (who didn't ask to be removed, back in the
pre-Majordomo manual processing days)).

To begin behavior modification now, with many of us unwilling to
convert to systems which would make conformance practical, seems
unwise.

In any case, that's a separate issue. Suddenly declaring the list to
be the personal property of Eric to do with as he pleases--a claim I
have not heard from Eric--is another category of issue.

I frankly don't know if it makes sense to say anyone "owns" the list.
(We went through this several times on the Extropians list; the
Extropians mostly solved this situation by having the list the formal
property of their Board of Directors. And yet debates naturally
continued.)

--Tim May



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