The premiere of a random TV show just doesn't cut it, for me.

On March 8th I posted in Press for (I believe) the first time ever. My possibly useless addition to the thread was to let anyone as clueless as myself know that a certain actor was on a certain television special.
No, it most definetly wasn't important to the majority of the board. However, in the recent past I had been clued into certain guest appearances on other certain television shows via Press and had been thankful for the opportunity to catch something I wouldn't have normally seen without the heads up. I just thought I would return the favor to a random Buffista. Passing on a good deed...or whatever.

I'd really like to hear a rationale other than "kinda inconvenient" for why things as they have been (including Deathmatch posts) are an issue.

Well, if you want to know more explicitly why I'm getting into this, you got it.

I feel like it's an obligation for posting at this board to read Press. To be sure, it's a "soft" obligation, distinguishable from "hard" obligations like our policies on civility and spoilers. Nothing is going to happen to you if you decide not to, but most people here do it anyway because it's part of being a Good Citizen Buffista. And because we observe this obligation, we should demand the same from everyone who uses the thread to communicate.

I feel that postings should follow the first rule of the categorical imperative-- "Act only according to that maxim by which you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law." In other words, if it would be a bad thing if the rule under which you are posting was followed by every buffista, don't post it.

For example. If every buffista posted about every poetry reading that they had, every graduation, book release, or board funding request, that would be OK.

If every buffista posted every time their neighbor's neice had a poetry reading, every time their favorite show was released on DVD, every time they wanted political action for a pet cause, this would make Press unreadable.

This has nothing to do with teleological concerns. In other words, "no harm, no foul" has no persuasive power to me on this. I feel like it's disrespectful to the community and the purpose of the thread to post something you think could not be adopted as a rule by every Buffista on every occasion without destroying Press.

It's taking advantage of the extremely low volume and the extremely high eyeball factor. It's taking advantage of everyone else's discretion in posting and conscientiousness in reading. And in deontological terms, that is unethical.

This is not, though, directed at any specific post or type of post. I have no position, say, on the DM issue. It's an individual decision whether or not you think you're posting or reading something that everyone should be able to post. The bug up my ass is directed at the "well, that didn't hurt in this specific instance, so it's OK" line of thought that really seems to take advantage of everyone's magnanimity w/r/t/ Press. People should be able to count on reading something that they themselves would either feel comfortable posting or at least could see how someone else could.

I was trying to stay away from the specifics: But in terms of no harm no foul. I actually did post something on the topic, and then decided it was getting too much into specifics.

But in terms of "pet poltiical cause". The specific thing I posted on was:

1) a humans rights issue, not so much partizan political

2) something that had not made the press - you could not have found out about it elsewhere. (I'd hear about it from a fried.

3) I'd taken the trouble to call the U.S. embassy in El Salvador to make sure I had the right information.

4) It was a case where a phone call could make a real difference. And in fadt the Embassy got phone calls, and it apparently did make a difference because the people were released, and the election is taking place without more than the normal amount of fraud and corruption that occurs in Salvadoran elections (a significant amount, not not enough that it is likely to result in a stolen election unless it is very close.)

I doubt many political cases match these criteria. Similarly in the case of the Peace rallyes way back when, there was reason to think that a large number of Buffistas would be interested. Nobody posted the peace rallies yesterday. It is not as "hot" an issue as the last batch. Though I personally think the Iraq war still should be hot issue, I recognized the reality and did not post anything on it, as I presume did others. But the El Salvador, though not hot in the sense of being something people find inherently interesting was hot in the sense there was something real that could be acccomplished, it was verified, and there was no alternative way of getting the info.

I don't think you are applying the categorical imprerative properly anyway. People come to the Buffista board with a variety of interests. The question is not "what if everybody did it" but "what if everbody likely to want to do so did it?" That really is your arguement for poetry readings. Not everybody hold poetry readings; so it is ok for the few who do to post them Well not everybody on the board is passionate about political causes.

I could go into how the categorical imperative is not exactly the touchstone of all ethics, but that would lead to natter...

I will note that the reason this aroused so much touchiness is that you are basically saying that this kind of posting is rude, and anti-social and unethical. You did not say it in those words, but that is clearly the conclusion of your arguments. I don't want to speak for anyone else, but I wonder if that is why some Buffistas, not enjoying being told they were rude and unethical, grew a little touchy in their responses.

As a side note, I'm not sure the "no harm, no foul" argument can properly be called teological. Ive always understood that teology dealt with purpose rather than merely results. But I'll defer to your legal training on this.

Allyson, of course you aren't hurting my feelings. You're saying that the deathmatch notices don't apply to you, so you ignore them. I think that's an excellent way of dealing with things that don't apply to you.

Got me where I am today, let me tell you.

I'm with the pile of 'If it ain't broke [and from where I'm sitting, it ain't] don't fix it'. Pretty much all of my reasons have been stated above. The only thing I have to add is that I figure, by and large, that people are using their best judgement before posting. YBestJudgementMV.

I'm saying think first, then post.

Thing is? I suspect that most people who post there probably would say that they do that.

People should be able to count on reading something that they themselves would either feel comfortable posting or at least could see how someone else could.

Again, I suspect that most people do think they are posting something that another person might post. I just think that relying on their good judgement -- which, if I understand, is what you're asking for -- is what people are doing right now anyway.

---------

So, for me, that's the bottom line. People are being asked to use good judgement for posts in Press. What's causing the problem is that Your Judgement Varies (ain't not May about it, really), and I don't see that changing. And I don't think it should.

Edited to take away something that was supposed to be funny but probably wouldn't come across that way at this juncture.

FWIW, my rule of thumb is simply "one degree of separation" for what's worth putting in Beep Me or Press. Asking for health-ma for your accupuncturist's cousin always makes me roll my eyes. Mentioning your mother is dying of cancer I understand. Aside from getting the well-wishing, and prayers, it alerts the community that you're under stress.

I don't feel like Press is being abused, but I hope that one outcome of this conversation is just to put a little hesitation into everybody's head about when they should post. It doesn't have to be something applicable to the whole board, but it should be something with wide interest. But I think it's fine if somebody announced that tickets were going on sale for a huge Sondheim festival, or that ASH was making a guest appearance on 24, or if they just published an article in a magazine.

If you're going to take a long hiatus, for work or personal reasons, or leaving the board I think it's fine to announce. If you're gone for the weekend I don't really think that's beep-worthy. In fact, anything less than a week is probably not worth noting there.

Is the problem just the number of posts, or is length also a factor? If length matters, maybe we could ask people with longer messages to link to them, rather than posting the whole thing.

Ok, now I feel bad.

I posted in Press before I got to this thread. (I read the shorter ones first).

I'm thinking my post was appropriate, but now I'm not terribly sure. Should I have done something different?

I feel like it's an obligation for posting at this board to read Press. To be sure, it's a "soft" obligation, distinguishable from "hard" obligations like our policies on civility and spoilers. Nothing is going to happen to you if you decide not to, but most people here do it anyway because it's part of being a Good Citizen Buffista.

I don't believe our responsibilities to be a Good Citizen Buffista extend this far. I think a GCB may include to respecting other posters, participating in conversation, not spamming the board and follwing our rules of ettiquette. I think you can be an engaged and active Buffista without reading Press.

I went back to the old Bureaucracy Thread on WX to see what the discussion was around the creation of Press. Surprisingly, there was little discussion or agonizing. The only hard and fast rule was announcements only, no natter. (Discussion is here: [link]

That said, there are few posts early on that don't relate to F2F and other board activities, local social activities, notices that would now go in "When come back bring tape" and announcements from the ME-dom. There were a only a handful, and nobody seems to have commented on them as being inappropriate or not. And at that time, Stompies were actively present in the thread--trying out stomp out natter. I'm not sure if they were considered fine from the beginning, or if they were unnoticed because of thier low number.

So I would agree there has been thread drift, from the implied intentions of the thread, but I don't know that those original intentions were ever codified anywhere, so it's hard for the many people who have joined us in the past to years to read our collective Buffista mind.

Don't worry about it, Heather. We haven't changed the rules, most people feel like "leave it be", we're discussing the discussion now.