Banning members

[Guest guest]

Dear ,

I created PLS-Friends back in January, 1999. I am

still the list owner.

List owners have several powers not given to members.

List owners may choose to decide who may become a

member. Further, list owners can chose to moderate a

list and decide in advance whether or not each message

to the list shall actually be posted to the members.

Although I could have chosen to have these powers, I

declined to do so when I created PLS-Friends. And I

have never changed that policy.

List owners can decide to make a group a closed group

or an open group. Messages to an open group can be

read by anyone in the world. Messages to a closed

group can only be read by the members. I made

PLS-Friends a closed group to protect the privacy of

its members.

As the list owner, I also have a number of

responsibilities. I try to fix things for members who

are having trouble receiving/sending messages. I have

also subscribed and un-subscribed people who were

having problems doing so on their own.

Since PLS-Friends is a PLS patient/caregiver support

group, I try to stop nasty fights on the list. In

that regard, I now send private messages to the

combatants, urging them to behave properly, for the

good of PLS-Friends. If my initial attempt to cool

things down fails, I try again, this time indicating

that I have the power (through ) to ban

combatants who fail to heed my warnings.

Note that , and each one of its

predecessors (eGroups, One List), has given list

owners the absolute right to ban group members. This

is not a secret to long time PLS-Friends members.

Last March, I went away with my family on a weekend

trip. I returned home to discover that a major fight

had broken out on PLS-Friends shortly after I left,

and was still in progress. I sent a message to

PLS-Friends threatening to ban anyone who continued to

use rude, insulting language on the list. Please find

the text of that message below. (It is still

available in the PLS-Frienda archives. See message #

9340.)

I will never ban anyone without sending them a message

explaining why they are being banned.

Please realize that banning anyone from a YahooGroup

is not a violation of anyone's freedom of speech. The

First Amendment protects everyone's freedom of speech

from government action. When someone is banned from a

YahooGroup, it is not government action. It is

private action that is not prohibited by the First

Amendment. In fact such action is protected by the

Constitution's freedom of association clause.

I do not discuss whether or why I have banned anyone

from PLS-Friends. I consider such information to be a

personal matter that is solely between the individual

involved and myself.

If you have a reason to believe that I banned someone,

and would like more information, I suggest that you

contact the individual and ask for a copy of the

message that I would have sent to him/her. As I

stated above, I will always send such a message when I

ban someone.

I do not take the power to ban lightly. I have done

my absolute best to use that power in a responsible

manner, recognizing that PLS-Friends is first and

foremost a support group of patients/caregivers. The

members are due a supportive environment.

But just as there are governmental limits to free

speech (the criminal law prohibits certain kinds of

speech--shouting " fire " in a theatre and making

fraudulent statements to name a few), there are

extreme limits at PLS-Friends as to what can be said,

and what can be done with information obtained from

messages.

Fortunately, the members of PLS-Friends are good,

decent people. As a result, banning is almost never

an issue, for the simple reason that messages almost

never reach the level that suggests banning. Further,

improper use of information obtained from PLS-Friends'

messages is almost never an issue.

I hope that I have fully answered your inquiry.

Most sincerely,

Mark Weber

___________________________________________

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Msg # 9340

From: markw732@...

Date: Mon Mar 26, 2001 6:03 pm

Subject: No more rude, insulting messages--OR ELSE!

Friends,

I don't know where the combatants intend the ongoing

" virtual

fighting " to go, but I am certain that it is about to

end.

That it has occurrred is a shame. Absolutely nothing

positive has

come out of it. I never intended PLS-Friends to be a

forum for

insults, and I have no intention of allowing it to

become such a

place.

If the rude, insulting messages continue, I fully

intend to ban the

offender(s) from PLS-Friends. As the list owner, I can

do

this--although I have never done it--or even

threatened to do

it--before.

Please end this behavior immediately. No more insults,

name calling,

taunting etc. If you don't want it written to you,

don't write it

to another.

We certainly can disagree with each other. But there

is no reason to

be disagreeable in doing so.

Mark Weber

List owner

PLS-Friends

__________________________________________________

[Guest guest]

Its good to see that nastiness is not tolerated. Really there is no need for any of this, life is just too darn short. Keep up the good work.

Debbie Lapointe

CALS - Prince British Columbia

Canada