It goes without saying that this incident is typical behavior for the Internet (you can choose as the bad boy whomever you hate more). While some people are probably that foolish and/or mean in real life, I've had the opportunity to meet a couple of people who behave like that on the net and so far no one has been that belligerent in person. Until we can find a way to figure out how to take away people's stupid bravado on the 'Net, it will remain a mixed blessing at best (albeit, one that pays my rent).
Here's a question for anyone else who wants to take a crack at it: do you think that hiding behind a keyboard reveals the inner nature of people, or is something else going on? (I have theories about the latter, but I'll just see what others have to say).
This looks like a joke in both cases. Yes, it was inappropriate to put an email address that was reasonably carefully hidden in public, machine-readable view, but that got fixed. Yes, it's inappropriate to swat someone's feedback away. But, in the absence of more context, Randal's email kind of looks anal if it's to be taken seriously, and if the whole module's a joke, the author might well think that the feedback's a joke too.
Perhaps aren't well executed/thought-out jokes, but it doesn't really look malicious. Sure, either communication could be interpreted as negative behavior, but some folks view the entire Acme namespace as a waste of effort, an exercise in pointlessness.
Like I said in the disclaimer -- I could be wrong, this could truly be malicious, it could be jerky, etc., but these just look like failed jokes to me.
As far as a keyboard releasing inner personality, I suspect that's a function of time. You can communicate more quickly with a keyboard than with words, so you both have less time to filter and more time to spew. Also, there's no way to gauge people's reaction mid-sentence, as with face-to-face speaking, so there's not really any way to tell if you should just shut up and let something go mid-sentence. (Believe me, that whole mid-sentence thing has saved my bacon in conversations a whole lot more than I ever give it credit for. Being able to change what you say to someone halfway through saying it is just about the only real advantage of vocalization.)
IMHO, part of the reason people can be so much more rude over email than in person is two reasons, depending on the type of person you are. One is a lack of empathy. We're monkeys that instinctively feel for other monkeys. Without a warm human physically present, we're not inclined to be empathic.
For some people, this empathy is busted. For them in human-to-human communication there's the implicit threat of physical violence. If you piss me off I might kick you in the balls. Candy bar commercials notwithstanding, nobody's going to fly to your house to kick you in the nuts.
So I propose the MBM protocol. This is a network protocol to speak to a special device which is federally mandated to come with any network capable device. Simply put, it kicks you in the balls.
I've now lost whatever vestige of respect I ever had left for Randal, who I now know to be a bully and a liar.
Re:Who's at fault here?
Ovid on 2003-09-19T19:23:30
Since a couple of people have asked me: I think Randal should not have posted the correspondence. I also feel that instead of giving the reply that you did, you could have chosen not to respond or to have responded in a different manner. Admittedly, I sympathize with getting irritated and sending out an email that reflects that. However, when I've done that, if it has an effect at all it's usually bad. Now because of what you have written, some people will have a bad opinion of you (and some will think you're a hero). I'm not saying that's fair, but it is how things tend to work. I am still living down a couple of posts of mine that were ill-thought.
We should expect privacy of our email as a courtesy, but there's no guarantee of it. You're certainly not the first to be bitten by this.
Re:Who's at fault here?
hex on 2003-09-19T21:36:01
Fair comment.
Regards,
Earle.
But instead of escalating it in email, and getting more pissed on each round, I decided to check out whether I was off my rocker or not, by posting the email for peer review. If people believed it was non-responsive, they'd also write the author. If not, they'd tell me I was crazy.
I don't see why people are reading more in to this. I asked for polite replies to the authors to confirm that (a) I was not alone and (b) the response was non-responsive.
Oh well. Try to do a good deed, and get burned. Such is my history.
Re:not sure what's getting worked up here
ask on 2003-09-22T11:15:05
Next time, consider replying something like
"Thanks for the wonderful violin music. While enjoying it I felt inspired to make the included patch to your distribution. Please consider including it in your next update."
That would have deflated the (minor IMO) attack on you and brought the talk back to focus on your goal (being able to install his Acme module with CPAN.pm).
- askRe:not sure what's getting worked up here
pudge on 2003-09-23T23:59:07
You could have accomplished the stated goals without quoting his email to you, and you could have asked for responses in the discussion instead of directly to him, and then sent him the URL where he could read the discussion.
