[EM] Why not filter out messages from participants who do not follow forum etiquette?

[Richard Fobes]

On 1/31/2013 11:31 AM, robert bristow-johnson wrote:
> On 1/31/13 1:05 PM, Richard Fobes wrote:
>> On 1/30/2013 2:21 PM, Michael Ossipoff wrote:
>>> ...
>>> For instance, the LNHe failure of such traditional unimproved
>>> Condorcet (TUC) methods, such as Beatpath, Ranked-Pairs, etc. is
>>> admitted by most to be a disadvantage.
>>
>> To anyone here who is isn't already aware, Michael Ossipoff makes
>> statements about what other participants here believe, yet frequently
>> those statements do not reflect what participants here actually believe.
>>
>
> killfile.
>
> ...
>
> please just plonk this dude so we can stop thinking about him. it's simple.

Thank you for your reminders that other people here are ignoring the 
posts from M.O.  It helps.  (And thank you Jameson for the same reason.)

You ask why I don't filter out all his posts.

There are several reasons.

M.O. has a better-than-average understanding of election methods, and he 
does make some worthwhile contributions to this forum. And I believe he 
has good intentions.

What I object to is his failure to follow normal forum etiquette.

On the positive side, Michael finally seems to be taking more seriously 
the request -- from many people here -- to include the full name for 
most of the acronyms he uses.

My recent request, which he has dismissed, is basically the same request 
that Jameson has made.  Specifically, Michael writes what he claims is a 
summary of what someone else has said, but his version is intentionally 
twisted.  And then he criticizes that misinterpreted "opinion."

The reason for my concern is that I -- and others -- have made efforts 
to invite to this forum anyone who is interested in learning more about 
election methods, and Michael's frequent criticisms make it unlikely 
that people following this forum will feel comfortable asking questions. 
They are likely to assume, probably correctly, that Michael will 
criticize them if they express any preferences or opinions that do not 
match Michael's preferences and opinions.

Another concern is that some people following this forum will believe 
all (or most) of what Michael says simply because currently he is so 
prolific, and because he sounds like he understands election methods.

This problem has already manifested itself. Someone on Wikipedia 
requested that the Favorite Betrayal Criterion (FBC) -- that Michael 
speaks of so lovingly -- should be moved from the last column to the 
first column of the "comparison table" in the "Voting system" article -- 
because of its importance. Apparently the person has been believing what 
Michael has been writing here and/or at Democracy Chronicles. The person 
was surprised to learn that very few academic articles refer to the FBC.

Of course Michael is likely to misinterpret this statement to mean that 
I do not appreciate the importance of FBC. Instead, my actual opinion is 
that I do not regard importance as a "yes" or "no" category. Rather, 
importance is a continuous dimension because something can have 
importance only to the extent that other things have less importance. 
Specifically, I would rank FBC in the lower half of the 
"important-for-elections" scale, but that is different than saying it 
has no importance.

I realize that in spite of my multiple attempts (both here and at 
Democracy Chronicles), Michael continues to dismiss most of what I say 
to him. That is why my latest comment is directed to other people here.

It is not directed to Michael O. because he dismisses feedback.

My goal is to make it clear -- to others here -- that Michael does not 
speak for all of us. And that his criticisms do not hold lots of 
credibility with other participants here.

My hope is that this recognition will help the rest of us to conduct a 
healthy dialogue here on this forum, in spite of Michael's lack of forum 
etiquette.

Rather than filter out all of his messages, I briefly look at some of 
them.  And, like most others here, I rarely respond to him.

Now, when I do respond, I address the message to other participants, not 
to the person who dismisses what I write.

Richard Fobes