Thank you, Rick. I second what you've said here.

Thanks Rick, that was well written and I, like Rob, also agree.

There are those whose use of OlyBlog conflicts with the mission to provide an inclusive, participatory, safe, and common area.

It's not complicated. Further more, I believe that it is the intent of this blog to portray a perspective that is altogether lacking in the corporate mainstream media. It should be the intention OlyBlog, in my opinion, to favor progressive content (e.g. questioning whether or not economic growth is equivalent to success), over patriarchal and status quo (e.g. "we need guns to protect ourselves").

But more importantly, I fear that an alliance might form that would elect docents who would do what certain people have been whining about all along: discipline people based on their political orientation, not based on their adherence to the social contract. If some of the ruder, more antagonistic posters were docents, Olyblog could soon deteriorate into a clone of the Olympian online comments forum. And this town has already got one too many of those!

You can read most of these comments and substitute "OlyBlog" for "Iraq."

I agree with everything said, though. The people who should - and need to be - in charge are. I don't see any reason to shift or detract from that power.

...but I try to read almost every blog and comment I see, here.

Mostly, I'm impressed that all of us get along as well as we do.

If I had any suggestion, it would be to tell you that you should not give positive re-enforcement to behaviors

which you are trying to change. This means ignoring these unwanted behaviors or (if you must respond) asserting an example

of a desired behavior, as a counterweight.

Secondly, I'd suggest that docents should strive to model the desired communication style, etc on OlyBlog.

Finally, try to be funny...a lot.

If the issue was a simple as "liberal versus conservative", I doubt there would be nearly as much grousing.  The riff on Olyblog is deeper than liberal versus conservative.

I'm a liberal in some ways, yet I don't embrace Enpen's sense of grafitti art and its placement.  I'm a conservative in other ways, but I find S6's need to openly carry a firearm to be confrontational.  My liberal side won't embrace anarchism and my conservative side knows that the bulldozer sign routine is pure horseshit.

I see the anarchy in Merwyn's challenge of authority, under the cloak of conservatism, I see the conservatism in Rob's desire to control the content of Olyblog.  I could go on, but I think I've made my point.

Rick and I have had a major disagreement in the past, and yet, here I am.  No one forces me to participate on Olyblog.  No one forces me to read Olyblog.  I had to come to the conclusion that SOMEONE accepts responsibility for Olyblog and its content and docents aside, ultimately it's Rick.  As a publisher, he is the most liberal I've run into in a lifetime of media.  By liberal, I mean he puts up with more crap than most.  The highly claimed "liberal" Olympian denied me posting rights for far less transgressions than I've made on Olyblog. Rick answers and discusses with his detractors.  That's more than I can say for the folks on the hill.

Whether you like my conclusion or not, here it goes.  If it were me, I'd shut the damned thing down and let the masses figure out what to do on their own.  Trust me when I tell you that is not my liberal side talking.

I sort of said this on the docent list, but I'll say it here.

I agree with most of what Rick said above, disagree specifically with Robert, but I agree with his intentions and know where he's coming from.

That said, if Olyblog is a commons, then we're screwed. I know in a way that Olyblog is the only game in town right now in terms of big blogs, but there is a lot out there folks. Olyblog is awesome, don't get me wrong, but if in two years this is the only big blog in town, it will likely die under the weight of its own bigness.

If we failed to inspire anyone else to set up their own blog and try to get people over there, then we've really failed.

The blog commons in Olympia simply needs to get bigger than Olyblog. 

Chad has mentioned not understanding why some of the people currently in charge of OlyBlog seem to have a hard time putting control of the blog up to elections, so here's a bit from where I come from: I decided to invest my time in OlyBlog because I wanted to get involved in my community, I don't have many "normal" hours with which to volunteer, I like the open ended format of the idea (it is what we bring to it) and I was okay with how it was being run. The project I have spent the most time on here (The Wall) takes me between 30-90 minutes to code per entry. This does not factor in the time it takes for me to go take, manipulate, upload and organize the pictures as a part of this process. I am protective of both the time I have invested in this project and in the shell that houses it and I have a hard time seeing how that feeling is not reasonable.

"In principle, I am an anarchist. Kurt Vonnegut once said he was an agnostic who respects Jesus Christ. I am an anarchist who loves democracy." - Kenzaburo Oe

Rick would be free to ignore the results.