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I would like to make a few comments about the increasing discordance that has appeared on the RWO website of during this year. I am not a moderator, just another poster like yourself, and one that has often tested the boundaries of permissibility in the RWO community.
We all need to recognize that in any community there are limits to acceptable behaviour, whether in real life or virtual. The pleasure of participating in any community is diminished if we rely on the police (moderators) to punish those who step out of line. We need understand when boundaries are crossed and know when to step back from the brink. RWO will be a much more pleasant experience if we find the means of self-regulating.
There is a famous essay on common usage communities called Tragedy of the Commons (Garrett Hardin, 1968), which has often been referenced in debate on ecology, but applies to all commons (in the sense how the word is used in English law). What we learn from this is that it only takes one participant to exploit the commons for the whole system to convert from a cooperative one to one destroyed by over-exploitation. It explicates why so many communities become acrimonious over time. That?s what makes it a tragedy.
The community is reliant on every single member to comprehend the difference between of what is humourous and what is offensive, what is topical and what is pushing one?s own agenda, because it only takes one to damage the quality of the experience. We face these challenges in our everyday lives and hopefully all in the RWO community have managed to negotiate their way through life knowing how far to go before stepping across the line. We only need to apply the same criteria to RWO.
It seems like we all want to keep the community as open as possible. There are few formal rules and regulations. The community is a dynamic entity which will navigate its way through both clear and murky waters. All natural systems will evolve toward an equilibrium point. Open systems, like RWO, have an ever changing dynamic as members come and go and vary participation rate. How we evolve is up to you, and up to me.
Family squabbles are useful in testing the boundaries of the community. We should use them to make adjustments to the way we interact in the community. The only advice I can offer is that if you hit a wall, bounce off; if you hit it twice, then back off.
We all need to recognize that in any community there are limits to acceptable behaviour, whether in real life or virtual. The pleasure of participating in any community is diminished if we rely on the police (moderators) to punish those who step out of line. We need understand when boundaries are crossed and know when to step back from the brink. RWO will be a much more pleasant experience if we find the means of self-regulating.
There is a famous essay on common usage communities called Tragedy of the Commons (Garrett Hardin, 1968), which has often been referenced in debate on ecology, but applies to all commons (in the sense how the word is used in English law). What we learn from this is that it only takes one participant to exploit the commons for the whole system to convert from a cooperative one to one destroyed by over-exploitation. It explicates why so many communities become acrimonious over time. That?s what makes it a tragedy.
The community is reliant on every single member to comprehend the difference between of what is humourous and what is offensive, what is topical and what is pushing one?s own agenda, because it only takes one to damage the quality of the experience. We face these challenges in our everyday lives and hopefully all in the RWO community have managed to negotiate their way through life knowing how far to go before stepping across the line. We only need to apply the same criteria to RWO.
It seems like we all want to keep the community as open as possible. There are few formal rules and regulations. The community is a dynamic entity which will navigate its way through both clear and murky waters. All natural systems will evolve toward an equilibrium point. Open systems, like RWO, have an ever changing dynamic as members come and go and vary participation rate. How we evolve is up to you, and up to me.
Family squabbles are useful in testing the boundaries of the community. We should use them to make adjustments to the way we interact in the community. The only advice I can offer is that if you hit a wall, bounce off; if you hit it twice, then back off.
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