GitHub: Block the Bullies • Hacker News Board

Re: GitHub: Block the Bullies

#41

Post by kneath » Wed, Jun 01, 2011, 5:16 AM UTC

ktsmith wrote: post #39

kneath wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's interesting to me that so many people want confirmations. You can remove yourself from any repository you wish at https://github.com/account/repositories (yes, I know — this is a confusing place. It's something I'd like to improve). But the idea is that "Confirm? Reject." is the same number of steps/interactions as "Added. Reject." Confirmations wouldn't make the experience any better for someone being annoyingl…

I think the number of steps isn't really that important. For me I care more about permission being explicit and not implicit. I prefer systems where other users have to get my permission to interact with me rather than automatically having permission to do so. It matters more on systems other than github but I think there's still an avenue for abuse with the current set up. It should be fairly trivial to script accou…

You'd just have a dashboard full of invites instead of a dashboard full of add notices. I have a feeling people just recoil to confirmation systems because it's comfortable.

But remember that Undo > Confirmation. Always.

Re: GitHub: Block the Bullies

#42

Post by defroost » Wed, Jun 01, 2011, 5:24 AM UTC

jz wrote: post #26

Background: http://sheddingbikes.com/posts/1306816425.html In all fairness, the guy was being a dick (no pun intended) to Zed. However, Zed should have kept the insults to the troll and left Github, Powerset, Engine Yard, and the Ruby community out.

I guess he felt that others besides the troll were having a laugh at his expense, (i.e., the HN Tips guys comments, other penis-oriented repos connected to employees of aforementioned companies) and were, if only indirectly, in on the joke.

Re: GitHub: Block the Bullies

#43

Post by senthilnayagam » Wed, Jun 01, 2011, 5:27 AM UTC

convenience and privacy are the issues, github has tried to do a balancing act.

Re: GitHub: Block the Bullies

#44

Post by jmaygarden » Wed, Jun 01, 2011, 5:40 AM UTC

mojombo wrote: post #27

kstenerud wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would disagree. If I happened to be in the job market, and my potential employer were to look at my github profile (yes, we do look at your github profile) and find "bigdicksucker" as one of the repos I'm apparently a "contributor" on, well, that wouldn't look too good, would it?

As it stands, when you are added as a collaborator to a project it shows up in exactly one place — your private, logged in dashboard. It doesn't show up publicly anywhere. You must make a contribution to a project before you show up in any kind of public fashion.

I got "dong markup" in my RSS reader from pull requests to zedshaw/mongrel2 today. So, the trolling was very much in public view.

Re: GitHub: Block the Bullies

#45

Post by cipherpunk » Wed, Jun 01, 2011, 5:43 AM UTC

jonursenbach wrote: post #30

endlessvoid94 wrote: post #5

I think this was a good response to an attention whore. EDIT: I wasn't trolling. Not even a single response?

I never understood why people absolutely loathe Zed Shaw.

Try this on for size: http://harmful.cat-v.org/software/ruby/rails/is-a-ghetto

Re: GitHub: Block the Bullies

#46

Post by rcthompson » Wed, Jun 01, 2011, 5:51 AM UTC

mojombo wrote: post #27

kstenerud wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would disagree. If I happened to be in the job market, and my potential employer were to look at my github profile (yes, we do look at your github profile) and find "bigdicksucker" as one of the repos I'm apparently a "contributor" on, well, that wouldn't look too good, would it?

As it stands, when you are added as a collaborator to a project it shows up in exactly one place — your private, logged in dashboard. It doesn't show up publicly anywhere. You must make a contribution to a project before you show up in any kind of public fashion.

Wouldn't it be possible for the troll to temporarily set his username to the same as yours in his git config, make a few commits, and then push them, thereby making it look like you had made a contribution to the project? Would this make your "membership" in the project appear publicly?

Or does Github track pushes by the pusher's Github username?

Re: GitHub: Block the Bullies

#47

Post by bad_user » Wed, Jun 01, 2011, 5:57 AM UTC

mycroftiv wrote: post #3

This is a very good feature, but I am also afraid it will make Zed Shaw and others think that his attempt to out-troll the trolls and multiply internet drama was a force for positive change. "If you throw a big enough temper tantrum and incite a large enough shitstorm, developers will address your concerns" is an unfortunate precedent. The fact that controversy and negativity attracts eyeballs and can trigger improve…

At least he's a creative dick.

Re: GitHub: Block the Bullies

#48

Post by zedshaw » Wed, Jun 01, 2011, 5:57 AM UTC

mycroftiv wrote: post #3

This is a very good feature, but I am also afraid it will make Zed Shaw and others think that his attempt to out-troll the trolls and multiply internet drama was a force for positive change. "If you throw a big enough temper tantrum and incite a large enough shitstorm, developers will address your concerns" is an unfortunate precedent. The fact that controversy and negativity attracts eyeballs and can trigger improve…

I love how you're this paragon of stoic virtue, and I'm a drama queen, yet, here you are talking about it even more instead of ignoring it and going back to whatever it was you were doing.

Re: GitHub: Block the Bullies

#49

Post by zedshaw » Wed, Jun 01, 2011, 5:59 AM UTC

endlessvoid94 wrote: post #32

compay wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sometimes you have to look at what somebody says, and not how they say it. I personally wouldn't have approached the trolls the way Zed did, but he was right that this was broken and needed to be fixed. Github did a great job - as far as I can tell they handled things professionally and cranked out a fix in just a few days. Everybody wins (except the trolls).

I do not agree. You can't simply ignore HOW somebody says something. How you say something almost more important than what you say. If Zed hadn't written a blog post detailing how he fucked everything up (in all his greatness, apparently) it wouldn't have gotten such exposure and would likely have died out. He had to make his point with a hammer or it wouldn't have mattered. And it's unfortunate that it took a hammer…

> If Zed hadn't written a blog post detailing how he fucked everything up (in all his greatness, apparently) it wouldn't have gotten such exposure and would likely have died out.

Can you explain where in my blog post I claim I'm great? I think all I did was explain what was happening and how this was someone who bothered me in the past and followed me to github, and then there was nothing I could do about it.

Re: GitHub: Block the Bullies

#50

Post by fhars » Wed, Jun 01, 2011, 5:59 AM UTC

willvarfar wrote: post #38

The profile page needs tidy up - if only it split the projects into tbose you collaborate on,and those you are invited to collaborate on. Its just wording, but it makes it clear that being added to a repo you haven't contributed to will not be shown publicly.

There is somethig to that idea: you are only invited to participate in a project until you accept the invitation by actually commiting to the project. Eveyone is happy: Nobody needs to change the code (except for resorting the display of the projects on the private dashboard into two groups) and participation requires an explicit confirmation. Win-win :-).