A question about Fremont Citizens Network

I have twice been a member of this group and have enjoyed reading the posts. Thanks to all of you for your thoughtful and passionate comments. I have learned a lot from these discussions and look forward to more.

I also understand that there are several points of view with regard to the A's stadium issue and that this issue seems to be the dominant discussion on this board.

My only comment, as a person somewhere in between the two opposing viewpoints, is that I have to disagree, in very strong terms, with the new policy of an arbitrary "filtering out" of certain people's opinions. If they are offensive or threatening, or are spam or have advertising in them I can see this. But to have legitimate dissenting opinions filtered out of the front page of the site is a bad move IMHO. I don't know that I would call it censorship, but I do not know what else to call it. Real debate is where opinions are made and swayed, not in presenting a single viewpoint when we all know there are many.

I want to reiterate again that I have enjoyed seeing both points of view. And if you want to convince me of your position, as a longtime Fremont resident and voter, I put much more credence in a free flow of information that is not filtered at all than I do in a flow of information that discourages other viewpoints. Speaking for myself, I'd rather see all the activity displayed in the main page so I can choose what to read and therefore what to accept as fact. I learned far more from the interaction between the two sides than I have from only hearing one side of the issue. I like the title and tagline at the top of the pages, so I'm asking that you walk the walk as well as talking the talk.

I studied Politcal Science in college, so I have strong opinions about the free exchange of ideas and I hope we can get back to that concept here. History has shown that without interacive discussions between the two sides, the truth is usually never uncovered.

I know the founder of this page is fond of Quoting Margaret Mead, so here is one of her quotes you may have missed:

"If we are to achieve a richer culture, rich in contrasting values, we must recognize the whole gamut of human potentialities, and so weave a less arbitrary social fabric, one in which each diverse human gift will find a fitting place."

So I humbly ask that this board go back to the way it was, presenting all opinions equally on all pages and also for the sides to interact rather than ignore rational points and questions. You may be surprised at what this simple concept can do to further your cause and equally surprised at how your cause can be undermined by not doing it.

People remember. And nothing etches into the mind more deeply than the perception of being censored or ignored or treated unfairly. Being disagreed with however, is part of how rational people interact and you may find that you have a better chance to agree and work together on other subjects when this A's issue has been settled if you allow equal access. Conversly, you may find that you breed a permanent opponent to anything you try to do if you do not give your current opponent the same opportunities as you do for those who agree with you.

Sincerely,

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Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by bbox231 on February 12, 2010 at 12:44pm

Jim -

I agree with your plea for "fairness".

What is there "fair" about a characterization of FCN as a "mob" by our mayor ?
What is "fair" about the claims of economic benefit by our City Council which so universally fly in the face of independant and peer-reviewed economic analysis ?
What is "fair" about the coverage of this matter by local media ?

My understanding of the FCN "home page" filtering issue is simpy that the topics shown on the home page are selected by the administrator - attempts were made to reclassify the banners for each section of the home page to make clear this selection.

In response, I have personally found it useful to simply ignore what I see on the "home" page, click on the "discussion forum" link and then use the SORT BY function to sort on "LATEST ACTIVITY" . . . .

In so doing, I quickly get to ALL of the most recent discussions irrespective of whether or not the site admin elected to promote them on the home page. I have never identified situations where messages were "censored" as you characterize - - - - - the content displayed on the home page is selected. ALL postings appear in the message forums irrespective of their relative position for or against any given topic.

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Permalink Reply by Dexter on February 12, 2010 at 12:57pm

Jim,

Since you're a brand new member with only a single post, I am suspicious of your post in light of what I'm about to say. However for the moment I'll take it and you at face value.

I'll also mention that I am not in any way involved in the administration of this board so I have no control over how it's set up or moderated. And that I *only* post under my own single screen name.

In the case of the "filtering out," I have not seen any suppression of postings in the "discussion forum" area. What I have seen is limitations, active or passive, placed on some postings regarding the ability of some posts/posters to show up in the "Activities" area on the first page of the site. And I have no problem with that if that is the case based on the *behavior*--not opinions--of specific posters.

The poster(s) that I believe have had limitation placed on them have *earned* that *privilege* reduction. He/she/they post under multiple screen names for the purpose of dominating conversations under the mistaken delusion that others on this board, probably including the admins, aren't aware of that fact. Apparently "they" (he) think(s) that if Larry, Curly & Moe all say the same things and "agree" with each other then others on this board will believe that "their" opinions carry more weight.

The poster(s) are abusive and belittling, both toward FCN as an entity and individual members despite the fact that FCN is not a single organization but rather a loose grouping of people with a shared interest in improving Fremont, *regardless* of whether or not they agree on any one subject. Name calling --- "NIMBY," "greedy" etc. is common in their posts.

The poster(s) attempt to dominate conversations, frequently responding to each and every conversation with his/their "rant of the day" even if it's not relevant to the conversation topic. In addition to trying to effectively "shout down" posters with other opinions, the motivation seems to be the narcissistic need and demand to have *his* posts appear and dominate this blog, *especially* the front page. He/they confuses the "right to free speech" with "everybody else has to listen to what I say."

Michael = Even Howards = Alex Singh = Matthew Di Paola, Jim Kelly? and "others" have also shared in your "why are posts not all on the front page" "free speech!" "censorship!" demands, alternating between "this is unfair!" tirades and "I'll be polite and ask that everybody is treated equally" 'reasonable' requests. But as I've said, those (that...) person(s) aren't/isn't treating everybody on this board fairly & equally given the multiple screen names and abusive behavior, so I have no problem with treating them--him--unequally as well.

*If* I were the admin of this board and had any say on policy (which I don't), I would have no problem modifying the written policy of this board to ban posters who post under multiple screen names. I'd also place limitations on #-of-posts-per-period (hour, day) to prevent a small minority (of one?) from dominating conversation and any "Latest Activity" area. I'd like to see a feature added so that each reader could individually block posts by specific posters (a feature common on USENET to block the "trolls")--again, "free speech" does not mean "freedom to make everybody else listen to every rant." And above all, I would also require blocked or banned posters who have shown this inability to "play nice with others" to *earn* their way back into full participation, ignoring any "rants" *or* "polite, rational demands" that "censorship" be removed. In the meantime they can go hurl their insults elsewhere.

But as I said, that's just me and I'm not in charge of anything here...

Dex

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Permalink Reply by FCN Admin on February 12, 2010 at 2:01pm

Jim,

Thank you for being an FCN member and your great comments. We make it very clear: FCN will not censor member's post.

Many false accusation from certain members are not true. FCN Admin didn't delete member's post. Although the forum has a moderate feature, we seldom use it unless it's inapproprioate (as state in our Term of Service: You must follow proper etiquette of this community. No profanity, no personal attacks on any other member, no posting of offensive and pornographic material.). We could have deleted those false accusation comments, but we still choose to keep them without censorship.

There are some misunderstanding of the front page "Activity". We only add the "Activity" feature recently. We try to present as much useful information as possible in the front page. FCN forum has many discussions about other topics recently, such as School, Education, Crime, Jobs, Redevelopment, Election, etc. But it seems certain people are only interested in stadium discussion. When there are too many comments from one person or one topic, we will have to make certain adjustment, so many other discussions have a chance to appear on the front page. We don't want to see certain discussions hog half of the front page. In the past two weeks, we remove more "no stadium" activities than "pro stadium" activities (and other activities like event, video, featured etc.). But their comments are still viewable in the discussion.

I'm not sure what you mean by "go back to the way it was". We didn't have "Activity" module before and the front page was all "no stadium" articles. With the new feature, the front page will be able to show all different views.

Regards,

- FCN Admin

PS. What do you mean by "I have twice been a member of this group"? Can you elaborate a little bit?

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Permalink Reply by Jim Kelly on February 12, 2010 at 2:11pm

I'm sorry to have bothered you all. I'll go back to reading instead of posting.

I joined twice because I first joined a year or so ago but lost my login and had to rejoin a couple weeks ago because I wanted to post something.

FCN Admin said:

Jim,

Thank you for being an FCN member and your great comments. We make it very clear: FCN will not censor member's post.

Many false accusation from certain members are not true. FCN Admin didn't delete member's post. Although the forum has a moderate feature, we seldom use it unless it's inapproprioate (as state in our Term of Service: You must follow proper etiquette of this community. No profanity, no personal attacks on any other member, no posting of offensive and pornographic material.). We could have deleted those false accusation comments, but we still choose to keep them without censorship.

There are some misunderstanding of the front page "Activity". We only add the "Activity" feature recently. We try to present as much useful information as possible in the front page. FCN forum has many discussions about other topics recently, such as School, Education, Crime, Jobs, Redevelopment, Election, etc. But it seems certain people are only interested in stadium discussion. When there are too many comments from one person or one topic, we will have to make certain adjustment, so many other discussions have a chance to appear on the front page. We don't want to see certain discussions hog half of the front page. In the past two weeks, we remove more "no stadium" activities than "pro stadium" activities (and other activities like event, video, featured etc.). But their comments are still viewable in the discussion.

I'm not sure what you mean by "go back to the way it was". We didn't have "Activity" module before and the front page was all "no stadium" articles. With the new feature, the front page will be able to show all different views.

Regards,

- FCN Admin

PS. What do you mean by "I have twice been a member of this group"? Can you elaborate a little bit?

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Permalink Reply by Harry on February 12, 2010 at 2:13pm

I am a regular reader of this site. I think the web master has the duty to make sure the page is readable and not overly dominated by one person or reincarnated "another person". I do think Michael's words and comments have often been abusive and belittling toward other posters. He meant to provoke and annoy rather than anything else. He readily uses words to brand the whole FCN group which is unfair to the 1000 members. Has he seen or talked with most of these members ? As some posters said, FCN Admin should have done something to this man and I agree, but he is still allowed to post.
Being able to post here should be seen as a privilege and such privilege should not be abused.

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Permalink Reply by NoAsWS on February 12, 2010 at 2:43pm

"I joined twice because I first joined a year or so ago but lost my login and had to rejoin a couple weeks ago because I wanted to post something."

In the sign-in window, you have a choice to retrieve your password using email address, unless you forget your email address?

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Permalink Reply by Dexter on February 12, 2010 at 3:17pm

That's a shame. If you're a legitimate poster & FCN member, and have polite discussion topics and arguments for or against issues regarding Fremont, we'd love to have you participate.

Jim Kelly said:

I'm sorry to have bothered you all. I'll go back to reading instead of posting.

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Permalink Reply by Jim Kelly on February 12, 2010 at 4:37pm

I changed jobs and could not get my login info. Why does it matter?

When I finally decided to post, this is not what I expected, I'm so sorry.

I give. I'm done. I won't post anymore. I'm sorry.

NoAsWS said:

"I joined twice because I first joined a year or so ago but lost my login and had to rejoin a couple weeks ago because I wanted to post something."

In the sign-in window, you have a choice to retrieve your password using email address, unless you forget your email address?

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Permalink Reply by Dexter on February 12, 2010 at 5:07pm

Well, "poor little me" only goes so far. You walk in wagging your finger at people and sounding like any number of abusive posters *after* they've been "limited," demanding, begging or trying to "reason" their way back into the limelight. Expect what you want, but nobody is going to be begging you to participate.

Jim Kelly said:

I changed jobs and could not get my login info. Why does it matter?

When I finally decided to post, this is not what I expected, I'm so sorry.

I give. I'm done. I won't post anymore. I'm sorry.

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Permalink Reply by fremonter on February 12, 2010 at 5:59pm

Wow, Jim, you certainly opened quite a discussion, didn't you?

First, welcome to the site (again). I hope that all the posts in response to your discussion don't somehow put you off posting, but reading is good too. Wouldn't it be a shame to miss all of the info that you can really only find here?

At least you gave lots of people an opportunity to let FCN Admin know what they like and don't like about how the front page is managed. I'm sure this information will be applied appropriately in future decisions about how to make the site as useful as possible to the greatest number of people possible. I'm thinking that, at times when there's lots of local news and site traffic goes way up, it must be hard to manage all the posts. Of course, everybody likes to see their own posts displayed prominently.

I learned something new; I had no idea that on some sites it was possible for each reader to individually block posts by specific posters. Now that's an idea I could really use if it were available here.

Anyway, don't go away mad. I'm not begging here, but I don't think that, as a group, we're actually all that bad.

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Permalink Reply by RonK on February 13, 2010 at 9:54pm

Dexter
FYI
According to my search on people search
The following people do not live in Fremont:
Even Howards = Alex Singh = Jim Kelly

http://www.ussearch.com/consumer/preview/peoplesearch.do?&searc...

It is not required to you use your real name on your posts
So, these names could be aliases

Just more information that points toward one person trying to dominate
the posts on this WEB site

Dexter said:

Jim,

Since you're a brand new member with only a single post, I am suspicious of your post in light of what I'm about to say. However for the moment I'll take it and you at face value.

I'll also mention that I am not in any way involved in the administration of this board so I have no control over how it's set up or moderated. And that I *only* post under my own single screen name.

In the case of the "filtering out," I have not seen any suppression of postings in the "discussion forum" area. What I have seen is limitations, active or passive, placed on some postings regarding the ability of some posts/posters to show up in the "Activities" area on the first page of the site. And I have no problem with that if that is the case based on the *behavior*--not opinions--of specific posters.

The poster(s) that I believe have had limitation placed on them have *earned* that *privilege* reduction. He/she/they post under multiple screen names for the purpose of dominating conversations under the mistaken delusion that others on this board, probably including the admins, aren't aware of that fact. Apparently "they" (he) think(s) that if Larry, Curly & Moe all say the same things and "agree" with each other then others on this board will believe that "their" opinions carry more weight.

The poster(s) are abusive and belittling, both toward FCN as an entity and individual members despite the fact that FCN is not a single organization but rather a loose grouping of people with a shared interest in improving Fremont, *regardless* of whether or not they agree on any one subject. Name calling --- "NIMBY," "greedy" etc. is common in their posts.

The poster(s) attempt to dominate conversations, frequently responding to each and every conversation with his/their "rant of the day" even if it's not relevant to the conversation topic. In addition to trying to effectively "shout down" posters with other opinions, the motivation seems to be the narcissistic need and demand to have *his* posts appear and dominate this blog, *especially* the front page. He/they confuses the "right to free speech" with "everybody else has to listen to what I say."

Michael = Even Howards = Alex Singh = Matthew Di Paola, Jim Kelly? and "others" have also shared in your "why are posts not all on the front page" "free speech!" "censorship!" demands, alternating between "this is unfair!" tirades and "I'll be polite and ask that everybody is treated equally" 'reasonable' requests. But as I've said, those (that...) person(s) aren't/isn't treating everybody on this board fairly & equally given the multiple screen names and abusive behavior, so I have no problem with treating them--him--unequally as well.

*If* I were the admin of this board and had any say on policy (which I don't), I would have no problem modifying the written policy of this board to ban posters who post under multiple screen names. I'd also place limitations on #-of-posts-per-period (hour, day) to prevent a small minority (of one?) from dominating conversation and any "Latest Activity" area. I'd like to see a feature added so that each reader could individually block posts by specific posters (a feature common on USENET to block the "trolls")--again, "free speech" does not mean "freedom to make everybody else listen to every rant." And above all, I would also require blocked or banned posters who have shown this inability to "play nice with others" to *earn* their way back into full participation, ignoring any "rants" *or* "polite, rational demands" that "censorship" be removed. In the meantime they can go hurl their insults elsewhere.

But as I said, that's just me and I'm not in charge of anything here...

Dex

▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Dexter on February 14, 2010 at 8:08am

I don't think I'd worry too much about screen names (Jim vs. James -- a google search even shows a couple in Fremont, Even vs. Evan, totally made up, etc.). Screen names are allowed, and I choose to use one to minimize the chances of somebody trying to "settle" a difference of opinion by throwing a rock through my window or harassing my family.

I think we need to leave it up to the FCN Admin to deal with multiple aliases and out-of-Fremont posters. When you sign up here they do ask for an address but I doubt there's any checking or reasonable way to prevent someone from using *any* Fremont address. For the most part I don't think it's been a problem except for a tiny minority. I guess FCN could demand proof (e.g. mail FCN a PGE bill with name<=>address, like schools require for registration) but the intent is to encourage not discourage sign-ups for wide & active participation.