Future of the Forum

[jsfisher]

It wouldn't be - pgimeno states it very well but you are also correct. The confusion is that we've been using a vaguely defined term "transfer" as a coverall for the entire process.

You are correct the JREF does not have the right (via the registration agreement) to transfer the licence they own to any new entity.

What the JREF can do is transfer the copyright that they own which is the forum itself, that will mean that the new entity can use as much or little of the forum as it wants - for example the structure, how it works and the look and feel.

That as you rightly say does not not include the content of members' posts. So what would happen is that the JREF would "republish" via its licence all the content here onto the new entity's forum. The actual licence (that the JREF owns) to use the members' content would not be transferred. (Consider the new forum as the JREF deciding to publish a book of all the posts from the forum.)

As regards to the personal information i.e. name, country and state if in the USA that will only be moved onto the new forum via a member agreeing to that happening. This will also depend on what "private" information if any the new entity will want for a membership, this is not settled yet, which means there may be no need to transfer anything.

[Spoiler tags added for brevity.]

This is my understanding, too. Even if the JREF were to cease to be, the republication of the current forums' posts could continue in the new. One interesting thought, though, is what happens if/when the forum is later transferred yet again?

 

[Chaos]

I can think of two separate things that get you immediately banned without discussion or warning.

- Advocating suicide
- Threatening legal action

Viruses and kiddie porn, too. But, come to think of it, we haven´t really had an example of either in quite a while - before your time, I think.

 

[Minoosh]

I notice the speed issues resolved recently and as for content - the strength I see on the forum is that it provides a way to discuss current events, etc. without undue fear of personal attacks. That of course is upheld by moderators. Every moderator action I've seen has been defensible, whether I agreed with the action or not. I assume you are volunteers. Thank you.

 

[zooterkin]

I can think of two separate things that get you immediately banned without discussion or warning.

- Advocating suicide

That is no longer the case, and hasn't been for some time. It was once an automatic ban, but it isn't any more. Which isn't to say you couldn't get banned for; it would depend what you said, but certain ways of advocating suicide could get you moderated for rule 3 (or possibly rule 2).

 

[Olowkow]

We can pull out anecdotal evidence all we want, because I've seen people turn their backs and never come back. "Never" is a long time, but when was the last time anyone saw a post by:

The Atheist
Lothian
CF Larsen
Marquis de Carabas
Slingblade
Schrodinger's Cat
FLS (Linda)
Central Scrutinizer (oh wait... he's just on ignore)

None of those are banned. They are self-exiled. To the best of my knowledge each of them had an issue with either management or treatment by other posters(and thus management).

I agree with Lionking and I posted the same commentary already. Changing the rules is something that can be tackled separately later. At present, by the very fact that we're still here, it's fairly obvious that we live within the MA and do not find it so repulsive that we've stormed off. Leave it be for a while. There are much larger issues that need addressing.

I'd add Complexity and Randfan. I miss them both.

 

[a_unique_person]

Not by icerat nor me. Everything we know is out in the open. Obviously can't speak about the JREF.

The focus at the moment is

1) getting the forum onto better hardware to stabilize the current forum before it goes tits-up.
2) getting setup for a formal handover, this is still very nebulous as it depends on what the JREF decides at the end of the extended period they have for consultation.

The hardware looks quite capable. Is it because of spam, bots and other Web nasties? A disk raid might be a good idea though.

 

[a_unique_person]

Despite the contradictory statement regarding the JREF being the copyright holder of the forum, the registration agreement does not grant the JREF the right to transfer any content to a third party, nor does it grant the JREF the right to transfer personal, private information to a third party. In the privacy statement it is clearly stated that the JREF will not transfer private information without consent.

I can't consent to the transfer of my personal, private information. I'll be interested in seeing how that particular issue is expected to be resolved.

I don't care about the posts--when I post, that grants implied consent for use on the forum. It's just how it works.

Personal information can be completely cleared in a few minutes with a simple sql command.

 

[LashL]

That has been disputed. A non-exclusive licence does not provide the JREF with the authority to sell or giive any post content to a third party. That is not republishing it is transferring.

I am not going to argue this as I am not a legal expert. It may not be true. I believe (at this stage) that it is true. Hence there would be legal risk to JREF passing on any forum history at all. And no--they may not be scared of legal risks. But that does not mean they would incur them for absolutely no benefit to themselves.

Hopefully I am completely wrong. We shall see soon enough.

Any legal issues about the JREF republishing the entirety of the content of the forum (that is, the posts) on a 'new' forum (or elsewhere, for that matter) are quite non-existent to trivial to deal with, as there is essentially no legal bar to doing so, and no legal risk to the JREF at all.

Forum posts are not "personal information collected by the JREF" and - as has been stated several times already - there are discussions ongoing about how to deal with the only actual "personal information" collected by the JREF (name, email address, state if in the U.S.), which is subject to the privacy policy. It may be some kind of opt-in or opt-out process; none of us knows at present.

But as for reproducing the entirety of the forum posts elsewhere, there is no real legal issue there at all.

 

[arthwollipot]

I'm all for second chances myself, too. But I think many of the banned had their second chances already.

The problem is that everyone (outside of just massively out there cases like threats of violence or such, the sort of which don't really seem to be the point of contention) banned on this board were already given second chances. And third chances. And twelveth chance.

Acknowledged.

Viruses and kiddie porn, too. But, come to think of it, we haven´t really had an example of either in quite a while - before your time, I think.

I recall one instance where someone attempted to convince people to post their passwords, which also resulted in an instaban. That also is one of the rare exceptions.

 

[pgimeno]

That has been disputed. A non-exclusive licence does not provide the JREF with the authority to sell or giive any post content to a third party. That is not republishing it is transferring.

I am not going to argue this as I am not a legal expert. It may not be true. I believe (at this stage) that it is true. Hence there would be legal risk to JREF passing on any forum history at all. And no--they may not be scared of legal risks. But that does not mean they would incur them for absolutely no benefit to themselves.

Hopefully I am completely wrong. We shall see soon enough.

Apart from what Darat said (with the disclaimer that I'm no lawyer either), the way I see this is that if you give someone a license to republish, when said someone publishes it through a publisher, you can't sue the publisher for reproducing your work without your permission.

In this case, the new forum would be the publisher, and the JREF is publishing your messages in that new forum using their (JREF's) license. The new forum just holds a copy necessary for displaying the posts, but it's JREF who's republishing them.

I may well be wrong. I'm sure they'll sort it out though.

ETA: Oops, ninja'd by LashL.

 

[smartcooky]

Any legal issues about the JREF republishing the entirety of the content of the forum (that is, the posts) on a 'new' forum (or elsewhere, for that matter) are quite non-existent to trivial to deal with, as there is essentially no legal bar to doing so, and no legal risk to the JREF at all.

Forum posts are not "personal information collected by the JREF" and - as has been stated several times already - there are discussions ongoing about how to deal with the only actual "personal information" collected by the JREF (name, email address, state if in the U.S.), which is subject to the privacy policy. It may be some kind of opt-in or opt-out process; none of us knows at present.

But as for reproducing the entirety of the forum posts elsewhere, there is no real legal issue there at all.

Nor is there, I believe, any liability risked by JREF for anything said by a poster on the forum, because...

 

[Foolmewunz]

It wouldn't be - pgimeno states it very well but you are also correct. The confusion is that we've been using a vaguely defined term "transfer" as a coverall for the entire process.

You are correct the JREF does not have the right (via the registration agreement) to transfer the licence they own to any new entity.

What the JREF can do is transfer the copyright that they own which is the forum itself, that will mean that the new entity can use as much or little of the forum as it wants - for example the structure, how it works and the look and feel.

That as you rightly say does not not include the content of members' posts. So what would happen is that the JREF would "republish" via its licence all the content here onto the new entity's forum. The actual licence (that the JREF owns) to use the members' content would not be transferred. (Consider the new forum as the JREF deciding to publish a book of all the posts from the forum.)

As regards to the personal information i.e. name, country and state if in the USA that will only be moved onto the new forum via a member agreeing to that happening. This will also depend on what "private" information if any the new entity will want for a membership, this is not settled yet, which means there may be no need to transfer anything.

Any legal issues about the JREF republishing the entirety of the content of the forum (that is, the posts) on a 'new' forum (or elsewhere, for that matter) are quite non-existent to trivial to deal with, as there is essentially no legal bar to doing so, and no legal risk to the JREF at all.

Forum posts are not "personal information collected by the JREF" and - as has been stated several times already - there are discussions ongoing about how to deal with the only actual "personal information" collected by the JREF (name, email address, state if in the U.S.), which is subject to the privacy policy. It may be some kind of opt-in or opt-out process; none of us knows at present.

But as for reproducing the entirety of the forum posts elsewhere, there is no real legal issue there at all.

I love these two posts. They warm my pedantic old heart. I had to transfer teams of people and contracts from one entity to another in my previous work and I am not being facetious when I say that I'm actually breathing a sigh of relief that you guys are grappling with these issues and have cut away the rhetoric to get to the actual legal issues. And those are they. It's not a blanket "OMG we can't just move stuff!" Things can be moved and re-assigned, LEGALLY. Not with work-arounds or tricks but just by adhering to the law and cutting back the law from generic considerations of "rights" to specific considerations of legalities.

FMW feels better! (I still want to hear some feel-good news about the assemblage of individuals who will actually be running whatever new entity this becomes, but obviously there's a lot that can't be discussed, yet. Oh, well, I'll allow myself to still be nervous about that point, but things are feeling better on my neurotic side of the discussion.)

 

[smartcooky]

I really cannot see what the problem is here. Its not as if JREF Forums would be the first ever to change ownership

Bad Astronomy + Universe Today combined to become BAUT, which meant that mods and admins and owners of each of the two forums would have had access to the membership information of the other forum.

BAUT then became Cosmoquest (changed ownership?)

So where was all the angst about privacy when that happened?

Was it an issue at the time? Not that I can recall.

 

[Foolmewunz]

Nor is there, I believe, any liability risked by JREF for anything said by a poster on the forum, because...


[qimg]https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/98915197/JREF/disclaimer.png[/qimg]

But this won't stop lawyer letters and self-lawyered nutbars, so the expense is as big an issue to organizations as the possibility of being found liable.

I'm quite sure Randi has legal support and the Foundation would've been delighted to defend a SWIFT comment or even a forum kerfuffle with Kaz or Sylvia or Trudeau. It's what Randi was all about. And the publicity would be worth the legal costs.

Defending against a guy who gets secret messages from Corn Gods? Not so much. Paul Bethke could sue tomorrow because Randi is allowing a conspiracy of forumites to refuse to go blind, thereby denying the work of Teh Lord. Worthless and frivolous and will be thrown out, sooner or later... but it would have to be acted on.

 

[ProBonoShill]

Any legal issues about the JREF republishing the entirety of the content of the forum (that is, the posts) on a 'new' forum (or elsewhere, for that matter) are quite non-existent to trivial to deal with, as there is essentially no legal bar to doing so, and no legal risk to the JREF at all.

Forum posts are not "personal information collected by the JREF" and - as has been stated several times already - there are discussions ongoing about how to deal with the only actual "personal information" collected by the JREF (name, email address, state if in the U.S.), which is subject to the privacy policy. It may be some kind of opt-in or opt-out process; none of us knows at present.

But as for reproducing the entirety of the forum posts elsewhere, there is no real legal issue there at all.

Good to hear LashL, it'd be a shame if all the great info here is lost.

Glad you've agreed to stay on as an Administrator too.

 

[RecoveringYuppy]

Yeah I'm not sure to what degree I really buy that JREF is an organization somehow terrified of litigation.

As noted James Randi essentially built his career on outing frauds. I'd wager there hasn't been a point in his professional career where he hasn't been involved in some sort of continuing litigation.

It's one thing to make and take your own risks, quite another to have thousands of people making risks for you.

 

[Hokulele]

I really cannot see what the problem is here. Its not as if JREF Forums would be the first ever to change ownership

Bad Astronomy + Universe Today combined to become BAUT, which meant that mods and admins and owners of each of the two forums would have had access to the membership information of the other forum.

BAUT then became Cosmoquest (changed ownership?)

So where was all the angst about privacy when that happened?

Was it an issue at the time? Not that I can recall.

The biggest difference there was that the forums were changing hands between similar non-profit groups with essentially the same mission. Here, the original transfer seemed to be going from a non-profit organization with a focus on skepticism, to ... what? For a while, it looked like it was going to either an individual with an unknown agenda, or to a for-profit business.

 

[abaddon]

The biggest difference there was that the forums were changing hands between similar non-profit groups with essentially the same mission. Here, the original transfer seemed to be going from a non-profit organization with a focus on skepticism, to ... what? For a while, it looked like it was going to either an individual with an unknown agenda, or to a for-profit business.

Not really. Somebody (and not the only one) broke the eleventh commandment that "Thou shalt not volunteer".

Once that happened, the peanut gallery started inventing nefarious "agendas" out of whole cloth. Sufficient red herrings to feed a nation were added and the rest is history.

 

[This is The End]

My view's long been that term limits (and accordingly, succession plans) are a better practice than what the forum's had, so in line with that and nothing personal I'd advocate you not staying beyond a transition stage, since your tenure has already far outlasted any term limit I think would be arrived at.

I simply cannot believe you are asking for term limits for an administrative position on an internet discussion forum.

 

[arthwollipot]

I simply cannot believe you are asking for term limits for an administrative position on an internet discussion forum.

Well, the idea of having elections for mods has been mooted, so why not?