| Username |
Post |
| ashu |
Posted
on 24-Jul-02 08:14 AM
Arnico wrote:
"I am NOT calling for elitism, or for any segregation of people, never have and never will. And no, I am not trying to hide from the filth in the real world (Ashu, you have a wrong impression of me)... "
No, I do NOT have a wrong impression of you, Arnico.
But, yes, having read others' comments in that other thread, I was concerned that one of my postings might have inadvertently portrayed you as an elitist, and that was why
I offered you my straightforward apologies, while still disagreeing with you re: the substance of this issue.
*********
"In fact, I would like to see this forum to be MORE like the real world, where if some one throws filth at me, or into a general public space that I inhabit, I know who it is and can react accordingly. "
Well, I don't know how you are going to achieve that.
I mean, this is a GENERAL forum, and NOT an issue-based forum where only the economists hang out and talk shop or where only the computer programmers hang
out and talk shop or where only the people from Boston hang out and so on and so
forth.
Because this is a GENERAL, OPEN forum -- catering to high school drop-outs to PhD students to professionals to unemployed Nepalis from the US to Bangladesh -- all of us and especially those of us who are more visible than others here -- ARE going to get
ALL kinds of known and anonymous perspectives here, and, hey, that's life here.
Sajha.com as it exists is NOT a risk-free zone.
You enter this site at your own risk.
This means, for instance, that I am going to be insulted/attacked/hurled with abuse and falsehood here (as I have been), and you are going to be get the same treatment on occasion too -- by anonymous folks who obviously need either professional help or a "jor-daar" kicks on their butts.
Ke garne?
My solution is neither to look away with a sigh as though I were above this all nor
to ask for censorship or special privileges.
And so, I acknowledge that filth exists in this GENERAL forum, but I, for one, consciously choose to be determined about the fact that all these anonymous insults/filth/ garbage and attacks are simply NOT going to wear me down no
matter what. I, for one, can out-tire and outlast my attackers simply because
their falsehood does not go further than a few postings.
And so, I shall continue to SHARE stuff here that I find interesting, provocative and
informative -- REGARDLESS of how many Patel Singhs or MadMaxes post their
khattam stuff too.
I mean, come on, is that so hard to do?
If you are already complaining about the free-fall nature of this GENERAL forum, how
will you ever work in Nepal in general -- where the PROFESSIONAL environment is like 10,000 times sajha.com's filth?
I mean, there would be people in Nepal (as everywhere) who'd spread lies about you, who'd try to hurt you professionally, who'd say one thing to you and then do just the opposite and so on and on? How will you deal with all that?
You know, my informal observation is that Nepal does not lack smart people with smart degrees.
What Nepal lacks are smart people with smart degrees AND -- this is the most important -- with a lot of street-smarts to take on the bastards (the ones ruining the country on so many fronts) in ways that are legal, politically savvy, democratically appealing and strategically brilliant.
Thank God for sajha.com for allowing some of us to develop our street-smarts in small, small ways by taking on, well, small, small challenges for now.
oohi
ashu
ktm,nepal
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| Baje |
Posted
on 24-Jul-02 09:45 AM
What is the point here in creating a new thread instead of replying to the old one? There is a limited space in the main page and I believe, San has requested us not to create new thread if the related topic already exists. You guys talk what sajha lacks and at the same time you don't hesitate to create some mess either. This is not the first time I have seen such.
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| ashu |
Posted
on 24-Jul-02 10:09 AM
Baje,
You ask "what's the point?"
Here are some of the points.
First, creating a new thread when you are posting from Nepal makes sense because
the time it takes to download 40 postings , even in 20/20 segments from a thread is
very lengthy. Because of the relatively lengthy time it takes to download postings on a computer in Nepal, I, for one, do NOT usually read threads that contain more than 20 postings.
Second, a new thread allows you to focus on a particular issue and discuss that in greater detail.
Third, anecdotal evidence suggests that the probability of MORE people reading and commenting on your (fresh) posting is higher.
Fourth, from experience, I have found out it's technically easier to start a new topic on sajha and see it appear immediately, than wait to make your posting the 42nd on a particular thread, and NOT see it appear at all fue to the upload time or some unknown technical error -- maybe San can fix these kind of problems.
So, these are the points I can think from the top of my head.
Please evaluate them carefully before you jump to conclusions.
Thank you.
oohi
"yes, another late night at work"
ashu
ktm,nepal
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| Paschim |
Posted
on 24-Jul-02 09:23 PM
Ashu, read your response to Arnico with apt interest. Your whole premise seems to be along the lines of "the real Nepali public space resembles Sajha and worse. If you want to function effectively in the Nepali public space in the future, start rehearsing on Sajha without complaining."
Not your words, but my understanding of your premise. Please correct me if I misunderstood you.
But I wonder if many people share your assumption about this parallel.
In the real public space, not always but most often you can track the source of opinion of someone on a person or issue or stuff. Further, because of the informal social norms on decorum, as well as formal legal measures, people restrain themselves. (Even in Nepal, we have libel laws, although I admit, they are not effective and the tabloids routinely get away with falsehood).
None of these fundamental characteristics hold true for Sajha where anonymity and unaccountability of opinion and location are permissible (by design), altering forms of public behavior radically.
So I think, calling for some discipline on Sajha says very little about a person's willingness or preparedness to take on the real, traceable vices one sees in the Nepali public space. The connection is loose (I'm not saying it's non-existent). Sajha may be a microcosm of Nepalis with well-off urban roots, but I'm not convinced that Sajha resembles either Nepali "public" behavior or that it has the public tools of redresses against publicly unsanctioned behavior that societies back home have. Hoina ra?
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| ashu |
Posted
on 26-Jul-02 02:15 AM
Paschim,
Is, for instance, a game of football a parallel for life itself?
No.
But does a game of football TEACH one some valuable lessons about how to handle
life better?
Yes.
How?
By teaching one how to be a better team-player, how to co-operate with one another, how to compete against one's opponents, how to handle setbacks/defeats in a mature way and so on and on.
LIKEWISE, is sajha.com -- a public, open space so far as the owner San deems it as
such -- a parallel for Nepal's public space itself?
No.
But does sajha.com -- with 700 unique visitors a day who bring DIVERSE perspectives, ideas, backgrounds, ways of thinking and interests -- (has the potential to) TEACH some valuable lessons to us about how to handle ourselves in Nepal's much larger public space?
I would argue: Yes.
How?
A. By teaching us how to handle our emotions better when we are unfairly attacked or, for that matter, when we are excessively praised.
B. By teaching us that disagreeing with a person's ideas with reasons is NOT the same as attacking that person on a personal level.
C. By teaching us that there are good days (when you are everyone's poster-boy or poster-girl) and there are bad days (when everyone just plain hates you), and what really matters at the end is your own sense of inner equilibrium about yourself.
D. By teaching us that, well, at times, yes, filth and garbage do FLOAT to the top and SEEM to have taken over the world. But thankfully, as verifiable experience has shown us in this forum, such filth and garbage do NOT stay on top forever, especially when "good" men and women choose to either ignore it or confront it, without feeling POWERLESS/helpless against it.
All these lessons and more, I would argue, Paschim, can be taken to heart by those contemplating some sort of a public career in Nepal.
On a larger note: The antidote to filth and garbage is NOT censorship and special protections BUT more supplies of "good" materials by "good" people.
*********
Finally, yes, like Arnico, I too would like to see nothing but "quality" postings from "quality" people here.
But, unlike Arnico, I happen to be a enough of a realist to accept that once you allow all kinds of people to post anonymously, then -- as matter of sheer practicality -- it's just damn difficult, time-wise and process-wise, to MONITOR who writes what and what to accept and what to reject, and so on.
Better to accept that filth comes and goes -- as it has -- on this site on a CYCLICAL basis, and as long as there are "good" people around, have confidence that filth will not travel much far.
And finally, Paschim and other sajha dot comers, ask not how we can get rid of all this cyclical filth. Instead, ask what we can all do more and better to attract many more "good" posters -- from Nepal and elsewhere -- to this site.
Thanks Paschim for your comments.
Have a great week-end everyone.
oohi
ashu
ktm,nepal
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| Paschim |
Posted
on 26-Jul-02 03:51 AM
Ashu, games of football, or cycling to work, or going out for dinner with a former wife, or teaching a class of 25, or confronting an elder with a moral dilemma, or posting a joke on Sajha and seeing how people react, are ALL facets of life that teach us lessons about, well, life, so that we can do all these things better the next time around. we also transport lessons drawn from one arena to other places: cycling to work carefully every day can teach us about the responsible attention with which one needs to hold a new-born child, or practice of holding a new born with compassion may teach us something about being patient and considerate when queuing up for tickets in art museums and zoos. you know what I'm trying to say. not everything in life need be about grandiose emotional stock-taking. like in football or sajha postings, one learns (and un-learns) from all actions in life everyday. to even say that we agree with all this is tautological.
on calls for privileges, censorship, holier-than-thou insinuations, no, I'm not part of the brigade. and arnico to whom this thread is addressed said he is not either. while I wish people exercised more restraint voluntarily, I'm not asking for favors or running away from filth. I know what rules govern me when I'm in an open forum like this; but I just seconded some people's suggestion that perhaps creating a parallel forum where posters are identifiable is an idea worth considering by san, the owner of sajha. let those who accept the non-elitist terms of membership of such a forum go ahead and value the pleasure of not having to deal with filth which they feel they can do without. their choice. those who enjoy the open nature of things - good and bad - may continue to hang around which I intend to do.
what my larger point was that made me serious enough to respond to you above was just this one implied question of yours: 'if you can't take the heat here, how will you perform in the real public space'. I just found the question simplistic, that perhaps, I thought, also over-estimated and assumed that sajha was somehow a monopolistic factory for rehearsal of tips for the real nepali public space. you probably didn't mean this, but I inferred this point from more than one of your postings which nudged me to pose a basic, humble point: everything in life teaches us things, and we move on, mature with time and age aided or not by past lessons. time spent on sajha teaches us stuff - big, small, insignificant - but to imply that one's expressions/positions here somehow reflected the potentials of promise of one's future role in the public is to me at least a wanting proposition.
anyway, I heard you ashu, and you've heard me. continue gare this can go on forever. I'll be in nepal again soon, mid august, so time permitting, we can pick this up over beer someplace. tara, ahile lai pugyo yaar. its friday afternoon. thanks for taking the time and making an effort to respond in length though. despite disagreements, always a pleasure to hear you make your points.
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| ashu |
Posted
on 26-Jul-02 04:58 AM
Paschim wrote:
"time spent on sajha teaches us stuff - big, small, insignificant - but to imply that one's expressions/positions here somehow reflected the potentials of promise of one's future role in the public is to me at least a wanting proposition."
***********
I agree that the connection between sajha and Nepal's public space is very LOOSE,
and indeed I share your view on the "wanting proposition". That's clear enough.
It's just that given the nature of this open, free, unmoderated and anonymity-allowed forum -- in which policing the contents which get washed away in a matter of days, if not hours, is just impossible to do -- I was just urging Arnico and visitors NOT to let the cyclical filth to get them down when they have the power to change the nature of postings by start posting "good" stuff themselves.
Tetti ho.
Using an analogy, I asked: If you have to complain about what you can change yourself in your own small, small way on sajha, what will you do when/if you find yourself in some public space in Nepal where you'll have to deal with much more unknowns and much more, well, nastiness?
Tetti ho, yaar.
Sure, let's get together sometime soon in good old CatManDo.
oohi
ashu
ktm,nepal
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| Suna |
Posted
on 26-Jul-02 07:05 AM
Sugar coat it as you will but it is/was " Clash of the Titans". Now now...no need to get excited over being called a Titan. I'm just feeling generous today - with words i.e.
:)
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| sangey |
Posted
on 26-Jul-02 10:04 AM
Sorry, this is little bit out of context (having the attention span of a gnat, I just read first paragraphs of the postings in this tread, hence can't be qualified to put up an opinion). But something is eating Gilbert's grape (heheheh).
Pashchim, whassup with this idea of "going out for dinner with a former wife" thingie? Nothing wrong with that, except the fact that you will probably end up sleeping on a couch that night, if, and this is a big IF, your current wife even lets you into the house. I have heard you are single, ready to mingle, but homey, and you are my homey so to speak, don't even go there.
Football, oh football. World Cup is over, so no more soccer talk. But NFL is in the horizon, and so is College football. Yeah baby! I, having spent lot of my formative years in Dallas, am an ardent Cowboys fan. But they suck, big time. And they will continue sucking for next few years, I think. My undergraduate Alma Mater's Mustangs suck big time too and there is no hope of getting into any of the bowl championships. My graduate Alma Mater's Nittany Lions might stand a chance, but they too are predicted to suck. Now my better half's current school's Wildcats might do a better job.
Hot diggity dang! How did I end up talking about former wife and football, I don't know. Ok, please, puhllleeeaaasssee, ignore this posting.
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| arnico |
Posted
on 26-Jul-02 10:23 AM
Despite seeing a thread addressed at me, I planned to refrain from replying to it, hoping to thereby speed up its disappearance from the first page of kurakani, as I share Baje's indignation about seeing the follow-up to one thread being scattered all over in new threads.
HOWEVER, it looks like I now do need to jump in and defend myself against being mis-quoted by Ashu. He wrote:
>
>Finally, yes, like Arnico, I too would like
>to see nothing but "quality" postings from "
>quality" people here.
I NEVER EVER mentioned anything about getting postings only from "quality people"... I am not sure I know what that means. What is a quality person? How does one determine who a quality person is? We probably all have our own definitions of judging who is a good person. According to my own definition, a person with a good heart who does not know ka-kha-ga qualifies, I don't, and probably neither do a lot of other people with enviable ivy-league degrees...
THE ONLY thing that I was unhappy about in the recent past (as well as at some point last winter) and was hoping we could stop was the flood of anonymous postings on sajha.com that were racist, sexist, and otherwise discriminatory and lacking a basic sense of respect for fellow humans. I don't care whether the person posting does not follow rules of grammar, I don't care what language(s) posts are in, I don't care whether the thoughts are clearly formulated, whether the arguments are logically stated... all I care about is that the person posting show some respect to fellow members of sajha and the world beyond.
And, as there seems to be a STRONG correlation between anonymous posting and disrespectful posts, my humble suggestion was to either allow only registered posters to post on kurakani, or to create a separate section for registered posters only. By registered posters I did not mean ones who had to reveal their name... just ones who could be traced...
Anyway, enough repetition. Let's put this thread to rest.
Have a good weekend everyone.
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| Suna |
Posted
on 26-Jul-02 10:40 AM
YEAH REALLY sangey!
How about some quality posting huh?? Tesai tangent ma janey bhanya??
oh well...I guess you were trying to lighten the mood? If it was unintentional you had admit to having the attention span of a gnat! hehehe.
ps People freshly in love have weird thoughts and analogies
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| sparsha |
Posted
on 26-Jul-02 10:47 AM
"THE ONLY thing that I was unhappy about in the recent past (as well as at some point last winter) and was hoping we could stop was the flood of anonymous postings on sajha.com that were racist, sexist, and otherwise discriminatory and lacking a basic sense of respect for fellow humans. I don't care whether the person posting does not follow rules of grammar, I don't care what language(s) posts are in, I don't care whether the thoughts are clearly formulated, whether the arguments are logically stated... all I care about is that the person posting show some respect to fellow members of sajha and the world beyond."
Arnico, I agree. I am with you.
Ani Sangey,
forget about former wife for now.
Bartaman ta nabhai ra belama Pashchim le ke sikne ho bhut sreemati bata? bhut sreemati bhane ko former wife bhanna khojya...kichkanni haina hai...
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| Uncle Bob |
Posted
on 26-Jul-02 10:55 AM
You guys really need to start a new user group...
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| Koko |
Posted
on 26-Jul-02 10:59 AM
Ashu,
Amogst most arguments that I have had with you... I agree with you 100% on this one. For crying out loud its a public site. Poeple from all walks of life, not just the inner circle(or civilized educated ones). Once you do that ir won't be public any more. Registered unregistered ir does not matter. Besides half the names registered are Psuedo names anyway. Who is who you cannot even sort out. So this whole registered unregistered discussion is pointless.
For analagy's sake... lets take the example of public transportation. The T in Boston...You cannot go around telling the T authorities to seperate the T you ride from all the rednecks and homeless people because you do not want to deal with them ???? Thats just straight up descrimination. I just could not fathom that all these educated intellects were asking the web master to do the same. My point is if you ride the public transportation you are not only going to have to deal with them nednecks, homeless people...you are going have to deal with a whole lotta other things like delays, rush hour etc etc... But THAT'S PUBLIC TRANSPORTATION TO YOU OTHERWISE IT WILL NOT BE PUBLIC ANYMORE WOULD IT ?
The same way when you post articles..of course there are going to be people with both -ve and +ve veiw on it. And there are a lotta uneducated people out there. Instead of ignoring them.. if we include them ....maybe we can educate them and bring them up our level. But if we just ignore them our social situation will go from bad to worse. The more you ignore them.. bolder they get(like the MAos). After all they are from Nepal...
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| san |
Posted
on 26-Jul-02 11:59 AM
The analogy of the Public T is a good one but you left out an important issue.
In the T(train) you have to deal with the rednecks, the homeless and everyone else that comes on board. But on a public T, you don't have to deal with a masked person coming to you and telling you to f*ck off. Or a masked man shouting out 'f*ck asians' 'f*ck hindus', etc.
It is the anonimity that a web forum gives, that make people think that they can get away with anything. (More on this available at http://www.rider.edu/users/suler/psycyber/badboys.html)
In a public transportation, if someone is derogatory to others, or racist, or exhibits any kinds of inconsiderate and indecent behavior, there are laws that deal with it. In this public forum, it is hard to apply any rules since anonymity gives a blanket protection.
If everyone was masked and not identifiable in the Train analogy, who would you punish? Having an accountable identify deters people from showing lack of consideration for others - maybe due to fear of being reprimanded in public or singled out as a troublemaker.
Is requiring Registration to post on sajha.com going to give all posters an accountable identity? No. But, what it will do is it will remove a major portion of anonymous posters who think they can get away anything. Does that mean that there won't be any anonymous poster? NO, since anyone can easily get a hotmail or a yahoo account to register, the usernames are still anonymous for all practical purposes.
The analogy of the public T is a good one, and this forum should serve a similar public purpose. The ability to use the publicly available service, that gives some sort of protection to the people who use it by regulating public rules, that includes the inability to come to the public T masked and start defying general rules of decency and consideration.
This can be a discussion for an against requiring registration to post on sajha.com.
Thanks,
San
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| sparsha |
Posted
on 26-Jul-02 12:56 PM
"Is requiring Registration to post on sajha.com going to give all posters an accountable identity? No. But, what it will do is it will remove a major portion of anonymous posters who think they can get away anything. Does that mean that there won't be any anonymous poster? NO, since anyone can easily get a hotmail or a yahoo account to register, the usernames are still anonymous for all practical purposes."
San, you are right.
Why are we so afraid of accountability?
Nabiraunu. Nadaraunu.
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| Koko |
Posted
on 26-Jul-02 01:03 PM
Good Point San,
We should have some sort of requirements or set of rules to go by. But the only thing I am scared of is the withdral symtom. If we put any sort of barrier then people are going to hesitate to post. It take quite a while and geting used to to post in any website.BUt once you get familiar with the enviroment then your inhibitions are gone. We are at the point where people feel ok to post anything, say anything...
NOw if we take that away and put obstacles then people are going to be hesitant to post.
If you look at the stats or the number of people logged in on any given dayat the bottom you can see the difference. Now do we want to do that ? Do we want to slow the traffic down. The whole point was to bring the communities togather reather than isolating certain group or groups of people. We have had pests here and ther whom we had to block their ip address due to their behaviour. And by all means we should do that. We should hold people accoutable...but when people bring in personal issues to public places....who is to blame ? I don't do my dirty laundry here in public...
But when you do then you should be able to face the consequences. ITS NOT THE WEBMASTERS JOB TO POLICE PERSONAL FEUDS. BUt he has stepped in when people like Patel Singh, Naresh karki etc etc Which is perfectly fine with me. My point is the whole community should not bear the consequences beacause of a few rotten apples.
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| sparsha |
Posted
on 26-Jul-02 01:31 PM
Koko,
"...The whole point was to bring the communities togather reather than isolating certain group or groups of people...."
Absolutely. The point would still be the same - bring communities together -but don't you think those "rotten apples (your words)" should and must be isolated. Sooner the better.
Kaso?
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| Koko |
Posted
on 26-Jul-02 02:37 PM
I thought San was doing that If Iam not mistaken. I remember there were quite a few instances like the guy who tried to sabotage the polls, guys who post Porn, etc etc
He has been active in doing that(Mucho gracia senor san). But he also has a full time job apart from Saajha... To police this site is like a full time job. Are you guys who want this accountability willing to chips in(financialy) and get a full time person to do this.
San alone cannot police the site 24/7..everyone have their lives to live as well. What do you say san....
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| Mitra 2 |
Posted
on 26-Jul-02 03:36 PM
San,
If you allow only registered users to post messages, I'm sure the site would become much cleaner. It takes time and effort to register, so I don't believe people are going to create too many user names just for sake of posing junk. Based on my observation, people delete cookies and post multiple times in the same thread with different names. Again, it would take time and effort to log out and login again with a different user name just to post another message. It won't be very convenient as compared to what we have now.
Having said that, I would gladly register my name if you make it a requirement. BTW, somebody has registered with my original user name 'Mitra' but haven't seen him post a single message with that user name. If user names are inactive for a certain period, could you make those names available (after it expires) for new registration? Who knows, we might run out of user names if we keep holding multiple user names :) This is just my opinion and not a new request.
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| Dilasha |
Posted
on 26-Jul-02 07:08 PM
This happened with this website called Sukulgunda.com which was really popular among the nepalese before Sajha.com was even born. People simply loved that site. I don't know the exact reason why it suddenly disappeared but my guess is this. They had a forum similar to the kurakani (well, maybe not in the same format) where people just loved to post interesting, thought provoking, meaningful at the same time funny, stuff that didn't make any sense,and sometimes demeaning, degrading and filthy postings. Then later, what the site admin did was filter people, and it was made difficult for people to view postings, like they had to log in every time they wanted to post or read something which isn't that big of a deal. but the whole idea did not seem appealing. I can't really explain in words but the process was too intimidating. Gradually, as time passed by, the popularity of sukulgunda especially the much popular forum diminished and finally the site itself vanished from the world wide web!
Not that the same thing will happen to Sajha, but just a caution to the site admin that people might not show any interest at all, if too much of restrictions are applied thereby leading sajha to be another sukulgunda on the block!!
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| Jame Bonds |
Posted
on 26-Jul-02 09:18 PM
Dilasha, I used to visit sukulgunda.com a lot. Sukulgunda had some regular columnists who posted interesting and thought provoking articles. I don't recall that the site had a discussion forum. In any case, I think comparing sukulgunda and sajha is like comparing apples to oranges. Sukulgunda was directed at sort of 'cool' people specially young crowd. Sajha on the other hand has a very diverse crowd. Sukulgunda had regular columnists who wrote while anyone can become sort of a columnist by posting in Kurakani here.
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