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Poll: Unban TempleOS?

100 points| jacquesm | 12 years ago | reply

Today after reading the article on Emperor Norton a parallel with SF/HN, Emperor Norton and Terry Davis struck me.

More and more HN'ers are re-posting his writings and even if they upset some I suspect that we could survive if we let Terry post as a regular account. Sometimes he has good points to make and he's an interesting fellow, and more of a genuine hacker than many here can lay claim to. All those who wrote an operating system from scratch please raise your hand... He's not always equally easy to follow, sometimes downright offensive but it's all just bits. Since I browse with 'showdead' on it makes little difference to me but I suspect it will make a huge difference for Terry, as far as I can see he means absolutely no harm.

So I propose we re-instate TempleOS as a full member, if that has popular support and dang agrees.

I recognize HN is not a democracy and that the 'management' has every right to ignore this petition if the answer is positive.

If you vote in the poll remember that is not the same as voting for the poll.

87 comments

order
[+] gecko|12 years ago|reply
Look: I'm a big fan of freedom-of-speech, but that doesn't mean that I, or anyone else, has any obligation to provide a venue for you to say what you want to say. As it happens, TempleOS manages to be sufficiently offensive and annoying that I don't think we should provide a pulpit for him to rant; I think his normal comments detract far more than the occasional insightful comment adds.

But don't take my word for it; let's look at his four most recent comments. In response to a recent post exploring the details of a Rails vulnerability, he posted

    TempleOS is God's temple. God always gets His way.
On an excellent article about cycle-accurate 6502 emulation, he wrote

    To me abstraction above the hardware is like condoms. Some people say "Use three condoms, its better".
    I don't want a literal C64 -- just the complete open simple access... but 64-bit and 3Ghz and multicored.
    I don't want it to run on a 386, just x86_64.
which is also off-topic, albeit slightly less so, I suppose. In response to the TrueCrypt vulnerability, he wrote

    http://www.templeos.org/Wb/Kernel/Compress.html
which, to save you the time, has no encryption code in it. Finally, in response to a rational article about (natch) rational ways to respond to the shooting in Santa Barbara, he wrote

    God exists. CIA waging war on me. Stupid fucks.
Note that I'm not cherry-picking these comments. Those are just his four most recent comments. (The fifth and the pile after that are roughly similar; I just don't feel like pasting them here.)

These all simply clutter up the comment stream and provide nothing to move the conversation forward. There may be the occasional bit of insight, but I hardly think that they balance out the random off-topic spamminess of the above.

[+] WaxProlix|12 years ago|reply
People are pointing out that his signal-noise ratio is bad, but that's why there's a vote system in place. It seems like the n-word argument might be stronger than the 'poor content of posts' argument to me.
[+] jacquesm|12 years ago|reply
But it is cherry picking. You stopped just short of including this one:

"I thought mind reading and clarvoyance, I donno. It just works.

I use VMware. I wrote all 130,000 lines inside the operating system. It has all tools -- editor, profiler, grep, merge, compiler, assembler, unassembler, shitty partial debugger, graphic sprite creator. BMP-movie-maker. BMP support. Boot loader. ISO9660 ISO file creator.

My BMP movie creator is kinda banned. I want no multimedia, but I use it personally. I'm not serious on a ban -- orther prolly want to make movies, but it's a step down the road to hell.

I generate my website natively. I have a html creator. That's kinda just for me and doesn't belong. What if other want to do it?

I'm chagrinned -- I'm not thinking of any uses. Oh! I normally do hymns, but VMware killed music. Hymns are a legitimate thing I do. Video animations with music melodies and bouncy ball words."

and this one:

" TempleOS 4 days ago | link | parent [dead] | on: CSVjs: Basic CSV parsing and encoding in JavaScrip...

http://www.templeos.org/Wb/Demo/SortFileExample/F64FileSort.....

At the time of the Commodore 64, it was not used for COBOL applications. There were mainframes that banks and businesses used.

This is not what my operating system is for. I made 100 applications and demos that show what it is for. Does yours have sprites in source code?

The RedSea filesystem will do only whole-file reads and writes of contiguous block chunks (or just let you do raw block access). I demand that Linux and Microsoft and VMWare support RedSea on hard drive and CDROM, so I can remove support for ISO9660 and FAT32. God's temple must be perfect.

http://www.templeos.org/Wb/Doc/RedSea.html

With whole-file access, only I can do compression."

If self-promotion is a sin we might as well ban half of the frequent posters here (quite possibly including me).

[+] dang|12 years ago|reply
1. This discussion is grotesque. I'm not going to participate in it.

2. Anyone who wants to read dead comments, can. Just turn 'showdead' on in your profile. Therefore this entire "issue" is a contrived drama.

3. Anyone who has questions of this nature should have the good taste to email [email protected] instead of creating a spectacle.

4. Obviously, we're burying this thread.

p.s. Why is it grotesque? Because it's an invasion of privacy; it's presumptuous to speak for someone in this way ("I suspect it will make a huge difference for Terry"); and for an internet forum to debate a human being like this—a poll, for fuck's sake?—is degraded.

p.ps. I should add that I don't doubt jacquesm's good intentions for a second. My concern is entirely with the systematic effect (i.e., is it good for the site).

[+] Houshalter|12 years ago|reply
This is an unexpected response. Shadowbanning a person is ok but talking about it is wrong and grotesque? Talking about things is drama and spectacle that needs to be censored? Public opinion doesn't matter at all?

It's not really contrived. The majority of users don't have showdead on or may not even be aware of the issue. And I did suggest a third option; manually approving good comments but not the spam and conspiracy rants.

[+] TazeTSchnitzel|12 years ago|reply
I don't think he should be unbanned. Most of his writings are rambling and nonsensical. Many of his posts contain randomly generated gibberish - literally; he seems to believe his computer's PRNG is the word of God, and he also includes random Bible verses. Sometimes, he posts incoherent and incredibly offensive conspiratorial rants of no real value. Also, I've never really seen the merit of the few posts he makes that others repost so non-showdeaders can see them.

Don't get me wrong, I have nothing personal against him, but the vast, vast majority of his posts do not live up to this community's standards. His case is a sad one, but there's a reason TempleOS (and every single one of his previous accounts) is shadowbanned.

[+] bdr|12 years ago|reply
I browse with showdead on and appreciate TempleOS's comments, but I'd prefer to keep things as they are. IIRC Terry is fine with it too.
[+] salgernon|12 years ago|reply
I too think having his comments readily visible would detract. While people that have been around long enough know not to respond to his less lucid prose, I've seen people post comments about how off-putting his comments can be. This tends to detract from the overall discussion without adding anything.

That being said, I do make a point of reading his comments. Hmm, perhaps there should be a TerryFilterBot that can repost them, although of course it would have to be tailored to each readers comfort level. There's probably an MVP there :-)

[+] oofabz|12 years ago|reply
I would like Terry unbanned but only if he promises not to use the n-word. I believe that is the #1 reason he was banned in the first place.

HN discussions strive to a high standard. That word has no place here, regardless of how talented the person saying it is.

[+] squidsoup|12 years ago|reply
As painful as it may be to acknowledge, Node is clearly here to stay.
[+] meifun|12 years ago|reply
I dont know if he can help not using it. I dont even know if he knows he's doing it and that it is wrong. Seriously. He has Schizophrenia. It might control him more often than he would like.
[+] jacquesm|12 years ago|reply
Offense is in the eye of the beholder, if someone has Tourette's would you berate them for profanity? Would you feel insulted anyway?
[+] captainmuon|12 years ago|reply
Feature request:

I wish it would be possible to vote on his posts, even though they are "dead". Maybe individual posts that get enough upvotes can be unbanned, or maybe certain users with enough karma can unban selected posts manually?

[+] SoftwareMaven|12 years ago|reply
Terry's case is closer to home than I like to admit. I have a loved one who deals with schizophrenia (fortunately, currently better managed than Terry's seems to be, but there are no guarantees). I hate the thought of her being ostracized because of her illness.

However, I still voted 'no', and it's because, while being ostracized is bad, being repeatedly beat over the head with negative responses to his comments feels even worse to me. At best, it could serve to cause him to feel worse about himself; at worst, it could worsen his illness.

Be well, Terry.

[+] jacquesm|12 years ago|reply
You make a very good point. I like the solution offered below with selective re-enabling of the comments.
[+] mindstab|12 years ago|reply
turned shadowdead posts on for a sec and checked his history. he sounds like a troll of a schizophrenic or generally someone unwell, and WAY out of line with the normal standard of discourse here. Most of it is a junk. And even if there is some value in some of it, it's also not phrased nicely. I politely suggest HN can do with out

https://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=TempleOS

[+] nanofortnight|12 years ago|reply
He is supposedly schizophrenic.
[+] vezzy-fnord|12 years ago|reply
The problem is that he constantly intersperses incoherent ramblings and paranoid delusions with whatever valid and on-topic points he makes.

I think that's the primary reason, not the use of the word "nigger". Actually, his use of it is directly related to the delusional rambling, rather than be a stand-alone point.

[+] norswap|12 years ago|reply
In response to this post, TempleOS wrote:

"When you know you're banned, you are very slightly less inhibited than when not banned, LOL."

Which is a fair observation.

[+] ronaldx|12 years ago|reply
I like to see TempleOS's posts but I think the system works quite well as it is.

He posts with the knowledge that he is banned (rather than creating a clean account), so I would take this as a deliberate policy of his choice. I also don't think he would remain un-banned without being treated as an extreme special case.

Poll wording is significantly biased towards the author's preference, i.e. 'please do this' vs 'definitely do this'. I fall on the latter side but not enough to agree with 'definitely'.

Edited to add: I agree that some option to reanimate valuable comments would be good; this applies particularly to TempleOS but also to other banned users.

[+] ggchappell|12 years ago|reply
I don't understand why this is even worth considering.

There is no effective way to ban a person; you can only ban an account. If this fellow wants to post on HN, then all he has to do is make a new account. If he hasn't made a new one, then I would guess he doesn't want to post.

I know nothing about the history of this issue, but apparently he did something Not Good with the old account? Permanently disabling that account, and requiring him to create a new one, strikes me as a very light punishment. I don't think it would be helpful to lighten the punishment even further, by re-enabling the account.

[+] McGlockenshire|12 years ago|reply
> I know nothing about the history of this issue, but apparently he did something Not Good with the old account?

Unfortunately this is a case where you need to know the history.

The man is, unfortunately, mentally ill, and is not coping very well. His messages are frequently incoherent and unconstructive (and occasionally downright offensive). He has a single agenda - promoting his work - and deviates from it only long enough to remind people that god is speaking through code he wrote. I am not exaggerating.

He's been shadowbanned for quite a while. He's more disruptive than helpful, regardless of his skills as a developer.

[+] andrey-p|12 years ago|reply
I did see a TempleOSv2 account (or something similar) posting on a couple of occasions. Also dead. In the light of that I'd say it's more of a problem with the person than the account.
[+] gabordemooij|12 years ago|reply
Thanks for the notice, just switched 'undead' on. I hate those censorship filters, I can't stand it when some system decides what's interesting for me to read and what's not.
[+] Legion|12 years ago|reply
This is exactly what shadowbanning is for. You can see what Terry posts by opting in to do so.
[+] krapp|12 years ago|reply
This is proof that shadowbanning doesn't work. It's supposed to drive him away because he isn't getting any feedback on his posts. Instead, he continues to post, (possibly) aware of his banned status, and because of the fact that he built his own OS, seems to have become something like a mascot around here.

It could be argued that he would simply create another account and continue posting if his account were banned. That's one assumption, but of course, the shadowbanning system seems based entirely on assuming things about people. Creating another account if you discover you've been banned is what you're supposed to do, is it not? For all anyone knows, he would have moved on long ago if not for the way this site seems to act to keep him here.

Meanwhile, every now and then you read a post from someone who discovered they were banned for months, or years, for some slight they weren't even aware of. Apparently someone flipped the switch and decided they needed to go away in the most passive-aggressive way possible.

[+] stevejohnson|12 years ago|reply
As much as I enjoy reading Terry's posts, I think he's better left an open secret. He's like a Hacker News Easter egg.

Besides, if he is unbanned, I'm afraid every thread he posts in will have a junk subthread with posters berating him or re-explaining the situation.

[+] Nzen|12 years ago|reply
This thread is a preview of our potential future and reflection of past conversations on this topic. I support, though, the concept of upvoting any shadowed user's posts into general visibility.
[+] morgante|12 years ago|reply
He has apparently been unbanned. I have showdead off but can see his comment here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7816725

I strongly oppose unbanning him. He is severely mentally ill and frequently posts random off-topic rants. Even more worryingly, some of his comments are extremely offensive (I'd say intentionally so, except I'm not sure he has the capacity of intentionality.).

His one redeeming feature is having enough technical ability to write an OS. That is absolutely not a reason to tolerate regularly posting content that would automatically get the poster banned.

[+] jacquesm|12 years ago|reply
No, that's just that comment. And in a way that's a solution too, if his individual on-topic comments are unbanned.
[+] mathrawka|12 years ago|reply
He posted in this thread "When you know you're banned, you are very slightly less inhibited than when not banned, LOL."

So why unban him? He knows that his comments still get viewed, so he continues to comment. He can use the guise of being banned to feel more free to speak his mind, which sounds good.

I am not saying I approve of what he is saying, but we are allowing him to have an outlet to feel free to say anything, without being worried about being banned again.

Isn't that the basis of free speech?

[+] thaumaturgy|12 years ago|reply
I have a lot of respect for Terry Davis' work, I tend to prefer associating with outcasts and underdogs in general, and I've had family with mental issues so I'm sympathetic. I wish that he wasn't being treated the way he is here.

That said, I also don't think active participation from him would be anything other than a disruption here unfortunately. And, his behavior isn't completely excusable; he is intelligent enough to rationalize, at least somewhat, about his behavior.

There's the additional problem that HN isn't really a "community" anymore, so much as some of you oldtimers might think. There are going to be a lot of people who would see his comments, and not know who he is, and I think that would draw a lot more abuse.

It sucks, it's a bad situation, I wish it weren't this way, but I don't think HN is the right place to host someone with his problems -- and that has as much to do with HN's flaws as Terry's.

[+] dsl|12 years ago|reply
I am in favor of having to up/down vote the occasional post, with the benefit of giving someone with mental issues a reasonable outlet to express himself.

In the case of all out trolls, they won't do harmful things to themselves and others if they get hell banned. Mental issues are unpredictable.