Re: CfPs on the semantic-web mailing list (and other W3C mailing lists)

I suppose some of the target audience will have already tuned out of this thread, and sorry to continue it.

I have just had an interesting exchange with the Chair of a conference that posted a CfP that did not conform - it wasn’t too bad, but it didn't.

It struck me that apart from Sarven's stick, we could offer some suggested actions.

Chairs on this list (and I am sure there are many), should take extra care to ensure that the people doing the publicity for their events (often volunteers), know that they need to actively go and look for policies in general, and then of course adhere to them.
(Just doing what was done last time isn’t enough - review is required.)
And they can specifically mention W3C lists, and the SemWeb list concession.

Also, when someone involved with an event, especially a Chair, sees a non-conforming posting, they should consider it a personal embarrassment, and take action to ensure it doesn’t happen again.

If we can get adherence to a better level with the events we care about (the ones we are involved in!), then Pierre-Antoine will be much more able to ensure that the other CfPs that feel more like Spam can simply be blocked, without feeling discriminatory.

In fact, if a few of us decide for a little while to personally point out to conference chairs every time they violate the policy, we might see a significant improvement :-)

Best
Hugh

> On 14 Apr 2022, at 12:21, Sarven Capadisli <info@csarven.ca> wrote:
> 
> On 2022-03-22 15:42, Pierre-Antoine Champin wrote:
>> Dear subscriber to the semantic-web mailing list.
>> I have been recently appointed maintainer of the list. It is with this hat on that I am writing this email.
>> W3C has an anti-spam policy [1] applying to all the lists it hosts. This policy specifies that call for papers are, in general, not considered appropriate for W3C lists. This list, however, is a historical exception to that "no-cfp" rule. There was an informal survey back in 2016 [2], initiated by Phil Archer. The conclusion was that CfPs were acceptable on semantic-web@w3.org, but /should contain the string "[CfP]" in their subject/. As you have probably noticed, that rule has never been strictly followed (and I was guilty of that myself!)... It used to be documented on the mailing-list archive page, but even that has disappeared over time (I just put it back).
>> I think, however, that it is a good thing to flag CfPs to make it easier to distinguish them from more targeted messages. Therefore, I ask all of us to stick to this good practice as much as possible.
>> thanks in advance,
>> pa
>> [1] https://www.w3.org/Mail/FAQ.html#spam
>> [2] https://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/semantic-web/2016Mar/thread.html#msg108 
> 
> 
> [1] states:
> 
> >We trust the members of our community to post responsibly, and in rare cases we will ask people to modify their behavior.
> 
> >Sending bulk announcements with generic text and cross-posting to multiple lists at once is a sure way to have your messages rejected, and possibly be banned from posting to our site in the future.
> 
> is the most relevant text I can see on enforcing the spam policy.
> 
> How is it exactly enforced and tracked? Is there a record of email addresses that are blocked and URLs of emails (published under w3.org) that are now 404/410? Or a record of contact that W3C made with people to modify their behaviour?
> 
> Here is an example email [3] sent just earlier.
> 
> Here is another email sent a few weeks ago from the same org / same email address [4]. And there are loads more like this that can be easily identified, as you well know [5].
> 
> Clear violation of W3C's Spam Policy [1].
> 
> This is all after numerous attempts to tell these academic organisers (in reality working for third-party publishers) to follow the requirements of the list over the years.
> 
> Will these offenders be blocked? If yes, when? If not, why not?
> 
> Note that at the end of [3]'s email, there is an offer to "unsubscribe" the semantic-web mailing list. Will W3C send an email to unsubscribe?
> 
> Thanks,
> 
> [3] https://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/semantic-web/2022Apr/0018.html
> [4] https://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/semantic-web/2022Mar/0045.html
> [5] https://www.w3.org/Search/Mail/Public/search?type-index=semantic-web&index-type=t
> 
> -Sarven
> https://csarven.ca/#i

Received on Monday, 25 April 2022 10:06:51 UTC