Re: [Chicken-users] [Chicken-hackers] Any thoughts on performance woes?

[arc]

On 08/04/15 22:27, Peter Bex wrote:
> On Wed, Apr 08, 2015 at 08:26:43PM +1200, arc wrote:
> > I would also caution against generalising from Usenet to some wider
> > community.  I haven't visited comp.lang.scheme in years, but I am on
> > my second go at trying to make sense of Forth, so I've been lurking
> > in comp.lang.forth, and it's also kind of problematic, due largely
> > to a small handful of problematic personalities (one at least is


> > Unfortunately open access, low barriers to entry, and no moderation
> > it's simply too easy for difficult people to ruin life for everyone,
> > (including of course brining out the worse in people who would
> > otherwise be better), forever.
> >
> > [people in #scheme] all seemed like thoroughly nice people, and it's
> >   hard to believe the intervening years have turned them all nasty...
>
> Gavino, that blight of humanity, has been appearing on c.l.s, even once
> on this mailing list, and keeps popping up on IRC under different
> nicknames.  I actively monitor #chicken to keep him out, but when I left
> #scheme a few years ago, that was mostly due to the fact that there are
> no active moderators, or at least Gavino is not kept out.  This spoils
> the atmosphere enough for me that I don't go in there at all anymore.
>
> I also remember various other trolls mostly being allowed free reign
> in #scheme.  Only when it got completely out of hand, sometimes Riastradh
> would step in to kick them, but he wasn't very active back then anymore,
> either.

My point is, of course, not that #scheme is/was a wonderland of 
meaningful and enjoyable interaction, but that the people who actually 
do anything interesting with scheme are, by and large, nice people, at 
least according to my experience.  And there's also numerous people who 
have nothing more than an interest in scheme who are also nice.  (And of 
course schemers are no different from many other groups of people who 
share an interest in this respect).

We can perhaps generalize from your experience and Felix's: most people 
who have something interesting to say don't have much inclination to 
spend time around vexatious people, so you/they/we tend to avoid places 
they (the vexatious ones) frequent. You're left with the vexatious ones, 
plus a few stubborn individuals, who often won't exactly be showing 
their best side due to the company, and may have become puppy-murderers 
as a result.

So what I think we're seeing here is not actually anything specific to 
scheme, or the people who like scheme, but rather just what happens when 
small communities have inadequate protection against trolls and other 
vexing characters.


-arc.