>>Michel Fournier has banned JVP by blocking the IP address of his work.
>>
>>IMO, blocking IP addresses is ridiculous! I have several clients, one of them is the KLM (Royal Dutch Airlines). Suppose the UT wants to block me... are they going to block everyone who works at the KLM, a company with over 20,000 employees???? Although it may be the case that I'm the only person here who visits the Universal Thread, that would really be overkill.
>>
>>Another reason why blocking IP addresses is ridiculous: The to be blocked person can go to his neighbor or an internet cafe and log in with another name. How is the UT gonna tackle that situation???
>>
>>Yet another reason why blocking IP addresses is ridiculous: At home only those who have DSL probably have a permanent IP address. Those who have not, have a temporary IP address for the time of the session. Useless to block such an address, don't you think???
>>
>>Last, but not least, reason why blocking IP addresses is ridiculous: While the UT has the right (and the obligation) to ban certain individuals when they 'misbehave', that does not necessarilly imply that this individual also looses the right to check what others are writing about him/her, after the banishment. In the case of JVP, I think it is his right to still visit the Universal Thread and read what others are (currently) writing about him. For that, he needs access via his IP addresses.
>
>Peter,
>
>I agree. However, the problem is how do you prevent someone from using an alias if you lock out the account? You can't.
>
>While this may be Michel's only option to prevent access, to me, it goes against the First Amendment to the US Constitution.
>
>We're all free to express our opinions as long as they are respectively worded. In my mind, too many folks hide behind the anomousity of the Internet to say things that they wouldn't dare say to someone F2F.

George,

The more I think about it, the less I think that banishment is an effective method. Rather than banish, the moderator should react QUICKLY and FIRMLY on any CLEAR violation, NOT by banning the violator, but by excluding the violator from THAT specific thread. Okay, one warning should be allowed, by marking the violating message as sensitive and allowing the violator to update the message. To prevent that the moderator's own subjective opinion influences the decision, other participators should have the right to ask the moderator to re-include the excluded person.

Moreover, it should also be impossible to REPLY to sensitive messages! This makes it even less attractive to post an insult or attack, for the discussion will end there and that's seldom the goal of the poster.

An indirect way of replying to a sensitive message is starting a new thread. Well, such a thread should be blocked right away, of course.

I think that such a mechanism would have worked well even in the case of JVP, and of BillS.

I agree with you on your remark about people daring say things on the Internet they don't dare to say F2F. Anonymity indeed is a factor. That's why I am glad that we are not allowed here to log in anonymous. We all know that one day or another we might be on the same project and that too might be an impetus to try to be respectful to each other.