
Mozilla now banning people for grumpy bug reports - AndrewDucker
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=668655#c1
======
asadotzler
It's my opinion that when you call a Thunderbird developer "some simian" and
when you tell them to "Die die die die" and "Seriously, screw you" and you say
things like "You know, every time I see a comment from [a specific Thunderbird
developer] I just want to reach out through the intertubes and cut off his
damned fingers to prevent him ever writing any code..." and when you're warned
in a very civil tone with a clear explanation of why your approach is hurting
rather than helping <https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=579372#c3>
and you still come back with more of that same approach, I think being banned
from Bugzilla is a perfectly reasonable thing.

~~~
shii
You're right, he is being a little abrasive there, but I'd take it in stride
and enjoy; this sort of thing is normal on the Internet.

And besides, he's right. Why did they replace cmd-f like that?

~~~
adw
Why should we accept unnecessarily abrasive behaviour as acceptable anywhere?

~~~
shii
Because sometimes actually helpful bug reports come packaged with snarky
people. I see little problem with that. There's guys like zedshaw who always
flame and get flamed, yet still provide lots of value. Plus it livens things
up a bit. Nothing wrong with a little sarcastic banter here and there. Some
people have their panties in a tight knot sometimes over some silly things.

Not everything has to be so srs bznss all the time folks.

From this banning, Mozilla has just lost a useful bug reporter and one of the
founding fathers of GNU.

~~~
asadotzler
Being a founding father of GNU does not give you the right to be a bully.
Telling a developer that you want to cut off his hands so he can't program is
not helpful and people who behave like that are not useful bug reporters. They
are bullies and they are toxic to an open source project. No project should
tolerate personal attacks like that.

------
jerrya
Richard Mlynarik is a hacker with a deservedly excellent reputation. And
sometimes he has a sharp tongue which in context can be both enjoyable and
terrifying.

But here's the important part for entrepreneurs: what percentage of users of
mozilla products or any product bother to submit bug reports?

What Richard is doing here is investing his time into making Mozilla better. I
am always amazed at the projects and companies that hold their users in
contempt and get upset when bug reports or forum messages express a user's
frustration. What they should be doing is sincerely expressing their thanks
that the user would give them any message at all, and not just switch to a
competitor, or just badmouth them to their friends.

I see nothing in this bug report that deserves banning, and it is certainly
Mozilla's loss and their user's loss that they would ban Mlynarik instead of
listening to him.

And to make matters worse, he's absolutely correct here too.

~~~
MrUnknown
He was being a complete idiot in his bug report. The moderator stated that he
has been warned many times before. He completely deserved to be banned after
being warned that his actions will result in being banned.

Sure, he is submitting bug reports, but his childish behavior shouldn't have
to be tolerated because of this.

~~~
gojomo
If this report is representative, I don't think a thousand similar reports
would deserve a ban. There's some exasperation, some sarcasm, some foot-
stomping while expressing strong opinions. But there's no profanity or
insults. The strongest negative word used is 'stupid', and it's applied to a
question in the UI, not any person. The details and rationale for considering
the software's behavior an interaction faux pas are strong.

It's hard to even see which part of 'Bugzilla Etiquette' this report violates:

<https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/page.cgi?id=etiquette.html>

If other reports are worse, that's another matter. But if so, it seems odd
this relatively mild report would be the final trigger that brings down the
banhammer. (If there's a reliable pattern of abuse, just wait for the next
non-mild incident.)

~~~
asadotzler
You missed the reports where he called developers simians, shouted "screw you"
and said he'd like to cut off a specific developers hands so he couldn't code
any more. (by the way, bugzilla is totally searchable, so if you want, you can
see this stuff for yourself before you step up to defend a bully.)

~~~
gojomo
Then why not announce the ban after those blatant transgressions, or the next
blatant one if they arrive reliably, rather than after a mild one?

BTW, a simple Bugzilla search for [Richard Mlynarik] returns "Zarro Boogs
found". Similarly, a Google search for [site:bugzilla.mozilla.org Mlynarik
simian] returns nothing.

I'm sure I'll find the right kind of search eventually – I did find a Mlynarik
'screw you' comment via Google – but if the action is justified by examples
with exact quotes, you might as well supply links rather than leave many
people searching.

And why personalize this by accusing me of "stepping up to defend a bully"?
I've addressed the exact action and manner of action taken in the above-
referenced report, with the caveat that other examples would change the
analysis. I've defended the precise comment in the 'compact dialog' report,
not the person's history.

~~~
asadotzler
He was given a warning and a second chance after the awful behavior in other
bugs. When he failed to heed that warning he was banned. If you had read the
report, you'd have seen that he had been given a previous warning. That's key
information. Weren't you curious about the previous warning? Didn't it occur
to you that he might have already been treading on really thin ice and
continued misbehavior, even minor might be enough to tip the balance? It
doesn't seem to me that you were. It seemed to me you were stepping up to his
defense without all the facts. That's a dangerous thing to do because you
might find that you're defending someone that's you'd rather not be.

~~~
gojomo
_"if you had read the report"_? _"weren't you curious"_?

It should have been clear from my conditionals ("If this report is
representative…"; "If other reports are worse…") that I was curious about the
alluded-to prior history, and my analysis was contingent upon the (at the time
unlinked) specifics.

The concern I still have is that this latest comment was so mild and non-
insulting that one possible interpretation is that the previous warning(s)
were working. He depersonalized his criticisms into the zone where, if judged
dispassionately, they could be more more helpful than hurtful.

Now, you've also been quoting other incidents ("simians", "die die die") that
might be more recent and salient. I can't find the context for those.
(Searches only turn up this thread.)

But I am only opining on the exact comments and actions referenced here. I'm
not defending any particular person (who I don't know), but one most recent
comment. And I'm not criticizing a general policy of exiling recidivist
assholes, only the act of pulling the trigger after a comment that, standing
alone, is innocuous.

If someone else over the years posted a thousand comments with the same level
of sarcasm and exasperation, but also the same level of actual useful info
(and no insults), as in Mlynarik's _most recent_ comment, would they get a
ban? Or even a warning? I suspect not. They'd just be considered a cranky but
useful bug reporter.

------
wladimir
Good. When filing bug reports you should try to work with the team and be as
helpful as possible in solving the issue. Being a dick does not help anyone.

~~~
vijaydev
Expressing frustrations is not being a dick.

~~~
MrUnknown
Expressing frustrations in a completely smart ass way is being a dick.

~~~
Kapelson
Regardless of whether he was being a dick or not, the issue is still there. A
helpful dick is still valuable, and banning him is really only hurting the
project as a whole.

~~~
MrUnknown
Most people don't tend to respond well to these types of complaints.

I used to work as customer service for a website and would constantly get
sarcastic help requests. It made me hate them and I certainly didn't want to
help them. In fact, I either ignored the ticket or just responded slowly as I
handled tickets with more reasonable people.

The people saying this is a "great" ticket and wish more reports were given
this way are full of it. You will very quickly get tired of it because you
realize you are doing everything you can to help them and they really don't
care enough to give you enough respect to speak with you as a human being in a
conversation. Instead choosing to be sarcastic and insult your efforts to
help.

I see this the other way around. I am thankful a huge bunch of volunteers
spend many hours of their day creating software I use daily without having to
pay for it. They don't deserve to be treated like this.

------
arihant
If someone writes that kind of bug report for code that I write, the first
thing I would do is take my shoe and beat myself to death. The man being
frustrated is your fault. High chances there are million others who feel the
same, at least he is conveying it to you. You're shooting the messenger here.

If your critics give up on you and stop telling you how much you suck and how
much they hate you, that's a very bad place to be in.

~~~
asadotzler
If your critic is a bully and he comes into your workplace saying he'd like to
physically maim you so you can't work any more and calls you names and think
it's OK because he was, (in his own words, while he's verbally abusing you)
"the second person after Stallman to ever write any GNU code" then I think
you'd call him a bully, treat his attempts at participation as toxic, and kick
him out of your workplace. You might even call the cops. Actually, you would
call the cops. And you'd be right to.

~~~
arihant
Sure I will.

But if he writes me a letter letting me know that I suck and that I should
rather die than writing buggy code making millions of lives miserable
everyday, I'd be fine.

He didn't throw stones at Mozilla labs, he filed and commented on a bug
report. Its just text, not a man in their office. Virtual != Real.

Its a mind over matter issue. And as Twain would agree..if you don't mind, it
doesn't matter.

~~~
evilduck
If a frustrated user repeatedly sent me threats of physical violence packaged
in a complaint letter, I'd turn it over to the police in a heartbeat. That's
absolutely not a helpfully frustrated user, that's a real threat. This
behavior is not just socially unacceptable, it's _so unacceptable_ that there
are longstanding legal structures in place that make it illegal. There are no
distinctions between virtual and physical here, it's a real person
communicating a threat to another real person using a digital medium instead
of a physical one. Filming yourself committing a crime in digital format vs.
physical tape/film is basically the same idea. "It's just bits" doesn't hold
water or we'd not have most of the internet child porn laws, or most of the
copyright and patent law cases going on, none of the internet censorship laws,
Wikileaks wouldn't feel threatened, etc.

People are routinely arrested and convicted for basically the same type of
behavior directed at public officials spawned from aggravations and
frustrations of similar sources..."bugs" in laws, perceived unfairness,
disagreements on important decisions, racism, xenophobia, etc, etc, etc (I
suspect enforcement is greater in this situation because public officials tend
to know the law and exercise their rights against this behavior more often).

------
JimBlandy
I don't understand why so many commenters on this thread consider verbal abuse
a mark of sincerity. You can say everything you need to say without it.
Mlynarik has pursued this style of interaction with people for decades, so it
doesn't express any particular intensity of feeling; he just likes crapping on
people. Maybe you don't mind reading it when it's not directed at you, but why
should the recipient put up with it?

------
rickmb
Although Mozilla would be quite right to ban someone if this kind of behavior
becomes repetitive, I do find these kind of bug reports _extremely_ useful,
because they also convey the impact it has on the user. I can easily identify
with his reaction to this "feature", and if my software annoys people like
that, I would really want to know.

In fact, this kind of irritating software behavior is one of the reasons I
ditched TB a long time ago. I'm sure that was considerable less useful than
actually filing a mildly offensive bug report.

------
kstenerud
I see this as the open source equivalent of firing your customer.

Just as there exists a certain kind of customer who increases the difficulty
in running a business, so too there exists a certain kind of user who
increases the difficulty in running an open source project. The project as a
whole will be much healthier in the long run with the small percentage of
users who generate the largest amount of grief removed from the equation.

Richard is deliberately making things difficult for Firefox. It doesn't matter
that he's "taking the time to highlight a bug". It doesn't matter what his
street cred is. He's behaving like a spoiled child throwing a tantrum. If he
started stomping his feet and screaming at someone in my house for serving the
potatoes too soft, I'd throw him out.

For reference (firing your customer):
[http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2006/04/the_customer...](http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2006/04/the_customer_is.html)

------
BasDirks
How on earth does that deserve a ban?

Mozilla would hate to have Linus Torvalds as a contributor.

~~~
masklinn
> How on earth does that deserve a ban?

That does not deserve a ban in and of itself. Repeated instances of that
following warnings of unacceptable behavior, on the other hand, does.

It would seem Richard here was in the second situation:

> You've been warned repeatedly about the Bugzilla Etiquette rules, and you're
> still failing to respect them.

~~~
felipemnoa
Linus has no qualms of telling someone he is full of BS:

<http://pardel.wordpress.com/2007/09/07/90/>

~~~
masklinn
Which really is irrelevant to the subject at hand.

------
gatopeich
I'm another Thunderbird user, who assumed its bugs will never get fixed and
will jump to a better alternative when I see it.

I fully sympathize with that Richard guy, and share his discontent at this
serious issue happening in too many open source projects: the "community
before quality" meme. Some people just don't understand that without quality
the project will just die. Slowly but surely. Some other people seem to just
want to see their name in the credits, even if they essentially screw the
project in the process. Screw them, if that's what they think.

Did anybody notice that the bug had been clinging there for +15 months and it
had 12 duplicates submitted by users and there were being ignored???

Also, as an experienced developer I can't figure a reasonable justification to
the injection of such bug in the first place, specially when a beta-tester
reported it in due time. Breaking the behavior of Ctrl-F is an awesomely
visible and annoying bug!!!

Regarding the insults, well, when you know that nothing will be done to
improve things and you are essentially wasting your time there, you don't f
__*ing care about being banned.

------
pbiggar
If those comments were made on HN, they'd be voted down, flagged, and by now
the poster would have been banned.

------
hollerith
Reminds me of Eric Naggum on comp.lang.lisp in the late 1990s. Although I have
no memories of Eric's ever threatening anyone with violence, he wrote hundreds
of very long very angry harangues, most containing insults and ad-hominems --
and (unlike Richard Mlynarik) he seemed to believe deep down that his debating
opponents wanted to _harm_ him.

As in the present case, people argued that for Eric to continue his abuse
would harm Lisp by driving away contributors and adoptees. Difference is that
it was very difficult to ban someone from a newsgroup, and Eric never was.

~~~
xyzzyz
Yeah, they were really strong and aggresive, and I really would people not to
be like this, but at least I do not recall him attacking anyone else first.
When the issue at hand was purely technical, he was really civil and really to
the point.

------
kermitthehermit
Mozilla is trying to be like Google with Thunderbird and Firefox, but they are
failing.

This guy who's getting / who got banned deserved it, but the changes they keep
making aren't all that good.

Firefox is eating a lot of memory, Thunderbird does odd things at times.

A friend has 500 corporate workstations which are running Firefox 3.6.x and
Thunderbird 3.1.x. Will he upgrade them to the newer versions, in which they
keep pouring poorly tested code? No, he will switch to something else.

------
lhnz
I agree that he's impertinent and rude, but I wouldn't have banned him. The
best way of dealing with certain people would be to patch bugzilla with the
ability to block people for periods of time: a week, a couple of months, a
year, forever.

~~~
asadotzler
Bugzilla has the ability to block a user from using his or her account. that's
what "banning" is in this context. That block can be lifted at any time. I
regularly disable accounts for abuse, have a long conversation with that
person and end up re-instating their account because they've come to
understand that what they were doing was counter-productive and agreed not to
do it more.

------
keyle
I'd call this "how not to deal with customer feedbacks". If it were paying
customers, they'd have none left with this attitude!

~~~
ww520
Sure you can take abuse when you are paid, except they are doing it for free
and deserve better treatment.

~~~
wccrawford
Except that most companies don't. Abusive customers are bad for the whole
company and the other customers. They lower morale, raise costs, and are
generally not worth the money they bring in.

So if a company wouldn't do it for money, why would someone take that abuse
for free?

They wouldn't. And they didn't.

------
eli
Well, I hope the customer got his money back.

------
kahawe
Title is way off on this one...

It boils down to:

> _You've been warned repeatedly about the Bugzilla Etiquette rules, and
> you're still failing to respect them._

------
Stythys
good.

