A House Divided
On Monday, May 29th, my partner and I were in our kitchen, talking. It was beautiful out, sun shining, cats lounging in the window, and a day off from work, but it wasn't a happy kitchen. A few days before, we'd discovered the OTW management was being actively obstructive to attempts to treat security concerns with the seriousness they deserved, which led to azarias, my partner, publicly talking about a lot of things that she'd previously been keeping quiet about in the belief that the worst risks to others were at least fixed. Azarias had posted that she didn't think the org was salvageable; on that Monday, I argued that I thought it was. That it was worth salvaging, that there were too many good people left, and that the org's purpose mattered too much to me, to just give up.
The next day the org sent out an internal message in which they did their best to strongly imply that azarias was somehow involved in the CSEM spam attack volunteers experienced in 2022, one evidently so carelessly thought-through that Legal's portion of the statement blatantly contradicts the Board's stance. You can find the text of that statement here.
This is not actually what I'm going to talk about.
I wanted to talk about it, much sooner than this. A broad, factual laying-out of the situation has been needed for weeks, and I have the advantage of being able to consult one of the chief participants of the story by, at most, walking to the stairs to yell down/up. Unfortunately, if you've never been in a position to try and do such a write-up for a situation that you are this close to, I have a word of advice: don't. Fortunately for me someone else has undertaken such a summary, across a more comprehensive array of topics than I could have managed. Thank you, deeply and sincerely.
I would also love to be able to go in to individually counter some of the minor distortions that are now leading to gleeful nitpicking "takedown" posts and comments, as if this was all some fandom drama that could be solved by pedantic arguments over word-choice. For example, there's quibbling arising from (other) people saying that azarias was "assigned" to handle all the CSAM/CSEM tickets. Azarias volunteered to undertake those tickets because A) that is simply how the system works, you are almost never assigned tickets directly, and indeed there was no mechanism to do so other than verbal directive, and B) she had relevant experience in such work due to her years on LJ Abuse before the SixApart purchase, and believed that, while of course policies would differ, the matter of legitimate CSAM/CSEM would be treated with the same seriousness and support it was given in those days. She continued handling those tickets because of the knowledge that if she did not, the tickets and violations would remain, and have to be taken by another volunteer with less experience with such content.
This urge to take one for the team is a known factor in volunteer organizations, where everyone involved has a natural urge to want to try to help: it's why they volunteered. It's for exactly this reason that tracking volunteer time/commitments is a standard best practice, so that you do not fall into a trap where even with everyone involved having the very best intentions, you accidentally set up a situation where one person is overburdened through people simply being unaware how much is going to one person. Like I said, it's a typical problem, so organizations have over the years developed a comprehensive set of potential strategies to handle it.
The OTW has an endless list of reasons why standard best practice cannot apply to them, why their particular needs prohibit this particular solution, and also that particular solution, and also that other particular solution. Some of them, in isolation, are likely true. Many more difficulties probably relate to conditions that were true once, or in a specific set of circumstances that somehow became generalized; one of the org's founders even discussed being disturbed that the org's early reasoning for not offering membership in exchange for volunteer hours "apparently has trickled down into org culture as 'tracking volunteer hours bad.'" That thread contains many good reasons for a specific practice at a specific time, but freely acknowledges that many of them are no longer valid, and doubtless due for reconsideration. But org leadership has remained hostile to any suggestions along those lines.
When you get that response to as many different kinds of best practices across as many different topics as I know the OTW has objected to over the years, it becomes a systemic issue. And so the org is constantly trying to bodge together homemade solutions, lagging behind the curve, and leaving its volunteers in unnecessarily difficult positions across the org. Many of those same volunteers are ignorant that there even are already-existing solutions that could make their work easier.
This is not the first time major failures have happened as a result of those knowledge-gaps, that institutional opacity. It's not even the first time where communication and commitment-tracking failures have led to a spectacular blow-up centered around one volunteer.
( That is what I'm going to talk about today. )
I will be doing my best to keep a list of posts of people who have spoken up on these and related matters, and their topics of discussion, here. I provide my comment section for anyone who wishes to discuss things in it. If you're concerned about maintaining anonymity, I am sorry that I do not have the reliable capacity to moderate anon comments, but if you would like to have me present your story for you, I have created a gmail account, inanabundanceofcaution @ gmail.com. I can only post what is sent to me, not verify it, and I cannot provide a promise that no eyes but mine will see it; again, a realistic and honest assessment of my physical capabilities means that I may have to ask a close friend (not azarias, for a few reasons) for help separating spam from sincere responses.
( Links )
The next day the org sent out an internal message in which they did their best to strongly imply that azarias was somehow involved in the CSEM spam attack volunteers experienced in 2022, one evidently so carelessly thought-through that Legal's portion of the statement blatantly contradicts the Board's stance. You can find the text of that statement here.
This is not actually what I'm going to talk about.
I wanted to talk about it, much sooner than this. A broad, factual laying-out of the situation has been needed for weeks, and I have the advantage of being able to consult one of the chief participants of the story by, at most, walking to the stairs to yell down/up. Unfortunately, if you've never been in a position to try and do such a write-up for a situation that you are this close to, I have a word of advice: don't. Fortunately for me someone else has undertaken such a summary, across a more comprehensive array of topics than I could have managed. Thank you, deeply and sincerely.
I would also love to be able to go in to individually counter some of the minor distortions that are now leading to gleeful nitpicking "takedown" posts and comments, as if this was all some fandom drama that could be solved by pedantic arguments over word-choice. For example, there's quibbling arising from (other) people saying that azarias was "assigned" to handle all the CSAM/CSEM tickets. Azarias volunteered to undertake those tickets because A) that is simply how the system works, you are almost never assigned tickets directly, and indeed there was no mechanism to do so other than verbal directive, and B) she had relevant experience in such work due to her years on LJ Abuse before the SixApart purchase, and believed that, while of course policies would differ, the matter of legitimate CSAM/CSEM would be treated with the same seriousness and support it was given in those days. She continued handling those tickets because of the knowledge that if she did not, the tickets and violations would remain, and have to be taken by another volunteer with less experience with such content.
This urge to take one for the team is a known factor in volunteer organizations, where everyone involved has a natural urge to want to try to help: it's why they volunteered. It's for exactly this reason that tracking volunteer time/commitments is a standard best practice, so that you do not fall into a trap where even with everyone involved having the very best intentions, you accidentally set up a situation where one person is overburdened through people simply being unaware how much is going to one person. Like I said, it's a typical problem, so organizations have over the years developed a comprehensive set of potential strategies to handle it.
The OTW has an endless list of reasons why standard best practice cannot apply to them, why their particular needs prohibit this particular solution, and also that particular solution, and also that other particular solution. Some of them, in isolation, are likely true. Many more difficulties probably relate to conditions that were true once, or in a specific set of circumstances that somehow became generalized; one of the org's founders even discussed being disturbed that the org's early reasoning for not offering membership in exchange for volunteer hours "apparently has trickled down into org culture as 'tracking volunteer hours bad.'" That thread contains many good reasons for a specific practice at a specific time, but freely acknowledges that many of them are no longer valid, and doubtless due for reconsideration. But org leadership has remained hostile to any suggestions along those lines.
When you get that response to as many different kinds of best practices across as many different topics as I know the OTW has objected to over the years, it becomes a systemic issue. And so the org is constantly trying to bodge together homemade solutions, lagging behind the curve, and leaving its volunteers in unnecessarily difficult positions across the org. Many of those same volunteers are ignorant that there even are already-existing solutions that could make their work easier.
This is not the first time major failures have happened as a result of those knowledge-gaps, that institutional opacity. It's not even the first time where communication and commitment-tracking failures have led to a spectacular blow-up centered around one volunteer.
( That is what I'm going to talk about today. )
I will be doing my best to keep a list of posts of people who have spoken up on these and related matters, and their topics of discussion, here. I provide my comment section for anyone who wishes to discuss things in it. If you're concerned about maintaining anonymity, I am sorry that I do not have the reliable capacity to moderate anon comments, but if you would like to have me present your story for you, I have created a gmail account, inanabundanceofcaution @ gmail.com. I can only post what is sent to me, not verify it, and I cannot provide a promise that no eyes but mine will see it; again, a realistic and honest assessment of my physical capabilities means that I may have to ask a close friend (not azarias, for a few reasons) for help separating spam from sincere responses.
( Links )