Re: Recruitment post decisions

["Wanko, Christopher G, CFCTRCFFIN" <apollo@ATT.COM>]

This is in reply to a question posed to me privately.  Since it is not the
first question I've
fielded on the topic, I thought I would share my views on it publicly and
save a few future keystrokes.

> I'm not sure where the whole conversation started but it seems to be
> about whether job postings are allowed on the list.
> Personally i would like to know what kind of work is out there just so
that I can keep
> track of the world wide marketplace.  But I also think that
> something to distinguish a job from a tech posting is called for.

I appreciate that people like to know what their skills are worth.  However,
the list is a forum to exchange technical knowledge, and that gets
compromised and misused when recruiters are allowed to post job ads.  My
reasoning stems from years of reading comp.programming and comp.lang.c/cobol
and seeing the technical discussions interspersed with job offers and ads.

There are well-defined areas of the newsgroups, web sites, and mailing lists
of the world for job ads.  While it would seem logical to narrowly focus a
job search in a place where the desired skills congregate, it's usually done
in an intrusive fashion.

Since I don't own the list (nor would I ever be elected Leader of the List),
I don't decide what posts are off-topic.  It is well-known that I despise
job ads in a technical forum, but my views are countered by others on the
list, and by the owner.  Since we lack a clear consensus, the job ads stay.

However, ignoring the significant portion of list readers that do *not* like
the job ads isn't very fair either.  I propose a compromise based on a prior
suggestion: tag the subject lines in a way that clearly distinguishes it
from real questions; if the writer fails to tag the subject line so it can
be easily filtered away, that writer is removed from the list.

List rules can unequivocally state this so that writers are aware of the
protocol and penalty.

This method allows readers to decide if job ads are what they wish to read.
It also allows writers to post job ads freely and without adverse
commentary, as long as the subject line has a clear identifier consistent
with job ads.

I would add that writers attempting to foil filters are guilty of spamming
and would be removed as well.  If we put a process in place to ensure that
job ads are seen by interested parties, then the only purpose of getting
around the protocol would be to harass everyone else.