[wp-forums] Ethical practices of consultants

[James Huff]

If we take it off the forums, we might as well not do it, since the problem here is unethical consultants preying on forum users.


________
James Huff
http://www.macmanx.com
http://programnotes.wikia.com

On Jun 30, 2010, at 5:46 PM, Chris Kasten wrote:

> On Wed, Jun 30, 2010 at 6:07 PM, Mark Ratledge <mark at markratledge.com>wrote:
> 
>> 
>> On Jun 30, 2010, at 5:39 PM, James Huff wrote:
>> 
>>> The basic format of such a topic (which would be closed and sticky, btw)
>> would include a brief bit on what we consider to be "ethical practices"...
>> 
>> Thoughts:
>> 
>> I think there should be real clarity in what is considered to be ethical
>> and what is considered to be not ethical.
>> 
>> Should people or consultants *never* email people offering to fix what they
>> need fixed? Can people or consultants email help seekers with a simple
>> "contact me if you are interested?"
>> 
>> Sounds like there will be a list of unethical consultants; will there be a
>> list of ethical consultants? And who decides that?
>> 
> 
> Good lord, not us!
> 
> This all has the potential to be a good idea right up until we start naming
> names. Then it augers into the ground faster than a stunt-show jet after the
> pilot punched out.
> 
> I know some of you probably follow the WP Pros mailing list. Have you
> noticed how often the "blacklist topic" comes up? 3 times this year so far I
> think (I'm not sure, I only follow that list casually). Pretty sure once in
> June though.  It generates a lot of noise and then kinda peters out -- until
> the next time.
> 
> Ultimately it just gets messy around criteria defining and the very
> realistic anticipation of "he said / she said" debates. I'd *really* prefer
> not to head down that road on the forums.
> 
> 
>> 
>> Should be people be pointed to jobs.wordpress.net or sites like Elance?
>> 
>> I can already see this: what's the process when a consultant is blacklisted
>> and they subsequently raise hell about it in the forums? Delete the thread?
>> Delete the user?
>> 
>> 
> We don't have the tools to ever win that battle. Too easy for them to just
> create a new account and come back (believe me, I've fought and lost those
> battles. You "win" when they get tired or bored...)
> 
> Dunno about you guys, but while I'm pretty quite on the forums these days I
> still spend at least an hour a day going through the akismet queue. All this
> does is give us more traffic in the queue with the inevitable battles and
> bozo-bit flipping.
> 
> If there's truly merit in the blacklisting let's take it off the forums and
> work with the folks in the WP Pros list.
> 
> My dos centavos,
> 
> Chris_K (formerly known as HandySolo)
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