In an open group, how do we discern credible reports?

It occured to me this evening as we were chatting about one of our members reporting the theft of their property that we are open for a problem we haven't yet considered. When one of us reports someone, many of us tend to take that at face value and automatically ban that person from our SIMs.

With the Sellers Guild being an open group, what's to stop a griefer from joining and making a false accusation, with a lot of us banning them on word alone?

This is something we need to think about a bit. I don't have a good answer, but I do think it's only a matter of time before this happens, and the politics follow.

The group is only as effective as the integrity in our process. What might we do to shore this one up a bit?

I don't think we should become a vigilante group in any way. Banning people from your land is a personal choice. I did not ban the person from my land.

But in the end we are an alliance, as stated before, and not a dictatorship. Who you ban is your choice.

True, we are all individuals first then part of the group so we do have free will and can ban who we chose. However, you miss Sue's point entirely and she raises a good point. It will happen, if not in that capacity, another. It's just a matter of time.

I really like the idea of Seller's Guild being closed simply because I want to be free to discuss anything with the group. It doesn't smack of elitism at all. How many groups are you a member of that are open enrollment? Not many for me but I've never sat back and thought how duplicitous and stuck up are those groups without open enrollment.

Also I think we really need a clarification of what this groups purpose is because what I'm seeing is different ppl with different needs approaching the group and being told - sorry we can't do that, we can't hear that, we can't know that by part of the group while being embraced by another part.

Just my 2 cents and observations over the past few days.

Nominations for Chair have started in another thread. Once we have the person elected they can state the purpose I suppose. But I am not convinced we need one singular direction. I have no problems with us holding contrary views on things. What matters only is that we present some solutions to LL.

As for the group being open or closed this issue has been thrashed out and most people agreed that open was the least bad choice. Neither answer was perfect. But then I don't agree we should get into naming names. We arent the police force. People can name names if they want. Some may follow those directions and some wont.

We can't tell who is credible and who isn't at this point and the spam of reports and everyone jumping on a bandwagon and ready to torch someone without even bothering to check facts and proof is becoming out of hand...

Pitch forks and torches are now available at my shop. Only 5 small payments of L$49.99 over 3 months. (Patent pending) Its a sad day when we do guilty before proven innocent in a public channel. Not to mention it is against TOS and CS.

I wholeheartedly agree that vigilantism will give the guild a bad name. However, what about those cases where more than one credible individual reports the same experience with, say, a landswooper or a texture thief?

We can't name names here but it can be done elsewhere, like on SLUniverse. And to be equally fair about it, the accused (if they're brave and read the board) also has an opportunity to speak in their own defense. After that, banning is an individual decision.

In principle it is a sound idea - but in a land where there are more ALTs than actual people a "crowd of credible individuals" could be the same person.

*beams at Cindy* here! here! I hope the person posting on SLUniverse informs the accused.
And lets not make this officially part of the Guild, it just so happens that people who want to do this are, obviously, sellers and content makers and likely to be a part of the Guild. But then since I am not dictator, yet LOL, maybe that will change after the voting.

Until a close personal friend of mine was ripped off for $40,000L worth of land, I was reluctant to engage in any public crucifixions and hoped that the Lindens would handle said crucifixion for us. But that incident, and the casual shrugs of indifference from LL, made me change my mind. I want the thief tarred, feathered, and strung up by his private regions.

I guess one's vigilantism depends on how much you've been personally affected, then?