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From: fetrow@bones.stat.washington.edu (David Fetrow)
Newsgroups: alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk,comp.admin.policy
Subject: Re: Ohio State University CIS Policies
Message-ID: <1991Jun5.234114.18168@milton.u.washington.edu>
Date: 5 Jun 91 23:41:14 GMT
References: <1991Jun3.165946.12637@eff.org> <1991Jun3.173550.13928@eff.org> <1991Jun3.232500.24850@ms.uky.edu> <1991Jun4.160947.7193@eng.umd.edu>
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In article <1991Jun4.160947.7193@eng.umd.edu> russotto@eng.umd.edu (Matthew T. Russotto) writes:
>
>I was barred from use of the computer systems at the UMCP computer science
>center without warning.  The message put up when I attempted to log on told
>me to talk to "the System Administrator", whoever the heck that might be. So
>I called the guy I knew logged on as 'root'---  he told me that I had been
>locked out by a different guy, the "accounts administrator".  I talked to this
>'accounts administrator', who told me that he had heard reports that I had
>been 'bothering people' (by messing with X-windows), but that to get my account
>back, I would have to talk to the 'system administrator'.  I talked to him
>again, and was sent back to the 'accounts administrator', who sent me
>back to the 'system administrator'.  I got sick of the obvious runaround, and
>went and applied for a number of new accounts under phony names.  Eventually,
>they brought me to the judicial programs office or having all those accounts,
>and I was found responsible for 'theft of services'.
>
>If there had been some sort of due process in the first place, perhaps I
>wouldn't have had such trouble.  Informal stuff only works when both sides are
>trying for a real solution-- not when the side with more power only wants to
>avoid what they percieve as a problem by getting rid of the student involved.
>--
>Matthew T. Russotto	russotto@eng.umd.edu	russotto@wam.umd.edu
>     .sig under construction, like the rest of this campus.

 I have a slightly different perspective on this. "Due Process" should always
be around, at least as a backup to informal procedures (e.g. a student
ombudsman) but it doesn't (in my experience) speed things up to invoke them.
It doesn't fix a place with bad communication and bad attitudes (at least not
by itself).

 Of course I'm writing from the luxurious vantage point of someone who knows
virtually all the users of our system with an office right off the main terminal
room. It gives the place more of a "team" feel than the "us and them" often
(but not always) seen in larger installations and helps keep the communications
channels flowing (it helps a lot to be able to see how customers interact with
the machines).

 -dave fetrow-                        fetrow@biostat.washington.edu  (internet)
 
Actually, unix is a very user-friendly system.  Its just that it is
particular about which users it chooses to be friendly with. -The Oracle