Rule Changes + New Restrictions

[John V]

Now the bad. Because the rules are much more open and there is much more potentia for abuse of them, their application can go weird in unexpected ways. Figuring out where in the rules to add breathing room, and how, and why, is more an art than a science. And rules interact with each other, creating a dynamic whole that is very complex. Sometomes, many times, even though there is an intention to improve things with such a rule change, because of the change from rule based less people-centric guidelines to those that are more based on personality, it's harder to predict results. What may have seemed an innocuous change when it was written on the blackboard during discussion of it, may morph into a monster of unseen proportions in actual practice. And what seemed like a potent stick for combatting some ill, may be dicovered to be useless in practice. Many of the consequences of a rule change are unpredictable and only known in hindsight. It's practice which will tell whether a significant change to the rules will result in better health and productivity of the community, or if it will bite the hand that feeds it by creating chaos, dissent, and unhappiness?

As I said, clear as mud. There's little point to publicly posting such "rules." They'd make more sense as internal mod guidelines.

ETA: A real rule would be more along the lines of: posts which only insult and do not add to the discussion are not allowed and will be deleted. The poster will receive a warning on the first offense, a suspension on the second, and will be banned on the third.