Annual Report of the OSMF Talk-List Moderators
May 23, 2024
This report chronicles actions taken by the five moderators ("Moderation Team") appointed tomoderate the OpenStreetMap Foundation-sponsored talk lists at talk@openstreetmap.org (the "talklist") and osmf-talk@ openstreetmap.org (the "osmf-talk list") and at three channels ("general","foundation", and "tagging") on the community forum at community.openstreetmap.org. This
chronology omits decisions to refrain from action on forum messages flagged for attention, when amoderator determined that no action was warranted, as no record of such decisions has been
maintained. It also omits trivial interventions, such as splitting forum topics, dealing with spam, androutine reminders to adhere to the Etiquette Guidelines.
May 23, 2023 - User Adamant1 was admonished by the Moderation Team and was advised at that timeto avoid further violations of the Etiquette Guidelines.
June 10, 2023 - The Moderation Team voted unanimously to suspend user Wynndale for one week fromthe talk lists and forum.
https://wiki.osmfoundation.org/w/images/e/e7/20230610_Etiquette_voilation_by_Wynndale.pdf
August 14, 2023 - Moderator Mustard and Moderator McGovern admonished user NorthCrab forviolating the Etiquette Guidelines in a forum thread. Moderator McGovern temporarily locked thethread. https://community.openstreetmap.org/t/why-does-osmf-budget-25-000-onamazon/102475/104
August 15, 2023 - The Moderation Team recommended unanimously to the Board of Directors that user
Adamant1 be suspended from all OSM activities for one year for gross violations of the Etiquette
Guidelines in multiple forum channels, bearing in mind past bad conduct in the wiki, in changeset
comments, and in direct messages, as well as a one-year suspension from the Ukraine channel.
August 20, 2023 - Moderator Mustard formally warned user NorthCrab to cease and desist fromviolating the Etiquette Guidelines in multiple forum threads. User NorthCrab replied that he considered
the warning "invalid" on grounds that in his opinion the Moderation Team has no jurisdiction over theforum and that the Etiquette Guidelines do not apply to the forum.
https://community.openstreetmap.org/t/formal-warning-about-bad-conduct/102701
August 22, 2023 -- The Moderation Team unanimously imposed on user NorthCrab a 28-day suspension
from the general, general:tagging, and foundation channels of the community forum, which had theeffect of suspending him from all channels on the forum due to software limitations of Discourse.
Following receipt of a final warning not to push back against the admonition and warning, or sanctions
would be imposed, NorthCrab stated that he still had "valid concerns" about the admonition andwarning.
https://wiki.osmfoundation.org/wiki/Etiquette_Violations_by_NorthCrab#Overview_of_violations
That same day, NorthCrab published an appeal to the OSMF Board of Directors on the forum's This Site
Feedback channel.
https://community.openstreetmap.org/t/appeal-of-moderation-action-by-apm-wa/102858

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August 24, 2023 -- The Moderation Team implemented a resolution of the OSMF Board of Directors tosuspend user Adamant1 from all OSM-related activity for one year.
https://wiki.osmfoundation.org/wiki/OSMF_resolution_Adamant1
September 2, 2023 -- Moderator Mustard locked a thread when the discussion degenerated to
namecalling. https://community.openstreetmap.org/t/how-to-massive-update-uploadpostcodes/103229/30
September 4, 2023 -- Moderator Mustard re-opened the thread on request, and admonished allparticipants in that thread to adhere to the Etiquette Guidelines.
https://community.openstreetmap.org/t/how-to-massive-update-upload-postcodes/103229/32
September 5, 2023 -- Moderator Mustard hid a flagged post to the Foundation channel and admonisheda user for showing disrespect to other community members.
https://community.openstreetmap.org/t/your-post-on-osm-carto/103516 andhttps://community.openstreetmap.org/t/osm-carto-maintainers-refusing-to-render-approved-highwaybusway/103289
September 16, 2023 -- Following consultations with moderators, the DWG, and wiki administrators, theModeration Team submitted a policy proposal to the OSMF Board of Directors for handlingrecommendations of project-wide suspensions and bans of community members.
December 23, 2023 -- Moderator Mustard advised a community member that complaining to the forum
about a DWG action is pointless and advised that member to appeal any adverse DWG decision to theOSMF Board of Directors, and furthermore to adhere to the Etiquette Guidelines.
https://community.openstreetmap.org/t/problem-with-vandalism-and-2-dwg-members/107298/21 andhttps://community.openstreetmap.org/t/problem-with-vandalism-and-2-dwg-members/107298/27
January 20, 2024 -- Moderator Mustard warned a community member not to reopen a topic (whether anon-existent bridge should be added to OSM) that had been closed twice at request of community
members on pain of a possible suspension.
https://community.openstreetmap.org/t/cat-hai-cat-ba-bridge-project-keeps-undoing/107416/16 andhttps://community.openstreetmap.org/t/ha-tien-phu-quoc-sea-crossing-bridge-project/108267/4
April 10, 2024 -- Moderator McGovern on behalf of the Moderation Team deleted several spam posts
from the forum related to generation of false GPX traces by a multi-account troll.
April 20, 2024 -- The Moderation Team voted unanimously to suspend user slice0 from the forum forgross violations of the Etiquette Guidelines, to wit: propagation of blatant misinformation. This action
followed moderators' hiding of forum posts offering misinformation and admonitions from members of
the community not to spread misinformation.
https://osmfoundation.org/w/images/8/84/20240420_slice0.pdf

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