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Comment by vijaydev | Hacker News Reader

We don't know the earlier instances where he was warned. IMHO, this particular bug report doesn't seem to be out of line with the rules here: https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/page.cgi?id=etiquette.html

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But you could look if you wanted to. How about when he called Thunderbird developers simians and said he wanted to cut off their hands so they couldn't program any more? Is that out of line enough for you? What about saying "screw you" and calling developers children. I consider all of that out of line. He was being a bully and he got banned for it. Good on Dan Mosedale. Bullies suck and we shouldn't let them pollute our communities with their abuse.

Yes, I saw one in a link posted above. Definitely out of line. No second thoughts on that. If the ban had happened in reply to one such post, it would have been unquestioned by many.

Yeah, unfortunately for everyone he was only warned on the worst of the interactions and given a second chance. Sometimes a ban on the first offense is better. Still, a ban after a failure to heed a warning seems completely reasonable. Heck, a re-evaluation of the original interaction with the knowledge of how he behaved after the warning would have worked too. But again, the important thing isn't where the ban happened, it's that the project rejected a bully.

The important thing is exactly when and why the ban happened. As others have pointed out, his latest bug report that got him banned was hugely better than his older bug report filled with personal insults that got him a warning. This shows that he took the warning seriously enough to stop the personal attacks.

Banning him now makes me think the developers of Thunderbird are ego maniacs.

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