block-list-brainstorming

block list brainstorming

Brainstorm proposals for a block list microformat. Part of the effort to enable greater social network portability.

simple container of hCards

On sites that present an interface to view and edit a block list (see block-list-examples), they nearly always have a containing list, div or table element that surrounds all the names (and/or URLs) of those that are blocked.

Thus:

• root classname: blocklist

individually blocked people, users, accounts etc are represented by hCards inside the element with classname "blocklist".

Thus an individual may be represented by name, or by URL (e.g. a user profile URL), or both, and thus a site can block specific user profiles, or perhaps "fuzzy" block any individual that matches a given name, or perhaps even provide an interface to manage blocking of specific accounts that appear to match just a name in a block list.

Proposed by Tantek during events/2008-08-12-weekly-meetup-dinner.

example

Here is a simple example of a block list using this brainstormed format:

<ul class="blocklist">
 <li class="vcard">
  <a class="fn url" href="/people/boarsunderabridge">boarsunderabridge</a>
 </li>
 <li class="vcard">
  <a class="fn url" href="/people/flyinlentils">Flyin Lentils</a>
 </li>
</ul>

XEN

If friends can be imported from a page bearing XFN links, then why not also import block lists using XEN?

XEN is satire and not serious, it itself documents that it is not for use: "XEN is not a microformat. It is a joke."

votelinks reuse

What if we just use rev="vote-against"?

It is possible, yet based on examples, sometimes all that one may have to block is a name, not a link, and thus vote-links are insufficient.

In addition, minimizing re-use of vote-links minimizes further suggestions of using the 'rev' attribute, per the rel-faq.

see also

• block-list
• block-list-formats
• block-list-brainstorming
• social-network-portability