It's not up to non-OP's to decide if an edit is good or bad, or what's it used for.

Well, I could argue against this, but it's pointless and it could derail the thread.
You're still wrong, though.

As for the "implicit deal", maybe the subject of this thread should become making it explicit, as part of the ToS when signing up? If you really want this new rule.

So they can not read that in addition to all the other things they don't read?

Why not the thread, too?

Because some of those posts will be written by other people. In your own words, "They own their posts ".

Nothing needs to be put in the ToS. This isn't really a change in forum rules. As far as I'm concerned it's common sense.

This is a publicly viewable website. If you don't want your stuff to be publicly viewable to everyone, then you shouldn't be posting it on a publicly viewable website. Duh.

The thought that you have the right to privacy when you post something publicly on the internet is absurd. Even if we allow these post removals and make it against the rules to quote people - there's still all sorts of webcrawlers to contend with (those that cache webpages they come across -- like google or archive.org).

Besides, if you want to argue that it's the OP's right whether or not they should be able to edit/remove their posts, then I could argue that it's my right to quote their post in full in my response (which I've considered doing in the past - but didn't because I didn't want to clutter the forums). Therefore OP has the right to remove their post, but I have the right to put it back. After all I don't recall seeing anything in the ToS that said we couldn't quote people -- and since there's actually a forum feature made specifically for quoting it seems like it is even encouraged.

Either way we end up with the same result. Preventing the edit in the first place just makes the forums more organized, reduces redundant text, and makes responses easier to read and understand.

I wonder if the admin would mind if I wrote a script that archives the first post in every thread and then reposts it if the first post gets deleted?

^I doubt he'd care. I wouldn't mind really.

@Chris,

I would personally thank you with a hypothetical cup of tea.

Would something similar to the track changes feature that MS word has (I know it's not just MS Word but that's the only one I'm familiar with) be a possibility? Or is that over the top? For anyone that doesn't know what I mean: Basically if you edited your post and deleted something what was deleted could be displayed with a strikethrough, and anything added could be added in bold or a different colour or something. You would also have the option to change the view either showing the markup or not. It means that when you are viewing the forum without showing the markup, everything would appear to be the same as what it is now, but if you wanted you could see how the original post was, and what changes have been made. When your linking to a post you could of course link directly to the markup version.

I think the original thread should be locked from the get go. If you typo you will just have to live with it. I think it is retarded to waste the time to make a new thread and then turn around and delete for any reason.

That is the way it used to be. I, personally, didn't like the idea of edits at first, because I forsaw this kind of abuse, but I do like being able to go back and fix typos and other updates -- particularly in posts where I made an error and future readers would be baffled when the fix is four posts down. The problem is that said power requires some degree of honesty. I like to add little "[edit] ..." information in my post to explain why I edited it and what I did to it that makes it different than the original -- such as telling readers that I am fixing an obvious screw-up. Unfortunately enough, though, I see it being misused to "take back" words (mis)spoken.


Users like helios and Disch understand something about how computer scientists view information -- a view that is being lost to the masses of "WOW I GOTS THE INTERNET NOW!!!" -- who feel that they have some magical "right" to control (or, more accurately, deprive others of) information.

A forum is a colaborative sharing of information. When someone seeks to gain information from those who wish to publicly provide help, and then leave things in an unusable state, he is abusing (1) those who sought to help them by removing context and value from the help given him -- such that only he can understand what is left -- and (2) seeking to claim an advantage for himself and deprive others of that same advantage.

Personally, I think that is a very selfish way of viewing things, and it really ticks me off when I take the time and energy to help someone through a solution, well aware that there are many who benefit from this public exercise, and said person takes all my effort and makes it meaningless. If I wanted to only provide knowledge to idiots, I'd charge money and keep off the forums. I would rather that people learn more, and I am glad whenever I can help. I learn a lot the very same way -- by reading what others more knowledgeable than I have left behind for me.


Some forums, like Wikis, have version histories that the users can access. I think twicker keeps histories of all post modifications until archived... so I don't imagine it would be too hard if he wanted to add a 'revert' or 'review history' option... Still, I don't know if there is any simple answer for the problem.

[edit] Fixed some grammar and wording...

A forum is a colaborative sharing of information. When someone seeks to gain information from those who wish to publicly provide help, and then leave things in an unusable state, he is abusing (1) those who sought to help them by removing context and value from the help given him -- such that only he can understand what is left -- and (2) seeking to claim an advantage for himself and deprive others of that same advantage. Personally, I think that is a very selfish way of viewing things, and it really ticks me off when I take the time and energy to help someone through a solution, well aware that there are many who benefit from this public exercise, and said person takes all my effort and makes it meaningless. If I wanted to only provide knowledge to idiots, I'd charge money and keep off the forums. I would rather that people learn more, and I am glad whenever I can help. I learn a lot the very same way -- by reading what others more knowledgeable than I have left behind for me.

EXACTLY!

Some forums, like Wikis, have version histories that the users can access. I think twicker keeps histories of all post modifications until archived... so I don't imagine it would be too hard if he wanted to add a 'revert' or 'review history' option... Still, I don't know if there is any simple answer for the problem.

That's what GameFAQs does, and it seems to work pretty well.

I don't remember who I saw mention this earlier, but I think preventing someone from editing a post if it's not the newest post makes the most sense (I know they do that on facebook). It seems like a good universal solution.

or when you click edit you it shows the changes you made underneath