Topic Line Edits .... Deletions .... What's Up ?

Site Admin,
I did not want to resurrect the "Dennis Hultman dabbles in more than reptiles BAD GUY" thread to ask you what the meaning of the following is, but this is a paste from your own "Rules For Posting in the BOI ....Required Reading". It addresses the debate raised in the latter part of that thread concerning decision to not lock, move, delete, add an "editor's note", or edit in any way the thread title.

Rules For Posting on the BOI ....Required Reading
Please note that inflammatory, malicious, or derogatory statements in the topic line are not appropriate and will be edited or deleted as needed.

This would compare to a statement by DT in the thread:

Dennis Thomas, post # 86
I can only think of one time a thread title was edited to fix a spelling mistake and we were told point blank by Rich not to do it again. That is why you see threads locked and the poster told to start a new thread when they leave someone's name out of the title.

Your "Required Reading" TOS are a contract. The only way I can read the above two statements harmoniously is that any such edits must be done by Rich, as Dennis only states that "we .... were not to do it again", and "we" was not defined. The assumption would be that "we" meant other super-mods. I do not see a harmonious reading of the "Required Reading" paste and the decision of site Admin to not take an action regarding the DH thread. If you have changed your policy since that part of your TOS (revised 27 Jan 07) was written, is not an edit of the "Rules for Posting" (TOS) prudent?

Jim, give it a rest. Your constant nick picking and tearing apart every little thing is getting tiresome. It really is getting to the point of antagonisom towards Rich.

Yeah..... I can see where that "TROLLING" warning may need to be resurrected.....

Jim,
I am going to other sites to get some of the chameleon questions I have answered; questions which are not by the way answered on most care sheets. Perhaps you could take some of your time and give it to chameleon hobbyists.

It was put there suggesting a change was in order. If you do not see a need, there's nothing to debate.

Lucille, suit yourself.

At this point... i dont honestly think anyone cares anymore. I know ill still continue to use this site regardless of what rich wants to do with it until he pulls the plug. Im done caring about what goes on "behind the scenes".... its just more drama, or petty annoying stuff that no one needs.

Hey Jim you should be proud...apparently your the only person she feels is qualified to answer the questions on her three threads...guess that makes you the Chameleon God!

Alicia,
Maybe you do not care. I have no way of knowing the motives of those who expressed a concern in that thread, and I would suggest that you do not either. Speaking only for myself, and influenced by the one time that my name was erroneously included in a negative thread title, my assumption is that people feel there should be a recourse action or remedy, and do not want to see it happen again to either them or someone they have concern for. Maybe they have some sense of "fair play" that they felt was violated. A few may also feel that it is in the best interest of the site to tidy up a few loose ends. As they say, if you don't learn from your mistakes, you will repeat them. A similar incident, with similar complaints, will certainly happen again here. If threads such as that are in the best interest of Fauna, then there is no need to reevaluate, whether it be a change in policy, or just the required reading. If the net result of the thread was some disenchantment by members, then I can only be left to wonder.

Lucille, if you feel so strongly to have now trolled two separate non-related threads, how about picking the appropriate forum for such discussion, like "Sound Off", and garner some opinions. I don't care where you put it, and would likely get dinged if I offered other alternatives anyway. My genuine and sincere advice to you is as it was before. You should not bother with chameleons at this time. Call us stuck-up, etc, but there are many breeders within the hobby who feel that such value judgements are appropriate before they make a sale. It is a judgement I rarely make, but my point is to suggest to you that there are better ways to get that which you seek, and that the current approach is not in the best interest of the chameleon(s) you hope to enslave for your pleasure. There are many out there who peruse the forums capable of providing you information. Any speculation as to why they have chosen to not come to your assistance as you want them to escapes me.

Originally Posted by Chameleon Company

Alicia,
Maybe you do not care. I have no way of knowing the motives of those who expressed a concern in that thread, and I would suggest that you do not either. Speaking only for myself, and influenced by the one time that my name was erroneously included in a negative thread title, my assumption is that people feel there should be a recourse action or remedy, and do not want to see it happen again to either them or someone they have concern for. Maybe they have some sense of "fair play" that they felt was violated. A few may also feel that it is in the best interest of the site to tidy up a few loose ends. As they say, if you don't learn from your mistakes, you will repeat them. A similar incident, with similar complaints, will certainly happen again here. If threads such as that are in the best interest of Fauna, then there is no need to reevaluate, whether it be a change in policy, or just the required reading. If the net result of the thread was some disenchantment by members, then I can only be left to wonder.

i say it, because threads like those should just be locked ( cant delete them because they show a persons true colors). But since we all know thats not going to change, ive given up caring. and i believe alot of others have too.

Im not saying i dont care when somones name gets wrongly used ( because thats just not cool!) , but those threads wont ever be stopped. So since we all know theyre a bunch of BS they should be avoided and stopped the second they are made.
Im just going to try my best to Ignore em and move on.

Thats all im saying really....

Please note that inflammatory, malicious, or derogatory statements in the topic line are not appropriate and will be edited or deleted as needed.

Inflammatory, malicious and derogatory are... as with many, many other adjectives, subjective. While each term can be defined it's going to come down to the interpretation of the individual to determine when the definition has been met.

Starting a thread that was titled say... "Generic Example- Bad Guy" might be considered all three of those things if Mister Example was not legitimately a bad guy. The question really comes down to the moderation team, led by Rich's direction (such as it may or may not be at any given time depending on how much effort he's choosing to invest) and what they feel crosses a line strongly enough to warrant the shared culpability of an edit. The above example, while it might meet the definition of all three terms isn't likely to be a signifigant enough infraction to warrant direct action.

"Generic Example- Idiot who wears underpants on his head, practices necrophilia and steals reptiles" when none of those are true or a thread title that is in clear violation of the profanity rules might result in a different response. The important thing here though- is that it's their decision about when the line has been crossed and when a potential infraction will warrant editing or a thread will warrant deletion. They (and most specifically Rich) are the ones who would be held responsible, so they are the ones who get to choose when, how and most importantly IF that sort of rule gets applied.

A lot of this recent rules talk has reminded me of junior high american history classes... The debates about ridgid or elastic interpretation of the constitution. Ridgid interpretation argued that the federal government could only take actions that were specifically detailed as being the duties of the government. Elastic interpretation argued that the federal government could (through appropriate channels) take any action which was not specifically prohibited in the constitution. It seems these days that similar wrangling with the rules is going on- people demanding (well, if it's not a demand, it's certainly not a polite or altruistic request) certain interpretations of the site rules to fit their own agendas or their own personal views of how the site should be run or in a way that nails someone they just don't like. Or the flipside; people making posts that the mods see as infractions, then arguing that whatever they did wasn't specifically prohibited.

I can kind of understand why there's room to argue one way or the other- the emphasis on certain infractions and the interpretation of the people who actually matter has changed a bit as time passed. These changes are all pretty clear cut and obvious though, so it's not like anyone who reads the boards with any regularity can claim any legitimate confusion over it.

When I was your age we were allowed to use adjectives like scumbag, garbage, crook and con on the BOI and misspelling someone's name as a juvenile and kinda idiotic way of insulting or irritating them was ignored as the childish noise that it was without any warning points being issued (I haven't done a search to verify this, but a good chunk of the uses of the word seamen and it's various misspellings were probably made by people trying to annoy me because the spelling of my first name shares some letters rather than refferences to the actual substance) and "overly abusive" meant just that... OVERLY abusive- not mildly inappropriate or slightly frustrating. We also had to walk eight miles through snow drifts higher than our heads with no shoes on every time we wanted to use our 28.8 dialup connections to open the site.

Most rules on most websites... and when it comes down to it, most laws and rules anywhere else... are generally reactionary in their creation and intended to be a deterant in their existance. Meaning that they exist almost as an emergency clause, to be taken out and used when the people responsible for enforcing them feel it's appropriate to do so. Derogatory statements in a topic line [b]might[/m] be edited or deleted, it's "as needed" and that determination is made in a democratic fashion; one man one vote. Rich is the man and he's got the vote.

For a guy who claims he wouldn't be a mod if he were asked to, you sure spend a lot of time worrying about the way the rules are interpreted Jim. My guess is that that you're showing some false modesty since you spend as much time as you do looking out for the rule violations of other members and crying about the terms of service- hoping... what, that your dedication will be reccognized and you'll be rewarded with a supermod spot? Or maybe you really do want to be in a position to determine how the rules are applied without actually taking on any of the effort or responsibility or hassle of doing it yourself. Not technically hypocritical, but it definitely smells similar.