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Grex > Oldcoop > #75: Member Initative: Restore the Murdered Items | |
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| Author |
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| 25 new of 424 responses total. |
jep
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response 51 of 424:
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Jan 11 04:05 UTC 2004 |
I agree there was value in my divorce items. However, it was all
intended for me, and for my situation. There was virtually no drift
in those items.
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cyklone
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response 52 of 424:
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Jan 11 04:26 UTC 2004 |
That's not the point. People said what they said, and just because those words
were placed in an item you began, and about you, does not mean you own those
words. Especially when those words may have independant value for someone
other than you.
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jep
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response 53 of 424:
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Jan 11 04:58 UTC 2004 |
I regret that that value was lost, cyklone. I wish I didn't think
there was a need to remove those items. It is possible someone would
have someday come across my items when in a similar situation and with
a similar mindset, and could thereby have gotten through the
experience a little easier.
You see, I do understand that aspect of the issue. What I would have
given for an account of that type of experience, while I was going
through it...
But those items mean something else, too. I wouldn't have entered
them, or at least wouldn't have said as much in them, if I'd had
appropriate concern for what might come of them some day. I just
*didn't care*. It seems to me to be pretty harsh to force someone to
have something remain when it was created under those types of
circumstances.
Also, that they're deleted now is an important fact about them. They
can not again be an obscure, past account of my feelings about my
divorce. Now they'd be a part of a political storm, a target for
people who have no concern about me at all, and also a target for
people who don't like that I had them deleted. They're deleted now.
That's real, and it has real impact. Undeleting them doesn't put
things back to where they were. Undeleting them is a completely new
action, which has never been done before on Grex.
That is of course true for Valerie's items, and for items all over the
conferences which once contained Valerie's responses. Restoring them
does not set back the clock. It'd be a whole new type of action,
compounding the consequences -- not erasing them -- of what has
already happened this week.
If I hadn't gotten my items deleted, they might well have gained new
usage from a different group of people; those who are archiving
controversial items just to show people they can't delete even their
own text.
It is *not* as simple as "the items were created once, now they should
be here permanently". Both because my items were deleted, and because
of other events, much has changed here this week.
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janc
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response 54 of 424:
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Jan 11 07:59 UTC 2004 |
Richard - nobody is arguing that their deletion was procedurally correct.
The person who deleted them has already resigned. We are all willing to
agree that that should not have been done in that manner. There is no need
to keep debating that point.
If I'd had my way, the items would have been deleted with the formal
approval of the board temporarily, so that we could have this discussion.
If that had happened, then there would be at least a little reason to
debate whether or not it was the right thing to do - it would have been
an official Grex action, not an accident that happened to Grex.
In any case, if they hadn't been deleted, one way or the other, then we
couldn't even be having this public discussion of the merits of deleting them.
The question here is to weigh the potentials for harm in each course.
One way, JEP is exposed to some risks that he has outlined. The other
way, Grex might have taken a small step closer to the slippery slope
of censorship. The first risks a person (two really), the second risks
an institution. None of us can do anything to mitigate the risks to
JEP if we restore his item. All of us can do things to prevent Grex from
sliding down the slope into routine censorship if we do don't.
I think there's no comparison here. It's a no brainer.
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jp2
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response 55 of 424:
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Jan 11 14:15 UTC 2004 |
This response has been erased.
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gelinas
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response 56 of 424:
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Jan 11 14:24 UTC 2004 |
That deleting the items was wrong does not make restoring them right;
restoring them is also wrong.
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cyklone
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response 57 of 424:
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Jan 11 14:48 UTC 2004 |
I disagree with jp's assertion that valerie and jep lack moral character. They
just made mistakes, as we all do from time to time.
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tod
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response 58 of 424:
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Jan 11 14:59 UTC 2004 |
This response has been erased.
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jp2
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response 59 of 424:
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Jan 11 15:30 UTC 2004 |
This response has been erased.
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jmsaul
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response 60 of 424:
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Jan 11 15:58 UTC 2004 |
Jep isn't insisting on that. I believe he'd be fine if his items were
restored minus all of his comments.
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jp2
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response 61 of 424:
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Jan 11 16:01 UTC 2004 |
This response has been erased.
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jmsaul
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response 62 of 424:
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Jan 11 16:07 UTC 2004 |
His objection to doing that is procedural -- he doesn't want the whole item
restored to public view while he removes his posts from it.
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jp2
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response 63 of 424:
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Jan 11 16:14 UTC 2004 |
This response has been erased.
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gull
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response 64 of 424:
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Jan 11 17:19 UTC 2004 |
jep, would you argue, then, that the standard for removing whole items
should be that the person who entered them regrets having done so and
feels their mental state was different when they did? That seems pretty
low. Would it also apply to items that the person hadn't entered, but
had posted a large number of responses to?
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jep
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response 65 of 424:
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Jan 11 17:46 UTC 2004 |
I am not arguing for a standard for removal of items. I am arguing
against the idea that Valerie's actions can be undone. They
happened. There are effects which cannot be undone now.
Overall, it would be better in most ways if no items had been removed
at all. If I'd been involved with writing a policy a week ago, I
would have tried to influence it against removal of items by staff
members. That would, of course, have prevented my items from being
removed by staff, too.
But circumstances are different now.
My expectations for my items is certainly different now than it was a
few days ago. Then, they were there and nothing could be done about
them. Now, they're gone and it would take a staff action to restore
them. That action would be an action to hurt me. That would be it's
main effect from my perspective. It would, by the way, hurt me more
than it would help Grex. I will not, of course, stand by while
something like that is done to me.
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janc
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response 66 of 424:
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Jan 11 17:56 UTC 2004 |
OK, Jamie. Let's all decide to delete JEP's items temporarily while we
discuss whether we should permanently delete them or not. Thus we
magically change their status from "deleted because Valerie was bad" to
"deleted because we want to be able to discuss them." This fairly
effortless transistion now allows us to declare Valerie bad without
being coerced by simplistic logic into instantly restoring the items.
Does that serve?
David: I think the standard for removing items should be that the risk
of harm to the person requesting the deletion if they are left up is
substantially greater than the risk of harm to Grex if they are deleted.
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mary
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response 67 of 424:
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Jan 11 18:10 UTC 2004 |
That makes it an easy call then, Jan. With the items restored, and all of
Jep's comments and Valerie's comments removed, then there is very little
left to cause them any harm whatsoever. And Grex is left with the clear
understanding that users can't censor other users. Which I find a biggie
in terms of what makes Grex special.
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mary
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response 68 of 424:
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Jan 11 18:17 UTC 2004 |
And this is going to sound very harsh, but has to be said.
Jan, are you quite sure that Valerie doesn't have access
to the pumpkin where she could tamper with the backup tapes
before this issue is resolved? I'm sorry I have to ask.
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naftee
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response 69 of 424:
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Jan 11 20:43 UTC 2004 |
re 65
>That action would be an action to hurt me.
Don't you agree that the action of censoring other people's text hurt them
as well? Or are you as selfish as valerie and refuse to acknowledge other
people's feelings?
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janc
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response 70 of 424:
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Jan 11 20:53 UTC 2004 |
It's theoretically possible that Valerie could swipe my keys and go to
the pumpkin. Actually the key would hardly be necessary. The outside
door is frequently open since the remodeling and the inside lock ...
well, we should get the deadbolt rekeyed so we can use that to prevent
people who sneeze strongly as they walk by from accidentally entering
the pumpkin.
The question mostly indicates that you don't understand what is going on
here.
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richard
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response 71 of 424:
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Jan 11 20:55 UTC 2004 |
Jan, you mention considering what is in Grex's best interests. I'd think
that insomuch as Grex is in effect publishing what people type onto its
board across the web, that there is solid legal reason for wanting to
maintain records of what has been typed. In this age of paranoid security
fears, and things like communications decency acts (which you shouldn't be
surprised if it is reintroduced in some form soon in congress), you have
to consider the extent to which Grex may or may not be held accountable in
the future for what it is transmitting.
Lets say that somebody enters an item on how to make bombs, or discussing
where good places are to bomb. Then staff deletes the item. Then
somebody sues Grex claiming the item posted actually advocated or promised
specific bombing. Grex is hauled into court. Where is the item? Its been
deleted. Are old backups kept forever? I believe that allowing wholesale
deletion of posts, without the presence of the scribble log, could open
Grex up to a potential situation where it can't defend itself against
legal challenges.
I think when you enter a post on grex it is not speech, it is nor oral
communication, it is verbal communication, print communication of which it
becomes part of a public record. It is publishing. And Grex needs for
its own protection, to have active records of everything it transmits, and
to not allow wholesale changes to what it transmits, where posts can be
taken out of context or changed and Grex find itself unable adequately
defend against outside allegations.
If somebody prints a column in a newspaper, and that column is available
on the paper's web site, the columnist can't go in the future and revise
the words in his column or delete it and pretend it was never published.
It was, its out there, and so is everything posted on Grex. You never
know who has read, printed, or saved what has been posted here. Once
something gets posted, its a matter of public record.
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janc
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response 72 of 424:
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Jan 11 21:02 UTC 2004 |
Jim: John has repeated acknowledged that some harm would be done to
others and Grex as a whole by the full deletion of his items. But I
don't think that it can be argued that that harm is of anywhere near the
order of magnitude as what JEP could be exposed to.
My memory of the divorce item was that all the most controversial parts
of his responses, the expressions of anger and such, could be completely
reconstructed from the comments of other users in those items. Exactly
the parts that are most likely to be embarrassing to him and most
harmful to him are the ones that would still be there if only his
responses were deleted. After all, those were the parts that obviously
triggered the most discussion. So restoring only other user's comments
would be almost as bad as restoring the whole thing.
I only made a few responses to that item - it's not a subject I'm too
knowledgable about. But if something I said about what JEP had said
were used to his harm someday, I would really hate it. So I'm going to
request that any responses that I made to those items not be restored,
if we make the poor choice of not leaving the whole thing buried.
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janc
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response 73 of 424:
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Jan 11 21:15 UTC 2004 |
Richard has a far-fetched theory about what might happen to Grex if this
special case became a precident for doing this as a general rule and if
we were too stupid to keep an archive copy of anything deleted. Buy as
much of it as you like, but it still adds up to much less risk to Grex
than keeping the item would exposes JEP to.
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slynne
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response 74 of 424:
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Jan 11 21:44 UTC 2004 |
I think that it is ok to have special cases and I think jep is going
about things correctly. I think that the only precedent this will set
is one where it is ok for this system to take special cases into
consideration.
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richard
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response 75 of 424:
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Jan 11 22:15 UTC 2004 |
Jan, it was just acknowledged by Mary that a staffer with access could alter
the backup tapes. Something is only far fetched until it actually happens.
I would argue that if JEP thinks he has been damaged by his posts-- which I
don't think he has, I thought his posts were heartfelt and anyone could
sympathize-- that he can't eliminate that damage by removing the posts now
and pretending they never happened. JEP, how do you know that your ex-wife
hasn't already made copies of everything you posted here, or her lawyer, or
members of her family? I think it is at least as likely that your son might
come across these posts from someone who saved them, as he would from someday
in the future actually reading these old conferences. In fact your scenario
seems quite remote in terms of possibility of actually happening.
The fact is that I and others posted in those items, and I believe that your
needs don't supercede ours, that we still have the right to see our words
posted as we intended. Grex is putting itself in a position where staff has
to decide whose rights mean more? And the logical way to answer that is that
the rights of the many outweigh the rights of the few. Staff has to act in
the best interests of the majority of grexers. I want staff to recognize that
my rights and the rights of every other user who posted in those items is as
important as JEP's. And Valerie's. I mean how many people posted in her baby
diary items and now have no access to their own words?
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