delete this?

[PepperElf]

You do realise we don't allow grammar flames, right?



Rapscallion

you mean like this?


The Doctor: With all this technology you could, oh, I don't know. Move to another planet.

Luke: If only that was possible.

The Doctor: "If only that 'were' possible." Conditional clause.


---
The Doctor: [...]The Atmos system could make things worse.

Luke: Yeah, well see. That's a tautology. You can't say Atmos system. 'Cause it stands for Atmospheric Emission System. So you can say "Atmospheric Emission System System." Do you see, Mr. 'Conditional Clause'?

The Doctor: It's been a long time since anyone's said "no" to you, isn't it?

[Jaden]

You do realise we don't allow grammar flames, right?



Rapscallion

I was an English major. Although I don't comment on them on here when I see them, grammatical and spelling errors, including my own, are like fingernails on a chalkboard to me when I read them

[Andara Bledin]

Although I don't comment on them on here when I see them, grammatical and spelling errors, including my own, are like fingernails on a chalkboard to me when I read them

This.

There are posters that I love reading dearly, but whose constant spelling errors make me wince.

I'm a bit OCD, so being unable to edit for simple things such as that would put a decided chill on my willingness to enter discussions.

Also, there's been more than once that I've re-read what I posted and realized that something I said didn't come out the way I had intended it to come out (don't ask me why I see it after posting but not during the pre-post review I do), and it's important to me to have the opportunity to adjust my grammar and tone to more accurately reflect what I want to convey.

^-.-^

[Lachrymose]

Hmm, good point raised in here. Should we prevent people from being able to edit their own posts?

Rapscallion

Another board I frequent has a 15 minute time limit on edits. I sort of like that.

[Nyoibo]

Plus, you'd end up with about five times the work on the admin side just to handle all of the "Oh, crap, I didn't really mean to be that much of a dick, please edit my post so people don't flame me" requests.

^-.-^

And the respinse to that should be, if you don't want to be that much of a dick, don't.

[HYHYBT]

Well, it depends. Does this site in fact have an ongoing problem with people abusing the edit function? If not, there's no reason to disable it.

And the respinse to that should be, if you don't want to be that much of a dick, don't.

Well, that's why people edit their posts when they realize what they were trying to say came out the wrong way. (Or in my case, often enough I've rewritten half of one of my extra-long sentences but forgot to rewrite the other half to match, which while, depending on the example, you *might* be able to make sense of, I'd rather you didn't have to.)

One thing I do like is that you don't even get the "last edited" notation if nobody saw the unedited version.

[Hyena Dandy]

And the respinse to that should be, if you don't want to be that much of a dick, don't.

Yeah, and in a perfect world, that would work. But honestly, people say things without thinking a lot.

Also, a lot of my posts go through a lot of revisions over the time I write them. Sometimes I take out part of a sentence but not all of it. Editing is useful. If you said something really horrible, everyone who say it still saw it, and knows you said it. This is a small forum community.

If someone had a habit of editing posts like that, we'd realize pretty quickly.

[Ree]

I don't think disallowing editing would be good, but I do like that people can't delete.

In the example of this thread, Raps has said, if you post, then you should mean it and be prepared to discuss it.

The OP says the thread was started and within seconds, s/he decided against the topic.
I have to wonder why.

I can totally understand it if an error was made in the original assumption and one only found out after posting, but I do have an issue if someone starts a thread and then simply decides, "Aw, never mind. I don't feel like discussing that after all."

I would think, if one goes to the trouble of starting a thread, they should be held accountable for the discussion and should not be allowed to change their mind.
I think there needs to be more thought put into the process before a thread is started.

I started a thread a long time ago where I was upset because I had thought a friend had inadvertently posted pictures of another friend's wedding dress.
(There was a wedding dress hanging in the background of her pictures.)
I knew how important the secrecy of the gown and things like that are to some brides. There was a discussion where some agreed and some didn't.
I think there was one member who has since ended up banned, who loved to threadstalk me and just be a general dick whenever I posted.
This person was really giving me a run for my money in the discussion.
When I saw my friend's wedding dress, I realized that I had been mistaken in my original assumption, and the dress that was hanging obviously belonged to someone else, as it was nothing like the actual dress.
I could have deleted my thread at that point, but I just left it up and it eventually died a normal thread death.
I felt, if I took it down, it might look as if I was being petty and couldn't handle the pressure from the member who decided to try and get under my skin.

It's not a big deal that the OP decided not to pursue the original intended discussion, but I do feel deleting should be left to the mods.
As for editing, the mods do have the option to restore posts back to their original condition, so perhaps that could be something to consider.
Perhaps there could be the added factor for the members, "Go ahead and edit, but be warned that, if you edit out your topic, the mods could, possibly, restore the discussion."

What about that?

[Nekojin]

I don't think disallowing editing would be good, but I do like that people can't delete.

In the example of this thread, Raps has said, if you post, then you should mean it and be prepared to discuss it.

The OP says the thread was started and within seconds, s/he decided against the topic.
I have to wonder why.

I can totally understand it if an error was made in the original assumption and one only found out after posting, but I do have an issue if someone starts a thread and then simply decides, "Aw, never mind. I don't feel like discussing that after all."

I would think, if one goes to the trouble of starting a thread, they should be held accountable for the discussion and should not be allowed to change their mind.
I think there needs to be more thought put into the process before a thread is started.

While it's true that more people should think more before they start a thread, I also think that an OP should be able to delete a thread they've started as long as nobody else has posted. No harm, no foul. It doesn't really matter what the reason they're deleting it was. Sometimes, just the act of writing gives you enough introspection to realize that maybe the topic just isn't worth the bits it's posted on.