[subego]

marden got dinged for a Rule 8 violation (read about it in the infractions thread) and Oreo Cookie is taking heat for it, from myself included.

After reading OC's response, the issue at hand actually seems pretty simple.

OC is taking heat (I believe correctly) because the post in question isn't really a Rule 8 violation. OC makes a case however that marden was violating the spirit if not the letter of the rule.

Rule 8 is vague. I don't think it's fair to blame marden for violating the spirit when that spirit isn't really contained in the rule.

So I propose that it be expanded to include cut and paste. The goal I think (if not the exact wording) should be something along these lines:

Cutting and pasting of long articles with only a short comment is highly discouraged. Please provide a link and write a summary of what the article contains. Quoting a relevant sentence or two if it improves your summary is acceptable.

As an afterthought, it couldn't hurt to have it explicitly stated that Rule 8 applies (or doesn't apply as the case may be) anywhere in a thread.

[Kevin]

Rule 8 just needs gotten rid of. Too many people are attempting to expand it to shut marden up.

It's getting old.

[subego]

Originally Posted by Kevin 

Rule 8 just needs gotten rid of.

A valid opinion that I disagree with.

Originally Posted by Kevin 

Too many people are attempting to expand it

I have noted no actual attempt to expand it, only inconsistency of enforcement due to the vagueness of the rule.

[Kevin]

Again, you know the way marden posts. You are attempting to further make it describe his way of posting.

No one starts up with the rule 8 complaining unless someone is posting something they don't like.

No one reports people on "their side" for rule 8 violations.

It's partisan mudslinging.

As a matter of fact, I want a new rule for no partisan mud slinging, or reporting people for partisan reasons.

[mac128k-1984]

I like rule #8, what bugs me is that some people provide a link and then paste the whole article in their post, then they puts a single sentence at the bottom like "and discuss"

Why not include the link (most do anyways) and paste the salient pieces that the poster wants to discuss or highlight.

[Kevin]

Why does it matter how a person chooses to get their point across? Esp if they aren't attacking anyone in the process.

I think the mods need to concern themselves more with hatefulness and less with petti posting format rules which only are used to report people that you disagree with.

[subego]

Originally Posted by Kevin 

Again, you know the way marden posts. You are attempting to further make it describe his way of posting.

marden posts in lots of ways.

Originally Posted by Kevin 

No one starts up with the rule 8 complaining unless someone is posting something they don't like.

What I don't like is cut and paste. I rarely get to find out if it's on my side or not since I don't read it because it's annoying.

Originally Posted by Kevin 

No one reports people on "their side" for rule 8 violations.

It's partisan mudslinging.

Your assertion that I find cut and paste annoying for partisan reasons, or that I'm trying to "shut marden up" is ridiculous. Cut and paste is irritating regardless of content. I talk to marden more than I talk to anyone else on this board.

Why would I do this if my goal was to make him "shut up"?

Originally Posted by Kevin 

As a matter of fact, I want a new rule for no partisan mud slinging, or reporting people for partisan reasons.

A-men to that.

[OreoCookie]

Originally Posted by Kevin 

Again, you know the way marden posts. You are attempting to further make it describe his way of posting.

So subego proposed the change in rules to shut up marden? Please.

Originally Posted by Kevin 

No one reports people on "their side" for rule 8 violations.

How would you know?
We do get reports for misconduct (not just Rule 8 violations) from people of the same political affiliation as the offender.

Originally Posted by Kevin 

As a matter of fact, I want a new rule for no partisan mud slinging, or reporting people for partisan reasons.

This is unnecessary because it is already covered by other forum rules. People have already been banned for that or it has contributed to the decision of them getting banned (usually you don't get banned for a single incident).

[OreoCookie]

@subego:
I don't mind taking the heat to be honest, I'm not afraid of discussion or disagreement.

I think you raise a good point. I will put it up for discussion with the other mods, let's see what they think about it.

[subego]

Originally Posted by Kevin 

Why does it matter how a person chooses to get their point across? Esp if they aren't attacking anyone in the process.

These are discussion forums. There are ways of getting one's point across that are not conducive to discussion.

Originally Posted by Kevin 

I think the mods need to concern themselves more with hatefulness and less with petti posting format rules which only are used to report people that you disagree with.

The rules aren't about busting people, they're about setting guidelines of conduct that when followed you don't get busted. You're focusing on the exceptions, not the rule (as it were).

[subego]

Originally Posted by OreoCookie 

@subego:
I don't mind taking the heat to be honest, I'm not afraid of discussion or disagreement.

I think you raise a good point. I will put it up for discussion with the other mods, let's see what they think about it.

[Kevin]

Originally Posted by subego 

marden posts in lots of ways.

But a lot of the time he posts in a certain way.

What I don't like is cut and paste. I rarely get to find out if it's on my side or not since I don't read it because it's annoying.

Let me clarify something. I wasn't singling you out.

Your assertion that I find cut and paste annoying for partisan reasons, or that I'm trying to "shut marden up" is ridiculous.

Read above.

Cut and paste is irritating regardless of content. I talk to marden more than I talk to anyone else on this board.

Why would I do this if my goal was to make him "shut up"?

Again I am not singling you out. You don't do this. Great, others do.

What I am saying is, there are far worse things that need taken care of in this forum. The mods claim they don't have time to do all this stuff. That they have lives.

I say we worry less about the petty stuff, and focus the attention on stopping the hateful actions.

Once that gets taken care of, we can move on.

Again let me clarify. This rule is used by people who DO report people just because of partisan reasons. Those that are just "annoyed" by it don't usually report such instances.

I was not claiming you were part of this group.


Same goes for Oreo's redundant post above.

[subego]

Originally Posted by Kevin 

I say we worry less about the petty stuff, and focus the attention on stopping the hateful actions.

Well, yeah.

This isn't mutually exclusive with a Rule 8 revision. If Rule 8 is expanded to put a lid on cut and paste, it becomes far more difficult to violate the rule in the first place. If you have to summarize you can't help but add your slant.

[OreoCookie]

Originally Posted by Kevin 

But a lot of the time he posts in a certain way.

If his posting style is disruptive, then he should use his `other styles' more often to express himself. That doesn't mean this rule is custom-made to prevent marden for expressing himself or even punishing him.

Originally Posted by Kevin 

Again let me clarify. This rule is used by people who DO report people just because of partisan reasons. Those that are just "annoyed" by it don't usually report such instances.

Again, you argue that because someone disagrees with you, it automatically invalidates his abuse report, because it is just politically motivated and automatically invalid as the person reporting the abuse must have some ulterior motive. The old pattern again.

How many instances can you come up with when a Rule 8 abuse report has actually had some consequences? I don't remember too many, to be honest. So there is no `Rule 8' problem (which doesn't mean that particular aspects can be improved) and your point seems to be moot.

[Kevin]

Originally Posted by subego 

Well, yeah.

This isn't mutually exclusive with a Rule 8 revision. If Rule 8 is expanded to put a lid on cut and paste, it becomes far more difficult to violate the rule in the first place. If you have to summarize you can't help but add your slant.

You totally ignored what I said. I said it's a petty rule. The ops are as they themselves claim sparse. They don't have time to read or react to everything.

Right now we have a worse problem with hateful postings. It would be better to focus our attentions to these things and let those get taken care of. Then we can refine the inane rules a bit later.

And again, the only people that have been reporting these infractions only do so for shill reasons. Demonhood himself claimed that there was only a few people in this forum that didn't report JUST those on the opposite side.

Such inane rules are used to "get back at" those that certain people you disagree with.

[Kevin]

Originally Posted by OreoCookie 

If his posting style is disruptive, then he should use his `other styles' more often to express himself. That doesn't mean this rule is custom-made to prevent marden for expressing himself or even punishing him.

Disruptive? How are they disruptive?

I mean seriously. this is just getting inane.

Tell me how come such a big deal was never made about it until vmarks or marden started doing it?

Plenty of people on BOTH SIDES do this. Take talisin for instance.
But only CERTAIN people are complained about.

Again, you argue that because someone disagrees with you, it automatically invalidates his abuse report, because it is just politically motivated and automatically invalid as the person reporting the abuse must have some ulterior motive. The old pattern again.

I am saying the only reason the complaint is made is because of partisan reasons. That is all I am saying.

How many instances can you come up with when a Rule 8 abuse report has actually had some consequences?

None TILL NOW.

[Dakar²]

Keep rule 8. The problem is mods either are never around or never care to enforce it.

And yeah, as far as I can tell, marden wasn't guilty of a rule 8 in the instance shown.

[OreoCookie]

Originally Posted by Kevin 

Disruptive?

Yes, disruptive.

Originally Posted by Kevin 

Tell me how come such a big deal was never made about it until vmarks or marden started doing it?

Marden joined September 2005
IMO the PL mods should have been more strict with Rule #8. But since it is not my forum, I respect their way of doing things. But it was a problem way before marden has joined MacNN.

Originally Posted by Kevin 

Plenty of people on BOTH SIDES do this. Take talisin for instance.
But only CERTAIN people are complained about.

Once again, you jump conclusions. Just because you don't hear anything about it, doesn't mean nothing is happening. You say a lot of things you have no knowledge of: how many complaints mods receive and what kind of people are sending those abuse reports. How much of an impact an abuse report has on the actions of moderators and admins. That nothing is happening to guys `on the other side'. Just stop making a lot of assumptions on these things and immediately returning a verdict on it.

[Kevin]

Originally Posted by OreoCookie 

Yes, disruptive.

Only because people make ad-hominem attacks on the person't posting style instead of dealing with the message he or she is posting. This is encouraged with the addition of Rule #8.

IMO the PL mods should have been more strict with Rule #8. But since it is not my forum, I respect their way of doing things. But it was a problem way before marden has joined MacNN.

Logic first complained about such a thing when Vmarks did it. First they complained that vmarks being a mod, shouldn't be offering his opinion in the forum. So vmarks posts clips and text to other people's opinions. Then the complaint switched to vmarks doesn't add anything to the discussion but quotes from other sources. That there should be a rule to stop this!

All of this complaining had one goal. To stop Vmarks from posting.

Soon after people started reporting ANYONE that had political beliefs that differed from theirs that did this.

This in turn created the Rule #8. And to THIS DAY said rule is used as a ad-hominem attack.

If someone posts a link to a web page, or pasts text, instead of arguing what was pasted, they attack the person.

An example of Troll doing it not 10 minutes ago.

So, you post quotes from someone else that still don't tell us what a Jihadi is!

The best you can offer is someone else's view that a "Jihadi" is anyone thinks that the Bali terrorist attacks was an act of defence of the Muslim faith. At least we have that clear.


Instead of arguing the context, he attacks marden.

Can we also now have a rule that disallows such a thing?

That would be great.

Once again, you jump conclusions. Just because you don't hear anything about it, doesn't mean nothing is happening.

Um Demonhood himself claimed only a few people turn in people on the "other side" that most reports are partisan in nature. He even offered a sarcastic congratulations to the forum. So no I am not jumping to conclusions.

So quit the accusations.

[Kevin]

Originally Posted by Dakar² 

Keep rule 8. The problem is mods either are never around or never care to enforce it.

If they keep it they need to add another rule. That attacking someone in the forum for a rule 8 violation is also against the rules. That if someone is doing said thing that they just report them. Doing what Troll did below is just as bad.

And yeah, as far as I can tell, marden wasn't guilty of a rule 8 in the instance shown.

Indeed he was not.

And I don't buy the backpeddle either.

[Dakar²]

Originally Posted by Kevin 

And I don't buy the backpeddle either.

Eh?

[Kevin]

The excuse that was used why marden got infraction points when he didn't do what he was accused of.

http://forums.macnn.com/61/feedback/...ctions-system/

[Dakar²]

Oh. I didn't think you meant I backpeddled but I wasn't sure.

[OreoCookie]

Originally Posted by Kevin 

Um Demonhood himself claimed only a few people turn in people on the "other side" that most reports are partisan in nature. He even offered a sarcastic congratulations to the forum. So no I am not jumping to conclusions.

So quit the accusations.

No, you went much further than that: you asked `why isn't anything done about member X then' where X is one of the names you brought up. And since you don't know what the mods are or aren't doing, please quit your accusations of us sitting on our butts and being partisan.

[Kevin]

Originally Posted by OreoCookie 

No, you went much further than that: you asked `why isn't anything done about member X then' where X is one of the names you brought up.

Because maybe I have personally talked to that person about it? Of course they could be lying and saying that they never got repremended.

Either way it's not me JUMPING to conclusions. And I wasn't talking about them being repped. But them being reported.

And since you don't know what the mods are or aren't doing, please quit your accusations of us sitting on our butts and being partisan.

AGAIN I am not talking about what the MODS are doing. But what the USERS are doing.

Would you please for me, differentiate the two. I am not saying anything about the MODS. But those who REPORT users.

For the 5th or so time.

As far as mods being partisan, that happens too however. We are ALL Partisan to a degree.

Denying that would be lying.

The only comment I made about mods is that I was told by a few admins that Religious affilation and sexual affiliation were NOT treated the same way in this forum. This isn't up for debate. This isn't me guessing or jumping to conclusions. This is me repeating it straight from the horses mouth.

I'd appreaciate it if you'd read the rest of my post above about the rule 8 violation problems.

If we are keeping said rule, a new rule needs to be added to it that claims a person can't be attacked for doing such a thing in the middle of a thread. that simply reporting the person is the desired response.

This takes away the problem the rule 8 brings to the forum. People attacking the person instead of the message.

[Chuckit]

Originally Posted by Kevin 

This takes away the problem the rule 8 brings to the forum. People attacking the person instead of the message.

If you post in a really annoying style, people will still get irked when you post whether or not there's a rule against it. Rule 8 just tries to force people to actually discuss things rather than regurgitate massive amounts of unoriginal, context-free information from Wikipedia. And this, I think, is good. It is related to stopping the "hateful posts" you're talking about, because this style of posting where you just throw books at people doesn't usually lead to a productive conversation.

[OreoCookie]

Originally Posted by Kevin 

AGAIN I am not talking about what the MODS are doing. But what the USERS are doing.

I know, but how would you know things only mods and admins can know, e. g. who has reported whose post? Normal users such as you can't. So you can't know whether someone complained about Talesin's posts in thread X or whether he has reported posts by user Y in thread Z. So for the nth time: you are not privy to this kind of information, yet you seem to make out problems that reports (sent by users) are being used as a political tool (e. g. `Plenty of people on BOTH SIDES do this.' or `Soon after people started reporting ANYONE that had political beliefs that differed from theirs that did this. ').

So it boils down to this (and this shall be my closing statement): you shouldn't make suppositions of things you cannot know. Reports on posts and infractions are not made public, but are usually only sent to moderators of a particular forum. Since I'm not a mod of the Lounge and the PL, I don't receive complaints made for posts in these forums either. But these matters are discussed among mods and admins. Lastly, you even concede that these complaints have had no effect, which you immediately change into a `None TILL NOW' to make it sound like a dam that's about to burst Not. Going. To. Happen.

[subego]

Originally Posted by Kevin 

You totally ignored what I said. I said it's a petty rule. The ops are as they themselves claim sparse. They don't have time to read or react to everything.

The rule isn't petty, it's vague. People are exploiting it's vagueness to be petty.

Dropping the rule entirely is one way to deal with this problem, but as I said, a revising the rule so it directly addresses what it's supposed to address is another.

If it's revised, the only way it could be used as a partisan attack is if the person being attacked did a cut and paste. It wouldn't matter that the attack was partisan because the person being attacked broke the rules.

As is, the rule is so vague you have to, like, try real hard to actually violate it, but it's too damn easy to get close. People get accused of breaking it all the time but nothing ever happens because no one really breaks it.

Regardless of whatever baggage Rule 8 has because of its inception or enforcement, it happens to address basic human nature. When you see a chunk of text without any context it often makes people go WTF am I supposed to get out of this? This is even more true in a partisan environment.

In a place like Pol/War, cut and paste is noise.

[Dakar²]

Originally Posted by subego 

\Regardless of whatever baggage Rule 8 has because of its inception or enforcement, it happens to address basic human nature. When you see a chunk of text without any context it often makes people go WTF am I supposed to get out of this? This is even more true in a partisan environment.

In a place like Pol/War, cut and paste is noise.

In my experience Rule 8 exists because some people enjoy posting an inflammatory articles, and watching the sparks fly, and not wanting to take flack for agreeing with the article.

Had they specifically posted in the OP that they didn't agree with the view, the flame-fest could have been averted/reduced.

[subego]

Originally Posted by Dakar² 

and not wanting to take flack for agreeing with the article.

Really?

Seems the opposite to me. I'd say most rather stridently agree with the articles they post and those that don't make it very clear they don't.

How does not posting anything insulate one from flack anyways? Doesn't that just leave people to the default assumption that the poster likes this article for some reason?

[Demonhood]

how about:

No posting and running. Cutting and pasting of long articles with only a brief comment is not allowed. Please provide a link to the article (with a summary and/or excerpts if you so desire) and then give your opinion.

[Dakar²]

Originally Posted by subego 

How does not posting anything insulate one from flack anyways? Doesn't that just leave people to the default assumption that the poster likes this article for some reason?

That's exactly it. People take the default assumption and then 3 pages later the OP strides in and says, "Oh, I didn't agree with it, I just thought you guys would find it interesting." If that's a lie, it's a difficult lie to prove, right?

[Dakar²]

Originally Posted by Demonhood 

how about:

Well, without referencing the old rule, I thought that's basically what it was.

Edit: Demonhood, people are going to nitpick you to death about the definition of brief.

[Demonhood]

Current Rule
No posting and running. Give an opinion, your slant, anything in regards to what you're posting. Simply posting a news story and no context or direction is not conducive to fostering discussion. Avoid it.

Subego Revision
Cutting and pasting of long articles with only a short comment is highly discouraged. Please provide a link and write a summary of what the article contains. Quoting a relevant sentence or two if it improves your summary is acceptable.

Proposed Hybrid
No posting and running. Cutting and pasting of long articles with only a brief comment is not allowed. Please provide a link to the article (with a summary and/or excerpts if you so desire) and then give your opinion.

that more helpful?

[subego]

Originally Posted by Demonhood 

how about:

I like it, but I'm biased.

I'd keep more of the old rule too.

No posting and running. Give an opinion, your slant, anything in regards to what you're posting. Likewise, cutting and pasting of long articles with only a brief comment is not allowed. Please provide a link to the article (with a summary and/or excerpts if you so desire) and then give your opinion. Simply posting a news story and no context or direction is not conducive to fostering discussion.

[Demonhood]

works for me. anyone else want to chime in?

[Dakar²]

I'm Dakar and I approve that message.

[Tuoder]

Originally Posted by Demonhood 

works for me. anyone else want to chime in?

I'd like to give it more teeth. A lock-threat would be good, IMHO.

[imitchellg5]

I think the rule is quite clear. ( new and old)

[C.A.T.S. CEO]

Originally Posted by Dakar² 

I'm Dakar and I approve that message.

+1.

[Dakar²]

Your name is not Dakar.

[OreoCookie]

I prefer Demonhood's hybrid: it's shorter.

[subego]

Originally Posted by OreoCookie 

I prefer Demonhood's hybrid: it's shorter.

Well, after much deliberation, I've settled on some of the key points.

"Post and run" and "cut and paste" are similar, but not exactly equivalent things. Depending on how much weight we give to brevity within a particular rule, it's possible that this should be broken up into separate rules. For the moment, I've gone with the idea that "post and run" can be subsumed by "cut and paste" (boring details upon request).

I think there should still be something about the motivation behind the rule. Its goal isn't really intuitive like the various "don't be an asshat" rules.

Loopholes are going to be an issue, unless you get heavy-handed or long winded. "I think this is interesting" is a toughie.

Kevin's point about the use of the rule by members as an in-thread partisan attack should be addressed as well.

Unfortunately, my current version is probably the longest, and it puts an onus on the mods that I'm not sure is appropriate, but at the very least I think the value added by the extra content is worth the verbiage.

Cutting and pasting of articles is not allowed. Please provide a link to the article (with a summary and/or excerpts if you so desire) and then give your opinion. Simply posting a news story with little context or direction is not conducive to fostering discussion. Suspected violations are to be reported. Posting an accusation is a reportable offense.

I'll admit, this seems a bit draconian (so take shots at it please), but I think "excerpts" offers a fair amount of wiggle-room.

If you put "long" back in, I think it may be too vague again.

[OreoCookie]

I think your latest proposal mixes two different rules (in particular the last sentence): this one is covered by other rules or unenforceable: what is just an accusation and what is something that has a foundation on fact? This is a political decision and I think this will make a PL mod's life even more difficult. It's quite easily testable whether the ratio between own content and copied content is off. You don't need to make any political judgements, it's just a matter of math so to speak.

Also, I would want to keep the rule as short as possible as it is easier to read, understand and enforce. In any case, I think the proposed revisions are a step forward as all of them would immediately apply to marden's post in the PL – which is progress since it helps to keep the posts in the PL cleaner.

[subego]

Originally Posted by OreoCookie 

I think your latest proposal mixes two different rules (in particular the last sentence): this one is covered by other rules or unenforceable: what is just an accusation and what is something that has a foundation on fact?

I'm not sure if I'm misunderstanding you, or my language needs to be cleaned up with the last sentence, but the idea I'm going for is discussing whether something is a Rule 8 violation or not is not allowed in a thread. If a member thinks it's a violation, they use the "report abuse" button. If a member makes a post that says something like "rule 8 violation" they have violated the rules so other people can hit the report abuse button on them.

This addresses what Kevin brought up: that people post "rule 8 violation" in the thread itself just to be a jerk.

[OreoCookie]

Originally Posted by subego 

I'm not sure if I'm misunderstanding you, or my language needs to be cleaned up with the last sentence, but the idea I'm going for is discussing whether something is a Rule 8 violation or not is not allowed in a thread. If a member thinks it's a violation, they use the "report abuse" button. If a member makes a post that says something like "rule 8 violation" they have violated the rules so other people can hit the report abuse button on them.

This addresses what Kevin brought up: that people post "rule 8 violation" in the thread itself just to be a jerk.

Well, to me the phrasing was ambiguous.
I would still make it a separate rule or amend it to another rule (e. g. no +1 posts would be a natural candidate to me). But it's two separate things and they should be kept separate.

[subego]

Originally Posted by OreoCookie 

Well, to me the phrasing was ambiguous.

I'll work on it

Originally Posted by OreoCookie 

I would still make it a separate rule or amend it to another rule (e. g. no +1 posts would be a natural candidate to me). But it's two separate things and they should be kept separate.

Well, proposing alterations to the general forum rules are way out of my purview. However, I think there's a case to be made to have it attached to Rule 8 because that seems to be the only place where there's actually a big problem with it. Just like Kevin said, people do say "rule 8 violation" just to be narky with someone they disagree with. People may say "wrong forum" to be a jerk too, but I don't think that happens as often. Likewise, should there even be a clamp put on "wrong forum" posts? This really seems like a very specific problem.

Also, maybe things have changed since the infractions system, but I can't say I've ever seen the +1 rule publicly enforced. I've never been personally dinged for doing it either, but then again I don't do it very often.

On a separate front, I think I can withdraw my idea of needing to have the "spirit" explicitly contained in the rule. I realized this was a hold-over from the more ambiguous "post and run" version. If the rule essentially says "no cut and paste", what that means is clear enough to let people figure out their own context for it. Score one for brevity.

I may be overanalyzing things, but I figure if I'm going to tinker around with the innards here, I should try and do it right.

[OreoCookie]

Originally Posted by subego 

Well, proposing alterations to the general forum rules are way out of my purview. However, I think there's a case to be made to have it attached to Rule 8 because that seems to be the only place where there's actually a big problem with it. Just like Kevin said, people do say "rule 8 violation" just to be narky with someone they disagree with. People may say "wrong forum" to be a jerk too, but I don't think that happens as often. Likewise, should there even be a clamp put on "wrong forum" posts? This really seems like a very specific problem.

Well, yes and no. I don't have as much a problem with `Rule 8 reply posts' than with Rule 8 violations themselves. Part of Kevin's argument weren't just `Rule 8 reply posts', but rather Rule 8 violation reports being used as a political tool. Unless the mods of the PL tell me otherwise, I'm not sure these are much of a problem either, or rather a problem that can't be solved by other means. Usually only a select few overuse and abuse the system and in most cases, we have other means to deal with them.

In other subforums, a `wrong forum' remark can even be helpful to noobs, so I would even want to keep those as long as they are not insulting to other posters. If they are, then other rules obviously apply.

Originally Posted by subego 

Also, maybe things have changed since the infractions system, but I can't say I've ever seen the +1 rule publicly enforced. I've never been personally dinged for doing it either, but then again I don't do it very often.

Up until now, it hasn't been enforced for people who make +1 posts only occasionally. Repeat offenders have been dealt with from the very beginning. With infractions, we can also deal with those cases that previously haven't been worth `prosecuting'.

Originally Posted by subego 

On a separate front, I think I can withdraw my idea of needing to have the "spirit" explicitly contained in the rule. I realized this was a hold-over from the more ambiguous "post and run" version. If the rule essentially says "no cut and paste", what that means is clear enough to let people figure out their own context for it. Score one for brevity.

I agree. Post and run can be interpreted as posting something inflammatory and returning three pages later in the discussion. However, this hasn't been the only original intention of the rule. Now that it says `no copying and pasting' explicitly, it is a vast improvement.

I would suggest the following. If you feel that some other rules need to be altered to fit the new context, try to split them

[Kevin]

Originally Posted by OreoCookie 

I know, but how would you know things only mods and admins can know, e. g. who has reported whose post? Normal users such as you can't.

Unless we are told by mods. Which has been the case here.
\

[Chuckit]

Originally Posted by Kevin 

Unless we are told by mods. Which has been the case here.
\

You aren't by any chance referring to a post made almost three years ago, are you?