Discussion:Deleting discussions
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Discussion Forum Index --> Basic Tax Questions --> Deleting discussions
Discussion Forum Index --> Tax Questions --> Deleting discussions
| January 16, 2008 | |
| How do you feel about entire discussions being deleted? At least two whole discussions have been deleted in the past couple of weeks or so. Personally, I think it should not be done. The code of conduct for this site says that we should not be editing posts from other people, and deleting an entire discussion is a major edit.
If you think you might not want to have something posted in the future, please don't post it in the first place. It doesn't go away, even after it's been deleted anyway. | |
Donniecastleman (talk|edits) said: | 16 January 2008 |
| Yep, one of those was me. I deleted a guy in Florida's solicitation of his "Cost Segregation Report", every single one, everyone was pissed off at this guy for plugging his crap on our board. TA has NO PLACE for solicitation of garbage like this. In 9 months of being on this board this jerk in Florida was the first I've seen to piss off people in the masses. Sorry for the deletions, but it seemed the most appropriate thing to do. | |
| 16 January 2008 | |
| I have an idea.
Instead of deleting the solicitation post, why don't you add the words IMPROPER SOLICITATION to the subject line so that everyone will know what it is and can add their abuse to the thread. The New Tax Guy | |
| January 16, 2008 | |
| Now I understand, Donnie. I think Newtax's idea is good. While there have been solicitations and other disguised PR plugs on this site, deleting entire discussions throws the baby out with the bath water so to speak. Many times there are other good points raised in those discussions. | |
| 16 January 2008 | |
| I don't think there were in that one, and I don't think any useful purpose would have been served by keeping it around. | |
| 16 January 2008 | |
| I agree with Natalie. I lost a couple of good dicussions on publicly traded gas and oil trusts last year because of some nitwit's "sales" pitch. | |
| January 16, 2008 | |
| Well, re-reading that discussion, I question HomeBoy's motivation. I think CPADavid is on the up-and-up, however, so I would disagree that there's nothing worthwhile in that thread. | |
Death&Taxes (talk|edits) said: | 16 January 2008 |
| Why not just label the comment 'SPAM?'
I had thought last night to post 'Get a Cost Aggregation Study' in the huge discussion of S Corp Health Insurance and other places. Sarcasm sometimes works better than censorship. | |
Rgtaxservice (talk|edits) said: | 16 January 2008 |
| I don't think the posts should edited or re-labeled. Especially if it's interwined with a relevant discussion. Many of us have been here long enough to be able to police ourselves. Maybe in the future we should leave a message on the offender's User Page to educate him/her on the Code of Conduct. Once warned, any further solicitations would warrant abuse. | |
| 16 January 2008 | |
| In defense of me, my post was sarcasm. The fish didn't bite. | |
Rgtaxservice (talk|edits) said: | 17 January 2008 |
| Silly me. I actually thought you were a shill. I'm such a duffus. | |
Donniecastleman (talk|edits) said: | 17 January 2008 |
| Oh man am I relieved! I figured I was the most hated man in America by now! Honestly I did what I did because I thought it was the right thing, sparing my comrades on this page from reading about Cost Segregation Report facilities in Palm Beach FL. Deal, we'll keep all the posts from now on but let's mark the solicitation/Amway/Investools solicitations as SPAM or SOLICITATION in the subject line to keep the content intact. Sounds good to me, thanks for everyone being there, and anything I can do in return, just drop a line!
p.s. Natalie, thanks for all you do on this board! You rock! :) | |
| January 17, 2008 | |
| Oh my gosh. Now if we were face to face, the body language that would be coming across is some pink coloration in my cheeks and a huge smile on my face. Thanks Donnie. | |
| 17 January 2008 | |
| Donnie's right, Natalie. You rock!
Tom PS: I agree with the solution. We just had another one of these trolls here recently who claims they can save thousands of $$$$$ on someone's taxes with "no red flags." Troll somewhere else." | |
| 17 January 2008 | |
| Natalie, I know I am one of the ones you are addressing because you left me a message stating this in no uncertain terms. I did try to respond with both an email and to your profile page and cannot find where it shows up or whether you got either one. I deleted a question/comment/discussion I started BUT only deleted my part of it. I have never deleted and/or altered anyone else's posts nor would I, though I know for a fact that I've had changes made to some of mine. I have also deleted posts I've made in other discussions because I was honestly very offended by some of the incredibly rude and insulting things people sometimes write. I hope that I am not one of those. I have re-read the Rules of Conduct as Natalie suggested and could not find anywhere where it stated that I could not delete my own post. Is this or is this not correct? | |
| 17 January 2008 | |
| I personally feel that it is OK to delete the spam post, but not legitimate discussions. HOWEVER, maybe the more polite thing to do would be to disable the links and label it as
SPAM as others have suggested. | |
| January 17, 2008 | |
| LJA, first, I did not receive your response to my message to you, and I do not have my email listed on this site. It took a while, but I found the partial discussion you deleted. All that's left is a response that no one else can make sense of unless they look at the history of the page. You are correct that the Code of Conduct does not disallow editing one's own postings, including deleting them, and I understand why you deleted your post. As I suggested in the message to you, I think we all need to remember that this is a public forum. If there's something we think we might not want others to see some time in the future, it's best not to post it at all.
The Code of Conduct does state we should not be editing other people's posts, and it specifically states that we should be polite. I've seen some posts that were very rude and downright mean. For those people who have posted those things, perhaps they will be reminded not to do so in the future. It makes this place much better for all of us when the code is followed. | |
| 17 January 2008 | |
Natalie, last year I was commended by Tim for deleting a persistent SPAM post and posting a GO AWAY message on the offender's profile discussion page.
No one wants spam. Especially if it is on a good, legitimate discussion thread. But some spammers start their own spam thread just for the fun of it. As a community, I say we shouldn't allow this. You are saying to leave it alone, which, to me, is like saying - "if there is grafitti in your neighborhood, don't clean it up, everyone is smart enough to ignore it", but studies have shown that grafitti that isn't cleaned up just invites more grafiti and broken windows (have you read the book The Tipping Point?) | |
Death&Taxes (talk|edits) said: | 17 January 2008 |
| As I recall, the problem here was not that this person was linking to anything, but in many discussions about depreciation and the like, posting and suggesting cost segregation studies to be the panacea for whatever ailed you. We've seen cases where posters hijack threads [did Beatle Fred hijack his own thread, or did he hijack the forum] and these posts had that potential. | |
| 17 January 2008 | |
| you can do a search on 'spam' and note all of the threads for which the offending post has been removed by various members in good standing of our community, includng Tim. | |
| 17 January 2008 | |
| Discussion:Ads in Forum | |
| 17 January 2008 | |
| From the outside looking in here , May I ask What exactly is wrong with Cost Seg studies or the recommendation to look into one? My understanding is that they are becoming a common tool for tax planning? | |
Death&Taxes (talk|edits) said: | 17 January 2008 |
| There is nothing wrong with cost seg studies, per se, but this guy was posting the suggestion to many discussions that had little to do with same, and where the original poster was not looking for such a suggestion. Oddly it wasn't his line of business either, but he seemed to have friends in it.
Heck, I believe our state NATP chapter had a CPE seminar this month on them. Did I ever tell you how great variable annuities are? Maybe its time all you people bought one from this buddy of mine. | |
TheTinCook (talk|edits) said: | 17 January 2008 |
| It's a just schill marketing. The guy was using multiple accounts to talk up his business. | |
| January 18, 2008 | |
| I do not want spam either, so maybe that should be in the code of conduct. I have seen some good information get deleted, which is really what I prefer not happen. I guess I got suckered into one of those threads that have turned out to be spam. | |
| January 18, 2008 | |
| Thanks for that link, Kevin. I hadn't seen that discussion before. I definitely do not want this site polluted by ads. | |
Donniecastleman (talk|edits) said: | 18 January 2008 |
| Let me tell you about AMWAY! PRIMERICA! Vitamin Supplements! NSA Water Filters! Direct Buy! Investools! Targus Financial Services! Umm, Gas Pills! OK I'm done, did I leave out anything? Besides Cost Segregation Studies? | |
Donniecastleman (talk|edits) said: | 18 January 2008 |
| heh heh! | |
| January 18, 2008 | |
| The reason I started this discussion was that I saw several deletions in a short period of time, and I wasn't aware that spam was involved. (I'll admit -- I'm naive sometimes.) I'm okay with deleting the spam as long as the other good stuff doesn't get deleted as well. So, will those of you who know something is spam take care of it right away? If it gets done as soon as someone spots it, it will be less likely to have other posts in it. | |
Bottom Line (talk|edits) said: | 19 January 2008 |
| You can tell if a post has been deleted because there's more space between the comments. | |
| January 23, 2008 | |
| I need to apologize to all of you who feel the way I do about deleting others' posts -- I just deleted something I think does not belong on this website. And I broke the Code. | |
| 23 January 2008 | |
| we also need to report the abuser to Tim and post a message on the abuser's discussion page to LEAVE | |
| January 23, 2008 | |
| Kevin I think he just looking for attention. It may be best to just report him to Tim, then just ignore him. | |
| January 23, 2008 | |
| I've blocked the abuser of the day and removed the posts as I didn't see much useful information there. If anyone disagrees, I have the power to "un-delete" them. Thank you so much to those of you who let me know about the situation!
- Tim Doyle, TaxAlmanac Moderator - Talk to me 15:03, 23 January 2008 (CST) | |
| 23 January 2008 | |
| thanks Sharon, Natalie and I have reported him, but anyone else that finds him offensive should also let him and Tim know. | |
| January 23, 2008 | |
| Thanks Tim - another forum I frequent has this option, and it's a good idea under these particular circumstances. | |
| January 23, 2008 | |
| As far as deleting discussions goes, I think there's a balance. For example, I would not like to see people deleting entire discussions that they had asked simply because they had received their answer already. Many others will visit TaxAlmanac later with similar situations, and so these old discussions have value.
Spam or abusive posts can be deleted from discussions, and in the case of the two today, I deleted the entire discussions because they consisted of little substance other than abusive posts and the responses. - Tim Doyle, TaxAlmanac Moderator - Talk to me 15:17, 23 January 2008 (CST) | |
| January 23, 2008 | |
| I agree completely. I'm relatively new to TA and I've learned a LOT by looking at old discussions - both for specific issues/questions and for general info about issues of interest.
The one today, tho, had no redeeming info at all IMO. Deletion and blocking was a good choice. | |
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