kudzurunner
3981 posts
Mar 18, 2013
3:41 PM
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This morning I received a terse, one sentence request from J.D. Hoskins to delete his forum membership. Members have a right to be former members, which is why I do my best to honor members' wishes to become former members--or did, until I realized just now why we are no longer going to do that.
I have no idea why JD made the request, nor was I inclined to ask. Live and let live. I asked one of the mods to honor the request and that was that.
Except it wasn't, and that's why I'm starting this thread. It turns out that when a current member is "formered," as you might call it, every single contribution that they've made to the forum vanishes with them. Or at least that's what seems to have happened with Mr. Hoskins--unless (and this is possible, although not likely) he went back through every thread he'd contributed to and painstakingly deleted every one of his hundreds of posts.
If I'm right about this comprehensive auto-delete function, then (semi-)official forum policy is hereby amended. Forum members are free to simply go away, but they should not assume that the moderators and I, even when asked directly, will delete memberships on request--if deleting memberships means auto-deleting every post that member has made.
The reason for this is simple: such an auto-delete function ends up rendering certain threads incoherent--especially when the member has played a high-visibility role and/or has acted as an agent provocateur.
I'm not claiming that JD did either of these things; nor am I claiming that he didn't. Nor do I have any animus at what has resulted from deleting his membership, as he requested.
By the same token, I have no intention of making it easy for members to erase all traces of their (troublemaking dadgum) presence here, or, worse, being asked to help them do that. This forum has a life of its own. Members should honor that.
If you want to leave the forum, please do that: leave. But the conversation you've had will linger--unless, truly possessed, you go back through and hand-delete every single post you've made. I don't believe that JD did that, but I can't say for sure. THAT option, in any case, is always open to you. But please don't ask us to delete your membership. We will occasionally do that--but not because you ask us.
Of course, those who are determined to erase every trace of their presence here do have one other no-frills option: they can flagrantly breach the forum creed in one or more ways (such as calling me a f---ing ass--le) and we will pretty quickly decide that they are persona non grata, at which point we'll terminate with extreme prejudice and all their pesky, flea-bitten, ill-begotten, and pointless contributions to various threads will just up and vanish.
I'm OK with that. That's the loophole. But that's the only easy way to become a former member from now on.
The easiest way, of course, is just to go away.
Last Edited by kudzurunner on Mar 18, 2013 3:49 PM
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SuperBee
1013 posts
Mar 18, 2013
4:06 PM
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I generally found JD's posts of interest. Sorry to see him go. He has lots of knowledge. And opinions.
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Last Edited by SuperBee on Mar 18, 2013 4:14 PM
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Bigtone
157 posts
Mar 18, 2013
4:08 PM
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Yeah bummer. He seemed like a perfectly nice guy. I emailed him back and forth many times. Wonder what made him wanna run off.
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6SN7
290 posts
Mar 18, 2013
4:11 PM
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I was just able to delete one of my comments on the thread about Bruce Collins new amp. Signed in, clicked the box next to the comment and clicked "delete." poof....
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Rick Davis
1476 posts
Mar 18, 2013
4:18 PM
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Wow! Too bad.
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-Rick Davis
The Blues Harp Amps Blog
The Mile High Blues Society
Tip Jar
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nacoran
6576 posts
Mar 18, 2013
4:19 PM
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SuperBee, could you link to one that didn't disappear? I've done a cursory search and they seem to be gone.
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Nate
Facebook
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dougharps
366 posts
Mar 18, 2013
4:49 PM
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I found his posts to be valuable, and I will miss his participation.
I agree that member posts to the forum should not all be deleted when a member is leaving, as this does wreck threads. I think that if we mess up a specific post that editing or deleting that post is OK.
If an individual feels that strongly about deleting all the posts, one by one is the way they should have to go.
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Doug S.
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ReedSqueal
389 posts
Mar 18, 2013
5:08 PM
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Well, his posts me be gone forever on the "live" forum, but they are preserved for eternity on the archive.org site. MBH has been archived since 2008. Posts can not be deleted from the archives, that I know of anyways.
Here's a snapshot of a page where JD posted, and it's preserved.
Web archive snapshot.
If you want to "take it from the top" for this forum in the archives, start here:
Modern Blues harmonica archive.
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Go ahead and play the blues if it'll make you happy.
-Dan Castellaneta
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rbeetsme
1144 posts
Mar 18, 2013
5:12 PM
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I asked to leave another forum where I was a frequent contributor, more than 14 years. I asked to be removed because I saw a pattern of behavior from the owner/founder that I felt was destructive and no longer wanted to be identified as a supporter. Same thing happened. Every post I made disappeared. Must be an automatic function.
Last Edited by rbeetsme on Mar 18, 2013 5:13 PM
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yonderwall
49 posts
Mar 18, 2013
5:18 PM
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I still see a post of his here:
http://www.modernbluesharmonica.com/board/board_topic/5560960/5059739.htm
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hohnerjones
37 posts
Mar 18, 2013
5:21 PM
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Uh Rick, would that be the B****** forum? Noticed you were absent. Miss your youtube and gear review postings! You should post them here.
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didjcripey
493 posts
Mar 18, 2013
5:28 PM
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Too bad eh?
One of the things about an internet presence, is that what you say and do is potentially preserved for all time. This is something I hope a lot of the youngsters understand with their social media business.
Its a good approach for life anyway, don't say or do anything you might regret later.
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Lucky Lester
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yonderwall
50 posts
Mar 18, 2013
5:29 PM
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There still seem to be quite a few of his posts around (or have they recently been restored?). Here are 3 samples out of the 4 hits from a forum search that I just tried:
http://www.modernbluesharmonica.com/board/board_topic/5560960/5142451.htm
http://www.modernbluesharmonica.com/board/board_topic/5560960/5043910.htm
http://www.modernbluesharmonica.com/board/board_topic/5560960/4736434.htm
Last Edited by yonderwall on Mar 18, 2013 6:10 PM
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SuperBee
1014 posts
Mar 18, 2013
6:41 PM
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The one I was referring to is in the current jr wells teaches harmonica thread begun by holliston harper
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nacoran
6582 posts
Mar 18, 2013
6:46 PM
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Okay, well it looks like it was probably him self-deleting. Oh well.
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Nate
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Afro Blue
130 posts
Mar 19, 2013
12:52 PM
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I will dearly miss J.D. Hoskins. He was a great member of this forum.
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Hunger is the best spice.
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