It's simple, really.

If I say it in public, you may repeat it and attribute it to me; if I say it in private, you may not (unless you get my permission.)

The chatterbox is public just as nodes are.

A private message is not.

It is our responsibility to be careful what we say before we say it. It is not everyone else's responsibility to shield us from the repercussions after the fact.

I don't understand the confusion over this. I don't think any monk should have the expectation that what he says in the CB won't be repeated. The reality is that you don't know who is listening and you don't have any recourse if it is repeated.

Furthermore, I don't think there is anything respectable about the behavior of a monk that says something stupid in the CB and then complains when it is repeated. We should all take responsibility for our words. If we say something we later regret, we can recant, apologize, and remind people that we did so as often as is necessary. What we can't do is go back in time and change it.

Lastly, we would all do well not to take ourselves or others too seriously. We all say stupid things once in a while. So what? If someone says something stupid and then they recant and apologize, give them some slack (that's "the benefit of the doubt" for everyone not accustomed to my american slang.) Keep it in mind that next time it might be you in the hot seat. We are all human afterall.

Update: Regarding context: we may expect to be taken out of context too. If that happens and we are confronted with such a situation, we can attempt to explain the original context. As a practical matter though, it will happen on occasion. We should consider that risk when we choose how to phrase things and if we find that risk to be of great concern, we can choose not to publicy air our thoughts.

When quoting others, it is responsible to preserve the original meaning as we understand it. Again, however, as matter of practicality, some will, some won't, and some will try but misunderstand us anyway.

-sauoq
"My two cents aren't worth a dime.";

To paraphrase what someone from Texas once told me,

Be sure to make your words soft and sweet. You may have to eat them someday.
--t. alex
Life is short: get busy!

jdporter
The 6th Rule of Perl Club is -- There is no Rule #6.

Nothing personal jdporter but...

Based solely on this statement, it could be argued that every cblast35 mirror should be taken down...

updated: Thanks for the clarification jdporter
s/this/your first/;

No, I don't think so. There's a big difference between recording something, and slightly delaying the evanescence of something.
But yes, there must be a line somewhere. How long is too long?
The other issue is context. cblast35 and its kin do not edit context.

jdporter
The 6th Rule of Perl Club is -- There is no Rule #6.

The difference that makes such an argument unlikely is that with a cblast35 mirror, the comments are only retained for a short period of time, whereas using them in a fortune-like program is to retain them permanently. There is an inherent understanding in posting in the ChatterBox that as a chat, comments there are fluid, and not retained for posterity. In recording them for such a program, however, they become "etched in stone," as it were. (And while there are likely private logs maintained here and there by some, they are not public-access.)

I agree that there is a treasury of comments and quips there that are highly entertaining. I also agree that it is reasonable, if assembling such a compilation, that one ask permission of the speaker to quote them with acknowledgement, or if the speaker would be uncomfortable with such, if they may use the quote and acknowledge it to a monk who wished to remain unnamed (or something along those lines).

I was trying to make a point.

I wholeheartedly agree that permission should be received prior to placing someone's quote in the fortune file.

This is as good a moment as any (and probably better than most) but I was going to tack a talk-stats and link-stats page onto my cblast35 mirror. So you'd know who the top overall talkers are and who was on top today. The other part - the link stats would probably just collect links to nodes and external URLs. I'm not sure what the semantics should be but maybe it shouldn't note references to user nodes. I also didn't think about the alternate text but maybe that shouldn't be included (though it is occasionally a good thing). For example - someone who said: [diotalevi|that rat bastard] might not the alternate text to live on.

It doesn't exist yet (except privately as a bunch of SQL views). If you feel like sending your comments prior to publication then let me know. Since rozalllin brought the issue up I'm interested in this as well.

Fun Fun Fun in the Fluffy Chair

My personal feeling is that this is a public forum. Any contributions I make here via chatterbox or post are quotable (with appropriate attribution, of course). If I felt something was worth copyright protection I'd post it on my personal site with the required legal jargon and link to it from here.

Go ahead and use me...

Update: ...although if I do say something regretably stupid, or I'm taken out of context, I reserve the right to ask that it be removed...

I also do not understand why anyone would be against this. If you said something publicly in the chatterbox, you knew it was public. Don't even start on me about 'invasion of privacy' or anything of the sort. As for anyone thinking that what they say is a fleeting comment, just blah! Here's a list of contexts your CB text might have been about:

• Simply talking: if you're just carrying on a normal conversation, then what you are saying is most likely not of too much interest and you shouldn't be ashamed/angry/happy/ (heck, you shouldn't feel any emotion) about it being recorded.
• A joke or a humourous comment: okay, so you said something funny. Why not have it around later so people can laugh about it?
• Something pissy/PMS: okay, here's one. You said something in a fit of anger, something that you probably wouldn't normally say, but your emotions overtook you and you insulted someone. You might not want this recorded, as you may think it will give you a negative reputation. Well guess what? Take responsability for the words that you speak. If you don't want your negative actions recorded, keep them to yourself.
• "I was talking about someone who wasn't logged in. I don't ever want them to see the message I just posted about them." Well guess what? If you insult people behind their backs, you deserve to be caught in the act.

Somebody mentioned that people could opt out of having their messages recorded. IMO, that just can't be done. Not only would you have to not record that person's messages, you would have to scan over every message that everybody else says to ensure those messages don't refer to the user that has opted out. If I wanted to opt out for example, you'd have to not record anything I say, as well as not recording any message that contains the word 'Coruscate'. The existance of this system is one of those 'everybody agrees on it or it doesn't get done' things. And, seeing that several monks don't like the idea, I doubt the system will ever exist.

One partial solution, of course, would be completely removing all names. That way all the messages would be anonymous. Once again however, it is quite impossible. Try removing all usernames from a CB message.

rozallin,
You have my permission to use anything that I say or have said, publicly or privately, in your fortune file.
(digitally signed),
Mr. Muskrat

Watch it Rozallin, I'd say he is making a pass at you ;-)

CountZero

"If you have four groups working on a compiler, you'll get a 4-pass compiler." - Conway's Law

No. If I was trying to make a pass, I would have said something like: "You can hold anything I say against me" and then followed up with... uh, on second thought I'll leave the follow up out!

Rozallin,

I hearby give permission for you (rozallin) or any Monk (member of Perlmonks) to use my public Chatter Box comments in quote files or examples. The only condition applied to this permission is that an attempt be made by the quote/example collector to keep the context of the comment.

Hmm, I need to stop listening to lawyers.

Roz - go for it. You don't need to ask me. Though I would request that you please ask me before using my private comments. Have fun with this.

C.

Can anyone imagine a judge buying the argument that someone screaming "$Variable_B has 21 write ups and -7XP" in the middle of Times Square at Noon was engaging in a private conversation with someone across the street and anyone who repeated it was invading their privacy?

If Rozallin (or anyone else) wants to quote my .sig, or any other perls of wisdom I drop, I'm honored. I'd appreciate an email letting me know that something I said was deemed quoteworthy, but the very act of posting words on a public forum invalidates any claim that the words were private. I would, however, expect proper attribution.

-Logan
"What do I want? I'm an American. I want more."

ditto for me.

---

Just a tongue-tied, twisted, earth-bound misfit. -- Pink Floyd