In case you're curious about the specific quote:

I worked volunteer time on a computer system where we had extra computer cycles and allowed guest users from the net to come and borrow our system on the theory that it cost us nothing to do so. Someone had done something that was alleged to be bad and the trail of evidence was gigantic, so we took just turned off his account for safety because it just wasn't possible to figure out what really happened without enormous cost to ourselves, and we had other responsibilities. Spending the time would have caused us to have to reconsider the cost-free nature of the entire guest program and perhaps to turn off everyone's guest account.

The quote, though, just seems to suggest that somehow I don't value fairness.

(Somehow I'm sure the Editors at Open Salon will relate to this quandary.)

Your experience reminds me that it is very easy in the online world to forget there are real people behind the words and avatars we see. It is always a temptation to indulge oneself in the act of "going off" on people, because we don't really see them as people at all, but only as the objects of our anger, our outrage, or our lust. Dog knows I've been as guilty of this over the years as anyone.

(Don't worry, Kent, I'm not lusting for you.)

But I do want to take this opportunity to point out that there is a real person behind each and every avatar here (with the possible exception of a couple of folks whose avatar may represent only teams of ghostwriters advancing particular causes).

I don't agree with all the people all the time. Sometimes, I keep my disagreement to myself, and other times I don't. Whenever we disagree, I try to disagree without seeming to be disagreeable or insulting. Sometimes I try harder than other times. (I just wrote a few pretty pointed comments, just this morning.)

Anyway, I don't think it is fair to people to be overly snide and insulting. I appreciate everyone here, whether I disagree with them over some petty political issue or not. Real people have real feelings. If your remarks contain words or thoughts that you would hesitate to say to a real live person , then please take the time to reflect and reconsider before you hit the "Post this comment" button.

My OS friends have touched me in ways that I had not bargained for when I joined this forum, and although I almost never use this term, you all make me feel blessed. Today I am giving thanks for all of you, whose forbearance allows me to feel unafraid to present my ranting and writing.

I would refer you to the use of truncati in everyday quotational context. Or out-of-context, if you prefer. http://open.salon.com/content.php?cid=29488

Particularly pithy was my misquote at calling the senator from Connecticut "Joe Lie."

Happy Thanksgiving, Kent!

That reminds me, CoyoteOldStyle, that I completely forgot about putting "truncati" in the OS lexicon. That's a bit of cleverness that belongs there, and I'll add an entry.

Let's see... I'll have to think about when someone might have quoted me.

I remember being amused by your truncati comment! It was random emergent brilliance, and unforgettable.

It is true, I did claim that there were WMD's in Iraq. heh heh heh
But I was misquotalized and my reputation has been damaged for ever.
All I was saying was that there were White Muslims who were Dangerous. WMD's--get it? heh heh heh
And we did find, many White Muslims who were Dangerous in Iraq and if we did not bother to fight them there we would have to fight them here. heh heh heh
Now that is not to say that there are not Black Muslims over here that we do not have to fight. heh heh heh
Although they do not like me very much.
But when you are misquotalized, your reputation can be forever damaged.
Everybody keeps saying there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and we should, therefore, not have gone to war.
But there were White Muslims who were dangerous over there and I came on the battleship in order to de-dangerize the White Muslims. All I want to do is straighten out that recordification.
Thank you,

W

There are many who won't let the facts interfere with their opinions.

Dick Day. Great impresion of "The Decider." Who put that idiot in charge? Oh/ yeah.....

Now I have to go look up truncati.

In a "sort of related" sense Kent, I'll say what I always say about the written word, on-line in particular. It's VERY easy, when you don't have a person's body language, voice inflection, tone, etc... to misinterpret their meaning.

That's one thing I hate most about e-mails and texts. Let's just say you are in a happy and/or feisty mood and text one of your good friends. You say "What's the deal man?", as in "Hey, how's it going?" That person has had an incredibly bad day where everything he has done has gone wrong so he's in "defense mode".
He interprets the text as "what's wrong with you?" In reality it was a harmless little text in place of "how's it going?"

Maybe a bit of a simplistic example, but it's really, really hard to get inside of someone's meanings of words, or the context they say it when it's on a page.

To quote Bill Clinton, "I feel your pain."

rated
Greg

I'm rarely lost for words but between Rich's beautiful comment that expresses better than I could why we need to be thoughtful before posting anything and Dick Day's perfect example of poor W's "misquotes" I think I'm out of my league here ;)

I've been misquoted, I'm sure, but the worst thing I can think of that was done to me in a public context was on a local access cable TV show. For the life of me I don't remember why someone asked me to be on the show--to explain something I was involved in at the time, AIDS education maybe. But after the show I found out that someone had put an identification on the bottom of the screen that said I was with some kind of racist group like the Klan. Apparently this racist had been on another show and that "title card" or whatever you call it had been mistakenly broadcast on the show I was on.

I made them edit the tapes so that would never appear again, broadcast an apology, and write a letter explaining what happened.

Sheesh, not very amusing, is it? What a buzz kill I am--sorry. Quick, somebody get the humor going again.

I did the google on truncati and ended up back at Salon. I get it now.

Now I have to look up ephemeral. Thanks.

That's a great story, though, Susan. There are only a few things, I think, that could be more damaging to one's reputation. I'm glad you got it worked out.

I once sent an e-mail to a colleague about a situation that upset me. She became upset with me over something else and forwarded that e-mail to several people, one of whom might have believed the e-mail was about her, when it was patently not. I had to put out a lot of fires that day. Sigh. I learned to never, ever write anything incendiary in an e-mail. EVER.

True dat Odette! "Step away from the keyboard. Again, STEP AWAY FROM THE KEYBOARD!" Gather yourself, take a deep breath and let it go...

Does it count the same if your photographic image has been cast upon the heartless winds of truncatitude?

Yikes, Lonnie. If it's the image I'm thinking of, it wouldn't be good to have a lot of gratuitous truncati

No UK, that just falls under the "disturbingly absurd" category.
:-D
J/K Lonnie, we love you and your lily white ass.
High 5's
G