The whole point of free speech is not to make ideas exempt from criticism but to expose them to it.

Friday, March 19, 2010

Rules of discourse...

Unless Sanborn overrules me on this (it does have his © on the masthead) I will delete comments from "Anonymous" from now on. You will have to choose a handle other than "Anonymous."

I know there is no way to prevent anyone from choosing a different screen name every time (s)he comments, but it will at least be more entertaining than having different people use "Anonymous."

I'm not kidding. Post as "Anonymous," and your comment will be deleted as soon as I see it.

6 comments:

Bob Newland said...

THAT's the spirit!

Funny.

hidden person with no name said...

What do you have against anonymous? Some of us would prefer to remain anonymous. You can still moderate on content if anonymous is too disrespectful...

Pot, meet kettle said...

So Mike, tell what you really think about your right winger Commissioners jacking up your property taxes? And Black Hills Power rate extortion? You wrote half a dozen articles about a small printing error that cost a couple thousand bucks - you are strangely silent, (compliant?) when it concerns larger and more significant government-facilitated rightwing-leaning raiding of tax and rate payers.

caheidelberger said...

"Hidden", you ask a lot of Mr. Newland. If the conversation is civil, there is little to no reason to not put your name to it. Instead of expecting Mr. Newland to exercise that sort of content-based control, why not put the responsibility on participants to speak only in such a way that they are willing to associate their name with their words? If you have some awesome scoop or whistleblowing that you can't risk being associated with, contact Newland privately, give him the info, and let him post it second-hand.

Bob Newland said...

"Anonymous" is boring and unimaginative, both sins in my book.

You did just fine as "hidden person with no name."

Bob Newland said...

Pot/kettle, we encourage you to write the piece to which you allude and submit it. If purported facts in it are documented and it does not libel anyone, and it is not boring and unimaginative, we'll run it as a topic.

You can send it directly to newland@rapidcity.com (you'll have to respond to a challenge from my spam filter the first time you do so).

For the record, I (and, I suspect, Sanborn) agree with your sentiments about taxes and power rates.

As for the "small printing error," the posts to which you refer were never about a printing error. They were about a conspiracy to defraud taxpayers of an amount well in excess of $100,000, which rises to a level somewhat above "small."