The discussion revolves around the issue of users modifying quoted text in Discourse forums. pqMMA suggests disabling the modification of quoted text to prevent misrepresentation of other users’ words. Thomas_G proposes adding a notice when a quote has been edited, and shares a relevant discussion on Meta Discourse.
Some users, like pfaffman, believe that proper moderation can address the issue, while others, such as pqMMA and tmomas, think that preventing or notating quote modifications would be a more effective solution, citing instances of spammers exploiting this feature.
However, codinghorror argues that this is a moderation issue rather than a software problem, and that users can find ways to grief each other through various means. They suggest observing the issue in practice before considering a solution.
I don’t know about other teams running Discourse forums, but I know the quote function as it exist now will lead to our users messing with each other.
When I highlight text and use the ‘quote’ function, the content goes into my WYSIG editor, but I have the ability to change what’s inside the quote. Basically it’s very easy for me to make it appear as if another user said something they didn’t.
I’d prefer not to disable the option completing, but is there a way to make it so the quoted text can’t be modified?
That’s something I hate every time I witness it. There should be a notice somewhere that the quote has been edited and it’s not the original one. Hm, what do you think?
Via CSS, this would disable the button when highlighting the test you want to quote. I guess though it does not disable the entire quote system.
Since it’s obvious that it’s easy to edit the text of a quote, users should be aware of the issue. If users change people’s words in a way that is against the community norms you should take action against them just as your would any other bad behavior.
Although I don’t disagree that proper moderation can alleviate the issue, I don’t think it would stop all the issues caused. Whereas either preventing this or at least notating it would be a 100% sure fire fix.
I have seen this recently being used by spammers (placing their spam link at a ‘.’, which makes it very hard to spot), therefore having an indication that a quote has been modified would be appreciated.
There is already a css style to indicate a quote has been edited, as I recall.
In general this is an issue of moderation, not software features. Similarly, users can post “blank” posts by using obscure Unicode spaces, etc. and there are about one million ways users can grief each other with Unicode, across the breadth of the internet.
Rather than imagining it as a problem in your mind, try seeing if it is an actual problem in practice, in the real world, first.
