I’ve run into a thing I haven’t seen before.
The basic question is: Can one quote themselves and change what is in the quote box that they had said earlier?
Here’s the example.
Here is Amateur Barbarians first post.
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=19600675&postcount=14
Here is where Amateur Barbarian quoted himself but added words inside the quote box.
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=19601282&postcount=24
What is the old yin-yang on that?
It certainly looks like any edits were made for a reason, and the edit is also signified in some way (in this case, bolded).
It also didn’t change the meaning of the quote in any way.
True. He added the words to make it more clear as to what he was saying. Which I think would be fine but like I said I’ve never seen that before and if it’s not cool then I’d like to know so I don’t do it in the future.
I’d just like some clarification.
EDIT: to make more better
Ban him.
Maybe he spoke the new post aloud before he submitted it, and it was those spoken words that he was accurately quoting without alteration in the new quote box.
He didn’t format it correctly, but otherwise what he did was ok.
Generally, stuff in quote boxes is sacrosanct. However, normal editing rules apply. You can add text for clarity like he did there, but you should put the added text in brackets instead of bolding it.
Cool. Thanks all.
Hrm.
I see little reason to complain and wouldn’t moderate it in GD or Elections provided there was no attempt to deceive. What that could be I couldn’t say but I have confidence the Teeming Millions could be creative.
Note, however, that editing someone elses text in a quote box - other than small things like ‘snip’ and such - is still verboten. Had AB done that in this case it would certainly have been warnable.
What about recursive quoting?
But just to be clear, editing a quote to alter its meaning is prohibited, even if it’s your own text you’re altering?
Correct. Anything that changes the meaning is prohibited.
From the FAQs (those stickies at the top of ATMB that nobody ever reads 
):
[QUOTE]
[NOPARSE]
Text inside
[QUOTE]
tags is sacrosanct. Normal editorial rules apply: that is, you may indicate omitted portions of a quote by the use of ellipses “…” and you may add text to clarify a word using square brackets (e.g., “her [the sister’s] friend”), but you may not add editorial comments or edit a quote so as to change the substantive meaning; nor may you substitute text such as “some blather” or “more nonsense” inside the
ETA: The FAQ says specifically someone else’s quotes, but that’s mostly since people don’t usually quote themselves. We generally treat all quote boxes the same, regardless of whether you are quoting yourself or someone else.
Then whats the rule on quoting someone without the QUOTE tags, striking out part of it and writing “fixed that for you”? Seems like that is “editing a quote to alter its meaning” if we want to be pedantic.
From what I remember just using quote marks instead of the quote boxes isn’t as sacrosanct but I have no idea where the line is, the mods will know, that’s why I just stick to the quote boxes, much easier and cleaner.
Generally speaking, as long as it’s not inside quote boxes you’re ok. As Drunky Smurf said, quotes outside of quote boxes aren’t so sacrosanct.
Just be aware that “fixed that for you” is often used in a very snarky manner and you might run afoul of our “don’t be a jerk” rule with it. But the modification of the quote outside of a quote box alone isn’t a rule violation (or at least hasn’t been enforced as such here historically).
This just came to my attention due to certain… blind spots of long standing.
I was warned long ago over a similar very minor change in a quote box, and I’ve been scrupulously careful with snips and the like ever since, and have never, never changed the content of a quote in any way except reduction to a salient point and that one (now two) humorous additions.
My quote-change post was to an exceptionally stupid reply and while I might have found other ways to set up the answer, adding the obvious clause to my own quote, bolding it, and changing it to a bright color seemed to skate past the no-change rule in this case. The color change did not post and I decided the change was adequately marked out by bold not to bother editing it.
I won’t do even this slight variation, on my own quotes, again. I apologize if anyone was even momentarily confused by it. But fuckmejesus, maybe there’s a user or two who could use walk out around in the fresh air if they think this was worth tattling to teacher about.
nevar mind