# Editing your own posts, revisited
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/editing-your-own-posts-revisited/162479
**Category:** About This Message Board
**Created:** [March 19, 2003, 5:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/editing-your-own-posts-revisited/162479 "2003-03-19T05:47:56Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Q.E.D](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.E.D)
#### Post date: [March 19, 2003, 5:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/editing-your-own-posts-revisited/162479/1 "2003-03-19T05:47:56Z")
I know this editing posts thing has been beaten to death, but would it not be possible to allow editing within a time limit or until a post has been made after yours? I’ve seen other forum boards that behave this way, and it’s a pretty straightforward mod. It would be nice to be able to do once in a while. _sigh_
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### Author:  [@Aslan\_of\_Narnia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aslan_of_Narnia)
#### Post date: [March 19, 2003, 7:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/editing-your-own-posts-revisited/162479/2 "2003-03-19T07:16:02Z")
It still has reprucussions, a guy could post something incredibly stupid/mean/racist, go back and edit it and say “Oh I made a typo” and people still might see it.
Theres no way of getting around it. Besides, even if it has tons of errors and bad grammar, it’s not that big of a deal.
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### Author:  [@Q.E.D](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.E.D)
#### Post date: [March 19, 2003, 7:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/editing-your-own-posts-revisited/162479/3 "2003-03-19T07:22:24Z")
True, but the number of views are also recorded. One could allow editing until the post was viewed, which would allow one to at least catch a "D’oh!"moment. Maybe. Besides, some of us_hate_to make typos.
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### Author:  [@Ice\_Wolf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ice_Wolf)
#### Post date: [March 19, 2003, 8:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/editing-your-own-posts-revisited/162479/4 "2003-03-19T08:11:56Z")
I know of other boards that allow limited-time editing (on a voluntarily regulated basis). While yes, it’s a neato feature to have, I don’t think it’s all that necessary, compared to the risks as **Aslan2** has described.
Of course, who likes typos? But that is what the preview screen helps you with.
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### Author:  [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)
#### Post date: [March 19, 2003, 9:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/editing-your-own-posts-revisited/162479/5 "2003-03-19T09:19:30Z")
I don’t think that the allow-editing-until-viewed thing would be very practical; when the boards are busy, your post is quite likely to be viewed by someone else almost immediately, possibly (and I’m not sure of the logistics of this) before you even get to see it yourself. Besides, if it was based on the incrementation of the _views_ field, it wouldn’t work - the views field is incremented when you (automatically) view your own post after submitting it.
I like the time-limited editing thing though; it works well on other boards and three minutes ought to cover it (in which time an inflammatory post(later snipped) would not do much damage).
It is hard to justify the need though, when we have a preview function (which I will be the first to admit I should use more).
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### Author:  [@TubaDiva](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TubaDiva)
#### Post date: [March 19, 2003, 1:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/editing-your-own-posts-revisited/162479/6 "2003-03-19T13:39:16Z")
We are up against server capacity as it is right now and often there’s not enough capacity to go around, right this very minute.
For us to open up the system to more of a beating than it’s getting already would be counterproductive. People are already complaining about board slowness now, imagine how much slower it would be if people got to edit and resubmit again and again.
Besides, I’m in no ways convinced that everyone that had access to it would use it only for good and not to annoy others. Unfortunately sometimes the good people suffer for the sins of a few jackasses. I’m sorry about that but what else can we do?
your humble TubaDiva
Adminstrator
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### Author:  [@Q.E.D](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.E.D)
#### Post date: [March 19, 2003, 1:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/editing-your-own-posts-revisited/162479/7 "2003-03-19T13:43:05Z")
Perhaps a one-time “you had your chance” type of edit thing? Dunno, just tossing out ideas, as I’mwont to do from time to time.
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### Author:  [@Shade](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shade)
#### Post date: [March 19, 2003, 2:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/editing-your-own-posts-revisited/162479/8 "2003-03-19T14:01:27Z")
Some indication of what was edited might provide a good compromise on the malcious editing issue.
Of course, its moot atm due to the hamster issue.
People get used to ignoring spelling mistakes
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### Author:  [@SmackFu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SmackFu)
#### Post date: [March 19, 2003, 2:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/editing-your-own-posts-revisited/162479/9 "2003-03-19T14:27:04Z")
If it’s really important, I believe the mods will edit it for you.
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### Author:  [@KneadToKnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KneadToKnow)
#### Post date: [March 19, 2003, 3:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/editing-your-own-posts-revisited/162479/10 "2003-03-19T15:30:40Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by Q.E.D. \*
> Perhaps a one-time “you had your chance” type of edit thing? Dunno, just tossing out ideas, as I’m wont to do from time to time.
I still don’t see how this is different from “Preview Reply.”
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### Author:  [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)
#### Post date: [March 19, 2003, 5:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/editing-your-own-posts-revisited/162479/11 "2003-03-19T17:07:56Z")
> [@](#):
>
> when the boards are busy, your post is quite likely to be viewed by someone else almost immediately, possibly (and I’m not sure of the logistics of this) before you even get to see it yourself.
Definitely true. There have been times when I started a thread, and by the time the board showed me my own brand-new thread for the first time, there were already two replies. There’s no sort of edit window which can possibly allow for that.
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### Author:  [@UncleBeer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UncleBeer)
#### Post date: [March 19, 2003, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/editing-your-own-posts-revisited/162479/12 "2003-03-19T17:33:16Z")
> [@](#):
>
> Some indication of what was edited might provide a good compromise on the malcious editing issue.
Except that anyone engaged in “malicious editing” ain’t very likely to be forthright about what they’ve redacted.
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### Author:  [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)
#### Post date: [March 19, 2003, 10:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/editing-your-own-posts-revisited/162479/13 "2003-03-19T22:33:06Z")
I did have an idea that I keep meaning to submit to the folks at vBulletin; it goes like this:
When you edit a post, the edited text does not overwrite the existing post, but is submitted as a new one; the thread index is updated so that the new(edited) post appears in place of the old one, but also with a little ‘editing history’ link (perhaps only accessible to registered users or maybe just moderators/admins) -clicking the link would pop up a new window showing the previous version(s) of the post.
One of the drawbacks of this would be that there would be no real way to know _why_ a post had been edited, so a lot of people would click the history link out of sheer curiosity, increasing the server load even further.
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### Author:  [@C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/C_K_Dexter_Haven)
#### Post date: [March 20, 2003, 1:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/editing-your-own-posts-revisited/162479/14 "2003-03-20T01:10:57Z")
Again, we just don’t have the server capacity for this.
We’re mainly talking about people wanting to edit a li’l typo here and there. That’s not worth slowing down everyone else’s access. If you’ve made a typo that you’re really worried or concerned about it (e.g., forgot the word “not”), email a Moderator and we’ll be glad to fix it for you. Otherwise, most of 'em are trivial li’l goofs, we all make 'em, no big deal… and, as I say, not worth slowing everything down for.
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### Author:  [@Essured](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Essured)
#### Post date: [March 20, 2003, 1:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/editing-your-own-posts-revisited/162479/15 "2003-03-20T01:59:02Z")
One of the things I love about this board is the fact that you can’t edit your posts. Makes this place better, IMO. Even if the server capacity could handle it, I’d vote against it.
If you hate spelling typos _that_ much, use preview.
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### Author:  [@Exgineer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exgineer)
#### Post date: [March 20, 2003, 2:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/editing-your-own-posts-revisited/162479/16 "2003-03-20T02:45:50Z")
This has been brought up any number of times, and I still don’t think it’s a big deal.
We all know we can’t edit our posts. We all know other posters can’t edit their posts. A couple of minor typos or mispellings are generally expected and excused in long posts, because we all know the rules, and we forgive you your minor errors, because we’ve made them too.
As **Goo** says, it also encourages people to actually think before they post.
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### Author:  [@Irishman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Irishman)
#### Post date: [March 20, 2003, 4:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/editing-your-own-posts-revisited/162479/17 "2003-03-20T04:18:30Z")
No to editing! Yes to preview.
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### Author:  [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)
#### Post date: [March 20, 2003, 10:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/editing-your-own-posts-revisited/162479/18 "2003-03-20T10:42:29Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by Goo \*
> \*\*One of the things I love about this board is the fact that you can’t edit your posts. Makes this place better, IMO. Even if the server capacity could handle it, I’d vote against it.
> \*\*
In spite of everything I have said above, I agree; I am also a member of a message board dedicated to the evolution/creation debate - I have actually seen people editing their posts to change their argument in the light of subsequent rebuttals (it faled miserabley because they didn’t appear to realise that quoted portions of their original pre-edit post (appearing in the responses) were there for good).
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### Author:  [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)
#### Post date: [March 20, 2003, 10:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/editing-your-own-posts-revisited/162479/19 "2003-03-20T10:43:54Z")
Or even **failed miserably** ; see if I could just edit that…
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### Author:  [@jjimm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jjimm)
#### Post date: [March 20, 2003, 10:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/editing-your-own-posts-revisited/162479/20 "2003-03-20T10:46:54Z")
> [@](#):
>
> _Originally posted by Q.E.D. \*
> \*\*us_hate\*to\*\*
Is that Japanese?
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