Quotations Weblog

There has been a firestorm within the blogging communities about free speech, death threats and responsibility. It all started with this entry from Kathy Sierra on the Creating Passionate Users weblog:

• Creating Passionate Users: Death threats against bloggers are NOT “protected speech” (why I cancelled my ETech presentations)

Kathy tried to explain why she had to cancel her ETech presentations:

For the last four weeks, I’ve been getting death threat comments on this blog. But that’s not what pushed me over the edge. What finally did it was some disturbing threats of violence and sex posted on two other blogs… blogs authored and/or owned by a group that includes prominent bloggers. People you’ve probably heard of. People like respected Cluetrain Manifesto co-author Chris Locke (aka Rageboy).

Chris Locke responded with this entry:

• RageBoy – all noise – all the time

He explained his side and his YOYOW philosophy:

With Mean Kids gone, I thought I’d have another go at it. After all, we were mostly having fun posting totally surreal stuff about nothing particularly relevant to anything or anyone. But again, there were a couple posts — the ones Kathy mentions in her post — that were over the top. I didn’t think for a minute that they were “threatening” — and again, they were not my doing — but when I saw mail from her objecting to them, I nuked the entire site rather than censor any individual.

I was a conference host on the Well 15 years ago where the core ethos was acronymized to YOYOW — You Own Your Own Words. This has remained a guiding principle for me ever since. I will not take responsibility for what someone else said, nor will I censor what another individual wrote. However, it was clear that Sierra was upset, so it seemed the best course to make the whole site go away.

In the end, they release a joint statement here:

• Kathy Sierra – Chris Locke – Coordinated Statements

Kathy: That said, Chris and I are in complete agreement that it would be tragic if this incident were used as a weapon by those who would limit free and open exchange.

Chris: Misogyny is real — and vile. Violence against women is wrong. It must not be tolerated. This issue should be explored and discussed, not swept under the rug, not rationalized away. At the same time, we need to look closely and carefully at the implications for free speech. The First Amendment allows and protects language that many find noxious.

It seems that this is an issue of freedom of speech and website responsibility. Is Chris Locke responsible for what an anonymous poster put on his website? God help us if he is. It is very difficult to monitor every comment and forum posting that is put up. Keeping up with spam alone takes so much of my time that I can’t imagine trying to censor every post. Is Chris responsible for putting up a website with the intention to “poke fun” at other people in the first place? Man, that’s a slippery slope to step on as well.

True be told, death threats are common on the Internet. After Kathy Sierra’s statement was released, many high profile bloggers came forward admitting that they have received similar threats. Additionally, this is not a new occurrence. Laura LeMay, another prominent female tech writer, posted a common admission here:

• lauralemay :: blog :: kathy sierra, or, imminent death of the net predicted

Do I get stalked and harassed and picked on on the internet? Do I get death threats? Sure. I started getting them the week I first posted to Usenet twenty years ago, and I’ve been getting them ever since. It was worse during the usenet era, and WAY worse when I was selling a lot of books. Its pretty quiet these days now that I’m mostly anonymous and I write a mostly personal journal blog. No one cares about cat posts; there are bigger targets. But it still happens.

In the end, the words of Carl Schurz ring true and both Kathy and Chris agree that legislation is not the answer. Here are a few more quotations about the subject to get you thinking:

All,

1. What is the justification of including “attributed” quotes here? What are the standards for concluding that an attribution is correct?

2. Should quotes that are “attributed” be included here at all? ever?

3. If “Yes”, then shouldn’t there be some attribution of the attribution? eg: Max Born in his autobiography quotes Albert Einstein as having said “….”.

I would be uneasy ever using any “quote” that can only be vaguely, without reference, rhyme, or reason, “attributed”.

Anyone?

Kip Hansen

Kip,

The short answer is that the “Attributed” tag means we have a strong suspicion that the quote is wrongly attributed and is not really the work of the quoted author.

So why is the quote still there? One of two reasons:

1. We haven’t determined the true attribution yet, but we don’t want the quotation to be missing if someone searches for it.

2. People commonly attribute the quotation to the supposed author, so we include it under their name where people will be looking for it. In these cases, there is usually a note indicating the true author. See for example the following quotation commonly attributed to Voltaire:

• Quote Details: Voltaire: I disapprove of what… – The Quotations Page

Ideally we would only have quotations in the second category, but we have a limited amount of time for tracking down quotation sources.

Incidentally, you would be pleased to know that there is also a “verified” flag in our database, which will indicate quotations with a verified attribution. This will become visible when we update the site in a month or two.

Michael Moncur
Owner and maintainer, The Quotations Page

hannahem27 asked in the Literature Forum:

I’m trying to put together a collection of books for my study – can anybody give me suggestions of what great novels I should include? So far I have Leo Tolstoy’s War and Peace, and the whole of jane Austen’s works. What else should I buy to read???

The great people on the forum recommended a wonderful collection of books here:

• Quotations Page and Literature Page Forum – Greatest Books Ever Written

But, I have a different opinion:

I used to collect books for my library. I used to have a room just for my library. When we were forced to move to a smaller house, most of my books were relegated to the basement in boxes.

Which books would I recommend?

Don’t try to have a library for anyone but yourself. You don’t need great literature surrounding you. You need books that YOU hold dear. The complete collection of Jane Austen is beloved to some, but was abhorred by Mark Twain.

I used to have a lot of books in my collection because I thought I SHOULD have them. Now, those books are rotting in boxes in my basement. You can only have so many things in your life. Choose them wisely.

On the other hand, you can have as many books in your head as will fit. I recommend that you READ all the books recommended here. Buying them for your library is another story. A library is useless unless it is read.

I have been thoroughly entertained for the last half hour reading the game in the Quotations Forum called: Now It’s Your Turn. You can see it here:

• Quotations Page and Literature Page Forum: Now It’s Your Turn

This is the description of the game from our inventive QuoteMaster, libra&libra:

Hello Friends;

It is a real funny and interesting game that I am inviting you all to share with me.

We know that words are infinite, so the game is to pick up any word at random that passes by your mind and the one who follows has to construst a meaningful sentence using the word that you suggested before.

After typing the sentence, he has to leave another random word for the one who follows and so on….

For example: I will suggest the word “Schools” and the one who follows has to use “Schools” in a sentence of his own for instance: “Don’t let schools stand in the way of your education.”

Once you post your quotation, you get to choose the next word. They have been playing this game for seven months and the range of words have been funny, inspiring and just plain enjoyable.

The last word looking for a quotation was posted today: Strength.

Know any good strength quotations? If you do, log onto our forum and play the Now It’s Your Turn Game!

After a heated discussion on whether we should cancel the Reader Meetup, we let the fortune cookie decide our fate. It said, “A man who dares to waste an hour of time hasn’t discovered the value of life.”

It’s not like we don’t want to spend an hour with our readers; we really do. Unfortunately, the few people who contacted us in Austin have either not responded to our email announcing the event or cancelled. No one has RSVP’d on the UpComing.org site, so the underwhelming response says: CANCEL.

If you live in Austin and were considering going to the Reader Meetup, contact me. Mike and I are are going to this event, which is open to the public, so you’re free to show up here as well.

Your Video Blog Can Save the World

Friday, March 9th, 2005 5:00 pm – 6:00 pm

Carver Museum Cultural Center (1161 Angelna Street). Google Map FREE admission, no badge or pre-event signup needed to attend this session.