• The following responses to Letter to Staff #1 (Why 100?) were published to at Tuttle’s Corner between December 14, 2009 and July 11, 2010 and were removed on July 19, 2010 at 11:38 AM.
• The deleted comments thread contains 22 replies, all submitted by one author, which discuss the behavior of the comments function at tuttlescorner.com. None of the comments relate to the topic of the post to which they are attached.
• Ordinarily, off-topic comments are welcomed at tuttlescorner.com; however, in this situation, the volume of (unrelated) responses to the entry, Letter to Staff #1 (Why 100?), has forced that entry to the top of the Popular posts list in the Tuttle’s Corner sidebar, which is misleading. Additionally, while the substance of the replies to Letter to Staff #1 (Why 100?) is interesting and perhaps useful, the responses themselves were only published in that context because that happened to be the page their author was perusing when questions about the behavior of the comments function at tuttlescorner.com arose.

The aforementioned thread of deleted comments is displayed below as an image. The comments section at the bottom of this page is available for replies to this entry…
 

• The home page from the late postdelete.com is reprinted below.

Welcome.

Here are a few notes about this site —

• postdelete is updated as circumstances warrant. Updates may include adding, changing, moving or removing entries and/or images. Changes and additions to postdelete.com content are described in the change_log at hobotrain.net/network, and new entries are listed under the Intratext heading on the main page at Tuttle’s Corner. If you’d like to be notified of new entries, subscribe to the RSS feed.
• History: postdelete.com was initially conceived as a compendium and a clearinghouse for posts made by Honest Joes and trolls alike which had been deleted (actionably removed) from corporate sponsored support forums across the interweb and also as a place for general discussion about moderating practices and the limits of free speech in corporate sponsored forums. For a number of reasons, both practical and imaginary, the postdelete project (such as it was) has been divested of resources and that domain, along with the essence of its original mission, has been folded into the greater hobotrain network project.
• Effective immediately, postdelete.com exists as the repository for content which has been deleted or otherwise dis-included from hobotrain network sites.
• Items at postdelete.com which are a product of that site’s previous mission have been deleted from postdelete.com, annotated, and re-posted as new articles.

Here are some people I’d like to thank —

• WP Diva for Split Personality.
   
• DagonDesign for the forms.
   
• 5L4M for the tea.

Network-wide appreciations, apologies and fuck-yous are posted at Tuttle’s Corner and updated regularly.

Thank you for visiting.

• ☷: 10 OCT 08 10:50:54 was published to both net/network and Tuttle’s Corner on October 10, 2008. The entry was deleted from net/network on October 12, 2008 and removed from Tuttle’s Corner on March 1, 2010.
• Sufficient causes for writing and deleting this entry are described within its text, although I may revise and extend my remarks at a later time.

10 OCT 08 10:50:54

by admin

This entry is cross-posted at net.network. This entry was cross-posted from net/network. It was originally written in response to a post that was addressed to me in an online forum during the last presidential election just after one of the debates although it was never posted to that forum (see below). It was expunged from net/network shortly after it was posted there and it will eventually make it’s way to postdelete.com. I have every reason to have moved it to postdelete.com already, but until I’ve done that, we can assume that I’m still glad to have written it.

[Image drained]

globalstatus follows…

globalstatus:

⎈ net/network: you are here. Updated daily.
ToDo: Decay. Thank you for visiting. I am here because you are here, even though, and even because, you may not be here for me.

♨ Tuttle’s Corner: functioning as a GUI for net/network. Updated daily often.
ToDo: See additional notes below.

✈ Monk Falls: a living fiction. Updated Wednesdays Sundays.
ToDo: See additional notes below.

⌦ postdelete.com: hobotrain network out-takes deletions anomalies. Updated as necessary.
ToDo: postdelete.com will be the next hobotrain network site to go live. Also see additional notes below.

additional notes:

Since we’re all here, I’d like to pass along a post that was addressed to me in a forum last week. It was written in response to a theory I have about its author’s motivation for voting a particular way in the upcoming election. Because their response (copied in full below) entirely avoids addressing the substance of my contentions, I am more convinced now than before that my theory about them and their preference of a presidential candidate was spot on. At the same time, the response I did receive raises some interesting and important questions about both the hobotrain network project and me, which—taken on their own and regardless of the individual who posed them—deserve to be addressed; and so, I’ve decided to reply to those questions for all to see here, rather than reply to them in a sub-thread of a topic in a private forum to which relatively few people have access.

Their post:

Posted: Sat Oct 04, 2008 3:23 pm

Now you’re a psychologist?

Tuttle, I don’t think you understand who or what you are. You hide behind various identities. You claim to be an artist (who doesn’t share his art) and a restaurateur (who doesn’t discuss food, service, etc.). You have some websites that make no sense and are incomplete. You claimed to be writing a story and were going to release it online soon (this was the first week of April…or didn’t you say that either?).

Who or what are you? You want so much from others but then you hide.

I’ve tried to reply to that post a couple of times already. At first, I responded with something like ‘I am rubber and you are glue’ which I command-A-Xed. Then I attempted to rebut the argument against me point by point, and in fact, I think I did a drive-by which I’m not sure anyone witnessed and which I also deleted. Now it’s a week later and I still haven’t posted a reply, but because I believe that the questions asked and the assertions made above demand a response, they also provide an opportunity to update you on the status of the larger hobotrain network project, and to provide a re-statement of the project’s goals, I’m going to categorize this under global_status and take another whack at it here (cross-posting at Tuttle’s Corner).

(And I don’t believe this person to be dangerous, if you’re wondering about that.)

Tuttle, I don’t think you understand who or what you are.

What I am is for other people to decide. Who I am is a lifelong question for me alone to answer, but to the extent that I am still alive and plan to be so for the indefinite future, I think it’s fair to speculate that at my time of death, whomever I will turn out to have been will or will not be who I am at this moment. And who am I at this moment, when none of us even knows what the next sentence I type will say?

You hide behind various identities.

Taken alone, my identity, if that’s what you want to call it, is neither comprehensible nor pertinent to most of the people I know, either in person or online. In fact, who and what I am doesn’t matter to very many people at all, although I do imagine the larger hobotrain network project to be an attempt at shaping and synthesizing many of the lives I’ve led into a fictional narrative, always keeping in mind that not all of those lives are fit for a public showing—although a lot of people who know me will be surprised to see some of the choices I’ve made with respect to the events I depict; which tales I do or don’t tell; whom I include in my thinking about my project from moment to moment, and whom I attempt to shut out.

As far as the people I’ve met, but don’t really know (you, like,) may be concerned, it’s not that I have something (anything) to hide, but that there may or may not be anything I want to give.¹


1. Also see: http://postdelete.com/dragnet/

You claim to be an artist (who doesn’t share his art)

(Must an artist share his art? And when you say ‘share,’ with whom shall I share my art, by your lights, and would it be out of obligation or kindness? Or by ‘share’ do you mean ‘sell’?)

And claiming denotes some doubt over propriety, doesn’t it, as if one’s calling is a choice one makes and not a force of nature one must bend to. It is a legal term, which in the ultraviolence at the outwardly barren and unpeopled site of the creative act, is fucking meaningless, and even with respect to itemizing my taxes each year, claiming to be an ‘artist’ only validates my work and its worth in the way that an audience for it might, but that’s not what helps me sleep at night.

Stupid as it is and stupid as it sounds, my life is my art. But there is only so much of me to go around; and as from day to day and from night to night there is only very limited seating in my restaurant, there is also limited access to my body of work. If you are not on my guest list—with special exceptions under irresistible circumstances—then there is room for you neither in my restaurant nor in my heart. I don’t have the physical space or enough hours in a day to satisfy the demand for me, on the one hand, and on the other, I’ve often realized that what I expend socially in terms of sharing ideas and my impulse to create (which is usually motivated by nothing more than psychic [adj.] horniness) is wasted when I attempt to revisit, re-create, those ideas in conversation.

[You claim to be] a restaurateur (who doesn’t discuss food, service, etc.)

All discussion of food and beverages (incl., issues of philosophy, gastronomy, agronomy, animal and human health, food preparation practices and economics) and service (incl., staff hierarchy, floor and kitchen protocol, front-of-the-house and booking procedures, employee expectations, scheduling and other personnel issues) is contained at Tuttle’s Corner (http://tuttlescorner.com/), where your questions and comments are always welcome.

You have some websites that make no sense and are incomplete.

The hobotrain network is currently composed of four sites, including this one, which describes the maintenance and status of the hobotrain network and catalogs changes and additions to content on hobotrain network sites. In the scope of the larger hobotrain network project, net/network exists to log various of the background processes that power the network, including the addition and modification of code, scripts and software, whether feature laden or invisible, on the various hobotrain network sites; descriptions of internal and external events that hinder or enhance the network’s, and my, ability to create, present and transfer content, and up-to-the-minute information about hobotrain network traffic and navigation patterns.

It is true that for many people net/network is unfamiliar looking and difficult to navigate, and that due to mounting code breakages on the back end, the site is becoming more and more inaccessible every day. All of this can become a perfect storm for an author, especially one who is primarily concerned with manufacturing content (and a relative nOOb at Web development), but as I’ve said before, and because nothing can be done about this from my end (not even with money), I’m going to let entropy dictate the fate of hobotrain.net/network rather than go to the trouble of re-theming the site.

Then again, I’m not selling advertising here, I’m doing art. I’m happy to see that people come to visit, but I’m also the first to say that it’s not for everyone.

You claimed to be writing a story and were going to release it online soon…

Define ‘soon.’

End.

Type ‘p’ for previous post or ‘l’ for last post, or click on the flashing prompt to see a list of posts. Type ‘editing’ and press return for site navigation instructions; type ‘help’ and press return for other options.

• First Ever Letter to the Editor was published to Tuttle’s Corner on September 27, 2009 at 1:44 AM and was removed at the request of its author on September 27, 2009 at 11:38 AM.
• I agree with 5L4M that while in general it’s fun to inject oneself into discourses and disputes over which one has no real authority or influence (and for us, especially enjoyable to enter into a debate over what using Macs or PCs may represent politically and ideologically), this post may over-step the mission and raison d’être of Tuttle’s Corner (and the hobotrain network generally), which is Service.

First Ever Letter to the Editor

by 5L4M

I just sent this email (which, I have a feeling, will end up on postdelete.com) to a favorite customer, Josh Marshall at TPM, in response to a post he put up yesterday called iFascism:

Hi, Josh –

Just reading your piece on the politics of Macs vs. PCs.

Like RS, I have used Macs exclusively since the mid-’80s and for a long time lived under the assumption that Mac users were somehow more socially engaged, progressive, creative folks … just like me. Over the years, as I’ve found myself having to co-exist with more and more people who are not just like me but who are Mac users, I’ve discovered, sometimes painfully, that many of my preconceptions about who and what Mac users are on the inside were very wrong, indeed.

I’ll cut to the chase: One misconception many Mac users on the left have about themselves is not so much their belief they have some sort of monopoly (or corner, at least) on edginess, creativity and taste, but in the fact that it is unimaginable to so many of them that people on the right could view themselves as being edgy, creative and tasteful, too. I mean, many of the loudest-mouthed people on the right are actually putting out some very Mac-like (clean lines, ease of use) ideas which also happen to be very consistent with Apple’s Human Interface Guidelines (perhaps substituting “Users” with “Listeners” or “Viewers,” and “Mac OS X ” with “Right Wing” and “applications” with something like “spiels” …

See: Introduction to Apple Human Interface Guidelines at Mac Dev Center

Introduction to Apple Human Interface Guidelines

Apple has the world’s most advanced operating system, Mac OS X, which combines a powerful core foundation with a compelling user interface called Aqua. With advanced features and an aesthetically refined use of color, transparency, and animation, Mac OS X makes computing even easier for new users, while providing the productivity that professional users have come to expect of the Macintosh. The user interface features, behaviors, and appearances deliver a well-organized and cohesive user experience available to all applications developed for Mac OS X.

These guidelines are designed to assist you in developing products that provide Mac OS X users with a consistent visual and behavioral experience across applications and the operating system. Following the guidelines is to your advantage because:

• Users will learn your application faster if the interface looks and behaves like applications they’re already familiar with.
   
• Users can accomplish their tasks quickly, because well-designed applications don’t get in the user’s way.
   
• Users with special needs will find your product more accessible.
   
• Your application will have the same modern, elegant appearance as other Mac OS X applications.
   
• Your application will be easier to document, because an intuitive interface and standard behaviors don’t require as much explanation.
   
• Customer support calls will be reduced (for the reasons cited above).
   
• Your application will be easier to localize, because Apple has worked through many localization issues in the Aqua design process.
   
• Media reviews of your product will be more positive; reviewers easily target software that doesn’t look or behave the way “true” Macintosh applications do.
   
• The implementation of Apple’s human interface principles make the Macintosh what it is: intuitive, friendly, elegant, and powerful.

To wit (or as Emeril Lagasse might say, “Boom!”):

Glenn Beck uses Macs at home (from: overclock.net )

Rush Limbaugh uses Macs everywhere and gives them away as presents

Michelle Malkin uses a Mac even though she hates Al Gore

Jonah Goldberg is a 20 year Mac user

Mike Huckabee made the switch because of Apple’s customer service

And so on.

Me? Well, I harbor no illusions that our common love of a computer platform and the ability to easily share files without passing viruses is enough to bring any of my right wing Macintosh-using brothers and sisters and me any closer together on either the issues of the day or the meaning of life; but I have learned that Steve Jobs’ real legacy turns out not to be the design of the products he sells, but the RDF, which is very like an open-source operating system that anyone with a Christ-complex is able to modify, derive from and/or distribute, presumably “in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE (cite),” know what I mean? ; )

See you soon!

5L4M

• ☷: 25 JUNE 07 13:46:15 (Early Boarding Notice) was published to hobotrain.net/network on 25 June, 2007 and deleted on 25 September, 2009.
• This post was was designed to provide a general description of the larger hobotrain network project. It was originally intended to be viewed by fewer than 20 people whom I’d invited to net/network when I launched that site a little over two years ago, and to be visible for 90 days. At the time it was originally published, I expected to launch the other three hobotrain network sites within three months. Since launching the other sites took much longer than I’d initially projected, I left this post intact for the benefit of net/network visitors who found the site through other means. Because hobotrain.net/network has recently surpassed 10,000 unique visitors, most of whom arrived indirectly through Digg, Google and other aggregators and search engines or through links in my profiles on other sites, the intimacy this post intended to convey to the original < 20 invited guests was displayed inappropriately for an inordinate amount of time, and it was removed.
• Elements of the text below may be utilized elsewhere because I don’t think a model of the project has been described anywhere else and this is a good basis upon which to develop an explication for the hobotrain network project that may be required in other contexts.

Return to hobotrain.net/network/?yoohoo
Return to spur.hobotrain.net
_________________________________________________________

25 JUNE 07 13:46:15 (Early Boarding Notice)

globalstatus follows… (press any key to screen down; press shift + up/down arrow to scroll up/down one line.)

globalstatus:

• ⎈ net/network: you are here. Updated daily. ToDo: One time personal message (i.e., thanks, regrets, excuses) to everyone who has offered their time to help me test my sites or who has otherwise expressed interest in what I’ve been up to here.

  –TO BE DELETED AFTER 90 DAYS–

  Hi, Friend.

  Thank you for your interest in the hobotrain network. I regret any delays in responding to your questions about what I’ve been up to here, but believe me when I tell you that there has been a fair bit of excitement and upheaval at the restaurant lately—changeover to the summer menu, staffing issues and so on—and for that (and because that’s where I make my money) I’ve been running a little bit behind. But all that’s unimportant now:

  As of today, hobotrain.net/network is online and available.

  As you may or may not know, the hobotrain project began about ten years ago as a traditional literary piece (ink, paper, etc.) which was intended to be a novelization of the journals I’d kept during my travels in South and Southeast Asia (ca. 1990-94 and 1996) and on my couch tours of New York and Los Angeles (ca. 1987-97). In addition to being eager to tell that story, I was, at the time, also very interested in creating a piece that somehow captured the growing sense that I existed at an early but discrete phase in literary history wherein the transition from the printed to the electronic word as the primary material and means for the creation and dissemination of literary works threatened to render me and my writing Weltanschauung obsolete before my career had really begun.

  Like many of my contemporaries, I’d been trying to find ways to link pages, themes and characters together non-linearly so that the book could be read in ways other than cover to cover. For several years I struggled mightily and mainly in longhand with ways in which I might emulate hypertext in a printed context, especially with respect to page navigation; and, also like many of my contemporaries, I ended up no closer to resolving this problem than I had been at the moment of its discovery.

  When I acquired Tuttle’s Corner in December of 2003 and I found myself in the unique position of having to report to work every day, my writing time was immediately and radically curtailed; my flat became a place in which to live and entertain rather than the more familiar place in which I simply slept, bathed and made art; I began spending a lot more time at my computer, and eventually, and out of necessity, I came upon the solution I’m experimenting with now in which the hobotrain network is entirely Web-based, its narrative interwoven among four separate sites:

  - hobotrain.net/network (net/network), which describes the maintenance and status of all of the hobotrain network sites and catalogs changes and additions to their content.

  - tuttlescorner.com (Tuttle’s Corner), which serves both as a graphical interface to net/network and as a receptacle for items which are related to the back-story and the aftermath of the events surrounding the monk’s fall.

  - monkfalls.com (Monk Falls) contains the monk’s journals which are the substantive portion of the hobotrain network narrative as well as its reason for being.

  - postdelete.com (postdelete), which is, among other things, the repository for items which have been deleted or otherwise disincluded from hobotrain network sites.

  Over the next several days, postdelete, Tuttle’s Corner and Monk Falls will be brought online, and while they are readied, their status will be reported upon here.

  Thanks again for taking the time to visit the hobotrain network. I’m glad you could make it.

  Kind regards,

  Tuttle

  –END MESSAGE–

globalstatus continues…

• ♨ Tuttle’s Corner: fine version dining – by reservation. Updated often.
  • ToDo:
    • Tuttle’s Corner is still password protected. It will be available to view shortly.

• ✈ Monk Falls: a living fiction. Updated Sundays.
  • ToDo:
    • Monk Falls is still password protected. It will be available to view shortly.

• ⌦ postdelete.com: hobotrain network out-takes deletions anomalies. Updated as necessary.
  • ToDo:
    • postdelete is still password protected. It will be available to view shortly.

additional notes:

• Be patient. Early boarding is a two-edged sword. On the one hand, it’s nice to be able to find your seat, stow your bags and settle in in a leisurely way; on the other, opportunities to experience discomfiture and degradation increase in number and by magnitude with every passenger who boards after you. Try to ignore late arrivals, if you must, by keeping your eyes down. And please take the time to read the help pages.

End.

Type ‘help’ and press return for assistance; type ‘editing’ and press return for navigation commands.

• Well-Come was published to monkfalls.com  on 11 August, 2009. The text below was was removed from Well-Come on 1 September, 2009.
• Well-Come [link to http://monkfalls.com removed] was created as the Monk Falls home page because I felt some notes about the site and how it is being constructed would be useful to visitors before they entered the text. The thank-yous were an afterthought, but I think they’re appropriate and deserved.
• These pieces from the notes about this site section were removed because they are too pained.
• The lined-out element from thank-yous section was excised because it reads a little drunken.

_________________________________________________________

Well-Come

Welcome to Monk Falls.

Here are a few notes about this site —

• Although Monk Falls entries are elements of a linear narrative (one with a beginning, middle and end) as outlined on the Routes ✈ and 1989 – 1996 pages on this site and as described on other pages on other sites within the hobotrain network, entries may be posted randomly and/or owing to the context and exigencies of any superseding or meta- narrative contained or described within and across the hobotrain network and elsewhere. Broader significance may or may not be assignable to the timing, placement or arrangement of any entry or image contained in the larger work. (Click on Monk Falls images to view captioned variations and enlargements.)
   
• Comments will generally be closed for entries posted to monkfalls.com. If you would like to leave a comment about a particular entry, please enter your comment along with some reference to the entry you are commenting about in the Message field of the Contact form and comments may be opened for that entry.

Here are a few people I’d like to thank —

• theme by Scott Allan Wallick for Simplr. I understand that Scott has withdrawn from WordPress development, but his work has been a great and elegant introduction of the capabilities of text in WordPress sites. His skill and creativity (and thoughtful emails) have and the Simplr theme has taught me more about scripting than I ever dreamed I’d know, etc. etc. I really can’t say enough about the elegance of Scott’s coding and designs. Although he has withdrawn from the WordPress community, his skill, creativity and kindness have made a great difference to me. and I really can’t imagine Monk Falls looking or behaving any differently than it does. See you around, I hope.

• cloud poem… was published to net/network  on 10 July, 2007 and was deleted 7 August, 2007.
• An interesting feature of the CLI theme at hobotrain.net is the word frequency cloud it generates using the command: cloud
  Though the line breaks below don’t in every case fall where they did in their original context, and taking into account the absence of any intent to create a work of poetry from these words while I was composing them, I think that the word frequency cloud generator seems capable of producing something remarkably similar to a poem.

_________________________________________________________

cloud poem

able about acknowledgments across added additional after all
also although anomalies any are art
article assistance available
back because been before being beta
between but can category check com come commands content corner course created daily
day days deleted deletions don’t down early editing effect end entries entry ever everything falls
few fiction follows follows…
four from functioning get globalstatus going good
gui had has have having help here
his hobotrain how i’d image images into issues items
its jul june just know later like link links list little live living long lot make many may moment monday
monk monkfalls more most much narrative navigation necessary
net network new next nice not notes now number one online
other out over page pages
people place placeofinterest please post postdelete posted posts
press project rather ready
restaurant return
safari same see several site sites software some static status still story sunday
tags take takes thank their them theme there these they things think those three time today todo too
troll tuttle tuttlescorner twice two type unposted until updated use very was way wednesday
wednesdays weekly weeks well were what when where which while who will work would writing written x2326 x2668 years

• technorati claim… was originally posted at net/network on July 3, 2007, and was deleted on July 11, 2007.
• This entry, comprised of a single embedded link, was posted as a part of Technorati’s process of “claiming” a blog as one’s own, which you must do if you are interested using the tools Technorati provides to help increase your blog’s exposure.
• Having established my ownership of hobotrain.net  eight days before, I found the impetus to remove the technorati claim post when earlier this evening I clicked the link below and discovered that the last time Technorati’s spiders crawled hobotrain.net  they were delivered a 500 Server Error page, and that hobotrain.net ‘s profile at Technorati was filed under the heading,

  Everything in the known universe about 500 Server Error

_________________________________________________________

technorati claim [to be deleted]

Technorati Profile

• Not even bubbies bicycling . . . , originally dated February 10, 2007, was removed from postdelete.com when that site was shuttered in August, 2010.
• Although I initially considered reposting this entry at Tuttle’s Corner, its content and tone are not exactly and not consistently in line with the immediate state of the evolving aims of the greater hobotrain network project: its sentiments are rooted in an earlier iteration of the present site which makes them not entirely pertinent anymore, while other, better formed explications of and apologia for my actions in these pages will and do already exist.

_________________________________________________________

Not even bubbies bicycling 2 x 2 can stop the blood and feathers flying . . . ¹

a message for my online friends . . .

A word about this project to my colleagues from the boards in which I am most active is well-advised, and I’ve been thinking about how to do that for a long time—how to go about both creating this project and breaking the news to certain people and to certain groups of people that I’d actually gone and done it.

I realize that the ways in which anyone who ‘knows’ me might approach my work here—should they happen to see it—will in part be a product of predispositions they may have toward “Tuttle” and the Tuttle enterprise and grounded in their experience of him/me and with him/me in various discussion forums and in the chats and group chats, pm’s, tweets and emails we’ve exchanged over the years.

I have to admit it: the relationships I’ve developed for better or for worse in the online communities I’ve participated in have always been more an object of my concern than any of the contributions I might have made toward fulfilling the missions of those communities; the swathe of human dramas which play out there are always more compelling than a community’s raison d’être.

This is especially true from a creative, or artistic, standpoint: not so much in terms of raping my online experiences or relationships for the sake of my art, but in terms of providing opportunities to establish Tuttle as an online artist and to provide him with canvases and a place to work on creating himself. There is, I mean to say, no one (no one) whom I’ve met online who will find themselves represented by me in these pages in any context, for any reason, so no one need worry about that.

The people, the places, the relationships: they’re not what this story is about. Just the opposite, really—although, without them, the hobotrain network project would never have been begun.

Let this be a gift to them, then. A thanks.

• The Chowhound moderation article was originally published at postdelete.com on 10 March, 2007.

• This article was not written in reaction to my having been mistreated by Chowhound’s moderators or its community (I haven’t been), but in response to a deeply disturbing interview Chowhound founder Jim Leff conducted with moderator Pat Hammond in the bar at New York’s Grand Hyatt Hotel. The interview was subsequently posted as a sticky at the top of each of Chowhound’s many hundreds of forums so that no “chowhound” would miss it.

  Throughout the interview, the overbearing Mr. Leff, swilling bourbon and scarfing free bar snacks, leads the kindly though misguided seltzer-sipping senior citizen, Ms. Hammond, by the nose down a list of bullet points which don’t seem so much to be an attempt to fend off the growing number of critics of Chowhound’s moderating practices, as an attempt to win over those “chowhounds” who are still undecided on the subject or who may not yet be aware that such widespread dissatisfaction with Chowhound’s moderating practices exists.

• Jim Leff Speaks With Pat Hammond:  audio  |  transcript

_________________________________________________________

Chowhound: The Internet's Most Heavy-Handed Moderation?

Rather than include this article (which was rightfully deleted months ago) I would like to include a series of links to other articles people have written about moderation practices at Chowhound:

Chowhound Board Nazis – [Crazies]

Chowhound Confounds

The Chowhound Sandbox

How I Got Banned From Chowhound

Here, “Jay” describes his fall at Chowhound in real time.

Chowhound Sucks

more here.

Defenses of Chowhound’s moderation policies and arguments for and against the implementation of a Blogger’s Code of Conduct are also extant.

Chowhound Posting Etiquette is available to review here.