[mb-users] Permanently destructive edits

[Robert Stockton]

> 2007/4/26, Robert Stockton <stocktonrgs at earthlink.net 
> <mailto:stocktonrgs at earthlink.net>>:
>
>     I'm not going to argue about "huge security risks" here, since you
>     clearly have a better "big picture" view than I do.  However, the
>     effect
>     on the community of permanent deletions may be larger than you think.
>     As a moderate-level user of MB who puts in 2-5 hours a week on data
>     entry, I do periodically find myself "seeing red" and wondering why I
>     bother to put in the effort -- because some album which I laboriously
>     entered in the past has disappeared and now has to be re-entered
>     again.
>     Given that these MB actions basically involve throwing away
>     volunteer-supplied labor, they serve as a strong counter-incentive to
>     users to provide any *more* volunteer labor.
>
>
> This has happened more than once to you? How many times?
It isn't easy to pull up documentation, but I'd guess 3 or 4 times.  
That probably puts it at less than 1 a year but it still ranks pretty 
high on my list of MB annoyances -- especially since the maintainers 
have done a pretty darned good job at diminishing most of the other 
persistent annoyances.

(As I think about it, I can't swear that half of these instances weren't 
caused by failed votes, rather than deletions after something had passed 
a vote.  I've already noted that *that* aspect of notification has 
gotten much better.  Unfortunately when all you can tell is that 
something that you put into the database is gone, it's easy to assume 
the worst.  It's also hard to recall which cases are deletions and which 
cases are "Create incorrect duplicate and then merge".  Maybe the 
problem really is entirely in my imagination, but I'm not totally 
convinced.)

Ultimately what I'm finding as I think about all of this is that I'd 
like to have an implicit *per-release* subscription to every release I 
create.  Frankly, I believe that I usually get it pretty close to right, 
and if someone else feels the need to delete, rename, merge or correct 
speling misteaks, then I want to know about it -- if only to thank the 
person who caught and fixed my errors.

I have no idea if what I'm asking for in the preceding paragraph is an 
easy tweak or a major change.  If its the former, I'd really like to see 
it.  If it's the latter, I guess I'll toss it onto the wish list and 
trust that resources will be allocated wherever they'll do the most good.

-stocktongs