Editing posts

Well, posters editing their own posts is one thing, and an Administrator editing posts is another thing.

Editing other people's posts can be a delicate issue.  You have to make sure that you do the right thing as an Administrator.

Editing items for cosmetic reasons (such as fixing the post if they cut and pasted html, etc.) shouldn't be a problem.  I would make sure that it says somewhere in your forum rules and/or terms and conditions that their "posts may be edited or deleted for any reason or no reason at all."

Editing a post to censor part or all of what someone says shouldn't be a problem either, as long as you have something in your forum rules and/or terms and conditions to back it up.  For example, if they violate a forum rule about cussing, and you edited their post to remove the cussing, you can always point to the rule to explain why you edited their post.  I would recommend replacing what they said with [deleted by Admin] or something similar to show what was deleted or changed by the Admin.

Editing a post because you don't like what they said or changing the meaning of what they said could be a problem in some cases.  For example, if you change what they said so that it makes them look bad now, you could be liable for defaming their character, which is illegal in many jurisdictions.

I usually try to mention WHY a post was edited at the bottom of the post in small print if I think there is going to be an issue about it.  Example: "Edited by Admin to remove links"

If you don't have a forum rule or something in the terms and conditions to back you up, you probably are not breaking the law (ask a lawyer to be sure) if you censor, edit or delete something (unless your terms and conditions for some reason says you won't).  But, your members will probably be upset if you start editing and deleting members posts without any posted reasons.

I would recommend posting forum rules that explain that you are allowed to edit their posts and give some examples of why.

Allowing your users to edit their own posts probably would not be a problem... unless, you are a public corporation, which is subject to strict record-keeping laws.

Allowing people to edit their own posts does provide a variety of other problems though.  For example, people saying one thing, and then editing it later so it says something completely different.  It can make it hard to follow conversations.  Sometimes they will say something mean to someone, get them to react, and then change their post to sound much nicer, in an attempt to make the other guy look bad and them look good.

For this reason, I wish WWF would include a time-limited self-editing feature, where users can edit their own post within x hours of posting (otherwise it cannot be edited by the user).  This will allow people to fix typos, grammatical errors, cure foot in mouth disease, etc., while not allowing them to change what they said 2 days ago, after 20 people have responded to what they said.

I allow users to edit their own posts on my forum, but not delete them.  That way even if they want to delete their post, their is an indicator others reading the thread that something has been edited/deleted, which would explain why the topic may not make sense anymore.

Some things I do to deal with some of these issues:

1. Have a Gmail account specifically for receiving e-mail notifications of all posts in my forum.  If there is an argument or something strange going on with people editing posts, you have the original post e-mailed to you and can look it up.
2. If someone says something controversial and you suspect that they will edit or delete it later, quote what they said.

These have come quite in handy, especially when people claim they didn't say something or are acting all innocent after doing something wrong.

So in summary, unless you are changing the meaning of someone else's post, its probably okay to edit it, and its okay to allow people to edit their own posts, but it does bring along with it some non-legal issues to deal with.

Disclaimer: I am not a lawyer, but these are some things I have read about and is my understanding of the laws.  It does not constitute legal advice and since each case is different, you may consider getting legal advice if your situation warrants it.

If the forum is for a public corporation, contact your corporation's compliance department for assistance by the corporation's legal team.