Over the course of my membership here, I've learned a lot about interacting with others in this kind of venue, which was a brand new type of arena for me to enter. I think the policies/guidelines are generally wise and necessary. The moderators, from what I've seen, are fair and tactful, even when they've seen fit to take issue with posts of my own. Not everything that pops into one's head needs to be posted. Also, there are often alternative ways of making a point that should be considered. I had room for improvement, and I still do.

There is one area of interaction that I think gets taken advantage of when members want to be less than civil --- the "private message." Of course, a hostile PM can be reported. A member can also adjust settings so as to limit who has access to message on the member's space. But I think there is something in the guidelines that gets misinterpreted.

The guideline says that members should work out their differences in private messages. That sounded quite reasonable to me when I read it. I took it to mean, among other things, an honest attempt to re-establish goodwill, when that's become frayed. I did not take the phrase "working out differences" to mean "venting one's spleen."

I'm happy to say that, in 8 years, I've only twice gotten PMs that I would characterize in that way. The second time was less unsettling because the first experience made me less vulnerable to what can show up under the "in box." I'm even glad of that.

I don't know that some additional guideline should be devised. But that guideline, as stated by administration, gets some pretty broad interpretation. If I post threads saying that my grandmother was the most miserable person on earth, and then I send you a PM saying, "You sure are just like my grandmother." that's not a sincere attempt to re-establish goodwill.

I don't think we should manipulate the options for communication to dig at somebody in a way that we don't want the community to see because we know we're not being nice, or even the least bit civil.

I saw an interesting policy on another support site. (I wasn't there long because I like PC better.) That site said that they encouraged members to be reserved in their use of the PM option. The site said something to the effect that interacting in open forums helped keep people mindful of staying on topic and being supportive. (It was better worded than that, but I can't look it up, as I forget the site.) In open forum, the membership better tends to police itself, which I think is very healthy.

I've gotten lots of PMs that enriched my experience here, not least of all from the moderators.

If I had to write a policy, it might be this: If your PM is sent mainly for the purpose of saying, "Hey, you stink!" then maybe it shouldn't be sent.