This post is a bit late as this certainly is yesterdays news. However, Dave "the dolt" Winer is making it the scoop of the fucking century and I can sit quiet no longer.

Let's get the facts straight:

Dave Winer often writes personal attacks, unsubstantiated claims and allegations, and then goes back to edit them out, as if they never happened in the first place.

Just recently, he did that for the nth time to Mark Pilgrim, claiming all sorts of things regarding RSS and how Mark had "wrested control" of it with his validator -- which is open source, free and publicly available -- by "secretly modifying it" and what not. Anyway, it's bullshit and Dave knows it, that's why he removed it later.

Mark Pilgrim wrote a web application -- Winer Watcher -- which checks a distributed network of RSS feeds for changes on ScriptingNews. This means that his web app never actually requests anything from ScriptingNews directly. He did this to "catch" the slurs, personal attacks and moot allegations that Dave throws around on a daily basis.

Dave's first comment on this topic was that he wanted Mark top stop requesting his RSS feed every minute (later changed to every five minutes) because the bandwith is expensive. Mark explained that he never actually requests Dave's RSS feed, and neither does anyone else exlusively for this specific application, thus, if he stopped, their bandwith bill would change by "precisely zero".

Dave then makes it about copyright. He makes all sorts of claims, asking if Mark is "immune" to copyright laws? Mark claims "fair use" and explains why.

Then comes the defence; some people think what Mark does is bad and that he should stop. Don Park says that he "frequently edits his recent posts". My opinion; all people who -- like Dave Winer -- on a daily basis makes personal attacks and unsubstantial accusations, and then edits them out and pretends they never happened, should have a similar web app watching them. Heck, maybe the Winer Watcher should be made a public app, one which people can hook their RSS to and show the world that they're not doing that kind of thing. My bet is that Dave wouldn't use it.

Dave explains why he flames and then edits it out. Actually, he doesn't. He explains that he "edits his posts", but he doesn't explain why he makes personal attacks and accusations in the first place.

Now it's not about copyright, or bandwidth, anymore. Dave compares Mark with the kind of punk on the subway who pulls the emergency brake for no reason. He says "most people are honest", referring to the kind of people who don't pull the emergency brake, and don't make a Winer Watcher web application, implying that Mark is dishonest.

Dave threatens to take his toys and go home, again: "If the service continues, Scripting News will just be links to articles. If it stops, I'll keep writing."

Dave Winer says he can't write about his heart-disease without flaming people and throwing accusations left and right... or... he's trying to confuse everybody who reads his weblog.

With [Winer Watcher], you won't get [public writing about my experience with heart disease]. No way I'll take the chance. Send a message to Mark Pilgrim if this makes you angry. Dave Winer

And finally, Dave makes ass-of-self:

I keep a file of sensitive stuff that I've deleted from Scripting News, stuff I found too personal, more vulnerability than I wanted. It helped to do the writing, but once I saw it in public, I got scared, and took it down. Now that people have set up a system to record everything on Scripting that I post within five minute intervals, I don't think I'll be writing any more of that stuff here. I guess it's time for weblogs to become like television. Polished and politically correct. Impersonal. Commercial. That's what they're really saying. When there's no room to change your mind, there's no way to take a chance. That's about it. They found a way to stop me from taking chances. Dave Winer

Does Dave Winer understand the underlying reasons, which has been explained to him a hojillion times; that Mark "watches" ScriptingNews for personal attacks and accusations that Dave edits out? If he does he is clearly trying to escape the issue and confuse anyone who doesn't have a complete understanding of it. If he doesn't understand, he must be illiterate, or blind.

A brilliant idea just hit me; I have no idea where it came from but it will solve all these problems, both Mark's and Dave's, and it goes something like this: STOP ABUSING PEOPLE DAVE!

For a half-way solution: keep abusing people, but don't edit your abuses out, Dave.

Update: I just edited this, fixed some typos, that kind of thing. Unlike Dave, however, I didn't edit out any personal attacks or accusations though, because that would be so fucking low.

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