I disagree with you, and I disagree with you for one huge reason. I disagree on what "harm" means.

To me the posting levels are a fun joke. They mean nothing. Yeah, my rating is higher today than it was yesterday. At the current rate it will take 2-3 days to rise as much as it had been rising in one day. I really don't care. I wouldn't mind if it was driven down as fast as it ever rose.

To me harm is measured in people not present and technical contributions not made. I am telling you flat out that btrott was far from the first or only person to tell me that harm by my definition has happened. From the start of my publically commenting on this I have consistently said several things:

1. If I believed that I was the only person this had happened to, I would not comment. Really.
2. Don't vote for me across the board. I would find this a ridiculous thing to say were it not that people have been telling me that they have done just that. Votes should not be a popularity contest about people, they should single out good content. Right now an archive is being built up, and the reputation of posts is laying down a record that will undoubtably be useful some day. Don't pollute that record.
3. If I bother you, feel free to talk to me. Perhaps after chatting with me in person you will change your impression. Perhaps I will learn a lesson.

For the record there have been some people I chat privately with a lot and this topic never comes up. Others have approached me. But it was not until I had been convinced that there was a problem that I began talking about it in public. Even then I don't bring it up in private.

Incidentally I downvoted your post simply because I think I have made my opinion on what I consider "damage" to be so clear that it is simply ridiculous for you to have avoided that issue. Having competent posters stop posting for extended periods because of perceived BS is harm. Having someone's rating go up and down like a yo-yo because of a joke most emphatically does not.

FYI the specific technical topic that I mentioned is one I have an opinion on, and is something that I intend to post. That I may not do that for some time qualifies as specific harm in my books. (My kind of harm, not yours.)

---

---

• Are you posting in the right place? Check out Where do I post X? to know for sure.
• Posts may use any of the Perl Monks Approved HTML tags. Currently these include the following:

  <code> <a> <b> <big> <blockquote> <br /> <dd> <dl> <dt> <em> <font> <h1> <h2> <h3> <h4> <h5> <h6> <hr /> <i> <li> <nbsp> <ol> <p> <small> <strike> <strong> <sub> <sup> <table> <td> <th> <tr> <tt> <u> <ul>

• Snippets of code should be wrapped in <code> tags not <pre> tags. In fact, <pre> tags should generally be avoided. If they must be used, extreme care should be taken to ensure that their contents do not have long lines (<70 chars), in order to prevent horizontal scrolling (and possible janitor intervention).
• Want more info? How to link or How to display code and escape characters are good places to start.