Members rights

[Margaret]

What are members rights as regards to requesting an admin to be deleted from the forum? (not this one) :o
I was on a forum I now wish to dissociated myself from and requested for my profile to be deleted. But the admin there is acting stupid and refusing to do it. Do I have legal rights?

[Lex]

I'm not sure on that one, Margaret. I for one like to have a good relationship with WOL's members, and if they have any issues with our forum, I'll try and solve them amicably. :)

[rebbonk]

Margaret, it will depend on the forum.

Many will refuse to remove comments. They argue that it will disrupt the threads for any later readers.

Some will remove your name and leave your comments as anonymous, which retains the thread integrity.

A few will remove all trace of you and your comments, which often renders threads incoherent.

It really is a case of 'pot luck' I'm afraid. (I'm a member of sites that have a mix of all these rules, but on the site I run if ever we get requests to leave I always offer option 2 because I like the threads to remain coherent and intact. - Most will agree to this, though as an admin' it does cause a little work.)

As regards legality, that will depend on the jurisdiction of the host, and it might not be where you first think, or the most obvious place. - I personally wouldn't even go down that route, as my pockets are not deep enough and the only ones likely to end up satisfied are the legal profession.

This is why I don't ever use my own name on sites or a picture of the real me.

[Margaret]

I didn't use my real name on the sited, but admin says he has my email and IP address and was threatening to show it on the forum because I was deliberately obnoxious in the hope that they would just ban me, but they are playing stupid games and refusing to delete my profile. The site is not an interesting site anyway. No posts there are worth the light of day.

[rebbonk]

I would think that if an administrator acted in that way you would likely have a personal case against him. However, I think it unlikely he'd go through with his threats once he has had time to cool down and think about it.

My advice would be to simply leave the site, perhaps before going change my 'signature' to something along the lines of "no longer an active member". - I'd also change my settings so I would no longer receive email from them.

The only case I've personally seen like you describe was on a foreign military site. That did get nasty and names and addresses were revealed. I have no idea how it finished as I left (as did many others) once that type of stuff started.

I'm a great believer that if you stop catching the ball when it's thrown, people soon get bored and move on. The teachings of Eric Berne I think.