There needs to be a way to delete content or disassociate your account from said content [duplicate]

Question

I know this has probably been beaten to death, but there really needs to be a way to remove yourself from posted content. I understand deleting content has its issues, but certainly you should be able to transfer something you posted to an Anonymous account.

I'm really going to open myself up to trolls here, but not being able to delete things you posted is a major issue for the new careers feature. I'm not talking about stupid questions / answers I've posted so much as smart ass remarks / troll posts. You will probably say that one deserves to have their inflammatory comments stay attached to their name. I think that everyone has bad moments though, and there should be a way to publicly delete it. Not having delete forces people to create new accounts just to use the careers feature.

Edit: I just want to make it clear that I agree you shouldn't post anything you don't stand by. I'm saying though there should be some recourse for when you did.

Answer 1

The Creative Commons license under which contributors post their content specifically retains the moral right to remove your name from any content that you do not want associated with your name. As such a simple request to the SO team ought to suffice to have your content disassociated from your account.

Quoting from the Other Rights section (moral rights hover-over):

In addition to the right of licensors to request removal of their name from the work when used in a derivative or collective they don't like, copyright laws in most jurisdictions around the world (with the notable exception of the US except in very limited circumstances) grant creators "moral rights" which may provide some redress if a derivative work represents a "derogatory treatment" of the licensor's work.

Answer 2

I don't think this is a good idea. However, there has been an interesting change in the "contract" between Stackoverflow and its users. Previously, we were communicating primarily with our peers, and knowledge and "rep" were the only currency. Now we've added potential employers, and real money may be at stake.

My suggestion would be to delete any comments and answers that you don't want an employer to see. If you have a question that you can't delete, flag it for moderator attention or email the team and see if they can do something about it (like transfering it to the community user).

In an extreme case - if your account is garbage and you want to start from scratch - rename your account to something innocuous, ask the team to delete it, and create a new one (tell them what you're doing so they don't merge the accounts).

Going forward, anyone using the careers feature will have to be on their best behavior. Ultimately, this is a good thing. If we did have a feature to transfer your post to a junk user that would only make it easier to post rants and noise.

Answer 3

Perhaps you shouldn't be posting things that you would later be ashamed of in the first place.

I don't think the system needs to change to accommodate this problem.

Just think of the avenues of abuse for this.

Answer 4

This is, IMO, a positive side effect of the careers side of Stack Overflow. I've been meaning to blog about this, actually.

Anyway -- as far as removing content, you can easily do this:

1. change your display name to "Anonymous" or whatever you like

2. email us to delete your account, which permanently denormalizes every post with your current display name "Anonymous"

Bam, done, all trace of your old identity is gone forever.

If you don't want to do that, you can of course delete your posts. Deleted content is only visible to 10k+ rep users, and I think it's verrrrrry unlikely employers will happen to have 10k+ stack overflow accounts.

It is true that some questions are protected from deletion depending on how many votes and answers they have, but if you flag them for moderator attention indicating you want them deleted and we agree, we can delete them for you.

It seems to me, you can already do what you want to do, for the most part.

Answer 5

As stated by tvanfosson, the CC license on Stack Exchange content allows you to have your name removed from your content.

It's pretty simple to make this happen; just flag your post for moderator attention, use the "other" option, and explain that you'd like it disassociated. The moderators can relay this request to the developers, and the question will be removed from your account (and your name from the question). It's generally a rather quick process.

An example of this is this question. As you can see, the user's name is replaced with the non-link "anon", both in the usercard at the bottom of the question and in the comments on the question.

Answer 6

For what it's worth... Disassociation was suggested many months ago on UserVoice, and got roughly the same response there then as it is here now.

I still think it's a good idea. There would need to be some safeguards (for instance, your name should stick around in the revision history, and I would hope that moderators would see everything you've posted and disowned just as they see deleted items now), but I don't see any insurmountable problems.

Furthermore, it already happens. If you delete your account... or if a question is migrated to a site where you don't have an account... then the association appears to be largely broken (apart from an entry in the revision history). Turning this into a feature could also help to smooth out some of the rough edges associated with the scenarios where it already happens.

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That being said, if you're posting stuff you don't want potential employers to find... using a name you care to re-use... on a site that has only soft-delete and keeps permanent revision history... You're a little bit naive. Even if you could convince SO to wash the revision history as well (which I think would be practically an invitation for abuse, and hardly think they would ever agree to), there are regular, public data-dumps: and you're never gonna cleanse all of those.

SO needs to be careful not to give new users the impression that they have any hope of cleaning up their tracks... or they'll quickly come to the same sad realization you did.

Answer 7

You can delete your comments.

You delete your answers, with certain constraints.

You delete your questions, with certain constraints.

Admittedly, I don't use the careers site -- does it expose prior-deleted information?

And like Rich says, don't post anything publicly you'd be embarrassed of later.

Answer 8

If you aren't comfortable with your comments and posts being the headline tomorrow in the Toronto Star, New York Times, Los Angeles Times, London Times, or "substitute local paper of good repute", then don't say them; and don't write them.

Grow up!

Accept responsibility for your words, and your actions!

If you have made snarky comments that you now regret, then track them down and apologize if you are an adult; or delete them if you are not. Do it yourself, don't make it SE's job.

Update:
Having a personal account and professional account is fine; I see nothing wrong with that. But to make it SE's task to rewrite your personal history because it is now inconvenient for you to own it is out-of-line. OP should have thought of that before making the snarky comments from an account with rep.

Like it or not, members look up to members with higher rep to learn what the appropriate standards of behaviour are on the site. When members of higher rep behave in unpleasant or snarky ways, they also teach other members that such behaviour is acceptable. Now OP wants it both ways, with SE taking responsibility for the clean-up and (cover-up). I believe that is out-of-line.