Quote:
I hope everyone now recognises that this poster is attempting to fashion yet another character slur against me out of thin air.
Of course I haven't changed his words. I wouldn't dream of it.
I did change the title of the thread (from ..."self review" to "...open review") to reflect the subject under discussion.
The text above regarding 'self review' is BS after the event. 'Self review' is not mentioned elsewhere in the thread and was, of course, simply an error in the first place.
Apologies to anyone fed up with this tawdry thread, but the above really can't go un-commented on.
So what's here? First a characteristic persuasive appeal to a gallery of sycophants to renew a chorus of disapproval to drown out opposition. This reader can see no slur, only a sober and accurate description of Smith's post hoc and purposive revision and editing of another's contribution to the thread.
Smith, hilarious lie notwithstanding, has of course "changed his words", the title of the thread having been chosen by the originator of the thread, yet summarily altered by Smith.
Of course rich's objection is "after the event": hard to object to the unilateral re-writing of your thread title
before it's been unilaterally re-written, no?
Whether titling the thread "Independent Academic review vs. self review" was "an error in the first place" is not something Smith can judge unilaterally. As it happens he's wrong, or lying.
At no point in rich's postings does the term
open review appear without being wrapped in inverted commas and appearing thus: 'open review'. This is a device of punctuation conveying several shades of nuanced meaning, ranging from uncertainty about the meaning of the term thus wrapped, through mild scepticism that it means anything at all or might mean something else, to an inference that in practice it has an altogether opposite meaning. "The 'free lunch' cost us forty quid" being an example of the latter. Smith understands this; note what he does to the term
self review, above.
So rich's consistent wrapping of
open review in inverted commas, taken in tandem with the title he chose for this thread (before Smith got busy with the virtual Tippex), suggests to this reader that he's looking to weigh
not only the merits of academic review vs open review,
but also whether 'open review' as practiced here on this site is worth the name, whether it can be distinguished at all from self review.
How might that question be answered?
This tidbit from page 7
Quote:
You have lost the argument comprehensively. Nothing in your original assertions has any standing left in the light of replies and explanations provided in this discussion. The open review policy has worked and has worked admirably.
where Smith declares himself the winner and gives himself a huge vote of confidence, seeking unilaterally to
close the discussion from a position of authority while at the same time claiming it a triumph of
open review policy, is a clue.
This, together with Smith exercising exclusive powers to alter other contributors' chosen wording, and to post
into other contributors' posts to advise readers to scroll forward to the really important bit where Smith almost lands a punch, leads this reader to conclude that there is no 'open review' in practice here worth the name, or distinguishable from self review.
Which is kind of what rich was getting at when he chose the title for this thread. And kind of why Smith tried to airbrush self review from the thread altogether.
It's not all doom and gloom. It's been at the back of my mind that Smith's behaviour here reminds me of someone. At last it came to me - Brian Glover's PE teacher Sugden in
Kes, simultaneously referee and player, awarding himself a penalty and then slotting it home with much crowing triumphalism.