Do bad reviews have a "right to be forgotten?"

In such an instance couldn't he request the school paper take it down, depending on the terms of the paper's publication? I mean work that you've created is different than what other people say about you.

Hapax Legomenon said:

In such an instance couldn't he request the school paper take it down, depending on the terms of the paper's publication? I mean work that you've created is different than what other people say about you.

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I honestly don't know. I haven't spoken to him for a couple of years (we both left the job, and he married and moved out of state), and I'm not sure whether he tried to do anything like that. I'm not sure he'd be able to do much if the paper refused.

I should note that the article not only occurred in the archives of that paper, but also sections of it had been copied onto a couple of other sites (one belonging to a former classmate of his who continued to hold a grudge). I don't know that he could do squat about that.

I feel bad for the guy because I only knew him after he'd grown up and ceased to be an asshole. I'm not sure whether I'd feel the same way if I'd only known him in college, even if someone told me he'd reformed.

Well I think it depends on the terms that it was originally published under. For example when you publish with a short story magazine, you (generally) still hold the copyright, and the story is kept in the archives unless you request that it be removed. Depending on the contract of the school paper, they may have the right to that article for perpetuity and therefore he would not be able to do anything about it. And, also, taking it all the way to a lawsuit would be hard and probably not gain him anything and only draw attention to that work.

It's less about the right to clear onesself from doing stupid things and more about the right to control one's own work in this case. So yeah, I think that one's own creations fall under a totally different category than erasing other people's words about you. There's a reason why on a forum the average poster has an edit button on their own posts and not anyone else's.

If I see some outrageous quote/article/blog from someone I know (even peripherally), my surprise generally makes me look for when it was said/written. If it was done ages ago and nothing similar shows up in more recent times, I tend to ignore it. People change.

shadowwalker said:

If I see some outrageous quote/article/blog from someone I know (even peripherally), my surprise generally makes me look for when it was said/written. If it was done ages ago and nothing similar shows up in more recent times, I tend to ignore it. People change.

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I think that was the lesson I carried away from that experience.

Which is why when people dig up very ancient dirt on a politician, I tend to take it with a wee grain of salt.

Certainly I give the benefit of the doubt to someone I know. Though, depending on what it is and how close we are, I might ask about it. I've never been sorry for asking my colleague about his article instead of just letting it fester inside me.

CassandraW said:

I honestly don't know. I haven't spoken to him for a couple of years (we both left the job, and he married and moved out of state), and I'm not sure whether he tried to do anything like that. I'm not sure he'd be able to do much if the paper refused.

I should note that the article not only occurred in the archives of that paper, but also sections of it had been copied onto a couple of other sites (one belonging to a former classmate of his who continued to hold a grudge). I don't know that he could do squat about that.

I feel bad for the guy because I only knew him after he'd grown up and ceased to be an asshole. I'm not sure whether I'd feel the same way if I'd only known him in college, even if someone told me he'd reformed.

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If I were him, I would write an article, blog article on how wrong I was...own it publicly and denounce it in one stroke...or see if the college paper wouldn't allow him to add a retraction to the original paper...

But, this is the nature of the internet...everything stays there forever...and believe me I have lots of things I wish I hadn't said on the internet gone (and here on AW at that)...but I try and hopefully just push the crazy old shit back by making better points and writing better stuff.

"I would simply like to be forgiven and forgotten. There is no need to remember me. The need is to remember yourself!"

Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh