As far as author mods go, if I may refer to the otherwise very upsetting Orkut: I was very active in the communities there for a while, and while I did see a post get edited out from under a discussion once or twice, it was never critical or disruptive as I saw it. The nice thing was that I was able to correct mistakes or update links, etc. It gave me more of a feeling of importance for each message.

Marking a post as having been edited would be enough for me, and I think it would work.

Yes, I think you're over analysing. But we'll all get bitten some time! There's always some awkward cuss who commits virtual suicide and deletes or removes *all* their posts. But it's very rare. Mostly people just need to edit out mistakes or add a link they forgot.

Brian, I also posted a thread today on 'TribeIdeas' ('edit / delete one's own posts') on this subject since this is at the very top of my tribe wish-list.

I like your suggestions, except that I don't think the 'until a reply' caveat is necessary:

1) As Liz pointed out on my TribeIdeas thread, all this really would do is prevent editing on fast-moving threads, where replies may happen before you even check the thread again yourself.

2) For another, if everyone can edit / delete their posts, all that editing a post well back in a thread would do is allow each person to decide whether the edit to the original post merits an edit to or deletion of their own reply-- or not.

either way, not a bad thing in my book. if you *really* want to 'archive history' then next to the 'edited by & when' notation, add a link to 'cached version of this post'-- a waste in my view, but that would address that concern, and still allow people to keep threads somewhat readable without 'addendum / correction / and oh yeah by the way' posts popping up all the time. and even better, once you make this change, a thread author can manage or remove their own words without destroying the contributions of others...

and as the other two folks who replied to you pointed out, on almost every other online community, the ability to make minor corrections is a basic and essential feature whose beneficial uses far outweigh the occasional irritation of an abuse.