All right. I agree that a rule to PM someone in private won't work well, due to honest disagreement, an understandable reflex on the part of the recipient to get defensive about her/his posting habits (whether right or wrong, a highly subjective inquiry most of the time), and a probable tendency to encourage the development of "forum police".

In the event that spawned the recent navel-gazing pandemonium, I could have just PMed Mark, though I'm usually loath to bother him, and though it would have felt like tattling. I could alternatively have continued, after my first post and the other poster seemed not to understand what the fuss was about, to point out to her exactly why I had an issue, while keeping as close to a neutral tone as possible (I think I did try to do this but could have done better). The new discussion definitely derailed the original thread a bit, so I probably should have suggested that we take it to another thread. That other thread could have morphed into a discussion much like this one.

Striving to increase my rate of flow, and fight forum gloopiness. sick