John Atkinson wrote:

Repost because my earlier response seems to have
disappeared into thin air. My apologies if both versions
show up:

Howard Ferstler wrote:
Incidentally, quite some time ago, John allowed an
edited version of a "The Audiophile Voice" article
that I published to be posted on RAO.

This is incorrect. 1) The copy editing I had performed
was done with your full knowledge and permission, Mr.
Ferstler.

Yes. But you did not have permission to post the thing. I
decided to put a stop to your plans, and therefore caused
your editor to essentially do all of his work for nothing.
(Well, I assume you paid the guy, so basically you paid for
nothing.)

2) You made several incorrect and misleading
comments about the copy editing on this newsgroup, but
refused me permission to reproduce the text to prove your
statements wrong.

Yep.

Even so, I did not "allow" the edited
text to be posted to r.a.o. and I publicly condemned the
anonymous person who did so.

Yes, but you were essentially in charge of the article. You
contracted to have it edited and then it became your
responsibility to see to it that the genie did not get out
of the bottle. You sent it to some boob whom you should not
have trusted. I know you are sorry for what happened, and I
am sorry for what I did, so perhaps we should just leave it
at that.

He did not post it directly, but he did send a copy
to someone who did not have scruples (he claimed
that they said they would not post it) and they posted
it.

No, to the best of my knowledge, none of the people
to whom I sent the article posted it to Usenet. It
was done by a third party.

Still, you let the genie out of the bottle. The edited
version of the article was initially your responsibility.
Had you not sent it to some pen pals it never would have
made it to RAO.

Several people said I should have sued, but I am
really not that kind of person.

If you felt you had a case, Mr. Ferstler, you should
have taken the appropriate action against the person
who posted the article to Usenet. But again please note
that that person was not me.

I realize this. However, you should have picked your
correspondents more carefully. Both of us are certainly
aware of what kind of people we are dealing with on RAO.

In any case, I have at least managed to get it deleted
from the standard thread links, and I have asked the
people at Google to delete it. I am not sure if this
will do the trick, but hopefully it will.

Thank you for making a good-faith effort to undo
your action, Mr. Ferstler. I am sure that that will
be the end of the matter as far as Stereophile is
concerned.

I have a guy helping out and hopefully the damned copied
article will be sent to the pits of hell in reasonable time.

As for The Audiophile Voice article, well, I have no
problems with it being in the archives forever, in
spite of its being originally edited to make me look
like a poor writer.

Unfortunately, yes, the editing did make you look like
a poor writer, Mr. Ferstler, but justifiably so, in
my opinion.

We all have our opinions, John. You know what mine are.

Howard Ferstler