[Sage]

Originally Posted by fov

To play devil's advocate - why?

For one thing, it caught me by surprise yesterday when someone mentioned this to me. Since they're called "Private Messages", I thought privacy was implied in both content and correspondant.

What bothers you about someone knowing you're sending a PM to a certain person? (Not trying to invalidate the concern - I'd really like to hear what the issues are, because it doesn't bother me at all for people to know who I'm writing a PM to. It's not like the content of the PM is public.)

Two things, really:
One, as with starting new threads or responding to existing ones, I often get a whole page typed in and say "Umm...nah!" at the last minute. The "Who's Online" area wouldn't reflect that the message was never sent, only that I spent some time typing it in.
My second concern is the big one, though. The person who informed me of this feature said "Yeah, I see that you and so-in-so PM each other all the time", which just flew all over me. I don't necessarily mind telling anyone that so-in-so and I PM each other, but I don't like being told by a third party who I PM regularly when it's really none of their business.
As I said, I don't mind the fact that I'm reading or composing a PM being public knowledge, but it just irks me that who the PM is to or from is made public knowledge as well.

If privacy is that big of a concern that you don't want anyone knowing you're conversing, there is always email (although that's not working through the forum right now ) or MSN or something.

Privacy isn't that big a concern unless it's promised and not delivered. If the messages sent between two forum members are called "Private", then I feel that they should be so, both in content and destination. Yes, there is always E-mail, but that means leaving this forum and going to my home page.

(Or you could set it in your profile so your status on the board is "hidden" - then people won't see you in the Who's Online list at all.)

I'm not saying I want to be hidden or that I mind someone knowing what I'm doing here, only that I wish the addressees of private messages weren't revealed along with the fact that I'm reading or composing a PM.

ScottMate