Alan,
Sorry if i did not respond t your earlier quesion. I kind of missed it within you message.
Your current one is clearly well demarcated and stated. So, here is my my response:
Our posts on this Forum are by and large a mix of information search and social interactions . As such, they are practically immune to any critique, and definitely to any harsh one. Reasoned disagreements are part and parcel of any discussion of any object or opinion ( “You are mistaken, in country A it is called not B but C. And here is the reference”), but sarcastic remarks, personal insults and such are unacceptable and the moderators must be harsh with the offender.
This is my view of a soft approach: friendly, respectable, sincere ( without being denigrating) and forgiving. In short, kind of family chat at the New Year table ot just Sunday dinner. By and large we practice it already, so it is not a great burden to continue.
Things change if one of the Forumites posts an article -like treatise on the Forum, with the reason for doing it, data, discussion with references. This is a different ball of wax and should be treated as a scientific ( or “academic”, if you prefer) contribution. The contributor decided to produce a serious piece of work and the greatest compliment from other Forumites is to take it seriously. Sometimes, the post contributed to the Forum is an early draft of a journal paper the contributor reveals to his friends (sic!). Their frank comments may be immensely helpful. I know it very well: I often send my own “ main job”:-) papers to friends for their perusal and very (!) frank comments. Saves me a lot of grief with the subsequent journal referees. My ego may be bruised, but my paper improves markedly. I also get similar requests from friends and do my best to return the favor.
This is a harsher, but still friendly approach.
The last one deals with articles and/or books submitted for publication elsewhere and peer review or published without the “ pre-screening” whether by Forumites or external colleagues. Here , if we want to be truthful and the topic is important to us we might go full forward and provide as harsh critique as the contribution deserves ( in our opinion, at least).
Again, no insults are allowed, but sarcasm is permitted when it is appropriate.
This is the “ harsh approach”. It should be factual, but pitiless.
This is the usual policy of all professional journals I know and definitely of the two I am editing now or edited in the past.
This is to prevent false or bad information to pollute the pool or to alert colleagues that a particular piece of information had just hit the road and is poisonous.
The entire medical field is functioning now on the principle of “ evidence-based medicine” . This is the beginning of the end of “ personal opinions”, poorly-executed studies, falsified results etc. I personally know people whose careers went down the drain because they published 2 pictures of the same histological slide turned 90 degrees away from each other and labeled as showing different phenomena.
Every submitted paper undergoes computer analysis to uncover plagiarism.
Every case of “ double publication” results in published retractions, indefinite ban by both involved journals as well as by a slew of others at the very least by the same publishers.
I see nothing wrong in implementing the same harsh policies in other fields.
Hope it answers your question. There is no “ all or nothing” cookbook, it all depends on the circumstances.
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