Oops,
You're absolutely right, John. However I still believe it's the wrong mode for most applications. I cringe at the thought of telling users "It's OK for you to look at a record, just don't change anything". If you're using Pessimistic mode you really need to have an Edit/ReadOnly button that defaults to Read Only for most situations. This prevents the user from changing anything inadvertently.
>I thought Pessimistic didn't kick in until you started actually editing