>Yes, I already said that the normal response would have been a couple of lines of polite nothingness.
>
>M.M.'s response - however rude it might seem to some - was still personal/private communication. Not exactly designed to nurture the self-esteem of the recipient, but not much to write home about either. However, S.K. took it to launch a very public, very personal attack against M.M. As I said earlier, it amazed me that any people at all sided with him because to me his postings said nothing of substance about M.M. or his business but a whole lot of things about S.K. himself (and none of them pleasant).

S.O.,

S.K.'s going public was his way of warning 'us'. A warning would have been hollow if he'd not mentioned any name.

Here we have a dilemma. Suppose you want to warn other people, e.g. about someone you worked with. How can you do that without unleashing any name? You can't.

How do you mean private? Are you saying that one person can (for example) insult someone else and that the insulted person can do nothing really about it in terms of informing others about it, as long as it's done in private???

And was there any line in the reply of M.M. that said it's private? And does it mean that we're never allowed to bring something from the private to the public?

IMO, under certain circumstances it is okay to bring it to the public area, although there's always the risk of unintended interpretations.