DSXchange

Hearsay is not admitted as evidence in courts in most countries of the world.

There has recently been a distressing (to me) tendency to introduce a thread with "I have heard a rumour that..." and inviting replies.

Be advised that I shall no longer be reponding to such posts unless some verifiable evidence is supplied as to the source of the rumour. A URL where I could check the facts, ensure that the quote is not being taken out of context, etc., would suffice.

If you claim "your vendor told you", name the vendor and the person, and provide an email address and/or telephone number so that we can verify your claim.

I heard a rumour that you might be posting something like this...

Can't say that I've noticed this going on, perhaps it's off in forums I don't frequent all that often. Interesting. I shall poke around. Computer, perform exact match for 'rumour', please.

I did a dsxchange search and discovered I had used the "I have heard that" phrase at least six times so now I feel I must defend it.

I'm of the opposite opinion, I think forums are a great place to talk about rumours. Why don't we have a rumour category? Better to let people debunk or confirm them then to leave misinformation out there.

Hearsay is generally not admissible in common law courts because it is of suspect value, but there are many exceptions to this prohibition.

- Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hearsay

Most of the exceptions that make hearsay admissable are when the original speaker is unavailable. I use the term "I have heard that" quite deliberately to indicate the source is unavailable. Either I cannot put their personal details on this forum or I cannot recall the exact conversation, email, white paper or presentation where I heard the "hearsay", but that I am quite confident it is reliable.

Hearsay and rumour is extremely important in the investigation of crime (as anyone who watches Law and Order knows) and this forum involves the investigation of issues. Unattributed hearsay can be useful if it triggers another forum member to provide links or confirmation.

Other forms of hearsay are also admissable in court, such as party admissions (information from IBM employees), excited utterances (DataStage can get people worked up) and dying declarations.
"What were his final words?"
"He thinks the next release of DataStage wont have Universe in it".
"God rest his soul".