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Today, a user edited an old answer of mine to add a completely different construction to the one I used. There was no indication made into the addition that this was not me writing it (a user would have had to go into the edit history to note this). Here is the edit history

I rolled back. I hope I’m not overreacting; it seems to me that this is the sort of thing that should have been added as a new answer by the editor, not dropped into my answer with no attribution at all (as I indicate in an added comment, it literally puts words in my mouth). Any comments on whether the edit was proper, or my rollback was improper?

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    $\begingroup$ It wasnt rewiewed since that member has the sufficient reputation to edit your answer. i think it would have been rejected if rewiewed. $\endgroup$ – Aryadeva Jun 9 at 15:43
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    $\begingroup$ @Aryadeva: I wasn’t asking for a review of the edit in the technical sense of “review before publishing”. I was confirming my actions were appropriate in rolling back and that this kind of addition would not generally be advisable, especially for someone with sufficient reputation to post their own answer. $\endgroup$ – Arturo Magidin Jun 9 at 15:45
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    $\begingroup$ Yes your action is appropriate. When I review edits I systematically reject edit that change the original answer. Thats what I meant. But normally when someone edit your answer you get a message a warning if I remember well ? $\endgroup$ – Aryadeva Jun 9 at 15:46
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    $\begingroup$ @Aryadeva yes, one gets a note in the inbox, saying a post was edited. Presumably that's how Arturo found out. $\endgroup$ – quid♦ Jun 9 at 18:18
  • $\begingroup$ @quid it gives you the right to accept or not the edit quid ? $\endgroup$ – Aryadeva Jun 9 at 18:24
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    $\begingroup$ @Aryadeva users with 2000+ points, which was the case here, can edit directly. The edit definitely takes effect. One can roll it back or edit the post to undo it after the fact, but one cannot preemptively "reject" such edits. They take effect and one is notified that they were made. $\endgroup$ – quid♦ Jun 9 at 18:27
  • $\begingroup$ @quid Thank you I didn't know that. $\endgroup$ – Aryadeva Jun 9 at 18:34
  • $\begingroup$ It would have been most appropriate to add those lines as a comment to your answer rather than editing your answer directly. I usually fix typos (if any) in answers written by others and even then usually a drop a comment. $\endgroup$ – Paramanand Singh Jun 10 at 1:54
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    $\begingroup$ @ArturoMagidin I would have done the same thing you did: roll back the intrusive edit, to the post you intended to submit. $\endgroup$ – amWhy Jun 10 at 19:54
  • $\begingroup$ As far as I can tell, the editor's username is misspelled in your comment. That means that they do not get the notification. (Since you have users @username, I assume that you wanted to notify that user in some way. This is one of those instances when there is no autocomplate.) $\endgroup$ – Martin Sleziak Jun 14 at 17:23
  • $\begingroup$ @MartinSleziak: I see that now; that is the re-done comment (don’t know if the original one was misspelled or not). $\endgroup$ – Arturo Magidin Jun 14 at 19:02
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It is appropriate to rollback if you think that it conflicts with your intent. Obviously if you want to keep it you can keep it, too.

While in principle it is possible to find out who added what it is no doubt true that it looks as if you had written it, and thus you should have some control over it.

It's also fine to comment-notify the editor; I likely would have phrased the comment somewhat differently, but I don't think it is out of line either. (The thing is that to me "putting words in my mouth" has a more drastic connotation. Nothing contentious or also just false was added; arguably it is even a relevant addition. You don't want it there, that's your right, but the intent was rather a positive one.)

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    $\begingroup$ Fair enough; I’ll edit/delete the comment. $\endgroup$ – Arturo Magidin Jun 9 at 0:32
  • $\begingroup$ If the alternate construction has merit (as @Arturo would judge) , perhaps a more positive but still biting way to comment would be to suggest "speaking for themselves" by posting their own Answer. $\endgroup$ – hardmath Jun 12 at 16:13
  • $\begingroup$ @hardmath: The editor who decided to drop it into my answer is absolutely welcome to add their own answer with that construction. I was annoyed that they decided to add it to mine without any indication it wasn’t me speaking, and that the edit summary indicated it was a “cleaner” construction (thus along the way giving a low key criticism of my answer) (and I would disagree with that claim anyway, since it would require a proof that the collection of all finite subsets of an infinite set is bijectable with the set, which is hardly obvious). $\endgroup$ – Arturo Magidin Jun 12 at 16:17
  • $\begingroup$ @hardmath: In a sense, it seemed like the editor wanted to piggyback on the fact that my answer has lots of upvotes and thus get their construction more eyeballs. $\endgroup$ – Arturo Magidin Jun 12 at 16:18
  • $\begingroup$ @ArturoMagidin: I'm sure I'd feel the same annoyance and rollback the edit. Putting them to the trouble of "speaking for themselves" would set up a better comparison of the two constructions. $\endgroup$ – hardmath Jun 12 at 16:22
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    $\begingroup$ @ArturoMagidin I propose to think about this in a bit more charitable way. Ultimately the editor would not have gained much anything either way. $\endgroup$ – quid♦ Jun 12 at 16:27

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