Prok/FIC Wars Lead to New Forum Policies
by Alphaville Herald on 18/06/05 at 8:18 am
The repercussions of the board war between virtual agitator Prokofy Neva and the Feted Inner Core (the SL denizens who have allegedly found favor with Linden Lab and constitute an in game Aristocracy according to Prok) has led to the announcement of a new policy governing behavior online and in game. Of special note is the fact that behavior on the boards can get you banned from the game – in effect, you are not just gagged, but toaded – and vice versa. The rationale for this policy remains unstated. Of further concern is the announcement that abuse will be “quantified” – good luck with that one – and a system will be introduced for abuse reporting. As our friend Zero Grace observes, this will result in “a system that can be easily gamed to achieve political goals.” Just think of it as the Second Patriot Act. By the way, Zero’s emoticon was winking at me in an insincere way clearly “intended to insite anger”. Can I bust a cap in his ass?
Tony Walsh
Jun 18th, 2005
Please do not bust anything in my ass, thank you.
Prokofy Neva
Jun 18th, 2005
My last post on the LL forums before my permanent banning was “Is SL Ready for Investment?” I know it has been ready for *my* investment as I have invested a considerable amount of RL dollars and time in establishing my “virtual estate” business. But is it ready for “the real people” from RL business and non-profits? I raised questions about what would happen the first time an executive from a Coke or an LL Bean got set up by the anti-business FIC for swearing in PG and banned for 3 days, or the first time a Red Cross or an ASPCA official suffers an event griefing. But the worst anyone will face is the connection LL now makes between your free speech on the forums with the ability to seize your land and stop your game! Aimee Weber and others imply that those of us raising this stark option are making an unfair claim because there are many steps along the road to being banned — informal warnings, officials bans, 7-day bans — and I can add “little chats” in-world.
This makes it sound that what happened to me is first I wrote “You fucking wanker” once and got an informal warning, then I wrote “You fucking faggot wanker” and got an official warning, then I wrote “You fucking Mick faggot wanker” and got a 7-day warning, and then I wrote “You fucking Linden cock-sucking Mick faggot wanker” from an alt account and got perma-banned. It makes it seem like the process is one in which the rules are clear, you deliberately cross the line knowingly and consciously, and you
must therefore take your punishment like a man.
But the rules aren’t clear and the *Lindens themselves* told me that my posts were *not* in violation of the TOS and that they *skirted* the TOS at times but that they disciplined me because they had *a near riot* on their hands from the FIC and didn’t know what else they could do. They felt that it made them look like fools for me to come back on an alt and defend myself against libelous charges.
(Interestingly, these posts are all “sequested” i.e. as Pathfinder says in a sticky, removed to “seclusion” to be examined and now invisible on the forums. Since all of these posts contain claims and counterclaims of RL-type libel, one can only assume they’ve done this as a defensive maneuver to avoid litigation.)
THAT’S WHAT’S REALLY TROUBLESOME. You can lose your land NOT because you violated the rules, NOT because your offense is clear, but because you defended yourself from egregious attack by counterposts instead of pushing the Little Red Button. THAT’s what is frightening about this new system — utter arbitrary discression and utter dependence and further empowerment of this really nasty , entrenched forum gang who have honed the ugly art of informing on one’s neighbour down to a science.
After all, the Lindens didn’t act when far, far FAR worse insults and actions were leveled on me, including even the disclosure of my RL. They were silent. They didn’t unilaterally suspend anyone else or hand out anything more than an informal warning or possible an “official warning” at most, when the offenses were of the type that should have led to a 3-day ban at the very least.
Imagine, I can risk the loss of my land because I never say “You are a fucking wanker” but I point out the absurdity of Pendari’s claim not to have gotten a deal with her free sim at Nberg and her feting? But she gets a wrist-slap for calling me a “fucking wanker”. I cite this as one of numerous examples.
Claiming that it is “dramatic” and “hysterical” to fear the loss of your land or your whole game over this arbitrary and whimsical forums is to completely overlook the hideous culture of the forums — you cannot defend yourself adequately from onslaught there because of one-sided enforcement favoring the FIC. Why? Because some of us simply haven’t brought ourselves to believe in, or practice, the informant’s game of pressing the Little Red Button. Imagine, weeks and weeks went by before I thought to press the Little Red Button on egregious TOS violators like Nolan Nash, for RL disclosure, or Merwan Marker, for a libelous claim that I committed a RL crime, like Pendari Lorenz, for calling me a “fucking wanker,” like Dark Cellador, for posting a parody of my icon with a bloody blown-off raven’s head, on Jauani Wu for claiming I was a “pyramid-schemer and tier-skimmer” and many, many more. Indeed, it was literally in the last hour before I was banned I managed to lob in ARs on some of these really egregious posts because I had simply failed to take part before in the KGB-like informants’ game.
In fact, the thought has occurred to me that some Linden, seeing that I was finally waking up an AR’ing some of these hideous posts against me, including the RL-actionable kind of posts, that if they didn’t ban me, they have to face me constantly confronting me as to why they were doing NOTHING about these really hideous posts — and that would mean having to rein in and discipline the FIC directly.
So they took another route — they fed the FIC Prok’s head, and then used this as a cautionary tale — “This can happen to you” to disguise the draconian nature of their new rules — because each and every FIC believes “it can’t happen to me because I’m good AND I’m FIC and it can only happen to that ebil Prok” — but deep inside, they will “watch it” a lot more — and they now know that that all their “fuck you, you wankers” are going to be looked at more closely.
My entire impression of the LL forums has always been: this can’t stand, surely LL will see this, it is so blatantly one-sided and unfair that they won’t let it go on and will correct themselves. My faith in them is shattered now, however — they are only able to into reactive mode when their legions of fanboyz — the monster they have created — bombard them en masse with pushes of the Little Red Button.
The first time I received an informal warning for “sexism” from Pathfinder over a flippant remark to Ingrid Ingersoll around Easter that she should eat a chocolate bunny rabbit for her menstrual bitchiness, I thought it was some kind of joke — I had seen such far, far worse from so many, especially men, that I couldn’t take it seriously. Nonetheless, out of deference to Pathfinder’s delicate sensibilities, I tried to avoid ever saying anything about Ingrid’s or anybody’s need to eat chocolate. Then when I was banned for 7 days because Cristiano and friends bombarded the Lindens with angry pushes of the Little Red Button because I questioned his site’s ability to out my private life *and* slander me with *false* RL libel, I figured again, the Lindens need to do this to save face with their FIC fanboyz, but surely they get it, surely they see that when people are harassed on third-party sites from which they are banned, and then goaded and harassed on the SL forums, they have to fight back somehow — and that was the context in which everyone must see Cristiano’s bleatings about me “libeling” him.
He does have the ability to block my IP and track the email which comes to him from Snapzilla — to deny that is to deny that you can function on the Internet in the normal way every site owner does.
He can indeed and does indeed “track me around the Internet” not by using some “radar” but by using the tools he has at his disposal to track on his site, plus the very concept of “google witch-hunting” — a term he himself coined once in. Does Cristiano want to deny that he never pressed on a link to read my RL info and the *wrong* RL info??? Please.
I always figured it would be *so obvious* to the Lindens that they’s simply have to take action and would begin to correct themselves. I honestly thought that they were starting to enforce more equally when they sent the informal warning to Pendari PRECISELY BECAUSE I AR’D HER, BREAKING WITH MY OWN BELIEF SYSTEM AND THE BELIEF SYSTEM OF ANY OTHER DECENT, NON-KGB TYPE PERSON.
I figured they might wake up and get a little more proactive after a few ARs like that but guess what — as Jesse once said to me “I can only respond to the case at hand.” That’s how they have to do their job.
There are a few ways out of this horrid impasse however, even given the unassailable FIC entrenchment:
o announce that you are leaving the General Forums, as Catherine Cotton and a few others have done, by announcing that you’ve understood perfectly the new Linden connection between your speech on the forums and your losing your land and your game. Eloquent, simple — and true.
o resurrect old Prokofy posts from the past and make the Undead Walk Again muahahah as blaze spinnaker has been doing by simply answering old fallow posts to make them show up again on the headlines with the original poster’s name
o methodically and relentlessly AR every single TOS violation you see from the normally scot-free FIC — that means obscenity, personal attacks, outing of RL, etc. etc.
o posting of positive and interesting topics to try to walk around the constant and obvious lack of ideas the FIC has most of the time and their inability to post creative new ideas, but only reactively blast and ridicule others
Cocoanut
Jun 18th, 2005
For the record, my position and my take on some of these things:
1. In the case of Cristiano, I think Prokofy was in the wrong in that one in one way. In one post, he didn’t just carry the theme that these sites do have information and their owners can look at that info (as the SL Herald well knows), but stated in one sentence that Cristiano did look at it and benefit from that, as if that were fact. We do not know that and there is no evidence of any such thing – and indeed, it is possible Cristiano never once set eyes on Prok’s, or anyone’s, IP.
I pointed that out to Prokofy at the time, and told him why I thought it was wrong to make that statement.
As for the rest of Prok’s presentation of events, that which I read above and in the other thread, there have been no misrepresentations, in fact or in overall gist, of anything that I have seen or had knowledge of myself, with the exception of the slight difference in memory of Prok’s exact words when he saw the Cubey blimp. As for those events where I wasn’t present, I can’t testify.
2. When I first saw Catherine’s response to the repressive and stiflfing new rule of tying forum posts to game play, my first reaction was just to say “ditto.” I waited a few hours, though, to think about it, and read further in the thread. I decided definitely yes, to withdraw from the General Forum, which is the setting for the majority of controversial issues, and participate only in the other forums until if and when I deem them risky, too.
Not because I think it is likely I’d be AR’d to death, but you never know. One of those instrumental in the campaign to get rid of Prok said yesterday, in response to my opposition to what happened to Prok and to the new rule, something on the order of how I was accomplishing nothing with my posts, except running the risk of being banned myself for my “recent actions.” Meaning my posts.
3. Since I know they AR’d Prok to death – in addition, of course, to holding informal meetings, one of them complete with Pathfinder, along with shunning campaigns, etc., culminating with a plea to the hotline; and since I’m pretty sure that with Prok gone, they will be turning to the next troublemaker; I would rather be safe than sorry.
That really isn’t all of it, though, since I don’t think they’d dare try to do me that way. A major part of it is for protest. But I have a third, more interesting reason. I just don’t like to write when I feel like I have a critic hanging over my shoulder looking for a reason to push that button and get rid of me, with power far out of proportion to what they should have.
In general, I write in such a way as to never receive warnings anyway, but this extra bit of heavy weight at my shoulder just makes me feel intruded upon, almost CHALLENGED to foul up, and in general, forced to write in an already pissed off mood. I don’t write so some little self-righteous twerp can sit there and decide if I have “attacked” someone or not (which they do all the time, if you disagree with them) so he/she can push that little button. To hell with that kindergarten stuff.
4. I can’t AR people myself. I have done it on rare occasion, but those occasions over the past three years amount to fewer than the fingers on my left hand.
I can’t AR those who wanted to get rid of Prok even though, believe me, their violations are legion, against not just Prok, but me and several others; and their attacks far more personal, direct, and malicious than anything Prok ever said.
If I had been able to AR them every time I was called an alt, a troll, etc.; if I had been able to AR them every time they called Prok a sick f**k, etc.; and if I had been able to AR them every time they called Catherine or one of their others slut and the other horrid names they have been called; and in general, reported on every nasty, sidetracking, and outright lying post that has been made by the very people who back Prok’s ousting, this might have been very different today.
But then, people who prize free speech and learning through the exchange of ideas, and even through the battle for them, aren’t likely to report posts, are they.
And therein lies the rub. And the power goes to those who will. Though the battle may go to those who will, for now at least, I like to think that the war will be won, eventually, by those who favor a free exchange of ideas, even if one of those ideas does state that Aimee Weber’s name calls to mind images of a prom queen.
5. In my book, divulging real life information is the worst online forum crime you can do. Yet that merited only an “informal warning.” Doubtless because the one/s who did it were in the in crowd. Theorize about the FIC though, or the techi-wiki, and now THERE’S a personal attack, on everybody at once even!
6. Bumping old posts is another thing I would not do, as doing so is generally against the rules of most forums, and even if it isn’t, it does a disservice to fellow posters.
7. There is no question in my mind that the system was gamed to get rid of Prok – over the objections of a few others of us. And there is no question in my mind that the system will be gamed again, by those who think they are too perfect and special for the new rule to ever apply to them. By those who KNOW they are right.
These people feel fully justified in what they have done to Prok, and even feel they have done the community a service. Some of them will feel getting him out of the game itself would also be a community service.
There is also no question in my mind that some of these people would feel fully justified in ridding the forums of me, as well, along with several others who disagree with them, whom they accuse of being “divisive” and “negative.” Along with so many other mischaracterizations and insults (“I’m sorry the game makes you unhappy”) I couldn’t even list them all.
If this then affected our ability to play the game itself, I doubt they would shed many tears for us; but rather would feel justified that we brought it on ourselves, and figure they did the game community a service, too..
I oppose this new rule tying speech on the forums to game behavior. Now, speech on the forums must necessarily please the self- appointed “majority” (or the most frequently vocal of those in the in group), or they can not only take the forums away from you, they can deprive you of your game altogether.
As it is, the forums are a den of lions for any newbie who comes in and agrees with the wrong person. This new rule will only give the old lions more power, which is probably why they like it so much.
coco
Ardith Mifflin
Jun 18th, 2005
I’m tired of being mischaracterized. I started the shunning. Anyone who doubts can review my posting history. It was an independent, unplanned attempt to convey my absolute disgust with the mudracking of one vile individual.
Unfortunately, the shunning has now been exaggerated into a vast conspiracy perpetuated by a cabal of shadowy individuals, meeting in secret in IRC. That is not what happened. Stop lying about the nature of the shunning.
Prokofy Neva
Jun 18th, 2005
For the record, let me once again set everyone straight on the Cristiano thing. Cristiano can and does harvest and use IPs. How do I know this? Because Cristiano banned me from my site using his harvested IP. Is picking up IPs somehow dastardly thing to do? Well, no, it’s done all over, and is often harmless, i.e. on bravenet.com polls, but the point is, he can and does grab it and then use it to block me from his site. To be sure, when he came to his senses, he let me on to counter his awful slander that was appearing on his site. But he fails to grasp the larger picture here — his grabbing of my IP, his permitting of other people who made use of others grabbing of my IP, his ability to out alts (once he grabs my IP I can’t log on with the same IPS and computer and try to put another name on his forum unless I alert him to the fact that I’m doing that). He fixates also on the idea that even though I’m blocked from his site, I can still file my Snapzilla photos — but of course with the information that is automatically stripped out, he could indeed block it (I’m not sure
Cristiano does indeed have the power to block IPs, he does indeed use this power, and he did indeed use it on me. Coco, that is not disputed, even by Cristiano. What he is fixating on is the second part of my infamous statement, in which I said “they track you all over the Internet.”
Cristiano interprets this to mean that I’m some tinfoiled hatted nutter who thinks he’s put a beaming device up my ass so that he can follow me everywhere, even to Bonsai Kitty’s homepage lol.
[paragraph containing comments that might be construed as actionable in RL elided -- Uri]
I don’t care if he does this, which is why I opted to rebut in his pages rather than ask for removal. What I do care about is him enabling the pack of jackals on the LL forums with this material to then *do the same thing with impunity on LL forums that are not equally enforced*. Had I swiftly AR-d them all back in December, and kept steadiliy AR’ing them mightily, perhaps getting a dozen of my friends involved, we’d not be having this conversation. That is why it sucks so badly, what they are doing.
It’s not wrong to say there is a Feted Inner Core in SL. When I first said this, no one disciplined me. I was never given even so much as an informal warning by any Linden for months, despite what were no doubt numerous ARs and indignant conversations. In fact, even in today’s chilled climate, I believe it is still not actionable to make the assesrtion there is a Feted Inner Core in SL. We all know there is one, and the Lindens know too lol. They themselves slip up often and refer to the FIC in informal convos before they remember the official company line from Robin “The FIC is an interesting myth.”
The FIC problem is a basic problem for any democratic or would-be democratic society: the problem of scientists acting without oversight of civilians. It used to be that we all understood the problem of the military acting without oversight of civilians, or Big Business acting without the oversight of civilians, and we lobbied against these bad developments in all sorts of way in RL. But increasingly, science has made itself to be a bastion that is above reproach. And that’s why in fighting it, you get crap like the Bushies banning stem cell research because they haven’t figured out how to create oversight and engagement and control over the tendency of scientists to take over, without dreaming something up that is just as bad in terms of its dampening effect on the pursuit of knowledge. This is among the biggest challenges of our time and I think SL is the perfect place to face this issue — tekki-wiki cannot rule.
Prokofy Neva
Jun 18th, 2005
We’re happy to credit your historic role in The Shunning, Ardith, but the facts of the case don’t bolster your tendentious and self-serving characterization of The Shunning. Aimee Weber has a grand role to play in The Shunning by setting the stage with calls for a “new forum” with all kinds of revisions, including the ability to close your own thread, the ability to zero out others, and the relegating of anything controversial to a little-reviewed scrap heap with a name like “Rants and Raves”. Aimee’s role is unimpeachable. She was courageous enough to admit defeat in her efforts though as her own FIClets questioned what kind of horridly sanitized vanilla forum they’d have left after she was done with it. All her reforms were undertaken as a means to find a way to get rid of the “cancer” Prok. So she emboldened and encouraged by her actions others who muted me. They all did indeed discuss how to get rid of me and ban me in the IRC channel, the transcript record has never been denied, and I’ve received the exact same text from four different sources. Aimee didn’t have to be physically in the IRC chat to be in close, symbiotic, nay, separated-at-birth status with this effort. The notion of a group of 30-odd people all separately standing up “as one” but with no coordination is just silly, given the wagons-circling, buddying-up, ass-kissing blatantly obvious to even the most casual student of the SL forums.
There’s no question that putting Prok on mute was a bonding ritual flaunted and enjoyed and pushed especially vigorously by various FIC wannabees. The other day at Digital Cultures, for example, we could note that Traxx Hathor was bragging that he “had that speaker you have quoted on mute, Gwyn”. ROFL. I’m glad Tom Bukowski had a chance to study the anthropology of a situation like that, where on the one hand, a person is present in the room and not a griefer, and not banned from the lot, and not misbehaving, and not doing anything that anyone can see is a TOS violation in any way, yet is muted by some of the people in the room who can’t listen to his ideas or fear his remarks in some way. I think this makes for a bizarre social dynamic.
Prokofy Neva
Jun 18th, 2005
Just to report a fresh development, Ulrika has now been handing an official warning, and has reported this fact, though discussing your disciplinary actions in itself can get you get another warning because I believe such discussions are also in violation of the Forum rules of conduct. Nevertheless, Ulrika thinks she can brazen this out, because “all she did” was write “Hallelujah” and then something I forget which knocked me. A Linden “reaching for low-hanging fruit” as Ulrika memorably put it, warned her for this as a personal attack. I didn’t AR her for that but apparently others did. I find it bizarre, because her gloating over my ban was to be expected, and whatever thing she called me, pseudo-intellectual or whatever, was so like the thousands of other times she had done that, as had others, that to official-warn her over that would seem drastic indeed.
Yet they did, perhaps in a (phony) show of “even-handedness” in the new Post-Prok Era. Ulrika is brazening this out. She’s openly calling on others to dissent, and to report their official warnings (in violation of protocol) because she firmly believes this kind of civil disobedience, especially with the “cancer” of Prok gone, can succeed. What she hopes to do is have the New Regime become toothless, when applied to herself, and keep it merely as a “shelved weapon” that the FIC can call on the Lindens to use on those rare times that they face a Prok-type situation but never on themselves.
Where will this go? It will be fascinating to watch. Ulrika has been zany and provocative on the boards and often incredibly abusive with nary a discouraging word from the Lindens. Will they crack down on their beloved socialist now? And will she push it to the point where she goes through all the “leveling down” of the bans and the warnings and the perma ban — and face some inworld punishment too? Could she face the loss of her private island if she keeps this up? She either is zealous enough not to think about this right now, or canny enough to realize she can probably get away with it once again.
It really will require steely vigilance from all those who’d like to see the LL new regime enforced at least equally, to AR her every move now as she violates the TOS with impunity in a gamble to override the Linden’s “reach for low hanging fruit”. This might blow over, if no one else is brave enough to report they’ve gotten warned, too.
As much as I loathe what Ulrika stands for with her socialist “toy,” as much as I detest the methods she has used on me in the forums, I don’t think it’s right for Ulrika to be banned from the game and lose her land. I’m not a socialist who advocates the state being able to grab stuff like that. If ever there was another candidate to be banned from the forums permanently, like me, it would be she (and a few others like Nolan who has outed RL info, which is inexcusable and should have a serious penalty). But I think the way to control the forums is not through the punitive approach but the incentive approach, with more Lindens commenting on good posts, and I think when suspensions are administered — which is as far as it should go — they should be done consistently.
Cocoanut
Jun 18th, 2005
Why do you insist on misrepresenting the shunning?
While it is admirable you take responsibility for starting this shameful episode in SL forum history, you apparently don’t understand the nature of mob behavior:
1. One person gets an idea. (That would be you.)
2. Others, who feel similarly, jump on the bandwagon. (That would be all the others.)
3. Together, in concert, they all decide to do the first person’s idea. (That would be the shunning, or anything similar, such as forming a lynch mob.)
4. Together, they gain strength from one another to take what was basically a bad idea in the first place (the shunning, the lynch mob, or the attempts to ride another citizen out of town on a rail), and because of this added strength, they become even more certain of the righteousness of their plan.
That is the nature of a lynch mob, and that is the nature of a community which decides to shun. That is how a group forms to tar and feather someone and ride them out of town on a rail.
No “shadowly cabal” or “conspiracy theory” is required to explain it, or to characterize it as a shunning campaign, a lynch mob, or whatever.
All that is required is a number of like-minded people deciding they are right in doing something wrong.
As for the venues for this decision, it can be on forums, on IRC chats, or in the local saloon after disgruntled conversation fueled by a few hearty beers.
And it is always bad.
coco
montserrat
Jun 18th, 2005
i don’t wanna be the one to sign up to defend dear prok, who has and can drive me completely nuts at times.
but i have to say, as a person with some experience at wagging the dog, that the restrictions placed upon speech by linden labs PARTICULARLY with regard to the looseness and flexibility of
definitions of terms like “inciting to anger” or whatever the fuck it was,
well, all i have to say is that these guys should go to work for
alberto gonzalez and karl rove.
all we need now to do, i think, is get them a flag to wear, a cross to carry and a little land in wisconsin with a nice lime pit wherein to bury bodies.
i admit that i did not go to paris for the autumn couture festival, but i wonder, like, was a new line of proto-fascist ideology unveiled at that show?
prokofy as big a pain in the ass as you are, i do pledge by the poison pen in my right hand that i will defend and assist thee. you have a right to blow your mouth off, churn notwithstanding.
Prokofy Neva
Jun 18th, 2005
Thanks for your support montserrat. I do feel that I haven’t really blown my mouth off so terribly though. I think it is not an outrage to say that Aimee’s name is like a prom queen, or that there is a FIC, or that Cubey shouldn’t bomb into the WA with a thinly-disguised moving ad called a blimp unless we all can do that. You’re not going to be finding my posts the ones that are the most horrid on there — I would challenge you really to google me, glance through my 3311 posts, and see if you really can find anything that does half of what was done to me. The notion that you can criticize a scientific/artisan bastion like the FIC and *not* incite anger is ludicrous. They are touchy, overrsensitive, usually provincial, usually young and insecure — of course they are going to get angry. It takes NOTHING to get them angry. They make getting angry a life’s sport. So I honestly think the problem here isn’t just the overbroad definition such as to chill free speech, it’s that it is overprotective of their little pets, the FIC, who have such thin skin that you would think they were in a goddamn burn unit with like a graft on them.
I’m SO glad you raised this very good definition of a lynch mob. Sure, every single person in a lynch mob can say “I am acting independently and voluntarily” but it’s that sense of IMPUNITY they get from goading each other and egging each other on, and seeing that NOTHING HAPPENS that creates the lynch mentality.
Aimee Weber
Jun 18th, 2005
“Aimee’s role is unimpeachable.” At last we agree on something.
Prokofy, does it concern you that your attacks against me have gone from outright lies (“Aimee’s bear was from the Lindens”, “Aimee plots against me on IRC (40% of her time!)”, “Aimee was leader of the shunning”) to a bunch of eye-winking and elbow nudgeing?
I mean look what you have become:
“Aimee was never SEEN organizing the shunning, but if you look at her threads where she asks people for suggestions to reforum the forums… her tone of voice was shunnerly *wink*”
“While Aimee hasn’t actually posted, or said anything about it, you KNOW she was separated-at-birth from the effort to get me banned *wink, nudge*”
“Aimee was never actually physically IN IRC at the time… but… you know, yoooou knoow *wink wink wink*”
Prokofy, these aren’t the SL forums. You’re out of that league now. Enjoy the freedoms your new status affords you. Tell the folks that the decision to ban you came shortly after Philip and I had a charming phonecall about dance clubs in Boston and how to cook a killer steak.
Prokofy Neva
Jun 18th, 2005
Aimee, if you’re going to accuse me of “lies,” you need to cut and paste the actual “lies” rather than paraphrase how you think you remember them. I said I got a bear from Devlin Gallant that had Nicole Linden as the creator, and I had to wonder, did she put the template on “mod” or “copy” or what — it was a “smoking gun” to show the link from Nicole Linden to the FIC. You made bears just like the Lindens and whether it was Nicole’s creation or not, so what? You fit right in with the program, hun, and I won’t say more than that because Uri runs a tight ship here, unlike your Linden bearz palz : )
In fact, it’s wonderful to see a forum moderated — even if Uri will get tired of this experiment no doubt soon — in the way the Lindens forum SHOULD be moderated — editing of personal attacks, calling into question of mental health, obscenities, etc. It’s wonderful to see! And you wonder then, can the FIC fight fair under fair terms like that? I doubt they can. You can’t even cut and paste here correctly without paraphrasing tendentiously. Trust me, Aimee, if I have said you had a Nicole Linden bear and I turn out to be wrong, I’ll be first to admit “Oh, Aimee, I was wrong about the link to Nicole”. However, I would like to exercise due diligence and peek in edit mode at that bear inworld. And my point would still stand — you cloned the Linden bearz to um fit in with the program, let’s put it charitably, eh?
Anyone with half a brain who reads all your screeds about how to “reform” the forums can see it’s all aimed against me and that created an enabling climate for The Shunning. When the Queen Bee gave the signal, the drones began droning. It’s all so obvious.
nerferder
Jun 19th, 2005
Really! [RL info elided -- uri] arguing over virtual teddy bears! Fucking brilliant!
Teddy himself would probably be ashamed to know that [RL info elided -uri].
“Envy is the ulcer of the soul”"
–Socrates
Tasty Tapioca
Jun 19th, 2005
Wow. I feel like I’ve been reading a novel in this report. I feel dirty. ;_;
Aimee Weber
Jun 19th, 2005
We already had that thread Prok
People can look it up. The reality of the SL Archives are on my side. Not yours.
Prokofy Neva
Jun 19th, 2005
Uri and others, while you were sleeping, and possibly thinking this was only about my case not yours, an even worse development occurred with further implications of loss of free speech.
Elle Pollack innocently linked the LL Police Blotter to “Live Journal” to build up an archive (the Lindens only show slices of it for 7-10 days usually). This was an excellent idea because the Lindens for some reason hide the police blotter on an inaccessible page, and don’t keep the archive. But Elle didn’t realize the implications of the storm of protest which enabled Kris Ritter to cry foul at the possibility that her internal comments on SL forums in a private group could possibly then be spread around the Internet. She queried the Linden Hotline and this is what she got from Ben:
“Reposting the police blotter is ok – that is why we put the RSS feed on it. More generally, the same IP issues on our site that you see in world. Don’t take another user’s forum post and publish it without asking for permission – they own the rights to that “content.” You can use our stuff to help create sites relating to SL – if you use our trademarks, you might want to put in that helpfull “no infringement is intended” phrase somewhere that our lawyers can read it. We WANT to see you guys talking about SL on the net – and if our screenshots or text can help – please use.
I would say that you shouldn’t use our content in creating a non-SL page.
ben”
Ben is raising the classic notion of the copyright of a letter or statement belonging to the author. SLHerald, SLuniverse.com and numerous other sites routinely dismiss this notion, publishing entire chat logs without permission of the parties involved, and quoting from their own notecarded conversations inworld in which only they’ve given the permission for publication. Indeed, deprived of the ability to quote inworld and conversations and actual forum statements, under the new regime particularly, we are once again letting the FIC determine what our parameters of free expression will be.
What Kris Ritter and other net nannies here have done is handily prevented any outside blogger or RL media or scholar from analyzing and *quoting* the SL forums in a quest to see if Prok’s banning was legitimate and if LL’s policy is a good or bad one — or to look at any other issue of any other kind emerging and being discussed on LL forums. Even an unattributed quote is in danger of leading to some kind of action within world, now that Ben has identified it as a policy.
The FIC chorus is thunderously proclaiming that Prok lied, insulted, incited, libeled, ruined businesses, etc. etc. blaze Spinnaker’s likening of this process to the Orwellian two-minutes of hate, and the Trotskyian figure of Emmanual Goldstein, is right on target. Lost in their fog of hate is the reality that they started it when I first began to publish my generic critics of the FIC and other negative game phenomena. Rather than understanding it as a legitimate critique of their society and taking part in the debate like adults, they reacted like sulking inferiority-complexed teenagers and obsessive hysterical mafia dons talking about “dissing” and “respect” and “honour”.
Aimee continues that fine forum tradition by simply claiming I lied and distorted her statements and actions without providing a single link or a single argument. Honestly, I fear not. If I believed something about a bear, and stated it, and it proved to be wrong, I’ll be the first one to apologize about the bear, but I’ll remind everyone the context of a) Nicole Linden placing the Linden collector cards unilaterally only on certain FIC property and not opening up the opportunities to others; b) Nicole Linden distributing the bear she created (evidently with “mod”) to certain FIC and not others c) Aimee filling up SL with a flood of FIC bears.
Like the IRC chat issue and the shunning, one cannot always demonstrate a smoking gun or a missing link but we can definitely always talk about “an enabling environment”.
Who’s in the Victory thread now in off-topic, Aimee? The Victory thread is a marvelous thing. The Motherland Must Know Its Heroes!
The Victory Thread was started the day *after* my 15 June banning (Cristiano stated falsely that it was started the day *before* — which would have been even more creepy!).
Aimee Weber (thread opener)
Oz Spade
Siggy Romulus
Ghoti Nyak
FlipperA Peregrine
Ingrid Ingersoll
Lector Hannibal
Forseti Svarog
Chance Abbatoir
Azazael Czukor
No doubt others will show up!
But who cares about bears? There are far bigger fish to fry here. SLH or SLUN have thrived on their ability to function as an escape hatch or safety valve for the hothouse world of the LL forums. I’ve questioned the appropriateness of LL forming partnerships with third-party sites that violate what would be their TOS (if they agreed to it) — but I would favor a liberal environment in which TOS free-speech restrictions would be lifted precisely because it is a RL-enterprise and not a game or a private club, but the origins of the Metaverse.
If they are going to play that game of being a game and a private club, however, stay private, and don’t let non-clubs violate with impunity the club’s rules once outside the club.
I see that posters could now face punishment — including punishment in world? including the loss of their game and their land and posessions? — because they’ve quoted from the forums or inworld conversations without seeking permission. Ben Linden’s statement about not permitting this type of expression is the first time I’ve ever see Linden Labs overreach out to the world outside its own walls, in the name of its own walled-garden denizes (I am thankful to Tony Walsh for his extremely apt description of SL as a walled garden.)
I can imagine now that both the SLH and SLUN, eager to keep themselves afloat, will now fall all over themselves to say they will obtain consent for convos and will not practice bad journalism by publishing attributed quotes or even unattributed quotes without permission. They may overlook their own sins in this regard regarding me, when both of them published convos about my RL that were taken and published without my knowledge or consent. Whatever, you can always make an exception for Prok, hmm, because Prok is a “cancer” that must be “removed”.
I personally would consider it bad journalism to cut and paste convos in this way but I think they could be times when certain matters of overriding civic concern would mandate that you do publish the material. Publication of the chat log of Pathfinder in the IRC channel with the FIC, to me, would be a perfect indication — issues of comportment and LL policy of keeping disciplinary actions confidential are at stake.
But I would have thought that both IRC and the LL forums are public bulletin boards, whatever the “private nature” of the membership-only club because anybody or his brother can simply make a trial account and come in.
Trying to guess and out alts is a forum sport which I find odious so I won’t play that game with Nerferder, other than to note that I know of few people who have the time and energy to hate me as much *and* write about it than Nolan Nash. Whoever it is, I’d like to point out that they are hiding behind an anonymous name and no doubt anonymizer because they know my claims about SLuniverse.com and other third-party sites — that they trap IPs and collect e-mails and keep them and use them as identifers to out alts and track people’s posts elsewhere on the Internet — is a true one. Nothing proves it better than these anonymous attacks : )
Ingrid
Jun 19th, 2005
So a few of are placing bets as to how long Prok will last in SL without the forums to stir up shit. Boredom will kick in because there’s no one to harrass… Prok tripple negged rated me yesterday, a last ditch effort to create drama and validate his existence. Soon, after this blows over, people will forget… they’ll move on. Prok’s worst nightmare. Anonimity.
Prokofy Neva
Jun 19th, 2005
Update: Upon checking, I found that Elle Pollack’s post is what she has dubbed “necroposting” (hehehe). It’s an old post of hers back from February strictly about the police blotter. Then it got answered from Ben back in February BEFORE this current restrictive new policy. Then it was bumped just yesterday by a forum reg more due to interest about the police blotter appearing and showing the Shunned One than it was placed with any awareness about the ramifications of third-party site publication of SL content. Well, the concerns still stand. Will we see the Stratics-ification of SL?
Prokofy Neva
Jun 19th, 2005
Uh, Ingrid, hate to disappoint, but I have no intention of leaving my business and projects in SL. It’s a constant fascinating spectacle for me and I don’t need to become a spectacle myself to enjoy the show : ) I’ll have lots more time now not only for RL but SL to follow up on my many ideas. I don’t think I’ll be burned out yet, but of course I don’t rule out that the legions of fanboy AR’pullers and the many vicious, intolerant fucktards who infest the game will no doubt continue to find ways to try to force me out and just generally make my life miserable as they are already doing now that the Lindens have essentially declared open season on me by permabanning me from the forums but allowing me to stay in the game.
Any person with pride would have left the game in indignation at such treatment but as you may be surprised to find, I’m not a person who is proud.
Your notion that what I do is feeding an ego or making visibility for myself lets me know how you view the world, and reveals more about you than it does about me and my motivations. It reveals a tendency toward conformity that perhaps you’d not like to revel in so much. I am passionate about what I believe in, I answer a call from a sense of higher purpose, and I fight, even if it means sacrifices like losing the forums which were important to me. Thank God there are people like that in the world!
I tripple negged you because I ran across something of yours in world and I thought my God, it’s long over due to triple neg you, Ingrid for the following:
o revelation of RL info to others without my consent as a form of vicious gossip and ridicule to help bond and lord it over me with others
o nasty posts FIRST in which you said I couldn’t “adapt” and my business was looking to force changes on Lindens in order to succeed (as if the gaping flaws in the group tools shouldn’t be fixed to help your group or anybody’s group, geez).
o relentless, nasty bitchy forum posts with barely veiled personal attacks and outright attacks which I never once AR’d, or you would have been in the cornfield : )
o nasty bitchy behaviour in world on any number of occasions despite my efforst to support your business and your art
o constant fanning of flames of others against me with TSO and SL gossip
o participation in gloating now on the forums
and many more offenses. I usually only neg people for spreading libel and false claims about my business. For you, a special, Ingrid. My negging of you is not only for your bad behaviour on the forums, but your bad behaviour in game in spreading RL info and gossip about me. Try to take some accountability for your actions. Indeed, my only means of trying to make you aware of that accountability is the triple neg.
nerferder
Jun 19th, 2005
“It’s a constant fascinating spectacle for me and I don’t need to become a spectacle myself to enjoy the show.”
LMFAO! You made the biggest spectacle of yourself than anyone I have seen in my SL lifetime!
“Any person with pride would have left the game in indignation at such treatment but as you may be surprised to find, I’m not a person who is proud.”
LMFAOx2!!! You hate LL and SL, it’s obvious. So it’s also obvious that the only thing keeping you in SL is PRIDE.
“I tripple negged you because I ran across something of yours in world”
Yeah, and pigs fly.
“Envy is more irreconcilable than hatred.”
–François de la Rochefoucauld
RB
Jun 19th, 2005
haha. I remember in the early days of TafkSO (The awayfromkeyboard Sims Online, since at least 60% of the game is played afk) when EA (the borg, destroyer of smaller studios in search of more profit) hosted thier own in house basic forums.
What you “said” on the boards affected you in game irregardless of your “actions” in game. two clearly seperate worlds that just cannot be compared or linked in anyway. You can act one way on discussion boards, and a very different in game. Words are percieved differently than actions. This is how you can dislike people for what they say but find they are good nice people in world.
Now this was an absolutley abhorrent policy that caused many a controversy and frustration amongst people. And didn’t last too long, and then we were palmed off to fan..err..stratics. 3rd party “community” hosting. I tell you, what good is it to judge people by what they say in an unconnected space instead of thier actions in game which is all that really matters. Looks like LL and SL have decided to take this dark path themselves now. Unfortunatley. Heaven help any “residents” that say the “wrong things” outside game but are perfectly normal everyday violation free people in game.
These policies amount to no more than a mmorpg equivalent of old Soviet times or modern china. Virtual police states, with implied thought control and applied content control. It’s disgusting, and no mmorpg environment that wants to foster continued growth should implement such iron fisted linked governence.
- RB.
Cocoanut
Jun 20th, 2005
What RB said.
RB, do you play Second Life? If so, I wish you’d get on that thread and voice your opposition to this. (Or maybe you already have, and I just don’t know who you are in SL.)
coco
Tony Walsh
Jun 20th, 2005
I’m surprised there was a controversy over publication of the Police Blotter, considering LL provides a public RSS feed. I’ve been displaying the last 3 up-to-date incidents for months. RSS feeds are, by definition, asking to be syndicated. It’s a pity there aren’t more SL feeds available, frankly.
There have been some interesting journalistic issues raised in this discussion. I’ve never really had much of a problem with LL’s policies or user-imagined policies regarding reprinting forum or inworld quotes/conversations. I don’t quote residents heavily, and when I do (such as in a formal interview), I’ve (afaik) secured permission from the author, or I’ve executed what I believe would be Fair Use rights. I think LL would have a lot to lose if it seemed as though they were killing Fair Use of “gated” (i.e. forum) material. I’m not concerned about being muzzled, and I don’t think any other SL “news sources” should be worried either.
Prokofy Neva
Jun 20th, 2005
Tony, it’s helpful to read the whole interchange on the forums about the quotation issue. Ben himself, as Elle does, points out that with the RSS feed, the Police Blotter is *meant* to be reproduced, but Ben opens up the door to some ambiguity when he says the content of SL might not be appropriate to use on non-SL sites. Are you a non-SL site? Could you run a permanent link or entire quotation of the Police Blotter? Well probably you could because of who you are. But could I? What if I were to attempt to match up Police Blotter incidents with actual in-game names (boy, could I assure readership with THAT!). I can’t imagine that LL would let that stand. So context is ALL here.
And there is a difference between quoting whole transcripts of conversations, as SLH and SLUN routinely do, and quoting in a “fair use” manner or quoting with consent. Some of the best and most important articles in SLH involve the use of such convos, and while glancing through some of them I’ll bet SLH *has* secured permission from both parties but surely in their research they’ve used tons of “unauthorized” material. In fact nowadays, seeming to reflect the results of some in-house memo and meeting, I’m finding that Hamlet Linden, Pathfinder Linden and other Lindens are responding “I’m not going to open that or look at that as it would be unethical” if you attempt to send them a chat log as proof of your concern about some latest egregious development of FIC favouritism in SL.
In a democratic society, and in times of great national urgency, documents needs to be leaked. We have only to think of the Pentagon Papers, and the memos of the attorneys general recently on torture in Iraq, or the 9/11 material by FBI whistleblowers. There have been people like I.F. Stone who worked assiduously to compile the public record but also the not-yet public record in cases of overriding concern of civil rights and democracy. I think it is unethical to print someone’s chat log without their consent, and just plain bad journalism. But when something comes along like Pathfinder in the chat in IRC, that deserves instant publication. I know I instantly attempted to post it on the SL forums under the headlines “HOW THEY DO IT” but Pathfinder deleted it in its entirely within minutes and told inworld that it was “inappropriate”. Frankly, the SLH seems to have chickened out about writing on this incident, in between the girlie pics *shrugs*.
Urizenus
Jun 20th, 2005
For the record, current Herald policy is to only publish convos when all parties have given approval. And yes, we have been given tons and tons of great convos that we simply can’t publish. *sniff* ethics can be so cruel…
I sort of have mixed emotions about the policy, since I feel that convos that take place “in public” should be available for republishing in a fair use manner. The problem is that we don’t have a clear picture yet of what counts as public and what counts as private in game. Hence we err on the side of caution.
Of course there is the threat of being banned by LL for publishing a convo without permission, but threats of banning have never really influenced our policy and aren’t really a factor here.
RB
Jun 20th, 2005
No i have never got into SL properly Coco. So im not in SL. Did the trial for bout a week a long time ago, that was it. SL just aint my thing. SWG and COH is my thing i do.
- RB.
Cocoanut
Jun 20th, 2005
And they are probably better things, to do, too.
coco
Pendari
Jun 21st, 2005
pfft! I cursed at you that one time Prok. And it was because you baited, and angered me to the point where I lost my temper and cursed at you. I actually apologized for my uncharacteristic behavior. Not because I didn’t feel it was true, but only because it did not belong on the forums.
Personally, I *am* glad you are gone from the forums. I *do* think you are an awful person, and I *do* think you anger people on purpose. And I think you infected the forums with your horrid nature and it really hurt a lot of people that did not deserve to be hurt.
Pendari
Jun 21st, 2005
Oh. And for the record, I only ever reported 2 of your posts in the history of you being on the forums. Other than that, I’ve used the report post function on 2 other posts. So four times in almost 2 years. Not everyone uses the report post feature as quickly as you seem to claim.
Prokofy Neva
Jun 22nd, 2005
Pendari, it’s useful for forum readers to really look at the forums
and see whether your false and tendentious characterization of “baiting” and “incitement” is really the case. I assure you it is not.
You got angry because I criticized your precious friend Cristiano’s policies (or lack of policies) on his website. I didn’t criticize him as a person. I didn’t even criticize his wonderful Snapzilla photo posting service. I criticized his capturing of IPs and other information and using it to block people, not for their actual violation of any policy, including his, but because he feels like it, on a whim, because his feelings are hurt, because his policies are attacked. That happened to Uri, too, but fortunately, Uri reversed it within 24 hours. Cristiano stuck with it much longer, and it was only my relentless drum-beat, and only my risking of my own forum privileges by posting with alts to counter what his site was doing to me, that I got him finally to unban me long enough to rebut libelous statements on his site.
There’s such a moral blindness at work here. All of your thin-skinned FICers never seem to grasp what is really wrong — and horridly wrong — with outing a person’s RL, and slandering them with the wrong RL. That crime is so much worse than any other offense you must muster about me, as to not eve require debate.
That I am forced endlessly to repeat this, that I have to daily fend off attacks and false claims that I “tell people RL details in world and therefore how can I be such a fucking hypocrite” — well, it all stands to expose those who engage in this nonsense, if nothing else. WHAT IS NOT ON THE SL PROFILE IN THE GAME IS NOT FAIR GAME FOR THE FORUMS.
Pendari, I’m not singling you out, it’s just that you’re such an exemplary case of the very typical response to me, which was “FUCK YOU PROKOFY YOU ARE A FUCKING WANKER”. That’s NOT how I spoke to people, yet there are numerous examples of you all speaking that way to me, even from such a decorous forum “saint” as Pendari, Mentor Extraordinaire. I’m not an awful person, Pendary, and it’s not personal. But go back to the Pahoa Jade thread. Sight unseen, without examining the dispute or the arguments, you rallied behind someone *merely because she was your friend*. You were blind to any faults or legitimate criticisms. That about sums it up with the FIC. If you only reported 2 of my posts in your forums history, that was 2 too many. You reported them not for actual TOS violation, but merely because you didn’t like the harsh critique I leveled at a group that you consider your bastion of friendship. Indeed, the pudgy-fingered little fanboyz and girlz on the forums rest their fingers on the AR and keep it alight constantly. You’re wrong there.
Let me take this opportunity to rebut a vicious false claim I’ve seen purpetrated by Nolan Nash. He claims I tell tenants that Weedy Herbst’s radios “cannot be deeded to Ravenglass Rentals land”.
This is utter tripe. In fact, when tenants ask me for radios, I mention Weedy’s radios in the lists of those that CAN be deeded — because they are in fact deedable. And this tenant who posted this original thread, would be the first to tell you this, because it is Weedy’s radio that is deeded and functioning in his home, duh. Honestly, Nolan, do you really think people can’t check FACTS?
Tenants often get confused about the deeding issue, it is confusing, and I have an elaborate card on the details which I hand out, and I tell them to get in touch with radio makers like Jeri Zuma or Weedy Herbst to clarify any permissions/transfer issues. That’s all. There’s absolutely no boycott or untruths spoken here due to forum wars. Shame on you for this post, Nolan.
http://forums.secondlife.com/showpost.php?p=535111&postcount=4
Pendari
Jun 22nd, 2005
No. You made false accusations about Cristiano’s website and his practices based on your own fears. Others have done very well at pointing out where you were wrong, and even though *you* fail to see you are wrong, others do. And the fires you started have been mostly laid to rest I think. Thankfully most people can put their dislikes of someone aside and see a logical answer when it is presented. You however stick your fingers in your ears and go la-la-la if the first words in a post don’t begin with “Prokofy is right”.
But, I find it so funny that you would think that situation was the first time I had issues with you. No, my issues started when you began spreading false information about a project that I was majorly involved in. Despite me or anyone answering your questions, you rallied on and on about a topic you had no idea about. Again, others including myself answered questions and thankfully most who read those threads came away knowing the truth. Which was what *we* said, not you. And I saw you do this time and again to other people and SL businesses.
I do read the forums Prok. And I’ve been on the forums a lot longer than you. It is not hard to read the history and see how horribly you treated many many people on the forums. The links you are providing on these herald articles; I am glad you are sharing them. As I read and re-read those threads, it only re-assures me that I am right in my opinion of you.
Prokofy Neva
Jun 22nd, 2005
Pendari, I stand by my critique of the capacities of Cristiano’s site to block people and alt outs. I’ve stepped through this. I know. It’s not just his site, it’s others. It’s deadly. It’s wrong.
Uh, it’s hard to say anything about any fears about “teh Intarnut” when Cristiano’s site has [elided by Uri]. Uri, if you feel the need to “elide” what I just said, could you PLEASE do an investigative reportorial story on this issue and just READ the SLuniverse.com (unless Cristiano has wiped it clean) and report back, please?
You and your “project” — if it is Neualtenberg — deserve thorough, ongoing scrutiny and criticism. Not mentioning what project you mean is definitely low-balling, Pendari. Are you afriad to face criticism? I’ve done a great public service by pointing out that the thingie calling itself “democratic” only is more rightfully called “socialist” so people understand truth in advertising.
You, like other, FIC, are thin-skinned Penari. My links are proof that these are not personal attacks, but generic issues. That you chose to so readily identify my generic critiques with your own persona, identifying your literal personhood with the essence of this game, shows me all I need to know about how right I am about my critique of the FIC.
Pendari
Jun 22nd, 2005
Perhaps it is because SL is not a game that I *do* take much of what you say personally. I’m not thick skinned, never claimed to be. Thankfully with most I don’t have to be. But I will stand my ground any day against a bully like you. I’m just not one to stand by and watch others be hurt and lied about and hammered day in and day out without saying something about it.
And yes, the project was Neualtenburg. It is right there in my signature on the forums and most anyone in the world reading any of this right now would know what project I was refering to. And no, you don’t know what you are talking about when it comes to the project. You never have, and you never will (by your own fault of course).
Walker Spaight
Jun 22nd, 2005
hehe, soon we’re going to have people inserting their own [elided by Uri]‘s into this conversation.
Prokofy Neva
Jun 23rd, 2005
It’s sad that Uri is falling back on this [elided by Uri] stuff over a very clear-cut case very easily established. Uri, contact me inworld if you are somehow not “getting” this, geez. I do hope Uri will just go and report it some day as a story.
HiroPendragon
Aug 6th, 2005
I’m insulted that I wasn’t even mentioned…
Prokofy Neva
Aug 6th, 2005
I know, Hiro, you’d like to think the Metaverse revolves around you and…so often it doesn’t…but keep trying.