So you thought the witch hunt was over?

awww, Alexa, that wasn't fair... you asked me for a definition...lol
my use of "perceived role as a Linden" meant our perception of what a Linden should be or is.

over and out.

Quote from the IRC log:

<LLPATH>yes, EXCELLENT song right now

This is all so stupid.

dun dun DUN!!!!!!

Some notes:

1. Pathfinder is definitely the Path in the IRC chat.
2. The context for recent events is that for weeks and weeks, a small group
of older players and younger players with a vengeance were getting together
and fuming and talking about "how to solve the Prok question."
They conceived and arranged the mass "shunning" of Prokofy that took place
coupled with strategic vituperative attacks in the forums.

3. Prokofy tried for 2 weeks to discuss with PF and other Lindens the
problem of how third-party sites violate the TOS with impunity and
constitute staging grounds for venting, publicizing RL info, recruiting
others to attacks, staging forums attacks and mass slams, and helping
some groups to gain advantage over others in SL.

4. Prokofy's statements aren't "slander". They might be verbose, prolix,
intemperate, sarcastic, or satirical, but they aren't slander.
A few people have become very indignant with a kind of "the shoe fits"
reaction to the concept of the FIC or the tekkie wiki, apt terms that
describe the collective behavior of a small group, and even take
exception to vague collective notoins of those on the forums bent on
destruction ("forum fucktards".

They've tried to stir up mass anger and hatred against one person in
the belief he is "harming the community" or "hurting Second Life" etc
but that's silly. Second Life is far far bigger than them, and the
"community" isn't just them anymore.

5. Prokofy can't be Philip, because Philip couldn't possibly be writing
such long posts, and writing them at that ungodly hour at his time zone.
The similarity in some of their thoughts is striking but coincidental.
What's more scary think dissent can only emerge from the Godhead and be a Godhead trick, not an independent force. Or that some players thought Profuky Naumova
was Phil and were willing to bet money on it. They thought the CEO
of this company would stoop to such a low parody. That can't be.

The behavior in the IRC channel feels like the good old boys down south
getting together in the barber shop and figuring how they can run
somebody out of town on a rail. When a few of the "town fathers"
toss of remarks like "We get one like that so often" and imply that
they "take care of business" and "get rid of troublemakers" and "have
their Lindens to help them get rid of those they need to," that's unseemly.
They can't *really* do that, however because SL is too big.
The Lindens don't *really* plot with them but they do live in a context
where they hear a drum-beat and don't always have the manpower or time
to research the context.

Pathfinder shouldn't be attacked or lose his job because he does a
good job. Inside SL, when asked about a customer, i.e. as I and
other tenants have asked him what to do about a problem tenant,
he'll say "I don't even want to hear the name" or "I can't comment
on that person's banning status" or "You'll have to talk to abuse-manager@
about that, sorry" and be calm and professional.

But in the IRC channel, off-campus, he could do what he wanted
and so could the older players -- he could say things like
"don't think I didn't think about it" about Prok and alts -- as if
he's spent time figuring out how to "get" Prok. And that's one of the things
Prok has been ranting about, because it undermines the game significantly.

I'm glad Flipper has pointed out that not only Prok, but Cristiano
is a public figure. Public figures are exempt from protection from
slander/libel cases. Therefore if Lindens and players get together
and talk about the figures they imagine influence their lives, like
Anshe or Cristiano or Prok, they should be able to do that without
fear or favor. The same rights and privileges on that score must be
extended to Prok, however, as he rants away about figures or groups
*he* thinks affect all of SL.

To get any libel suit to stick, one has to show not only deliberate intent,
they'd have to show loss of livlihood and actual damages. And this is a
private club with its own TOS which additionally makes any libel lawsuit
a non-starter.

When Prok talked about the "tracking you on the Internet" whatever it's incorrect
technical understanding or rantings, the essense was sincere and true.
He said that people get tracked - and they do in some fashion.
There is always an effort to out alts, keep ahead of alts, ban alts,
use outside channels to pass around RL information and commentary
about people, assess their performance in SL and past games, etc.

The point is, Cristiano has raised issues with Anshe Chung's sites;
Catherine Cotton has raised issues with everybody's sites;
Prok has done the same, he is merely the latest.

The essence of the matter is this: an entire community is allowed to play the
hypocrite by maintaining a "dry country" in SL, but hopping over
the border line to the next county -- Sluniverse.com or the IRC channel
or other third-party sites -- to go and get drunk every now and then and violate the TOS in ways they couldn't get away with in SL -- it isn't even a TOS anymore out there, showing they don't live up to their ideals in their charter.

They can't out a person's RL details here -- but they can there.
Then they can -- and do -- blow it back into the game to destroy people.
LL can do nothing about this -- unless they overreach like Stratics.
What is the solution? Leave it alone -- but create better in-game structures
for dispute resolution.

1. Eboni's case has been well rehearsed and can be read in the relevant threads
-- she wasn't even named in Prok's original post about people who charge
too much and outed herself so it is hard to lay the blame for a concerted
slander attack on Prok's door when he didn't engage in one.
There are other stories like that all well rehearsed in the forums,
where people bring grievances here because they can't solve them in world
-- the absence of effective in-world tools for players to resolve their disputes
is the chief reason the forums here are so sour. In many of these cases, Prok is
*fighting back* against those who *attacked him first*.

2. Cubey first slandered Prok asking a weighted rhetorical question which was
merely a reiteration of a flatly malicious slander statement by Traxx Hathor
and picked up later by Hiro Pendragon, namely that Prok scams newbies,
gets their firstland for a song, then grabs their tier to enhance himself and
his group. It's all fake and false and the happy newbs in the group
Ravenglass Rentals and related groups can all testify to this.

3. Ulrike, pandastrong, weedy and many others have malicious, repeatedly,
personally attacked, slammed, ridiculed, asshatted, etc. Prok numerous times
-- beginning with his innocent efforts to defend himself from the false
and unfair charges are Pahoa Jade, the first person to bring an in-world
dispute over some viewblocking stuff in water near Ravenglass.
It's instructive to go look at this thread because in embryonic forum, the
posts for the next few months can all be seen. But it's important to remember
that this person took a dispute to the forums that did not belong there,
escalated the incident into hysteria, made false accusations, and got
everyone to pile on merely on the basis of membership in a putative
more privileged and status-conscious group of oldbies.

/120/d9/31559/1.html
(the thread with the first use of FIC and fuck-you hedonism as concepts.)

There's a simple solution to this kind of constant grievance -- make
inworld player-based dispute resolution mechanisms, and make it an
offense to bring personal disputes to the forums. A thread like that
one of Pahoa's should have been closed in an instant because it was a
thread started soley about one person, and soley as a means to attack them
in a personal dispute. It had no place staying open -- forum moderators
who didn't do their job back then, and let that go for months with that
cast of characters, shouldn't be now just doing their jobs and only doing it
on Prok.

Ditto the Midge Project thread, the Purple Cube and White Cube threads,
the I Need Help With an Ugly Build the Anti-Business Thread and many other
Prok's greatest hits -- they almost always involve a player coming on to the forums
with a dispute against Prok *first* often not naming him, then helping to get
everyone to pile on with slander and hysteria instead of solving the problem
in the normal way -- inworld discussion, search for solutions, compromises.


Some Lindens just tuning into this don't see how it began some 4 months ago
and they are just hearing the anger of some in the community now full bore
and feel called on to respond. They need to look at the historical context,
and realize their failure to enforce their own TOS, their failure to rein in the
pack-dogs from the established core who haze newbies, their failure to discipline *their own friends from before they were Lindens* is at the root of a problem like the Prok problem.

There's a lesson from history. Bad cases make bad law. Prokofy is a bad case.
You don't bend the TOS and decide to enforce the TOS with new determination
and new tools (?) and then only use it on Prok. It's like the Smith Act and
Harry Bridges, the longshoresman union strike leader. If you face "sedition,"
you have to go back and look at the original poor working conditions and
poor labour law that sparked it, not jail the demonstrators.

To be credible, all those who have engaged in systematic personal insults,
systematic trolling, systematic disclosure of RL info, *should be liable to
the same enforcement of the TOS as Prok*. But they haven't been,
from all indications.

THAT more than the presence of PF in the chat room on IRS is what is troubling.

If LL wants Prok or anybody to abide by the TOS, they have to ensure that
they are equally and fairly applied to all. People "skirt" the TOS when they see
that it is never applied when it clearly should be, that it is applied only
as selective prosecution, that it is applied only, as Coco has aptly pointed out,
when one small group clamors and clamors to have it done.

One wonders how someone as busy an important as Robin Linden can come
into a thread late on a Sunday night at a late hour on her time zone,
and close a thread that doesn't even really need closing -- it's because
some well-placed individuals got to her by phone or e-mail.

THAT is what is troubling -- that the whole AR and TOS structure doesn't function
as it should, and is pushed and pulled by the most vocal group at this or that time.

Finally, I invite you to look at an interesting statistic:

Number of threads started in which the phrase "feted inner core" is used: 174
Number of these threads started by Prokofy: 14

(1) click "SEARCH"
(2) enter "#secondlife"
(3) click "GO"

You will notice that a search for "#secondlife", the name of the IRC channel, returns the maximum 500 results. Its well publicized and discussed often.

Regards,

-Flip

It's generally pretty easy to identify someone who works for LL. Nicknames can change, but everyone on IRC is identified by a hostmask, which is going to be: [email]username@machine.name[/email] much like an email address.

There are a couple exceptions (remote Lindens) but for the most part "/whois <nick>" will show the user's hostmask. *@janus.lindenlab.com readily identifies the "office Lindens".


I wouldn't necissarily assume they are choosing to represent Linden Lab. I'm fairly sure when Robin and Philip have shown up, they choose to. For the most part though I would write it off as disclosure versus the cry of "Lindens are secretly watching us!".

What about all the ones you've hijacked and FICED up?

From an in-game chat with Pathfinder Linden:Sorry I have to resort to big letters for this, consider it a forum version of a clue hammer:


For the humor impaired, I made the chat log up and do not think Pathfinder stupid nor resigning, sheesh.

can you fix the line formatting? your random text generator isnt working right.

Yep.

All good advice which everyone should follow before spilling their guts to anyone on IRC. But I *did* say you should simply not assume its them by their user name. Which is still true. So nyah

To repeat, I started a user-driven channel in December, 2003 in the early 1.2 time frame. This is in no way a Linden IRC channel, and they are specifically forbidden from having any "power" there.

The Lindens do not have a public IRC channel.

#secondlife, EFnet is a user (me) creation.

Go away, Prok. You're banninated.

Pardon me, but does anybody have a sandwich? I skipped my last two meals reading this thread.

passes Flip the Cheez-its she found under the forum couch

Sorry, Flip, if you aren't going to be the wiseass, I feel it is my duty to stand in your place.

Hehehe, thanks Nethermind.

Here are some halftime stats for the thread:

ORIGINAL FIC POST NUMBER: 31559
THIS POST NUMBER: 47076

47076 - 31559 = 15517

This means we've spent just about ONE THIRD of the full life of THESE forums (yes, these meaning vBulletin) with this concept being alive and the dominating topic of conversation.

Time for some new material, folks! SL IS ENTERTAINMENT! I'm through with these topics while I still hair some sanity left.

Ye gads,

-Flip

There is no conspiracy against you. There is no strategic set of attacks. There are just a bunch of people recognizing you for what you are. Point #2 is a fabrication.




There is no violation of the Second Life TOS on SLuniverse or IRC or other third-party sites because they are not subject to the Second Life TOS. It is thusly hard to violate it. Only what is run by Linden Lab is subject to the TOS. Point #3 is a fabrication, as it is by definition impossible for "third-party sites" to "violate the TOS with impunity".

Yeah, fixed the formatting, sorry.

Here's the really important part, you can skip the rest:




Ingrid, if you have the time, you might review the 174 threads to see if they are in fact, as you might imagine, threads innocently started by people about, oh, the weather, in which Prok invaded and talked about his nutty FIC stuff. Still, when you factor out those kind of situations, you'll see that many of those 174 items are threads *other people started as rants* on these topics, not Prok. It's actually quite surprising to peruse all this information looked at in this light.

Yes, that's understood and stated there in that previous thread.

The analogy was already given that it was like living in a dry county with your ideas under that dry law, but then driving over the country border to the country where you can buy liquor, where you drop your dry laws or blue laws, and drink with abandon because there's no dry law there. I think it's an apt analogy.

Seems to me the mass ignore, "the Shunning" was concerted, planned, executed -- but whatever. The point isn't that it is some evil conspiracy, but it was organized -- just as in the last week, groups of players as well as Lindens had to "do something" and acted to do that not by applying the TOS across the board but evidently applying it only against one person. But...the night is young let. Let's keep a watch on the police blotter. There is hope yet.

BTW, that's how rumours get started. Prok didn't say the KGB went to game sites. He said that shills going around to game sites to flak for the company are *like* the KGB running around putting pro-government stuff on blogs and chat rooms. It's an analogy. It's an exaggeration and a hyperbole.

Did you ever take any literature classes? These are forms of literature and rhetoric.

"I want a straightforward answer from you Coco; do you think that Prokofy did not bring this on himself? Yes or No. No long "but they did it too" spiels, no excuses, just a Yes or a No."

Yes.

I agree, I think Pathfinder was trying to reason with the lynch mob. And he has tried to reason with Prok, as well.

I am not “baiting” anyone.

Do you think I like the fact that I get on a new game and discover people burning Prok at the stake? Do you think I LIKE constantly having to talk about witch hunt behavior?

I do this in order that we all be free from mob-like behavior.

If you knew me in previous games, you would know that I’m a highly-regarded player, just as I’m a highly-regarded and well-liked person irl, and I don’t do this lightly.

It pains me to have Eboni put me on ignore. It pains me to have to take this role in this game. I HAVE NO CHOICE.

It pains me that Pathfinder, who merely responded to both parties the way I would if I were him, albeit from a different perspective I don't necessarily agree with, gets the fallout and the flack from this. I think we are lucky to have him, and I always have.

It is unfortunate Pathfinder gets the fallout from this, just as it is unfortunate I get the fallout from this. Neither of us deserves it.

I disapprove tremendously of some things Prok does, and have said so both here and to him in person. When he has gotten something wrong about me (never in malice, but sometimes stated in a somewhat condescending manner), I have screamed my head off about it to him in the forums. But I have never – in this game or any other – decided something “had to be done” about this individual and formed a lynch mob against him. I can handle him myself, as everyone else should be able to.

That thread was NOT put there for the sole purpose of bashing Pathfinder. I like Pathfinder, I have said we are lucky to have him, and I think he knows that.

The fact that Pathfinder was IN that conversation is something I can’t help. But if you look at my original post – you will see I did not bash Pathfinder. I think Pathfinder is fair and honest enough to know that himself.

Some of you wish to dismiss this whole thing by labeling me – ME, COCO – with being a troll and all kinds of things. That you can’t understand what is wrong with lynch mob behavior – and how it threatens ALL of us, is something I can’t help. You absolutely refuse to acknowledge that I am standing up against a principle I consider VERY IMPORTANT. That people never, never, gang up against an individual, no matter WHAT. Otherwise, believe me, I wouldn't stick my neck out and get "ignored" by half the people on this forum.

I do trust that others, though, will see what I am talking about, and – I suppose in the final analysis – it’s their opinion that should matter more to me.

I think this sums up the whole and short of this thread. If I want drama, I'll watch the Soaps on TV.. or go over to TSO.

Again, I do not WANT Pathfinder’s head on the chopping block. I also don’t like MY head on the chopping block. If both our heads are on the chopping block because of this, so be it. Because none of us should ever be in the position where people who think they run the message boards are conducting a campaign to get rid of one of us.

THAT is my point.

The pandastrong Fairplay version:

1. Prokofy declares war on a specific group of people within SL

2. Prokofy loses

3.

It was innapropriate. Not terrible or earthshaking or even worth more than maybe a slight reprimand, bit it was indeed inappropriate. I've been on the customer service side for many, many years. I call'em like I see'em.

I think Pathfinder has only the best intentions and is very open with the community, which is great. I just think with an issue such as Prok, and the fact that he constantly claims FIC and mob-rule and LL favoritism, that little chat wasn't the best idea, and was inappropriate. Shoulda just talked about sheep..or my penis. Both are huge topics and can be discussed in-depth.

You may have missed my question to you David, since this thread has gotten so big. I am curious about your opinion on my question to your earlier statement. If you are tired of this thread, we can always talk about it in world. Here was my question:




I think that is exactly what was happening. It was just a "group" of residents instead of just one. Which does happen often. Where would it have been more official to talk to a group? On someone's land in world? On a phone conference call? On the forums? On a third party forum? In a chat channel (which this was)? What about an in world chat channel? In *many* of those cases any joe blow could come into the conversation or at the very least overhear what is being said.

Individuals and Groups take or talk about "complaints" to Lindens all the time. Usually whenever they can get the opportunity to actually find one (which is harder and harder these days as the world gets bigger). How is this time any different? I'm just not seeing it...