cross has been using his staff powers to repeatedly harass me. Please excise him from all official, unofficial, and semijudicary positions on Grex.132 responses total.
Filling up user partitions, denying use of the system to other users, has consequences. Trying to pin it on other users has consequences. I hate to have to be the one to break it to you (actually, it's a pain in the ass to be the one to break it to you).
I'd side with cross on this one.
(FYI, dah just admited his actions on mnet party.)
cross is a fucking moron. Not only does he ban users which are clearly different, he uses the excuse that they come from the same host, when clearly GreX does not log the full hostname that a user comes from, if the hostname is too long, which in my case it is. Just because two users share the same ISP does not mean they are the same users. What a fucking moron.
I am being mass-splatted-banned from GreX. I don't know what the staff is trying to prove.
I'm not trying to prove anything. I'm just trying to keep you from abusing grex's resources. Actually, the system right now is okay; you can access the conferences via the web interface, but can't login interactively. This limits the amount of damage you can do to the system.
Thanks, cross.
Sure thing. Unfortunately, it's not clear I can plug all the holes he comes in from.
This response has been erased.
Please post excerpts
Dude, cross, dah is not naftee nor is he asddsa; dah is polytarp and asddsa and naftee is soup; they are 2 different people.
Um, right.
triluda's right. polytarp=dah=david a hoffman. asddsa=naftee=nafteee=soup. If ou paid attention to their posts and party comments, you'd know.
that is odd i told him the same thing last night about paying attention to their post; but, he just jetted off.
As a board member, I'll freely admit a bias toward staff when it comes to evaluating commentary on their actions in response to abuse of system resources. If a mistake is made, I expect staff will amend it as soon as it can be verified. As for complaints of harassment by staff, my comment is: If you've shown a history of specious complaints or spurious charges then show me the evidence or you'll get no support from me.
re 9 You should read the series of writes cross and myself exchanged. It started with cross saying something like, "I'll give you a cookie if you promise to be nice".
Nonsense. I told him I'd give him his account back if he said he wouldn't damage the system. The response was something on the lines of, ``CAN YOU TELL ME HOW TO FIX MY TV!'' I concluded after a couple more exchanges he wasn't serious about getting anything unlocked, but just wanted to be irritating. This is a hard issue; Freedom of speech is a rough thing. It means, in exchange for the right to express one's own ideas, periodically one has to put up with idiots who want to abuse the system for kicks, who in effect take advantage of the right to say whatever they want to say things just meant to annoy, who push the limits just because they can. Sometimes the latter is good; sometimes shocking people out of a complacent existence can be beneficia, if that complacency is itself bad. But sometimes, it's just irritating, and while it's an irritation we have to put up with, but that doesn't oblige me, or anyone else, to facilitate it. I locked asddsa's account because I had reason to suspect he was the same person as dah. Both their comments in the bbs (I infrequently see both them in party) struck me as juvenille and immature. Their harassment of staff was annoying. Their continuing complaint about polytarp's account being locked was just stupid. Forgive me if I couldn't tell Tweedle-Dee from Tweedle-Dum. A few people I trust have since said that asddsa/naftee/soup/salad isn't polytarp/dah/scholar. Okay, fine. However, I'm not going to play a series of games with naftee over getting his account back; freedom of speech doesn't entitle you to a specific login name. It's clear naftee, or whatever his name is, knows how to run newuser, and it's clear he's both figured out a way to access the BBS via the web, and login interactively. As far as I'm concerned, he hasn't been censored, and he can get his other accounts back after they've been expired in the normal reap cycle. I have better things to do than (a) fix naftee's TV, and (b) engage in juvenille debate over this or that.
You're arguments are so silly. Response #16 is an excellent paraphrase of what you wrote. An occaisional user of GreX suddenly finds his account locked and most of the IPs he comes from banned, and a staff member writes to him that he's abused the system and'll only give the account (and access) back if he promises to do this or that. And then this staff member wonders why this user is so mad at him. Well, gee golly, don't think to hard. Hmm, let's look at these "reasons". You say naftee is childish and immature. Thanks for your opinion. You've seen either dah or asddsa harass the staff. But wait a minute, you can't tell the difference between the two. Better attribute it to some unknown "person" who's somehow two different people, even though many GreXers can tell the difference at first glance. I guess you just don't have "time". Oh, and that argument about polytarp's account? Glad to know you think it's stupid, but other people do have concerns over their privacy and identities. But obviously you've shown that identities mean little to you. Those are pretty weak reasons to lock an account. Plus, the evidence is purely circumstantial, for to show any real technical evidence would throw any reason for the locked account out of the water. So please, feel free to continue to splat accounts that are owned by "annoying" and "childish" users. Who's next? sabre? jp2?
I fully agree with asddsa's essay.
of course you do, tweedle-dum.
Cross, a number of comments you made in #17 sound like you're taking this personal, and the response is very un-Grexlike. We don't ban people here. If someone is intentionally breaking one of our few rules, then there is reason lock an account and make an attempt to find out the issue. You seem to be going beyond that here. I hope other staff members are watching and, if they agree, ask you to set away from this matter.
I think it's pretty extreme... but I don't think cross is out of bounds on this. We do site-block on occasion.
he is way out line on this. he also reference time as a factor for banning asddsa and dah; time as in i don't have any to look into the matter. what the hell is that about? perhaps if he spent less time splatting accounts he could have found out earlier soup and poly are different people. he should step away from the matter.
I agree with cross on this. polytarp and naftee have been annoying, and it is easy to think they're the same person. Dan's not the first person here to think so, and will not be the last. The only difference is that he locked naftee's account, thinking it was polytarp. Simple enough mistake, that would have been easily corrected if two 17 year olds would behave like 17 year olds and not 6 year olds. Behaviour that I usually ignore, but could definitely irritate some people. But I'm not staff, or a member of the board. Feel free to ignore me.
Regarding #21; I'm not taking it personally. But what I am saying is that I'm not going to waste a lot of time *unlocking* accounts for people who (a) have other access to the system, and (b) clearly aren't interested in getting their accounts back anyway.
You're saying you don't have a personal grudge against polytarp? Pages of drunken ramblings in party logs speak differently, cross.
re 25 But you'll waste as much time as you want locking accounts of users who you find annoying, won't you? re 21 Actually, it's a natural extension of GreXism; ban and splat users who are "annoying".
Fucking communists.
If that (#27) were the case, there'd be no more than five or six people on Grex. Dan, there is a very fine line which distinguishes your actions from similar one in prior cases. I think that line separates actions against users who have abused the system resources from actions designed to prevent abuses with debatable (but definitely nonzero) likelihood of happening in the future. Grex has traditionally taken a very conservative approach in dealing with these circumstances in order to avoid setting a precedent of crossing that line unnecessarily. This means the system takes more abuse in the short term than it might otherwise, but it probably also increases long-term stability. Comments users make online are best regarding as contributing circumstances supporting an action, and otherwise treated with all the regard they deserve (i.e. ignored). No matter how persistently annoying a user may be, our policy is to respect that user's right to be so, so long as it is by their words that they annoy and not by means of recognized abuses of the system. I think you responded appropriately to a situation, but with only a bit more zeal than greater experience might have rendered. Certainly, you should not take these comments and others in similar vein as attacks or expressions of disapproval of your choice to respond, but rather as constructive feedback which you can make use of in future decisions.
cross is a Zionist. And someone should unblock my IP address.
And you are a stupid ignorant fuck. What of it?
I think all these facts form one obvious conclusion: Someone should unban my IP address.
Regarding #29; No, I appreciate the criticism. Constructive criticism is perfectly fine with me. Like I said, I'm really not taking any of this personally. However, there does seem to be some confusion as to what exactly I was up to, so let me try to clarify that here. What I did was intended to lock out a vandal who had purposely tried to attack the system's resources (by filling up the disk in an attempt to frame another user). If dah had never posted to the BBS before, yet had filled up the disk, I don't think we would have treated him any differently. We have a long-standing precedent for locking or otherwise deleting the accounts of vandals who attempt to damage the system. If they continue to login, we block their IP addresses. There are, in this case, I think three distinctions: (1) The user in question is an active user of the BBS. (2) In a case of mistaken identity, another user got locked out as well. (3) Both users in question complained. Of these, perhaps only (2) and the relevant part of (3) are significant, since I don't think we've crossed any lines by blocking or otherwise disabling the accounts of dah/polytarp/scholar, who acted as a vandal in this case (and who, for the record, publically admitted it in party on m-net): it's a case of dealing with vandals pretty much as we always have; if you fill up the disks, we lock your account. The case of naftee/soup/salad/asddsa/dsaasd is slightly different, in that it really was a mistake to lock his various accounts (by the way, he told me the `naftee' login has been locked for over a month, not by me). So, to me, the only real question is how to solve that problem. I was willing to reinstate his accounts, but it seemed to me like he wasn't that interested in getting them back. So, I decided to punt and just not waste any time on it. If he wants them back, fine; someone else can track him down and try and figure it out (and possibly fix his TV at the same time). If not, fine too. I feel no need to spend anymore time on the matter, trying to track him down and see what he wants, or otherwise play games. If another staffer wants to do that, by all means, go right ahead.
(IIRC, naftee did what polytarp did: set his .forward to deliver mail to another account, and then _FROM THAT ACCOUNT_ ask that his password be changed. It was. This was discussed in another item in coop.)
polytarp didn't do that.
re 33 So you want to compensate? Fine, please do. In fact, at the least, I think I deserve the naftee account back for what was done. It was the content of your telegram to me that caused me to respond with a childish remark. You had automatically "assumed" that I had caused all sorts of "vandalism" to the GreX system, when in fact I rarely use the system, if only for party and BBS. Either way, the staff should really take a step back and look at each other a little more closely. The user cross is really a very dangerous addition to the staff; he obviously has a lot of pent-up anger inside, and feels the need to occasionally (and sometimes frequently!) splat users who annoy him. Heck, his very username, cross, is a synonym for angry! Clearly he should be denied root priviledges. Oh, and don't forget about those accounts, plz, or my TV.
Okay, I unlocked the `naftee' account and sent the new password to salad. As for my login name.... Well, it's my last name, too. And that's a shortened version of `Crossroads'. As far as I know, it has nothing to do with either anger or religion, but simply to mark where two roads intersect.
k thanks cross
Will NextGreX log full IPs and hostnames of incoming users?
oh please.
Dye-it.
Yes.
It should be noted that cross banned all of Canada's largest ISP, Sympatico, simply to get rid of a single user.
What does that have to do with whether grex logs IP addresses and/or hostnames of incoming users?
It has to do with it, because it should be noted that cross just banned Cogeco, Canada's second largest ISP, to get rid of a single user, who he hasn't really got rid of.
I didn't `just' ban anything.
Yeah, you 'just' banned most everything.
Hmm, with all this banning and cutting out users, maybe we should get cross to solve Michigan's growing budget debt crisis.
polytarp, make up your mind, which ISP did cross ban?
I never heard of eithere of these ISPs.
I have a lot of folks from Canada using them on one email list I manage.
mynxcat: he banned both. But now they're unbanned. Of course, the staff won't bother to explain any of its actions and you have to rely on me, but oh well.
I wouldn't rely on you for anything
Now they're both banned again. I think you guys should know you're losing millions of potential users to get rid of one who you're not really getting rid of.
Only one person (or is it really two? I don't know) has logged in from that ISP. And not all of the ISP is blocked.
Which ISP? There've been TWO which've been fully blocked. I don't know why staff won't explain its actions.
Staff *has* explained its actions. You've yet to explain *yours*, however.
How can you justify punishing all the glorious people of Canada, because one of their rank was accused of doing something which isn't against your rules?
Seriously, it would be nice to see a concise explanation of what was done -- or a pointer to such, if it's posted elsewhere, so that I don't have to go hunting for it.
A subset of the IP ranges polytarp logs in from were blocked via TCP wrappers and in the SSHD configuration. That's basically it. It's certainly not all the people of Canada.
Why do you continue to block them, when it remains fairly obvious I can connect to Grex anyway?
Blocking IPs of frequent users like polytarp is silly and fruitless.
Perhaps. But so is unlocking accounts of adolescents such as yourself.
hehehe... "all the glorious people of Canada" Go Canuckleheads! (I can poke fun all I want; I have an aunt who was originally from Edmonton-- the Canadian flag was usually displayed somewhere in their home, at least for a while. Big McKenzie Brothers and Oilers fan.)
I think that #61 contains a reasonable question, regardless of what one may think of the person asking it.
I'm afraid the answer might be, "because I can". I hope we're learning here.
cross: one of the conditions of unlocking naftee's account was that he would not criticise you in the future?
A vandal abuses the system. We try to lock him out. It doesn't work. Now we're not supposed to try to lock them out anymore? Regarding #66; What are we supposed to be learning? That blocking vandals is pointless, therefore don't try? I'm confused here. Don't people realize that willcome abused the system, in a manner that we usually lock accounts and block people from accessing grex for? Do we make an exception in his case, because he posts to the BBS? Regarding #67; Tell me where I said that. All I said was that unlocking your account was a waste of my time. I suppose Mary can do it next time.
re 68 You unlocked the willcome account, after someone using it vandalised the system?
Re. 68: You can't not lock me out anymore, because you haven't locked me out at all. And my use isn't limited to just the BBS. Yes. If something's demonstratably pointless, there's no reason to keep trying, especially if in doing so you hurt others who're innocent entirely. Surely, the minor DoS not performed by willcome (but by dah) was less harmful than your blanket ban of Canada. Oh? So, it IS a personal issue for you. (correlating paragraphs).
I am sorry to inform you that blocking a subnet or three on an ISP is in no way a blanket ban of Canada. I am quite sure that Canada has more than one ISP, and that most of the ISP's have more than one or two subnets.
Goodness gracious, this item does goes on and on and round and round.
Regarding #69; For the record, I never locked willcome. Regarding #70; Okay. I've unblocked all the Canadian ISP's I blocked. Someone else can clean up these problems on grex; I've got other things to do.
Welcome to Grex Staff, Dan. ;)
I've unlocked the polytarp and dah accounts, and emailed the new passwords for both to willcome.
And that's what I get for chasing away staff members, and DoSing the system and blaming it on potentuak staff members. (more than I started with).
Perhaps an unfortunate lesson for all concerned?
I meant potential (impotent, importent) Board MEmbers.
Perhaps. But if no one is going to back me up in cracking down in people who vandalize the system, I'm not going to bother.
I hear ya, Dan. You did your best.
I would agree with mynxcat.
He didn't. In fact, he did an awful job which he knew was awful. And I'm preparing legistlation which'll make sure he's forced to resign because of it.
Oh, screw it. I'm actually so disgusted by Mary's comments on my action, that you don't have to prepare any legistlation, polytarp. I resign from staff as it is.
I'm sorry you dont have the right combination of thick skin and grasp of the subtleties of balancing effective administration with respect for the rights of idiots and assholes who abuse them anyway to stay on staff, Dan. ;)
Please don't resign.
He already did, keesan, and good riddance.
(We've had other staff members resign and then change their mind. There has been no problem putting them back to work, when they are willing to help out.)
Nope. cross is not allowed back.
"I don't love you anymore, momma!"
Dan, I'd appreciate it if you'd stay on the staff, too. I think you contribute a lot. Specifically, NextGrex needs you very much.
Don't listen to twirps, and don't let them drive you away. RE #88: You really don't have any say in the matter of who is on staff and who isn't. And we won't allow immature little boys like you set policy here.
re 83 My God, this really was a personal battle for you, wasn't it? is this the first time you've been involved with banning harmful users? Is this the first time you've been wrong? Have you finally lost touch with reality; specifically, the things you've either done wrong or right?
re 83 cross, in response 33 of this item you mention that constructive criticism is "prefectly fine" with you. But now you are saying you are "disgusted" by Mrs. Remmers' response(s). Please explain.
91: Why's cross on staff, then?
for starters .... he's better than you! s'nuff fer me. any queations?
Oh for heaven's sake. Cross, you are brand spanking new to staff. There is a learning curve. You have some rough edges. None of this means you won't fit in nicely but you'll need to ask some questions and listen to the answers to make that process easier. I'm not going to detail where I think this specific situation could have gone better. That would only feed the problem. But the very first thing to keep in mind is not to take it personal. The second is that we have an open newuser and that's non-negotiable. So someone who is coming in and dumping lots and lots of files and then going away will probably need a slightly different approach from someone who is looking for lots of attention. And I'll compliment you on this - you are eager and willing to help out. That's a huge plus right now. But, at least in the beginning, think it through and maybe ask those who have been doing this a very long time if your plan is sound.
Actually we do on occasion site-block. We feel shitty about having to do so, but at times it has been necessary.
I really have no say, but if you have a couple of kids coming on as newuser and causing rtrouble repeatedly, you either report them to their authorities - and who is really going to do that? - or you block their source. If what someone said up there is tue - that at most 2 people came in via the blocked sub-nets, then I think it was the right decision. Or spend valuable staff time cleaning up after these vandals. And I think most people will agree that with NextGrex on the charts, staff needs all the time they can get.
Cross, I hope you will reconsider your resignation also, but before making any decisions, please be aware (as I'm sure you are, now if not before) that being staff requires quite a thick skin. Think of it this way, cross. Grex is currently under attack by a different kind of vandal activity: someone is using a social engineering attack to try to drive away one of our newest staff members. Staff is one of grex's most important resources and certainly one of the most scarce. If you resign, the vandal will have seriously damaged Grex.
(I hadn't said anything earlier because I have no doubt that Dan had taken the right action, I didn't feel compelled to reiterate the obvious, and had no reason to believe that anyone would seriously disagree.) (oh well.) :P
I agree with #100. Besides, if cross resigns, the terrorists win. ;>
I too tend to stay out of conversations when I agree with staff. My thinking is that needless additional postings just drag out the controversy. I will say, specifically, that I expect staff to use their best individual judgment. If, in retrospect, other staff members or other users say, "maybe next time, you might consider....", then I read that as support for the current decision, and light being shed on the complexity of that decision, which may have looked simple at the time. I think cross did the right thing. I think he should stay on staff. I think listening to other points of view and mulling them over; asking other staff to think/talk through the process; and having a different set of tools available when the next incident happens is what we all do, all of the time. There is no need to turn a staff decision into a confidence-vote every time the user in question whines. Staff is chosen because we trust their decision processes, not because we expect perfection. If I _dont_ trust the process, I say that in this forum. If I don't say anything, its because I think the process is working just fine. .
Keep in mind that cross has attempted to stop people from using this forum to criticise blantantly poor decisions he made, and, when the people were able to do it regardless, he responded by resigning. Surely, Grex does not need to be staffed by people who "rock against free speech".
Uhm, yeah, whatever
re 102 You agree with what cross has done. Great, then why don't you follow his lead. Be a hypocrite and resign, all the while blaming it on polytarp and naftee.
YEAH
As a staff member, and general onlooker, I agree with what Dan did. As Scott says, there have been former incidents where we've felt compelled to and have site blocked IP subnets. In this case, unfortunately it was not effective, except it did serve to highlight the reckless behaviour of vandals. I hope you reconsider your resignation, Dan. We most certainly value your contributions.
resp:105 "and I'm not going to take it anymore, momma!"
I very much agree with cmcgee's #102.
I support cross in this situtation.
re 110 In other words, you agree with response 105
i agree that cross should resign and stay so. he is a drama queen. he is quick to do actions without thinking them out. he takes nothing well, bitches a lot and then ends everything with either this is a waste of my time or i quit. whatever later pussy.
Later.
110: It's sad to see the Old Grex community so united in being wrong.
Or enjoying being wrong, for that matter.
a) It's not sad, and b) it's not wrong.
What do you mean it's not sad? I think it's tragic that Old Grex -- after having a staff member overreact in punishing a user, who he didn't know for sure commited the incident until AFTER the punisment; punshed users who demonstratably had nothing to do with the incident and who only had the punishment undone by cross reluctently, after he at first refused to do so; resign after two comments made by a wonderful lady; and cuss out JHC -- wants that staff member back. Maybe you're an autist or something.
If I'm the wonderful lady you are referring to, well, you might want to think again. You set out to light a fire and found someone with a low flash point. Nothing clever about it. And nothing I said should be construed to support your behavior.
re 118 Exactly, but that doesn't mean he should take out his problems on other people!
118: Mary, it's sad to see a wonderful lady like you libelling people. I did not set out to "light a fire"; I set out to correct a wrong. I don't see why you wouldn't condone that, but oh well.
What "wrong" did you correct by filling up a disk and destroying another user's files in the process?
With the ringing endorsements of cross's stewardship from willcome and triluda, how could he even think of resigning? Think of this whining like DDoS attacks on anti-spam organizations.
because he is a smarty art nigga, russ -- get with the program.
121: jp2 tricked me into deleting all my files on M-Net. I got him good.
re 116 You think it's not wrong for people to be hypocritical and blame it on others?
Yawn.
http://www.yawnforjesus.org/
http://grex.cyberspace.org/~nharmon/hayzismfp.txt
nononono, hayz is plongeur
It's true.
TROGG IS DAVID BLAINE
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