h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

To rehash some of what I've said in Mistdancer's journal here's my .

Things that might suggest that Symphony *might* be LeKZ:

A musically themed screenname and user space. (Not uncommon)

Multiple Personality. (Not very uncommon on H2G2)

One or two statements to friends to the effect of 'hi, it's me, you know who I am, right?' (many likely other contexts)

Well, that might lead to *suspicion* but that's as far as I'd go. I've read a lot of the postings of LeKZ and Symphony. Except for signing posts in the form of 'name 1, for group name', I haven't noticed many similarities. Of course I'm not privy to any other 'evidence' the italics might have, (and of course I'm making an assumption they even used the 'evidence' I've cited) but I'm thoroughly unconvinced.



The italics have seemingly dismissed this incident and the resultant convos out of hand. They did not follow the transgressions procedure because they assumingly believed it unnecessary because it had been followed for the user they 'CONCLUDED' this to be. To them they were just closing the account of an already banned user.

They've made their decision and they don't seem to even care to consider changing it.

Now of course I'm not privy to what is going on via email (other than what has been posted elsewhere) concerning Symphony's attempts to prove hir innocence. Unfortunately it does seem that, other than to 'make a stink', there would be little we bystanders can do that would be productive. So, I'm going to just carry my beanbag over here from the original convo and continue my sit-in here until the account is reopened or I'm given adaquate evidence that it was justly closed.

It could be a long sit.

CZ

The latest emails have been uploaded to the website. They show Symphony emailing copies of documentation containing their name, address, and providing their phone number. They've had a read-receipt and nothing else.

Granny, I'll be emailing you later tonight, if that's ok. Symphony do live very close to you.

I think it's pretty clear where I stand on this. Symphony are not LeKZ. They're not in the US. They should never have been banned. Full stop.

Misty, e-mails from you are always welcome . However, I don't want to leave myself open to any accusations of collusion. I have never met Symphony - to the best of my knowledge - have never corresponded with them, either on or off site, never posted to any conversations they were involved in.

I am independent and impartial. I only want to see justice done openly, even if it is contrary to my present beliefs. Anyone who has a problem with that is more than welcome to take it up with me on my space.

Since I've just posted a very long (for me) post in my journal reiterating that I know that Symphony is in the UK, I'll just post a link here F74902?thread=310523

*giggles*

What of much the keepers take.

-- DoctorMO --

Well, this is just awful.

I vote to restore Symphony. It really upsets me that the normal transgression procedure was skipped over and it was assumed that she was LeKZ. Why? I guess because Symphony is a multiple personality, and a lover of music. Come on, people. The IP address is from the UK, and Symphony doesn't even write like LeKZ - except for their love of smilies, they're very different.

Besides, it's a little arrogant to assume that LeKZ would want to go to all that trouble just to log into h2g2. For her to acquire an IP address from the UK, she would have to get Internet access from a UK provider. The only problem with this is that logging onto h2g2 would be about five hundred dollars a call. It's just not worth it!

" it's a little arrogant to assume that LeKZ would want to go to all that trouble just to log into h2g2."

First of all, it's not arrogant, it's based on observation of past behaviour. No less than seven accounts took varying degrees of trouble to conceal their origins as hers, and succeeded to different extents, in two instances successfully enough that a significant proportion of people still insist two of them were not, in fact, her.

"For her to acquire an IP address from the UK, she would have to get Internet access from a UK provider."

Untrue. I have no idea how one would accomplish it, but I have been, within the last couple of months, assured by someone who tells me they know how to fake IP addresses, that anyone could appear to be logging in from anywhere with minimal effort and free tools downloaded from the web.

The identity of this self-professed competent hacker?

TaKE a GuESS.

"The only problem with this is that logging onto h2g2 would be about five hundred dollars a call. It's just not worth it!"

Not worth it to you, and certainly not to me. But if it WASN'T $500 a call, if all it took was a couple of minutes work or less before logging on, I could see how it could be worth it.

To reiterate - I *don't* think Symphony is LeKZ, for several reasons. But saying it's unreasonable to assume it might be is simply inaccurate, I'm afraid - and that's not Symphony's fault.

H.

I don't believe it *was* just assumed Symphony was LeKZ in the sense of the italics going looking for new accounts with musical/multiple themes (sounds like counterpoint!). I believe it is much more likely that someone emailed the italics to make the accusation. Someone who knows the staff well enough to push the right buttons in complaining. Someone whom the staff show the poor judgement to trust despite this informant (evidently) not being reliable. The "investigation" will probably have been limited to looking at the things pointed out and not anything which might really qualify as investigating (or they would have found Symphony not to be LeKZ).

NB Nearly all the above applies even if Symphony were to be LeKZ! I just don't believe the staff put any effort at all into the "investigating" they claim to have done. They haven't in the past.

"I just don't believe the staff put any effort at all into the "investigating" they claim to have done. They haven't in the past."

That is absolutely untrue. A straightforward, easily disproved lie.

"Silent Lucidity" was investigated, and found to be using a PC whose user had christened it "LEKZ". Case closed.

"wallflowergirl" was outed by an IP trace and didn't dispute her identity once busted.

The two Blonde accounts made mild protests about who was actually using them but didn't put up a fight.

The staff had considerable correspondence with "Quincy" and "Satyagraha", some of which is posted on this site A683778. They went to considerable effort beyond that, attempting to trace the name given by the holder of the "Quincy" account, contacting professional organisations in the US.

Suggesting they have never bothered investigating these things is simply a lie.

You have well-publicised problems with the staff, SEF. Lying about them is

(a) counterproductive, as it makes you look bad, not them, and
(b) unnecessary, as there are easily sufficient true things one could say about their activities if one is aiming to show them in a bad light.

Stick to the facts, eh?

H.

You misunderstood my reference to the past, H. Though I can now see why you would have done. I didn't mean the LeKZ history at all - because I wasn't there to know what precisely went on. By "They haven't in the past.", I meant the recent cases which *I* know about. It would have been clearer if other posts hadn't been hidden.

Post 5a (repeat)

I don't know Symphony, although I was mildly interested in the account when I randomly came across it long before this latest fiasco. It didn't seem to be doing very much then either though. Perhaps I should have bothered to say hello at that point.

I also don't know Mistdancer. This could be taken as a negative thing but it's really more of a positive one. I've never seen them do anything wrong or be dishonest that I could tell.

Post 5b (reworded)

I *do* know something about the italics. They tend to take the word of certain people over that of other people who can and have demonstrated that they know better. They have been seen to be dishonest, eg the recent EdPol issue and another previous instance of lying about doing anything which might qualify as investigating. That was in a situation where I already knew the truth, unlike this one. However, the pattern of behaviour in this case does seem remarkably similar. Given that the account did nothing wrong, the only "evidence" has to have been the word of someone and, if Symphony is in the UK and not LeKZ, then they must have been lying about investigating too or they would have found this out. That leaves them calling reading the informant's email and looking at a couple of Symphony's posts "investigating" - which I regard as a dishonest use of the word.

Post 5c (repeat)

So at the moment, for me, Mistdancer has a whole lot more credibility than the italics and I vote that Symphony be unbanned. This is more about justice and retraction of defamation of character (ie italics declaring Symphony an unsuitable person by their actions) than utility though, since Symphony does not appear to have used the account much.

Incidentally, the post hasn't been returned (at time of writing). I have a copy because I happened to have a second browser window open at the time I was replying and it was simultaneously removed.

Also the person who yikesed it was probably someone who knew that it didn't refer to the LeKZ past at all.

"it didn't refer to the LeKZ past at all."

Ah, I understand. Here's everyone *else* in this thread talking about Symphony and LeKZ, and I, perhaps foolishly, assumed you were too.

But you weren't. You were talking about yourself.

Again.

My mistake.

A suggestion: if you're going to continue to do this stuff - and I assume on the basis of past observation that you are and nothing's going to stop you - could you let the rest of know by marking it up, e.g.

The staff are unprofessional people who have it in for me personally and I have lots of evidence I'm not going to talk about because if I did I'd get banned and they'd lie about it,

that way the rest of us will know whether what you're saying has any relevance at all to the subject of the thread or whether we can safely roll our eyes, nudge each other and ignore it.

Thanks!

I do agree on likelihood of the posited chain of events, i.e. one or two complaints from trusted sources leading to a summary banning without process. It's all the more frustrating because it was precisely this sort of thing that the ignored procedure was designed to stop - and by "this sort of thing" I mean not just the banning, but the interminable debates it causes. On the other hand, this doesn't appear to be wasting any staff time, because they're quite happily ignoring it, it seems.

Can anyone suggest a reason why they shouldn't?

H.

The only reasons why they shouldn't are:

a) It shows their bad attitude - except that part of their bad attitude is in not caring that they have a bad attitude and not enough people can see it anyway. So that one's a non-starter.

b) If someone took a law-suit out against them and the BBC, eg for defamation of character.

Before you all go off misunderstanding again, I mean the defamation of character of being banned. It doesn't matter what the excuse is. Whenever it is an excuse as opposed to something true or for which far worse offenders have not been banned, then it is defamation by implication. Everyone who doesn't know the facts and hasn't read the backlog of whatever the situation was (ie pretty much everyone) would assume that the staff were nice and right and that the banned person was nasty and wrong. Only some of us know differently.

SEF I think the terms and conditions we agree to when we sign up make it pretty clear the BBC can terminate our accounts at any time for any reason.

Ergo I would argue that it would not be possible to sue the BBC after tbey had banned you.

Any lawyers hear who could clear up this legal stuff?

Notice: This is a personal observation and not an invitation to begin a discussion (though I do recommend that others take this position for the sake of the spirit of the transgression policy.)

Observation: Just like other times in 'real' invocations of the transgression policy, the person who had the most to do with that policy being accepted by the italics is doing the most to show why it is barely useful to researchers or to the italics.

In this thread where people have been directed to post their support of Symphony's account being restored, HVL has persisted in finding ways to transform statements by supporters into arguments against that support while professing, on the surface, to be in support of restoration.

The result is that statements of support are transformed into debates in support of personal positions as if HVL's consent were required before any such statement could be accepted.

I will not speculate why HVL (and other accounts that might well be run by or for him judging by their style, content, vocabulary, and apparent intent and which he may or may not be aware of participating in) seems to feel this *his* responsibility, but I will observe that he seems to have a personal interest here that has little to do with Symphony's situation.

I, who have no reason to expect him to ever listen to me, take this opportunity to call this behavior to his attention and ask him to stop this harrasment.

If he has some other agenda to pursue, it would be proper for him to do it elsewhere without, apparently, seeking to transform what was directed to be a statement of support into a pointless debate and attempt to minimize the strength of any plea for restoration.

This is a place of opinion and his 'logic' is not required and, I suspect, is not wanted by anyone posting here.

That being the case, in my opinion, here is my statement of opinion.

Opinion: Since I have spoken with some of Symphony and with some of that system whom they are accused (and what a hideous thing to do, to turn a perception of similarity,ight or wrong, into an accusation worthy of condemnation to Coventry) of being or being in a puppet of, at two different and distinct phone numbers in two different countries, I regard it as being highly unlikely that the charge that they are the same as or are working in collusion for the benefit of a banned researcher could possibly be true.

This is my single voice and my single position.

Exhortation: Please, vote for Symphony.

Signed: Barton Rolsky -- Barton (aka B.)

"the BBC can terminate our accounts at any time for any reason"

Not if the reason they give is untrue and defamatory and more than any of the other untrue and defamatory things they say are acceptable. It isn't about closing the account per se. It is about what that says.

In Symphony's case they did try to keep it quiet. So quiet that many people refused to believe the account had been banned. That and the fact that the reason given (while still apparently untrue) is not genuinely defamatory, might make a difference.

However, there are a lot of people round here who *do* think that being LeKZ-like is a bad thing. So the issue of defamation is in the general perception rather than the reality. That of course is rather the point of defamation itself - having people believe something which isn't true. If it is bad but true then it isn't defamation/slander/libel (even though a number of people may not have known the bad thing before).

Symphony didn't visibly do anything wrong, so Symphony shouldn't be banned.

Oops - typo. That should read:

Not if the reason they give is untrue and defamatory *any* more than any of the other untrue and defamatory things they say are acceptable.