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

Yeah, be good to meet you, GTB.

to everyone for the positive vibes. Not much to add... I might get moderated.

Oh, that reminds me - anyone who'll be in London or within a day trip on London between March... oh, 8-20 or so, and who would like to get together, email me! Or post to my space here.

Saying that on *this* thread is bound to get me hooked up with an interesting crowd...

GTB, could you possibly jump on a train to Cleethorpes?

I dunno, how far *is* that? I mean, it's just an island, how big could the whole thing be? Coming from Texas, anyway, I'm not inclined to think much of distances in li'l ol' foreign countries. I mean, the UK's not bigger than Europe, and Europe's roughly the size of the greater Houston metro area, right?

Hopefully I'll see you in the office GTB.

Ladies and gentlefroods,

There's been rumor and speculation, and a lot of nonsense talked. This was exactly what was intended, among other things. Here are a few actual facts for you to chew one. But first, some important information.

This will be a LONG post, so go get a and get comfortable, or if you prefer, go and find a conversation where people are brief.

This will also be the LAST post from this account. The last post from the other four accounts already happened.



I have been asked nicely to take down the content on the five personal spaces. This I shall do in exactly 24 hours, 2200 GMT. If you'd like a copy of what I wrote there, get it now, because tomorrow it will *all* be gone, voluntarily, and permanently. If you are one of those people offended by what I wrote - don't read it again, and be assured that it will be off this site, never to return, as will I, this time tomorrow. If you're wondering WHY I did this, then the simplest explanation is simply that my patience snapped. I am aware that I am not alone in this. Others have snapped before me. I hope that this little episode contributes to some kind of conclusion, rather than being just another step along the way. It's certainly a conclusion for *me*. You people of course are free to go to hell in your own way.

It is completely pointless making any kind of "response" to this post hoping for an answer - you will be talking to the air. After this post, consider me gone. In fact, I hope there are NO answers to this post. It explains some facts, states some opinions, and makes a coupla pleas.

You may make observations about me, of course, and talk about me to others. That happens. I don't mind at all, because I won't be reading it. It's that simple. I'm just trying to save everyone time and effort by saying don't bother trying to debate me, because by the time you read this, I am not here and I won't be back. Others *may* take up the cudgels on my behalf in my absence. If you were thinking of doing that, or thinking of "explaining" what I've done to someone else, I advise against. People might think you were me, despite what I've just said. Just direct them here, where I'm explaining as much as is needed.



So - the issue of identity. There has been speculation. I have three points to make on this.

First: I am not who you think I am. I have no intention of saying who I am, because I've seen the results of that kind of honesty. Many people have had the finger pointed at them, and thankfully none of them are me. Just to save you the trouble; I am NOT (in alphabetical order) agcBen, Dastardly, Fenchurch, Gravity Welles, Hoovooloo, John W. Fulton, Lucinda, Mina/Linda, Tefkat, THE KID, tonsil revenge, or Wumbeevil. If any of these people are offended because they were taken for me and people didn't believe their protestations that they weren't - interesting sensation, isn't it? If I have omitted anyone who was specifically accused of being me - I'm not them either, I've just forgotten you or never saw you accused. Sorry.

I am NOT a member of the SBVM. I am NOT a member of TrusT. I am NOT a member of FoLKZ. I am NOT an Italic, nor connected in any way with the BBC or any of its employees. I am also, in case anyone is wondering, NOT LeKZ. There is a simple fact which proves that, which obviously none of you knows and nobody has guessed. What proves it is that this account is still active. Which brings me on to my second point.



Second point: I had no intention of wasting the Italics' valuable time with this little amusement. Far too much of their time is taken up with LeKZ related nonsense already. I therefore made absolutely no attempt whatsoever to conceal from them who I am. I used the same contact email address for all five accounts. They know perfectly well who I am. This has made any suggestion of them needing to conduct some sort of "trace" to find out who I am humorously redundant.

As I say - my intention was not to waste the time of the Italics. It was to waste the time of (and perhaps to amuse some of) the boneheads and debating society verbal dire-rear sufferers who just won't leave this subject alone - on BOTH sides. In this I seem to have succeeded admirably. Perhaps you will all now take the hint and drop this nonsense. I hope so.



Third point: these five accounts were the work of a single person, working alone, starting on Saturday morning at around 0900 GMT. I have opened the five that are known about (the ones with the sequential numbers starting U189490) and no others. I understand that there has been speculation about other accounts. I cannot supply information on them, because any other accounts are nothing to do with me. There were these five, and no others.



This brings me neatly onto another point. I've seen it said that five accounts was "excessive". Well, pardon me for having an excess of material to draw on. Actually, five accounts was UNDERkill if anything. If I had been strictly accurate in my parody, there would have been six - there should have been a Brainy Brunette Bloke Version 2.0. I think I made my point with five, though. I'm flattered that someone thinks is shows a great deal of forethought and planning, and if "a great deal" is three minutes thinking "hey, this would be fun, now, which one shall I parody first..." then you're right. This was *incredibly easy and simple* to accomplish - no planning was needed. People who think the only thing this exercise achieved was inflicting pain are obviously sticking their fingers in their ears to avoid hearing the inconvenient sounds of laughter from round and about.



Please note also: I was NOT parodying a person. I was parodying a single, specific behavior of that person which I find appalling, ridiculous and indefensible and hence a fit subject for humor.

If the intention had been to parody a PERSON (which I agree, would have been cruel and uncalled for), then be assured there would have been accounts called "Adagio of LiEZ" and "Evening Became Oedipus".

I *just* made those two names up, because it never occurred to me to think that the original account deserved parody. It also never occurred to me to parody a breach of the rules done openly and honestly for an honorable purpose. If my five accounts are excessive, what about the SIX LeKZ *admits* she opened? Disregarding the two that it is JUST POSSIBLE weren't her, but were instead the work of a clairvoyant hacker with incredibly fortunate connections, incredible technical skill, incredible mimicry skills that make me look like the amateur I am, and incredibly similar areas of knowledge...



Which brings me on to the subject of hacking. I haven't done any. I didn't want to do any, had no need to do any, and in any case have not the technical skill required to attempt any. Nothing that has taken place on my keyboard over the last few days has compromised or even attempted to compromise the security of h2g2 in any way whatsoever. All five accounts were opened perfectly normally and legitimately. A personal space and screenname was set up for each, and that screenname did not change at any time during the operation of the account. Absolutely no attempt *at* *all* was made to hack other users' accounts. I neither needed to nor wanted to. This was a JOKE, not a hack attack. Which brings me on to the subject of impersonation...



I did NOT impersonate anyone. Specifically, I did not impersonate LeKZ. If anyone actually thought for more than about ten seconds that any of those accounts *was* being operated by LeKZ, you have a lower opinion of her than I do. ...... The whole point of those personal spaces and the postings was to suggest the style of LeKZ while making it blatantly obvious to anyone who made even the most cursory inspection that this was someone else, poking fun. Now, you may think that poking fun was mean, or not very nice. I suggest you ask some of the people who have received or still regularly receive emails (or even it seems in at least one case phone calls) from LeKZ how very nice and not mean she is. There are plenty to choose from. None of them are me.

Neither did I impersonate any active researchers. That is against the House Rules. At no stage did any of the accounts break any House Rule (notwithstanding some currently hidden posts which despite this explanation I'm not contesting - people want to hide backlog, fine, let 'em, it just makes things more confusing and I LIKE that). What I did do was post in such a way as to convey the impression that someone else was impersonating ME. The intention there was to sow confusion. This worked like Gangbusters.

This was NOT impersonation. If you think that posting something (regardless of what it is) to YOUR personal space, with MY (*completely* *different*) name at the top of the posting, counts as "impersonation", then I expect you think that if I were to walk down the street in a tutu and a sombrero shouting in a high, squeaky voice "I'm a cop, you know" I should be arrested for impersonating a police officer.

A secondary intention was to question trust, and to demonstrate differing styles of denial. The only denial which contained any profanity was from a friend of LeKZ. This was by far the most vehement denial which was issued. Yes, Dastardly, I did pick you because you were online. I was hoping you'd pop by, call me b*****d and deny it was you as quickly as possible. You did exactly that. Thanks.



I reiterate, I am not any of the five people I "pinged". I would apologise to you if I thought I'd done any of you any harm. I don't think I did, so, no apologies. Once again, it was obvious *very* quickly to some people (as it should have been to everyone) that the "oops" posts were merely a confusion tactic. (and no, btw, I'm not Potholer either)



I've seen it said that as a result of my japery, this site feels less safe. Well, excuse me. There are people who use this site who are *scared* of LeKZ, and they believe they have reason to be. There are others who claim to have been harrassed by her. In the past four weeks three accounts have been opened by her - she admits this. In every case she agreed to a set of rules when they joined. This, despite the fact that those rules actually forbid her from joining. They're banned, and they were banned for a reason. You may dispute the reason. But the ban stands, and recent threats (legal action, for example) and insults to the staff are hardly likely get it lifted. Two other accounts were started, one of them for the purposes of impersonating a medical professional. As I said elsewhere, it is possible that these were not LeKZ's accounts. It's so unlikely as to not be worth considering for a nanosecond, but honor demands I admit it is possible. Now, all *that* happened before I fetched up here and started making people laugh. And you're telling me that it feels unsafe *now*, and that's MY fault? Now *that* is funny!



Like I said, I broke no rules. If you take each of those accounts at face value, as LeKZ demands everyone take all her various accounts at face value, they harrassed nobody, trolled nobody, didn't swear, make sexual remarks, racist or otherwise offensive remarks or do anything IN THEMSELVES which was in breach of any rules. I checked the House Rules carefully before I began to make sure I didn't break any, and I maintain that I still haven't, unless you count "otherwise objectionable", and hey, humor is in the eye of the beholder, and you can't expect me to please everyone.

A lot of people here, on both sides of the seemingly endless wrangling which has surrounded this subject, seem to take themselves very, very seriously indeed. ALL of you were the target of this. Look at yourselves, spouting and posturing and debating this account or that account to death, and then doing it all again. Look at yourselves, demanding the time of the Italics be taken up going over and over this DEAD issue, simply because you don't like rules YOU signed up to, in some cases at least six times.

I'm even aware that threats have been issued of legal action against the BBC. I urge anyone with a sense of humor and a buck to spare to send it in to finance this action and make sure it gets to court, because if you thought my parodies were funny (and I *know* some of you did) then they'll pale into nothing compared to what a court would make of what's gone on here and elsewhere since July.

(hang in there, we're nearly done)

I'd like to thank "Eccentrica Gallumbits" and "Nobody Special" and someone whose username began with "FM" for making it almost as entertainingly mysterious for me as it was for everyone else. I have no idea who you are, but thanks, and well done. I hope you, like me, will now drop this subject.

And so, on that note, I would like to draw a line under this. I will not post again from any of my five IDs, and the contents of the five personal spaces will vanish in exactly 24 hours.

I join Mark Moxon in urging all the people who until now have enjoyed debating this so much to just drop it. Just in case this request is ignored, or someone has the sheer bad judgement to ever mention this subject again anywhere on this site, I'm also urging the people who appear to enjoy pressing triggers to stop handing someone you call friend the means to cause themselves more pain, and if you care about them at all try to help them to stop hurting themselves. I would address some related advice to the person whose behavior I've parodied, but since I'm obviously no friend of theirs and they ignore to their own detrement the advice of their closest friends, it seems a bit pointless.

Please, please, please - nobody post anything after this. Let's *all* just drop it, huh? Here's hoping.

VD

Boy, I'm so glad that there are people like you on this site who really know where they can spark off some good natured humour.

Two vultures were having trouble getting their luggage in the overhead compartment when the flight attendant comes running up and says, " Gentlemen, please! I'm terribly sorry, but only one carrion per passenger."

Two vultures were having trouble getting their luggage in the overhead compartment when the flight attendant comes running up and says, " Gentlemen, please! I'm terribly sorry, but only one carrion per passenger."

Two vultures were having trouble getting their luggage in the overhead compartment when the flight attendant comes running up and says, " Gentlemen, please! I'm terribly sorry, but only one carrion per passenger."

Two vultures were having trouble getting their luggage in the overhead compartment when the flight attendant comes running up and says, " Gentlemen, please! I'm terribly sorry, but only one carrion per passenger."

And, in case you didn't get it the first time:

Two vultures were having trouble getting their luggage in the overhead compartment when the flight attendant comes running up and says, " Gentlemen, please! I'm terribly sorry, but only one carrion per passenger."

Ideas are easy; editing is hard.

-7_Überkill_7

'ello 'ello what's all this then?
Someone having their baggage stowed?
I see my name was spelled with CAPS. Outstanding!
Sorry I didn't get here sooner.
That's a lie.
yours, truly,

jwf

Awww jwf. Where's the fun in following you around if you're just going to keep falling asleep?
Your name does look terribly posh like that doesn't it?
(Why was my name in there? No-one in their right mind could ever have thought I was either bright enough or funny enough to have done that could they?)

Well if anyone's at a loose end now come and help for Bro. Maynard's housewarming party. I'm running out of

(I'm trying to create a giant backlog to warm the cockles of his heart - you lot are REALLY good at those )

Hey, why don't we all take a leaf out of this guy's book and spread some love and goodwill?

http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20020125/od/hug_dc_1.html

Think of the chaos we could cause

(How about next Thursday, naked, wearing wings and armed with bows...)

I'll try not to wind anybody up.

I didn't read the parodies, nor would I want to.

I don't understand why anyone would still
be discussing an event that happened 7 or 8
months ago, when there have been so many
other interesting things to talk about since
then. The world has moved on. H2G2 has moved on.
The people who want to communicate with the
banned researcher can do so in other fora.

I respect everyone's inner reality. If you could
see my inner reality (which you can't ),
you would understand why.

Post 86...

"I am NOT (in alphabetical order) ... Hoovooloo ..."

This named person has been using these accounts recently.

Quite a few of them, in fact....

Mikey

Looks like someone's been busted

So I lied. So sue me.

In my defence - it worked. Better than I even planned, it worked.

Je vinaigrette rien.

H.

Name: (Name)
U Number: (U Number)

?

GoddessBen