Hey, this is feeling very much like a set-up designed to make me look bad. I hope it's not the case.
I got a message from Annie today, which read:
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Hey!
You're a Moderator, right?
Why don't you check Free's IP address?
@nnie
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So I inquired further. Annie then sent this:
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American Dream wrote:
The only username I ever had here was American Dream.
the super secret RI inner sanctum wrote:
IP address for this post
24.47.174.67 [ 40 Posts ]
Users posting from this IP address
American Dream [ 805 Posts ]
Free [ 40 Posts ]
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When I asked if AD/Free had been disruptive and asked for examples, she sent this:
Prof Pan,
Have you ever considered finding a replacement for yourself?
Now that Jeff has a different work schedule, he doesn't seem to have as much time to oversee.
I think it would be helpful to have moderators with more time, energy and interest than a new dad should have muster.
Not that I don't enjoy your contributions, but your posts of late indicate that this responsibility might be stretching you a bit thin.
Hopefully you are not offended by my questions.
Annie
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To which I replied, no, I still wanted to be a mod, even though I am frequently absent these days.
So I went into the thread in question, and posted a not-so-veiled comment about two members posting from the same IP address. I didn't see Annie's message to me (below) before posting.
Let's wait until Dad gets home.
I think sunny's got a handle on it, but thanks for the offer.
Then I got another PM from Annie:
U R DOING RONG
Then this:
professorpan wrote:
Uh, why? What's wrong? And why did you bring the IP similarity to my attention if you didn't want me to say anything about it?
I was hoping to alert you to a situation that sunny and I have been monitoring for a while, give you a bit of a heads up since you aren't often here, and maybe have some discussion backstage.
I didn't ask you to say anything about it on the forum. If I were certain that was the best approach at this juncture, I would have taken it myself.
AD and Free both wrote, alarmed, saying that they are two people and Free is a survivor of abuse and dangerous people might be after her. I have no idea whether that's true or not. And I don't see how revealing that two people share IP addresses is going to reveal anyone's location or endanger anyone. But I did edit my message and claimed my statement was inaccurate.
But seriously, annie, to point out a possible sock puppet (in 2 separate posts), then question my ability/desire to moderate, sure seems like you were asking me to weigh in on the issue. You said nothing about discussing anything with Sunny or wanting to keep it private until I did what I thought you were suggesting.
I also checked the moderator forum before I posted, and didn't find anything, so clearly you two weren't discussing it where I could have seen it.
And hey, I don't moderate much, and I'm not on top of all the threads anymore, mostly because the level of civility has shrunk in contrast to the rise of noise. But I do stop in once in a while to keep an eye on things. I do that because I respect Jeff and was honored that he asked me to mod, and I have always tried to be fair and to encourage fairness.
This has been a very weird situation, and I can't say I'm very comfortable with the way it unfolded. And it seems odd the way you handled it, Annie.
