As has the offending "Political Compass" post + graphic from the other link. Now says "This comment was deleted." No surprises there.
It is, of course, right that Chris should delete these posts if they breach SE23Life members' privacy. However, they are both 3 years old! Yet deleted within minutes of my post above.
Last edited by brazil nut on 19 Jul 2019 17:32, edited 2 times in total.
brazil nut wrote: 19 Jul 2019 15:32
I agree that none of this is insurmountable. It takes an awareness through training and a willingness to comply. My concern is, given the revelations, can Chris Beach be trusted? It's been revealed on Twitter that he gained unauthorised access to private Twitter direct messages exchanged between Nicola and another party. I assume that would take more effort on his part than it would to access PMs exchanged between users of his own forum. Do we believe that a man who would make the effort to gain unauthorised access to someone's private Twitter messages really wouldn't be tempted to access SE23Life PMs behind the scenes if it was easy for him to do so?
To be clear, I'm not making any accusation that this has in fact happened on SE23Life. But aren't these questions to be considered if the community wishes to regain trust in the forum after some pretty damning revelations about the deceptive and underhand practices of its owner?
Could not agree more.
Addressing these issues is fundamental if there is to be a return to a position of trust and assured integrity.
Speaking from experience I know CB can and did monitor PM's. In the midst of a PM exchange within the forum with one of the mods, CB interjected to attack a comment I had made mili-seconds before to the mod. I genuinely believe the mod himself was shocked and he made commitment to check whether this action was permissible. Never did get that answer. Left at the time not knowing whether CB used an integral function of Discourse software or whether he hacked the conversation.
Running around the internet kicking the sand over your digital footsteps is not exactly the actions of a person who made one sleep-deprived mistake, is it?
As a former mod, as far as I remember we did not have any access to PMs as standard.
Rachael... he was once asked if he could access PMs. He said he could but would never do that. As technical owner he has significant access. Though I've personally not had reason to think he has.
starman wrote: 19 Jul 2019 16:54
Rachael... he was once asked if he could access PMs. He said he could but would never do that. As technical owner he has significant access. Though I've personally not had reason to think he has.
Some one asked if it was also a standard thing for mods to be able to access PMs. I can confirm that it wasn’t. The owner, above and beyond the mods, also not accessing PMs would be a matter of trust. As this thread has amply demonstrated, that trust has been comprehensively destroyed. Participating in a forum where he still has technical access to data is not something I can countenance doing again.
So one thing is perfectly clear here, that Mr Beach IS reading the comments, and acting on them accordingly.
That poses the question, that if some of this is being taken on board, what are the intentions?
Is it to simply remove any posts, tweets, or data which may cast him in a poor light, or are the other comments such as his trustworthiness to be at the helm of the other forum also resonating with him?
My guess would be look after #1 and nothing more right now. The intention is clearly to protect his public reputation for the wider audience. While the chances of anyone stumbling across this thread while looking into his past and behaviour is slimmer than some of his more public works.
The past couple of days have shown this to be very much the case. A whole forum section closed down and squirreled away, posts from years gone by disappearing within minutes of mention on STF. But again, is this because wrongdoing has been recognised, responsibility accepted, and doing the right thing removing them. And in future will not make such poor judgement calls. Or simple damage limitation? The latter I fear.
As has been said already, there is no doubting the technical abilities of the man, the forums are very pleasing to the eye etc. The question is, what is going to happen with the forums. With nothing more than self preservation in mind, could we see the whole forum closed down to avoid anymore public questions being asked on there, or light shed on questionable behaviours? As much as we hear repeated comments of dedication for the forum, and love for the area, I have no doubt that they would disappear in a heartbeat if it was in HIS best interests.
From my perspective, the driving force behind the whole charade is ego. Recognition within the community, thanks and praise on a regular basis, and the need to have some form of control, and in some cases leverage over others. To maintain the place in the hierarchy so to speak. Control is key here.
With the concerns raised about private data, and the seed planted in peoples minds that there might be something to worry about here, could it be that people will become less comfortable engaging on the forums in the future. I think trust has always been a key factor in the success of forums, especially local ones where people might actually cross paths IRL. I think it is fair to say that the consensus between people, at least those who have aired their concerns publicly, that Mr Beach remaining to have access to the data on the forums is an uncomfortable situation.
Initially I had wondered if simply stepping back into the shadows, and allowing the forum to continue, run on a day to day basis by local moderators, would be enough for those who are currently disenchanted with the whole situation. On reading some of the comments above, I now have my doubts on that.
This isn't to say that the forum is doomed, far from it. But what I think it does signal is a bit of a wake up call for some. As well as a lasting very public record of the kind of behaviours one can expect from the admin of the site, and the wrath you could face for daring to speak out, or even disagree with him.
I really hope that SE23 continues to have a successful community forum in one shape or another. Having seen the dot com site take a steep nose dive over recent times, gaining a bad reputation for over moderation, heavy handed admin tactics, and other such things, it saddens me to see dot life take the exact same path, albeit on a much more unnerving level. With breaches of privacy, accusations of hacking, sharing of personal information, not to mention abusing people who did not conform.
For quite some time dot com was doing just fine, but people make their own decisions on what they see and hear. It has happened once before, could it happen again. Let's hope not.
So, as JGD has already said, an honest and open appeal to the moderators of dot life, to take a long hard look at matters past and present. Evaluate the bigger picture, not just the incident that got us here. Can you honestly say with good conscience that you see no patterns. That there is no ill intent in the actions of the admin, and that you wish to continue working on the forum while the whole thing could happen all over again, should the mood take?
Some honest answers would be great. Is the position of admin tenable? Can trust be restored with Mr Beach in control of the forum, the data, and with access to thousands of peoples messages, IP's and so on? Is no one willing to go on record and say openly that they are appauled at some of the behaviour that has come to light?
I sincerely hope that some deep thinking is going on here, about the future, about associations with the admin, and how people will view the failure to so much as speak out against what has happened. Action takes time, words but just a minute.
ThorNogson wrote: 18 Jul 2019 03:36
It’s been mentioned that this could make a daytime TV soap or perhaps a book. I understand that the following working titles are already in development.
Duncombe Hill Street Blues
Names under the Hammer
Sunset Beach
(Bad) Neighbours
The Great Flava Bakeoff
Pointless
The Clangers
Sorry...
Am I reading this right?
The woman Chris Beach has beef with/ was trolling/ was being trolled by/ whatever *didn't* send a Tweet to him suggesting she knew where he lived and who his wife was
She sent it to a sock puppet account of his to check it was him because of this longstanding beef / trolling blah blah blah?
And all this information was in the public domain anyway? And then Chris posted all this 'personal info' AGAIN on SE23.Life?
And it's PART OF AN IMPORTANT POLICE INVESTIGATION (i'm assuming it's the same kind of 'investigation' you get when your coat gets pinched in a pub... maybe you get a crime reference number of something?)
hotterthanurex wrote: 19 Jul 2019 20:59
Sorry...
Am I reading this right?
The woman Chris Beach has beef with/ was trolling/ was being trolled by/ whatever *didn't* send a Tweet to him suggesting she knew where he lived and who his wife was
She sent it to a sock puppet account of his to check it was him because of this longstanding beef / trolling blah blah blah?
And all this information was in the public domain anyway? And then Chris posted all this 'personal info' AGAIN on SE23.Life?
And it's PART OF AN IMPORTANT POLICE INVESTIGATION (i'm assuming it's the same kind of 'investigation' you get when your coat gets pinched in a pub... maybe you get a crime reference number of something?)
hotterthanurex wrote: 19 Jul 2019 20:59
Sorry...
Am I reading this right?
The woman Chris Beach has beef with/ was trolling/ was being trolled by/ whatever *didn't* send a Tweet to him suggesting she knew where he lived and who his wife was
She sent it to a sock puppet account of his to check it was him because of this longstanding beef / trolling blah blah blah?
The person being trolled by Chris Beach sent a private email to the Chris Beach sock puppet account without naming Chris Beach. There was no Tweet posted with the same content as the email by the person being trolled.
And all this information was in the public domain anyway?
I am not a Facebook user so have little first hand knowledge of what was or was not in the public domain prior to this. I have received reliable reports that much of the personal information was in the public domain, namely Chris Beach’s open Facebook account.
And then Chris posted all this 'personal info' AGAIN on SE23.Life?
Chris Beach did not reply to the private email. Chris Beach chose to publish her email on his .life forums and on Twitter and on other media groups. He chose to include the personal data including first names of his family members and a picture of a road. The person being trolled did not publish this data into the public domain.
As the creator of the sock-puppet account and falsely claiming that the fictional social media manager of the sock-puppet entity worked out the email was about him, he lied that the sock-puppet passed the information to him. This of course proved to be untrue as all of these actions are attributable only to Chris Beach when he confessed he had created and had sole control of the sock-puppet account.
And it's PART OF AN IMPORTANT POLICE INVESTIGATION (i'm assuming it's the same kind of 'investigation' you get when your coat gets pinched in a pub... maybe you get a crime reference number of something?)
Both SE23.life and SE26.life have posts on them alleging that the matter is being investigated by the police. There is no supporting evidence for either or both assertions and no CRN is published. No police service has been in touch with the person being trolled by Chris Beach.
hotterthanurex wrote: 19 Jul 2019 20:01
Love this! Although, to pay tribute to the true spirit of SE23 Life, shouldn't it really be turned into a mural?
Great idea! With a sock puppet in place of the walrus.
Joking aside, what has become abundantly clear to me is that SE23 Life will never be a safe space as far as I am concerned. If, as suggested there, Chris gave up control and sold it on to a new admin, do we suppose he would just leave it alone? Or would his focus switch to destroying SE23 Life in its turn? For those of you with access to Nicola’s twitter account, she has laid out in forensic detail ways in which he used sock puppets and regulatory bodies to attack and force the hand of the SE23 com admin. And that was two years ago. All the time he was attacking the SE23 com admin for underhand tactics, he was doing the same and worse. There is no reason to suppose this pattern of behaviour would change no matter how far he was removed from the running and/or ownership of SE23 Life.
While it’s easy to say this is just about a local forum and why worry, the fact is that his manipulative behaviour hurts people. Real people, real pain.
Rachael wrote: 20 Jul 2019 10:53Or would his focus switch to destroying SE23 Life in its turn? For those of you with access to Nicola’s twitter account, she has laid out in forensic detail ways in which he used sock puppets and regulatory bodies to attack and force the hand of the SE23 com admin. And that was two years ago. All the time he was attacking the SE23 com admin for underhand tactics, he was doing the same and worse.
Just to add almost exactly the same tactics were used against STF - and, I believe, still are. Except CB made a simple fatal mistake of believing I was the Admin which meant it has rather backfired and a free and open Forum is still here - for now.
What he has subsequently said in private to people who know me in an attempt to destroy me has been fed back. He really has no shame.
Given that I have never used underhand tactics against his forums or him one can conclude it was pure completely unjustified vindictiveness. Quite shocking. But something I don't have to lose sleep over. But others have. That is very wrong.
Do we let it continue? Do we have a choice? Rachael may be right the only person who can stop it is CB himself. But is it possible to persuade him it is in his own interest? That's the really hard question.
Again... biggest question. Where does this guy find the time? Or the energy? Does he work? Has he amassed a huge property fortune after successfully gentrifying Forest Hill with a web forum with nicer interface?
