complaint

[nobody]

why have i suddenly lost the ability to edit my posts?

[Acoustic Interloper]

[Acoustic Interloper]

This is another post. Now, can I still edit the first?

[blue hell]

[nobody]

I have posts and files I do not want here any longer. while I like many of the people here, I am tired of the way things are done (or rather, not done) around here. It's absolutely wrong to prohibit an artist from modifying or removing his own work - and you know it. You have exercised excessive admin control and that is wrong. I am doing no damage to the forums - that is nothing short of utter nonsense.

So, either return my ability to edit posts so I can remove my own stuff, or completely delete my account and all files. I am withdrawing all rights for electro-music.com to hold or play my work. I don't think I need to point out that I can ascertain whether my request is being honored without an account here, and I am prepared to make a stink if it is not. It is a point of honor with me to treat others with respect and to be treated with respect, and I am not being respected at all lately. I wanted to be a member of a community of artists, to share, to have fun. It is NOT fun to be a member of a broken board with admins making arbitrary decisions that prevent things from working, not to mention make people upset.

I'm just totally tired of how things are run and now I'm extremely irritated at how I've been treated lately. Yes, I may have tried to put my nose where it wasn't wanted, but I can say in my defense that it was out of a sincere desire to support a community of excellent musicians. Was it necessary to say that there are "personality issues"? That was insulting. What's wrong with saying "We have an admin team, thanks for your offer"? I think my only flaw here is that I'm sensitive and nice. I think the people running this show can't say the same, and that's just a damn shame.

Anyway, I want my stuff gone. Either you do it, or let me do it - I don't care which as long as it happens.

[blue hell]

Damien, as requested I have removed all the remaining tracks you had posted here, I will not however remove the posts you made.

I'm really sorry that things had to go this way, but this exactly is the kind of character incompatibility I had in mind at the time.

[Airlock]

[EdisonRex]

And although Jan honored the request to remove Damien's music from the site, the Creative Commons license that Damien chose to protect his work with can't be revoked for those works, so the site has the same rights to play his works as anybody else.

Being accused of administrative incompetence on Facebook, whilst simultaneously unfriending me from Facebook so that I wouldn't see the slander (presumably all of our common friends did) is nasty and personally insulting, however.

This is the sort of disturbing arbitrary and judgmental behaviour which has brought about this situation in the first place.

[nobody]

This is exactly the kind of uptight, holier-than-thou attitude that has driven me away. Are you really so unembarrassed about being such total dicks?

By the way, I don't unfriend people and block them so they can't see all the slander I'm creating. I don't slander. Lay off the paranoia. I don't KNOW you people well enough for that. I just know that as admins, you've done things to make this an unpleasant experience.

I'm gone. I got better things to do with my time.

[JovianPyx]

Wow, what a surreal thread this is.

All I have to say is that I've had nothing but a pleasant experience here at electro-music.com. The "admins" have been not only accommodating, but expeditiously so. I merely mentioned once that I might use more file space for attachments and extended space was immediately granted. I mentioned that my port was unavailable one time and it instantly was re-established - and I had said that I didn't need it - was just curious. And that's all I remember right now... there are more.

None of the people that run this site have any ill will toward anyone, in fact, quite the contrary. Everyone bends over backwards to help.

I would be a character witness for any of them.

EDIT ADD: I know Damien won't read this, I read his post, but I must say that there is no "holier than thou" by admin anything on the forum. That's just nonsense.

[pyrosonic]

In the words of Robin Williams in Mork and Mindy:

"Heavy sigh"

[loydb]

What Jovian said, +1. This place is awesome.

[EdisonRex]

I just spent the weekend thinking all this through. To the point where my kid said to me that he thought I was putting way too much thought into it. I guess that's the type of person I am, I have to work to figure out what it was I did wrong, or resolve it so I am confident I didn't do wrong.

The internal conflict, of course, was that I didn't think I did anything wrong. Nor do I think Jan did anything wrong, or Howard, for that matter. The site is non profit and doesn't run ads, except that one at the bottom which always has the same ad (I don't think Howard makes much from it). It's better than a lot of banner ads controlled by someone else. Point is, we don't get paid for this, it costs money to run, and we do not get paid to do what we do - we just love to do it. I wish I could love my day job as much.

Yeah we've had a rough patch with moving servers, and GoDaddy has had some issues. I've been through this with my other sites (I run a few and don't pimp them here). ISPs have issues, the hardware has issues, and it is more likely someone will contact you about the site being down than you picking up on it before anybody else does. The issues are not all resolved. We still have network issues at the server end, although it is not the server itself (this makes it harder to resolve a ticket for). Especially when it's intermittent. But if you've got a contract, it's hard to throw away money when you could just work with the ISP instead. And moving a terabyte somewhere else (and moving the DNS pointers, etc) is a lot of work, for no real guarantee of better service, no matter who says what. I've been told a lot of stories about ISPs.

After spending a whole weekend thinking about what I must have done wrong, or what Jan did that I had not agreed with, I came to the conclusion that there was nothing - absolutely nothing - that I disagreed with in retrospect about either what Jan said, or what I said or did in this episode.

I won't speak for Jan - I respect him too much - but I can say for myself that I do this because I love the community. It is a small admin team; it is hard to see how a bigger one would work better (we have lots of moderators and janitors, they are a huge help). Harder still, though, to make the admin team bigger when demanded to "because we suck at it". Maybe a larger sample size of dissent would sway me, but a sample size of one isn't really big enough. The community is huge, and growing. So we must be doing something right, despite the problems.

To me, now, after thinking about it, I am comfortable with who I think is wrong in this dispute, and he took his ball home. We objected to the wholesale purging of community knowledge - this is what happens when one contributor wants to "take his content" away. It says in the word "community", you contribute. I think Airlock said it up there in a previous reply. You can't really "un-contribute" without causing real damage to the forums - this is what Jan said, and he did not mean mechanical damage - and I can't escape thinking that Damien knew what he was doing by blowing intellectual holes in hundreds of threads. This was on my mind.

We routinely remove posts from spammers. Every day, day after day, they come. They don't add value so we can easily make that judgement. But I'm stymied by the thought that you can say 1000 separate things on a forum and in a fit of pique, claim a right to remove your existence that took a couple of years to collect, just like that. We could do that, of course, same way we do spammers, but to what purpose? It destroys the historical continuity which is a large piece of the value of the site - the legacy of the community. There have been others who have tried this trick. Sort of like selective amnesia. I don't agree with it, and I never will. It is anti-community, and such behaviour (being willing to edit your history out of a community) is to me more about the self than the community. The spammers aren't community, so I don't see the same philosophy there. I always thought it was a service to the community to remove spam. It is rarely a service to remove, or allow to be removed, a contributing member. And I do not think it is the "right" of someone to un-do what they say by making it go away. I am not in the least bit sorry for thinking that, either.

The hardest conclusion I came to this weekend is that I don't actually regret this outcome. I am disappointed, frustrated, and tired of it. I will try not to bring this thread up again. But I did want to say how much I appreciate the support of all of the people who have mentioned it (in chat, in the forums, and my wife and kids who also commented) and to thank everyone for being a really super and caring community; it's all about you, not me, not Jan, not Damien.

If you read this far, thanks. I didn't want to feed the troll, so to speak, but I do feel better myself getting this out. My conscience is still clear. If I'm a dick, well, I guess that's the way it is. At least I'm transparent about it.

[Johan Zwart]

I'm not the starter of this thread, but... http://electro-music.com/forum/post-336303.html#336303

[abstraktor]

without intending to flame the topic, I'm sure some folks detected possible nascent troll like tendencies from early on

[Acoustic Interloper]

Paul, fear not. These things will happen. No reflection on you, Jan, or anyone else working so hard to keep this site the great place that it is.

[Airlock]

[Inventor]

As is so often (well, always) the case, I am impressed with the thoughtfulness and dare i say it - love - of this electro-music.com community. I once exploded and ran off in a fit of self-destructive frustration and months later was welcomed back with open arms. At that time I mentioned burning all my bridges and I was told that those bridges were made of stone, not wood.

So it is with Damien. If you are reading this, if word gets to you, once you cool off and realize your tremendous loss of community you will be welcomed back should you choose to return. Oh, and by the way, erasing your posts will not erase our memories of you and your refreshingly reactionary personality.

Les

[hrastprogrammer]

I don't have anything to add to what Les and the others said in the posts above

[Symatic Star]

To the Fantastic admins volunteering 1000's of hours of their own time that they could be spending with their families, making music, building synths, or walking their dog for that matter......

You are very very very appreciated here at e-m community.

Your honest self examination and open communications in the above matter shines and exposes your strong integrity and emotional intelligence.

I am confidant you would also welcome Damien back if he chooses this and like any evolved interpersonal relationship , it can be talked through with him calmly when things cool down.

To Damien- Take care mate , and see you if you return later

Symatic

[Uncle Krunkus]

I for one can attest to the patience and tolerance of the E-M moderators and members in general. I've had more than one blinkered rant in my time, and it has generally been met with compassionate ears.

However,........

Erasing posts, even your own, is a destructive and childish practice that should not be tolerated.
You have again executed a competent, difficult and often thankless job, Paul & Jan.
Thank you.

[Jack_Hertz]

I really hate to see folks not getting along. As the admin of a few forums myself. I cannot tell you how much it pains me to see the Staff getting a black eye even when things go wrong. Ironically, this comes from a curious situation where the Staff are doing such a good job that people forget about them. When things go wrong, it seems outrageous and incompetent. When the reality is, the Staff is there all along running things smoothly. Moreover, even when nothing is wrong on the surface. There is a torrent of issues, a back log of to-do's and mostly luck that tomorrow won't bring too many surprises.

That said, every member of any community. Please, the Staff are not our servants but they serve us. Try to return a little consideration and remember that. Even better, don't post a topic to show your angst. Simply drop them a PM asking if something is wrong and be ready to be patient, understanding and willing to compromise. You have no idea how far that goes in helping these people do their job. Yes, Its a job to be invisible.

[Airlock]

[A E J O T Z]

Does this mean that I'm expected to actually follow rules that I agreed to follow?