While scanning The Olympian threads this morning, I realized that my lifetime ban appeared to be lifted, as there was no "banned by webmaster" located on the thread. So I posted a comment. Everything went through.
I posted another. Everything went through. And another. Same result.
I then posted a blog on Olyblog mentioning this new find. A few comments went back and forth.
During lunch, I stopped by home and the "banned by webmaster" was back. Must have been a glitch in the software, but I'm wondering, had I not been honest and posted my name and email address, what might have happened?
Would Aaron Mason (see earlier blog in September) have known to block my posts? I could have used a phoney email (one from yahoo or hotmail or something else) and the ever favorite "anonymous" moniker.
This brings up a funny and interesting story. An associate of mine, a former newspaper person, a social liberal/fiscal conservative, with a sarcastic streak, began posting a few months back as "Larry". Mason banned him! Larry called to ask Mason why and Mason began yammering about "people causing problems on the threads" and apologizing profusely (Larry controls a substantial newspaper advertising budget in Olympia). Larry was aware of what had happened with me and was acting on his own. Mason actually disclosed my first and last name to him in their conversation.
Whether I post on The Olympian threads or not is not a life and death situation. I find it comedic that any media would get involved in such a resentment issue to "ban" a commenter. I can understand deleting (which amounts to editing) but aside from that, anything else constitutes spitting in the face of freedom of speech (yes, yes, I know...The Olympian owns the website, but I'm speaking principles here....of course that might be the problem.
The real humor of the day was a couple of the people that opposed my way of thinking had to make an issue about the posts that did get through.
For me being so wrong, they are certainly afraid of what I have to say.
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3 comments:
I wonder if that's why Emma hasn't come to Olyblog. Apparently the IP address isn't always blocked when a person's banned.
As of last Spring ALL of the computers in the lab at Evergreen were banned from posting to the Olympian. Read into that what you'd like.
All of the computers at our office are blocked because we use a router and a single connection, thus one IP address.
There is not much to read into any of this action. It's nothing more than power madness and hypocrisy.
What was posted today in the LTE thread was worse than anything Emma, you and I ever posted.
I still chuckle, though, at the though of Aaron being speechless with The Other Brother Larry.
All the computers at the both the local libraries are banned from posting and even a hospital in Seattle is banned from posting from any family use computers. Several of the WiFi Hotspots are banned around Oly as well. It's crazy. Why even bother having comments sections if you're going to ban most places you can post from?! Personally, I think the owner's of the Daily O should just ban Aaron Mason!
Aaron Mason went on a power trip and his idiotic little ban button is probably permanently attached to his forhead. Every time he smacks his head over a comment, he bans another viable IP address!
I did notice after all the flack between AM & those of us calling him to task about his banning procedures, everything changed at the O. Now you report links to "webmaster@theolympian.com" instead of him directly. And the subject is now the poster's screen name as opposed to the Haloscan website addy like it used to be.
I still believe the O is raping posters of their freedom of speech rights despite the fact it's a website!
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