Mike in CA

This thread has now jumped the shark......

abe

hmmmm...maybe this forum originates from China! Maybe the real moderators names are #"=# (sorry I don't have Chinese characters on my computer).
I came from Cuba....it looks like Cuba followed me here! Never thought I see the day...Amerika...thats good Dan.
Long live the revolution...long live our Father Fidel...death to the Jankee Imperialists!
Who knows what the real truth is...I suggest we talk Porsche or you too maybe errased!
You got to love this....death threats over a car talk on a car forum. Man...how low can people sink.
abe

Marc Gelefsky

That is some good stuff right there.

Gretch

Unfortunately, "easy" is not the objective here, and "cut and dry" is in the eye of the beholder. This web site is a community but it is not a democracy.

In addition, we live in a land governed by rule of law. "Owners" of business assets and public places have a responsibility higher than that of their patrons and customers. Thus it is not always practical nor advisable to defend the firm's actions in the court of public opinion.

Such is life.

LlBr

All the more reason to behave. Sure you can have some rough days but you can't make a habit out of disrespecting people even if "everybody" agrees they "deserve" it. Negativity attracts negativity and breeds more negativity. OcBen didn't know that? There's a guy down my way in real life. He's just looking for an assaultive confrontation. I give him a wide berth. Why would I want to provoke him (or anybody else?), his life is probably tough enough? I'm guessing the internet is a hundred times worse.

997, esq

Apart from being totally irrelevant, you guys seem to be forgetting that this is a private website, and the mods can do whatever they want. (In this case, the free market allows and even encourages restrictions on free speech, to the extent that the forum's viability depends on the absence of fighting words.)

The mods should be able to figure out if OC Ben made a credible (i.e., non-joke) threat of violence, and can act accordingly. I doubt they would terminate someone like Ben or Stoppie without believing they have good reason, as each of those guys generated tons of page views. We, of course, are free to go use other sites

This all being said, I personally enjoyed and used OC Ben's posts. Politically, we probably have some differences. But that's fine. He added a lot of value here, made many quality, well-reasoned posts, and shared a lot of good information.

DJ23

Dan, I have to agree with you. All of a sudden it's starting to look a lot like China and the Google, "freedom of internet debate".

Jay

Minok

Sorry, but I'm not buying that position.

There are (or should be) very specific rules for behavior in a forum. If someone violates those rules significantly, banning from the forum is the right response. It is a public forum after all (ie anyone can sign up and get access).

As such, for the forum rules to mean anything and not be some secret-police action, at a very minimum, it should certainly be public knowledge about which forum rule was violated by someone to get them banned. Exposing the post that caused the incident isn't necessary, but you at least owe us the reason for the ban.

Its a public forum, not medical records where are dealing with here.

Ray S

I agree. You have Bob, Gretch, Mark, and Lewis all indicating that there was justification for the ban. I have not met any of them, but they all stike me as pretty level headed, even handed guys.

Modding has got to be a pretty thankless job. I'm willing to give them the "benefit of the doubt".

Minok

Interesting. The usual way things work is that a post becomes the property of the website, not the poster. A poster can request removal of all of thier posts, but there is no reason a website needs to comply with that request.

A forum like this gains its value as being a record of technical discussions. Search engines link to topics. If a user cannot find a post that was on topic and searchable because it was removed, the usability and the usefulness of the entire forum is undercut.

I hope this website considered these things as they take such actions which weaken/damage their brand.

LlBr

Very true. Owners have the right to decide who's in their place of business. They can handle problems anyway they want as long as no laws are broken. Privately owned business is private.

I guess all of this is very different from our not-exactly-innocent expectations of the Chinese Government.

Okay, I'll shut up now. I tried to do my good deed for the day.

Bob Rouleau

Minok, you are correct about the content belonging to the site. Posts are not deleted on a whim.

tpenta

I'm not sure I can contribute much to this thread but I do have a related question:

Considering OCBen was from Southern California, and given all the rain we have been getting down herre, what do you guys recommend for protecting the paint after going through a heavy rain storm?

I know. I know. Not exactly on topic but a serious question, nonetheless...

-T

RollingArt

Refer to OC Ben's thread on paint,,,

oh wait, that's been deleted. You're on your own !!



Phil

MyEmily

My two cents into this. This is a forum and OCben contributed greatly to this forum. Although he may have gotten dark toward the end of his postings, I can't see why his good contributions are completly taken out? ie his detailing etc... He can simply be banned but to wiped out his contributions? It's like wiping out Reagan's Legacy due to the Iran contra...

Guess this forum have finally reached the end of it usefullness and it's time to create a new one. I think this will be my last post here. I don't like censorship...especially in the WWW. It's fun chatting with you all. I have gotten great infos about my P-car. Saw a lot of great pictures and experienced lots of drama. I will miss it...