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As of last night, Absolute Write was gone. It was one of the leading sites for information on writing and publishing, especially the scam versions thereof. Their ISP pulled the plug on them one hour’s notice. Now, where there should be a broad, deep online community with an enormous message base going back years, there’s this.
Among other things, AW was the main collection point for information about PublishAmerica.
How this happened: remember Barbara Bauer, that horrible old harridan and scam agent who tried to get me fired because I reproduced the Twenty Worst Agents list and she was on it?
Apparently Barbara Bauer made a screaming, abusive phone call to one Stephanie, the person who owned the web host. Bauer claimed that having AW’s scamhunters post her email address at AW was illegal under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), and that doing so had caused Bauer to get spam, which meant that AW was a spammer, and that this would get the web host put on every blacklist in the world.
Mind, the message that quoted Bauer’s e-mail address had some time ago been amended to remove that address. Furthermore, Barbara Bauer posts that exact same email address on her own website.
Stephanie had no more sense than to panic and shut down AW on an hour’s notice. I’m given to understand that some of AW’s message base was lost. For the record, AW was hosted at:
JC-Hosting
TotalWeb International Net Consulting
4037 Navaho Trail
Nashville TN 37211Toll Free: (877) 411-7891
Phone: (615) 469-7533
Fax: (615) 250-2430
Stephanie’s been known to post as “Moonshadow” at Absolute Write. The wonderful fact, for certain values of wonderful, is that Stephanie is one of PublishAmerica’s authors. Some people are just not smart enough to be allowed to run loose on the Internet.
Here’s what I’m told AW requires of a new host: 100-150 Gigabytes per month in traffic, plus 2 Gigabytes more of space, plus running a very active webboard based on MySql and a bunch of scripts.
Meanwhile, I have frantic email from a friend who posts to AW and is trying to figure out how to find versions of the texts of her messages there so she can save them. Any suggestions will be gratefully appreciated.
Addenda: Many members of the online writing community have responded to this appalling event by re-posting the 20 Worst Agents List that Barbara Bauer is trying to suppress.
Back when I first wrote about it, I linked to AW’s version of the list. Obviously, that’s a dead link now. Anyone else who’s linked to the AW version might want to consider re-linking to SFWA’s instantiation of the list.
AW regulars Jim Hines and Dawno have their own suggestions for spreading the word.
Further: I’ve been seeing various mentions of this, now confirmed: Stephanie Cordray (that Stephanie) has chosen this week to announce her revival of her “comprehensive resource site” for writers, Writing Wise. (Why, yes, that is a nofollow link. Funny you should ask.)
Do I still believe in the culpability of Barbara Bauer? I certainly do. There’s too much corroborating evidence. I believe this Writing Wise thing is a separate piece of stupidity.
To extend what I’ve already said to Stephanie’s guy James, down in the comment thread, it looks bad for an ISP to pull the plug on a customer’s site for foolish reasons, and worse to do it for no reason at all, but it’s downright offputting to do it in the same week that you roll out a competing site of your own.
I hope they find a host soon. Ms Bauer certainly sounds like someone determined to silence all criticism. Perhaps she even thinks that she is altruistically providing a service for writers and ensuring that they get their work to the public, rather than wringing the pennies out of people with large dreams but limited abilities.
Static stuff is available from the Wayback Machine,
http://web.archive.org/web/20050401092424/http://www.absolutewrite.com/
but I don't believe the forums were archived.
Your friend's best bet is probably to try her name or userid on Google along with "site:absolutewrite.com", and see what they have cached (click on the "Cached" links, not the page titles). That should be done as soon as possible, before Google notices that the originals are gone.
Holy crap! )-:
I've got nothing but positive things to say about Speakasy.net's service, FWIW. I believe they're up to hosting AW from a technical standpoint and they seem to be very cool, competent folks, so they may be worth talking to.
Even if she does believe her own line, the way you silence all criticism is to be so damn good that all the people who really have benefitted from your work leap to your defense, before you even have to ask them.
If you find yourself in the position of constantly having to defend your work to your peers, you should probably consider asking whether they have a point. (They may not. It is possible that you [meaning the impersonal you, which really means "one" but I'm being informal here] are such a maverick, so misunderstood, and so misrepresented that absolutely nobody understands you. History does have its share of misunderstood geniuses. But it has a greater share of dishonest scammers.)
Would writing JC-Hosting accomplish anything? AW's been a godsend resource, giving me a place to send the hopefuls who call the editorial hotline looking for advice on how to write their novels.
I use site5 dot com to host. I don't do anything fancy, but they've been good for what I do.
One glitch occurred a year or two ago when they had to rename a computer. Apparently they use randomly generated letters to name them (or something), and I ended up on a host that had the word Sierra Echo Xray* in it, and apparently some other customers didn't like that. It took a little work to make sure all my stuff pointed to the right destination. fairly smooth since then, though.
*I spell phonetically because Making Light rejected my post and I'm not sure why.
testing the filter:
"I use site5 dot com"
oop. no. It didn't like an actual dot
That's awful. As for a host, I use BlueHost.com. Their standard package runs $6.95/month and offers more bandwidth and space than AW requires, plus it has MySQL and lots of other goodies.
Testing:
"the word SEX in the machine name"
false alarm...
. . . this is when I kick myself for not updating my PublishAmerican page earlier, as my notes to myself on what needed doing were in the forms of, you guessed it, links to Absolute Write.
I haven't had the time to read the boards there for a while, but it was a great resource and a lot of good people posted there. I hope it's up again soon.
I can actually empathize with the host.. I've had to field the kinds of calls she probably got, and they can be extremely ugly. A small host could easily either panic or simply decide the site isn't worth the hassle, especially if the person on the other end sounds just kooky enough to try to make good on their threats.
It was definitely a horrible overreaction, however. I certaintly hope they can find new hosting quickly.
AW's not gone! It's only restin' (and pinin' for the fjords).
Jenna is very appreciative of everyone's concern and wants to reassure all that the site will be back ASAP.
No worries. Jenna (AW's owner) is looking for a new hosting site even as I type this. She promises that the site is not gone and will be back up "badder than before."
Look for AW's returning within the next 24-48 hours. We'll keep everyone updated.
If you visit AW's main page -- www.absolutewrite.com -- there's a link to the forums where our peeps are gathering in the meantime.
Thanks for keeping people updated for us, TNH.
~Lori aka Birol
http://www.nomonthlyfees.com
I swear by them. They have always been fair with me and the price can't be beat.
Nooooooo! I had just finally gotten beyond the 10th page of the Jim Macdonald writing thread after giving up and just making a bookmark to whatever page I'd ended my night's reading on.
Loosing the Great PA thread is a tragedy.
Loosing Jim Macdonald's thread is a crime against humanity.
I hope a new host can be found soon, and the majority of the data recovered. I refuse to believe that -all- of it is just... gone.
Oh my gosh, this stinks. I love AW. I never posted much, mostly lurked, but the good work they do and the community that they offer to writers is fantastic.
May Barbara Bauer rot in literary Hades for her perfidy!
I can recommend my excellent webhost, JaguarPC. It looks like the Longhorn hosting plan will fit AW's requirements, though they might want to upgrade to a semi-dedicated account. I've had good results with their customer service, and I would suggest alerting the owner to the possibility of scamming idiots trying to shut them down for speaking the truth.
For all we know, the entire SQL database is still there on the old ISP's servers, just not live on the web. I hope someone's looking into that, AND SOON. All very well that Jenna Glatzer says it'll be up again soon, but accumulated value of AW is contained in its message base. It's the heart of AW, and should be saved ASAP on a "take heroic measures if needed" basis.
Aaaargh. This is like watching GEnie SFRT go down all over again.
J. C. Hosting's actions are those of an incompetent provider, technically and legally.
They responded by taking down the entire domain, rather than dealing with the specific issue.
They gave their client an hour to retrieve not only the database for the forum, but all data.
They did this in response to a telephone call.
Note that the DMCA has nothing at all to do with the kind of content Bauer objected to.
Even if it did, there are specfic measures and procedures to follow--procedures the J. C. Hosting didn't follow, even though they had contact with people who explained this to them.
Note as well that J. C. Hosting lacks a TOS statement, a DMCA compliance statement, or a Privacy statement.
And that nothing said about Bauer on Absolute Write was false; it was all true. And none of it violated copyright.
What a colossal load of crap. I've been following the ramifications of the "20 Worst" list since they first went public.
Thanks for posting this, or else I may have never learned what happened.
I should say that by going to AbsoluteWrite.com, there is a placeholder page saying the site will be back within 24 hours. I hope that's the case.
Honestly, the whole thing sorely tempts me to call Bauer directly (Sign #143 that she's a phony: She puts her phone number on her webpage) just to harass her a little, but I get the impression she exerts a lot more energy being crazy than she does selling books.
Just wondering... has anyone contacted a lawyer about a possible coutersuit?
I'm tempted to provide alternatives for Sierra Echo Xray, lest any sites have the NATO phonetic alphabet programmed in.
Sam Edward Xray
Sugar Easy X-ray
Sugar Edward Xerxes
Samuel Emil Xanthippe
It seems that X has always been a problem with these things, but otherwise it's as easy as Ack, Beer, Charlie.
"Here's what I'm told AW requires of a new host: 100-150 Gigabytes per month in traffic, plus 2 Gigabytes more of space, plus running a very active webboard based on MySql and a bunch of scripts."
1&1's developer package, which I use, is $20/month and features 150gb of space, 1.5tb of transfer volume and the capacity for 100 MySql databases.
Hell, if money is an issue for AbsoluteWrite, I could probably host it myself, via my own developer account. I've got space.
What Lisa Spangenberg said, about that ISP.
We use Hosting Matters (http://hostmatters.com). They're technically competent, they know what kind of harrassment they need to deal with and what kind they can ignore, and they have highly affordable plans that could easily handle AW's needs.
For a big site (and that sounds like a big site) you need your own server. I recommend layeredtech.com. They'll lease you your very own server for as little as $68 a month. The only downside is that you need someone somewhat tech savvy to get everything set up.
Normally a post about literary agents on my blog would be rather off-topic. But I'm going to add a copy of the 20 Worst to my blog and a link to this thread explaining what BB's been up to, and I hope all the other AW bloggers will do the same thing.
This means WAR!
(Disclaimer for rotten agents spying on this thread: This statement in no way endorses physical threats on Barbara Bauer's person or attempts to cause physical harm to her. War is being used in a purely metaphorical sense to denote a struggle to publish our side of the story on the Internet.)
That's really terrible. It wouldn't surprise me if the SQL is still on the server, whther they'll let her access it is another story.
As far as another host goes, I've been very happy with dreamhost. They're very reliable, customer service has been pretty good, and the price is great. Even the lowest plan is well above absolutewrite's needs, and they expand their servces constantly.
If AW's owners end up needing techie assistance to migrate the site to a new server, I'd be happy to help out. (I do the Apache/MySQL/script thing at my day job.)
If any of us can help find a hosting provider, do you have an email address of the either of the people involved in Absolute Write so that the hosting provider can contact them? Or should we just post recommendations here?
TotalWeb Hosting can also be reached here. I just sent them a polite, brief shame on you email.
http://www.totalweb-inc.com/contact.html
I did not state that they're gettiing more negative publicity than they could dream of about the whole thing.
Jenna has a handle on the data contained on the forums.
For those who don't recognize me, I'm Birol, one of the Supermods on AW. I'm here because Jenna asked someone to handle questions, etc., as they arose while she concentrated on finding a host and getting the forums back up.
She spent a good portion of the post-midnight hours researching hosts last night. She has selected one based on her research, which included contacting her top choices. The data, including the forums, is believed safe.
I will let her know about the offers for technical assistance.
Thanks all. Your concern for AW is heartwarming.
TNH, I hope it is alright that I'm responding here?
Can a host really drop someone that fast? I don't mean technically, I mean doesn't it violate some contract? Once the dust settles, the data is saved, and AW is back on-line, could AW turn around and nail J.C. Hosting for breach of contract?
Jenna and Absolute will prevail! Thanks for all of your great work AW 'behind the curtain' gang! We appreciate it. See you in the COOLER!
That's an excellent question, Alice, but I'm not knowledgeable enough to respond to questions about the potential legal ramifications of the actions of any of the parties involved.
AW exiles are gathering here: http://www.starchat.net/chat/?chan=absolutewrite
At this point, I find myself unable to remember if Stephanie went by "MoonShadow" or "MoonDancer."
Hi all.
I'm Jenna's co-administrator at AbsoluteWrite and one of her employees as well. I post on the forums as ChunkyC. We did indeed manage to retrieve all our sql databases before the plug was pulled. It's only a matter of time -- and making sure we're bright-eyed and bushy-tailed while we do the work -- before we'll be back in business.
On behalf of Jenna and everyone at AW, thank you all so much for for your support. It means the world to us.
I'm tempted to provide alternatives for Sierra Echo Xray, lest any sites have the NATO phonetic alphabet programmed in.
A little time experiencing real nato acronyms teaches encoding skills. Abhor reducable entries. Grant obfuscated oddities deviously.
I loved the Uncle Jim thread. I was horrified this morning to see it missing!
I want to add that Hasweb is a GREAT ISP. I've never had a problem, they are cheap, give good support, and can do lots of things.
Thanks, Charlie, Lori, and everyone who's helping Jenna find a new home for AW.
i really hope to god that it all comes back...
i posted all my stuff there. its just gotta be there.
Just wanted to add my support - I've been lurking on the "Uncle Jim" threads a while too - and I have reposted the "20 worst" list at Villagers with Pitchforks.
It looks like AW will be back up sometime tomorrow morning. The data is currently loading -- it will take some time to complete this -- and then there's some technical stuff that has to be done to make certain it is safe before reopening the site.
Had it not been for the Absolute Write Water Cooler, I would have never applied to Viable Paradise last year. It's a terrific resource, and I'm very glad to know it'll be back soon.
I hate seeing somebody get results by yelling and screaming and being abusive to people who don't deserve the abuse. That, I think, is the worst part of this whole mess for me. Dr. Bauer has now learned she can get (at least temporary) results from throwing a large enough fit. She's not the sort of person I want getting that kind of positive reinforcement.
If there are further problems with the new host, I'll second the recommendation for Dreamhost. I've been extremely pleased with them. My forum is nowhere as active as AW these days, but I had very little trouble getting a 1.2GB database transferred to them.
Because of the size and then-activity level of our forums, we had three host changes within six months. It's always good to have a back-up host selected.
Wowzers. And I thought it was just a bandwidth issue. If Barbara Bauer thought she had issues with people talking about her on the web before, she's going to sorely regret it this time tomorrow.
I do hope Jenna and gang inform their new ISP of what had happened, in case it's attempted again.
Thank you Lori! That's wonderful news.
I'm hoping that the ultimate result of Barbara Bauer's temper tantrum will be many more new writers warned away from her.
I wonder what the odds are that this fight may spill over off the Internet and turn up in magazines too? Jenna is a contributing editor at Writer's Digest, and AW is a hangout for freelance writers who may see interesting stories in this for both writing and technology magazines. I can just see the headline now: "Disreputable agent attempts to destroy popular writing website."
Thank you so much for these updates -- I was wondering what in the world was going on. I usually sign on first thing in the morning and wake up with AW while drinking my coffee. It was an odd thing to see it gone. I'm glad to hear it isn't going to be for good, though!
I'm glad all the data's been saved.
And I second the 'countersuit' motion. As I understand it (IANAL), this case certainly meets the criteria for a legitimate lawsuit. The site being pulled probably cost AW money in advertizing, not to mention money in time spent finding a new host and getting everything up and running again. And they can certainly make a slander case on the grounds that Bauer's actions cost them a business relationship.
I do hope Jenna and gang inform their new ISP of what had happened, in case it's attempted again.
In light of the positive results Whazzerface gave to Barbara Bauer, you can be certain that it will be attempted again.
Bauer has a history of this kind of nonsense, too. Bank on more attempts.
these guys are reliable, inexpensive, and know their legal rights. plus they don't take any crap from silly people:
http://www.arrowweb.net/
Thanks for the update, Teresa. I saw Moondancer's angry little post about Barbara Bauer yesterday morning and had a terrible feeling that this might have been behind AW's sudden disappearance. Great. Way to give a bully and a blowhard exactly what she wanted.
Best wishes to Jenna and the other AWers trying to deal with this -- I'm so sorry for everything you guys have been through.
Insomnicole on AW.
I'm tempted to provide alternatives for Sierra Echo Xray, lest any sites have the NATO phonetic alphabet programmed in.
Sam Edward Xray
Sugar Easy X-ray
Sugar Edward Xerxes
Samuel Emil Xanthippe
It seems that X has always been a problem with these things, but otherwise it's as easy as Ack, Beer, Charlie.
Wrong code. You want an old British WWII code if you want to be subtle.
A for Horses
B for Mutton
C for th'ilanders
D for mation
E for brick
F for vescence
...
X for th
Y for heavens sake
Z for effect
It apparently gave German codebreakers nightmares - particularly as it was obvious that there was no codebook. (May be an urban myth that it was used against the Germans). There are, of course, many versions of this code.
Are there any legal issues with Googlebombing, as described here?
Hope not, because I think it's a damn good idea...
Dreamhost.com. They're great. I can get her a deal too, so it will cost her 20 bucks.
A little time experiencing real nato acronyms teaches encoding skills. Abhor reducable entries. Grant obfuscated oddities deviously.
Although masterful, acronymic zeal indicates nuttiness, Greg!
Be rightly awarded voluntary ovation!
I have over 500GB of bandwidth per month, and I will gladly donate 150 or more for free to AW.
-=Jeff=-
I just spoke to Stephanie. She won't say anything but "I am not at liberty to discuss it." I said fine, so listen instead, and exhorted her to make sure that data had been saved. She said, rather sullenly, that she is not at liberty to discuss it.
Fine time for her to suddenly get scrupulous about legalities.
I've been on the phone to my friend who's lost a book's worth or more of her writing, if the AW message base isn't saved. Scouring Google Cache has yielded her about three hundred posts, and it's obvious that many major pieces are missing.
She's desolate, of course. Writers who've lost their writing are like that.
I'm mad as hell at Stephanie, and Barbara Bauer, but I'm also furious at the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. Lisa Spangenberg is right about JC Hosting acting wrongly; but the DMCA primarily exists, not as a set of rules, but as a reason for service providers to be constantly afraid of finding themselves in violation of those rules. It leads them to take ill-judged, cruel, and stupid actions.
And a word about sex: there ought not be any content-based blocking on this site. If you're getting messages to that effect, post them here.
I am deeply saddened. I had read the first handful of screens of Jim's "Learn Writing..." thread and meant to get back to them later, but it looks as though that may not be possible.
I'm extremely displeased. In fact, were I to wax Biblical, I would say my wrath runneth over. I had an article on AbsoluteWrite back in December, and I don't have many articles anywhere.
Now it's been *censored*. And not by the gov't, or the military, or a powerful corporation, but by a gallingly inept scam artist.
Googlebomb her to the level of "miserable failure", say I.
I've been on the phone to my friend who's lost a book's worth or more of her writing
I suck at backing up my harddrive. The fear of losing years and years of work has been insufficient to get me to start a burn-cd-and-file-away-safely habit, so two months ago I bought an ethernet based, raid-5 drive, with a terabyte+ of storage. It's the size of a shoebox, and contains four separate harddrives for raid-ing the data, and a linux brain to handle everything. If one drive ever craps out, I shut it down, order a new harddrive, insert the blank, hit a button, and it restores the drive. Another button will automatically backup data in a directory from that drive out to an external USB drive. I just got it up and running this weekend and will start pulling all my data over to it in the coming weeks. I've had a harddrive crap out on my previous systems about once every three years, so I got sick of all the hassle involed in recovery.
Just wanted to add my own note of support for AW. Glad to find out what happened.
Folks, please don't panic, yet. It does look like we managed to save almost everything (fingers crossed)--and Medievalist is kindly talking to me about future backing-up options, so this can't happen again.
Have them check out BlueHost.com. I use that for my host and I'm fairly certain it would meet their hosting needs.
Of course I placed a link to this entry in both my blogs, and mentioned Barbara by name. I almost stooped to calling her a name, but I have younger readers.
I hope the Karma train runs her over, backs up and runs her over again.
MacAllister, I can volunteer space and bandwidth for a mirror as extra insurance. I have something like 9GB of disk space and an obscene amount of bandwidth going unused.
Just as a heads up - I have linked to this over in the cranky_editors livejournal community, as it should be of some interest to those members.
I wish Jenna all the best luck in finding a new host, and a smackdown from the Kharmic Hand of Fate to Stephanie and Barbara.
BetN
I find it rather horrific that a faux literary agent making money on the dreams of ignorant folk would be able to call onto the carpet their whistleblowers. There is no justice.
I've been in contact with the webhost, and I've been assured that the underlying data will be available by FTP within the next hour or so. I've had some behind-the-scenes discussions; I can't disclose anything, so don't ask.
C.E. Petit IS a lawyer. Not, of course, that that's relevant to the previous post. That I'm saying.
*hugs* Charlie. I respect your legal confidentiality if you respect my right to 'Woohoo'. =D
Are there any legal issues with Googlebombing, as described here?
I believe, and f---ing hope, that truth still wins out over all else when it comes to such stuff. therefore, if said link was used in the context of stating an indisputable fact, such as
"Barbara Bauer(link) has been listed on SFWA's '20 Worst Agencies'"
then I believe reporting the fact is not a problem.
I am not a lawyer, although I beat one up on TV.
One of my (admittedly selfish) fears is that some of the wonderful folks who have gathered at the Cooler will decide the tumult isn't worth it and stop posting.
Teresa, if your friend has posted a book's worth of wisdom at the Cooler, I have undoubtedly benefitted from her wisdom more than once. I hope she doesn't lose heart.
I second Christine's comment about the Karma train.
This is ridiculous. Don't want crap to fall on you, don't be a scammer.
I say forward this information to as many writing communities as possible and let crap fall where it deserves.
Most of the people who are regular to AW are at the chat having a good ole time. Feel free to join us.
Just go to absolutewrite.com and click on the link there.
I don't think people will stop posting or being part of that community because of this.
"Here he comes to save the dayyyyy..."
Thanks, Charlie, for all that you do.
The ISP should have first gone to Chilling Effects:
http://www.chillingeffects.org/
...in order to find out how bogus the original takedown threat was.
If anyone here ever gets any form of legal threat letter related to online activities, research in Chilling Effects first. A threat looks worse if you feel like you're alone in receiving it. If you need to make a change, you can learn where your responsibilities start and end. If the threat is wrong, you'll have better tools to counter it.
And always send a copy of the legal letter to them. Keeps everyone aware of the larger and smaller patterns in online legal threats- especially the bogus ones and the automated ones.
C.E.is run by the Electronic Frontier Foundation and multiple law schools, and as they summarize:
" Chilling Effects aims to help you understand the protections that the First Amendment and intellectual property laws give to your online activities. We are excited about the new opportunities the Internet offers individuals to express their views, parody politicians, celebrate their favorite movie stars, or criticize businesses. But we've noticed that not everyone feels the same way. Anecdotal evidence suggests that some individuals and corporations are using intellectual property and other laws to silence other online users. Chilling Effects encourages respect for intellectual property law, while frowning on its misuse to "chill" legitimate activity.
The website offers background material and explanations of the law for people whose websites deal with topics such as
Fan Fiction,
Copyright,
Domain Names and Trademarks,
Anonymous Speech, and
Defamation. "
I'm so relieved to hear that people are working to get the site back. I'm also amazed to see so many of the people I know posting on this page (btw, I'm MDavis).
AW is not dead it's just sleeping!
I am much heartened that a recovery may be possible. Best of luck to those involved in getting it running again.
Of course, finding a set of takedown letters in Chilling Effects isn't everything: the resolution may be found elsewhere.
Witness the letter from Mastercard dealing with a "priceless" style joke:
http://www.chillingeffects.org/trademark/notice.cgi?NoticeID=17
And the response:
http://www.netfunny.com/rhf/jokes/01/Apr/mcrhf.html
"Web site hosting for anybody: $10/month and up
Threatening letters to people who satirize you, hoping
they won't know the law: $500
Reputation as giant corporation required to intimidate
small publishers: $billions
Supreme court decisions protecting parody and
satire from accusations of copyright and
trademark infringement... Priceless
There are some rights money can't buy. For everything else, there's Mastercard's lawyers."
Some AW Bloggers are starting to post about Ms Bauer on their blogs and many are using the Technorati Tag: BarbaraBauer
Maybe if you're blogging about this, you'd like to use it too :-)
What a shock it was - I joined up last night, worked up a slightly wordy Newbie introduction, clicked my bookmark to sign on and post for the first time and - NOTHING! It was gone, and I've been depressed all day. So glad to hear things will be sorted out soon.
That's horrible Midnight. Please come back to us when we're reopened. Or join us in the chat room now.
Francis: That's a version not of a code, but of the 'Cockney Alphabet', which is the alphabet rendered as a series of puns in an East End accent.
I am stunned. There are other words, but they are not fit to use here.
Perhaps this shows why I'm not a lawyer, but I thought that a DMCA takedown notice had to be in writing. Perhaps it was, but a phone call shouldn't trigger a takedown. Also, it doesn't take an advanced degree to know that spammers get your e-mail address by various means. Heck, when I changed ISP's last month I was getting spam at my freshly-minted address before the day was out.
I'd like to add my offer of technical help, and plan to blog about this.
a phone call shouldn't trigger a takedown
part of me is wondering if "Stephanie is one of PublishAmerica's authors." may have contributed to the ease of take-downed-ness. But then, I can be a cynical bstrd sometimes.
It was all about the posting of her e-mail address? I thought and was told that it was my and Jim Macdonald's posts about Barbara Bauer that, when Jenna refused to take them down, made the web host shut AW down.
I didn't hear about this part of the story though.
Hah, I just called the webhoster and complained that they had pulled AW off the net. They claim AW was committing seven separate crimes, but I tend to doubt their story. The guy was nice, but he did a lot of hemming and hawing and none of it rang true. Basically he said AW was taking Bauer's email down then reposting it.
He also claimed that Bauer had nothing to do with the shutdown, but he couldn't explain why everywhere the woman went a trail of destruction followed. Coincidence, no doubt.
The J. C. Hosting claims depend largely on when you call and which person you speak to.
Bottom line: it all goes back to BB, and the Absolute Write ISP behaving unprofessionally, and stupidly. This is the kind of idiocy that earns hosting companies a really bad reputation; it's the kind of thing we talk about at IT and networking conferences and content and design conferences, and you can bet I'll be talking about this episode for quite a while. It's got all sorts of lesson potential for How To Be A Your Own Worse Enemy as an ISP.
He also claimed that Bauer had nothing to do with the shutdown....
He's lying.
Just for the record:
1. "AW's message base was lost" false the data base is intact.
2. "Stephanie is one of PublishAmerica's authors" false again she has never been involved with PublishAmerica
I could go on but I doubt that my post will stay for long as it is real easy to see that this group is not about truth its all about how big of a rumor can I start.
A big thanks to C. E. Petit and the whole AW Mod Squad. It looks like the end result is going to be absolutely the worst possible outcome possible for Barb. Had Stephanie merely laughed this off, it would have been just a footnote in one thread that many AW members don't even read.
But instead, it looks like she has merely bought herself maybe sixty hours of time during which people looking for threads about her on AW will get error messages. And meanwhile, she has done something very public to annoy the entire online writing community. Multiplying online enemies is about the worst result you can get if you are trying to keep something about your operation a secret.
Thank you for posting that explanation. I was wondering what had happened.
That lunatic--and we should give her a name they way the AW PublishAmerica thread gave one to the fellow we now call "Shemp"--has sent some incoherent e-mails to me. She's accused me of extortion and blackmail for posting that 20 Worst list on my site, along with a link to Writer Beware. She also demanded that I hand over your home address, number, along with that of several others on her **** list. (Yeah, surrrrre. Sheesh.)
Just in case my name crops up on the BB radar I've fired a mail off to my ISP host with a link to THIS page. I've asked to be assured that they won't shut my site down. "Shempett's" e-addy is not on it, but I like to be careful.
"Stephanie is one of PublishAmerica's authors."
Now that's scary. I recognize her AW name and am rather puzzled that she's wholly ignored the overwhelming bad press PA has gotten on their site.
It strikes me that there is something of a conflict of interest going on, and perhaps this was a convenient excuse to stick it to AW.
Shame-shame. Baaaad host! No cookie!
Last night when I tried to go to AW I got an "exceeds bandwidth" message. I figured some PAer finally went rabid and started a Denial of Service attack. Given that a PA author pulled the plug, I was more right than I knew.
The not-so-redoubtable Ms. Bauer will be quite busy, I'm certain, firing off abusive emails to the folks blogging it all.
We'll have to get together in a few weeks and have beers and compare hate mail.
I could go on but I doubt that my post will stay for long as it is real easy to see that this group is not about truth its all about how big of a rumor can I start.
Oh, no, James. Your post will live on to embarrass you for years.
But since I have you here, how about you tell the real story of why you guys pulled the plug?
You say it had nothing to do with scam agent Barbara Bauer, PhD. I say you're lying.
Let's hear your story. And make it convincing.
Oh.My.God. I can't believe this! I abandoned a different forum and came to AW at the urging of Christine. I sooo can't believe a single individual did this! (I had a post I was waiting for a reply to) I've met some wonderful people, had great feedback and received good advice when I asked even the silliest of questions!
I'm holding out for you, Jenna. (You're my forum hero, ma'am!)
I don't think Moondancer was a PA author. Last year she posted "I'm not a PA author or an author at all... yet.." on the AW board (found via Google cache)
Her blog is http://www.sgcordray.com/ and it doesn't mention it. (Though was she does mention is pretty suspicious for the tin-foil hat types like myself).
I have been wrong before, though.
James, it's not going to look good that you pulled the plug on AW because of Barbara Bauer, but if you just say "Okay, it was a dumb thing to do, but she was a complete harpy and she scared the bleep out of us," it'll blow over.
Do you have any idea how much worse it will look if you claim that you pulled the plug on AW for no reason at all?
Do you really expect us to believe that on the very same day that Barbara Bauer called up and screamed at Stephanie, and that Stephanie posted in public that any web host would toss a site for less -- that on that very same day you just randomly pulled the plug on AW, and yet Barbara Bauer had nothing to do with it?
All my life I've been hearing the phrase, "scare the wits out of someone," but this is the first time I've actually seen it happen.
One explanation:
The DMCA has no relationship whatsoever to this contretemps. The DMCA relates only to copyright infringement, and I am not aware of any accusations of copyright infringement that have been made against AW. Copying someone's e-mail address is not a copyright infringement.
Phooey. I would so very much have liked to have blamed the DMCA. Are you sure? Perhaps they misunderstood, and thought it did apply...
I am shocked that BB succeeded in puling down AW. I hope Miss Bauer does not think this will resuslt in more clients for her. It will not. I also plan on discussing this on my blog
I wasn't a member of the AW forums, but I frequently browsed them for market info, etc., and the news that they'd been shut down by a scam artist just infuriates me. I've done my bit for the Google bomb on my own blog and will encourage all my writer friends to do the same.
Thanks for letting us know about this, Teresa!
Just leaving my message here, to support Jenna and her moderators in their hard work to get AW back online, for 110%. Your work is so valued and so incredible, you really make the (writing) world a better place! I believe in karma, what goes around will certainly come around to those who deserve it! To all my fellow AW members, hang in there!
Bauer typically claims that there's a DMCA issue when she writes her screeds. She's wrong, but somehow I don't find that surprising.
Will you go for the proposition that the chief purpose of the DMCA is to spread a chilling fog of fear, uncertainty, and doubt? If so, and if BB used it to terrorize a couple of people who couldn't tell that it didn't apply, could you not say that we've seen the DMCA in action?
We're talking here about a couple of hosting-site proprietors who fell for BB's claim that specific instances of spam were traceable to one specific appearance of an e-mail address in an online venue. While I wouldn't take that as proof that they'd believe absolutely anything, it kinda comes close.
The DMCA has no relationship whatsoever to this contretemps. The DMCA relates only to copyright infringement, and I am not aware of any accusations of copyright infringement that have been made against AW. Copying someone's e-mail address is not a copyright infringement.
This is ABSOLUTELY correct.
A google search of Barbara Bauer yields... her site at #1, and another BB at #2 (different field, engineering or something) and....
AW Water Cooler cached page, then this page and the other Making light page.
Of the top 4 links related to BB, three are bad.
Apparently, she's been at this for a long time...
http://forums.writersweekly.com/viewtopic.php?t=2084
This thread was 3 years ago, and comes up #5 on an AOL search of Barbara Bauer Literary
The last two posts of that thread at Writers Weekly were posted within the last couple weeks. Asking for a billion dollars is way beyond the scope of any sort of legal claim, even if she had one.
Here's my response from the parent company of the original Web host. "We're sorry you were given false information?" WTF? Sounds like they want to sue me because I sent THEM a note.
-------
Hello Ms. Helm,
I am truly sorry that you have been given false information on thi\ issue.
I wished I could give you more truth but at this time our lawyer has asked us to refrain from publicly speaking about this till he can gather all the information.
Thank you for your email and I am sure we will be getting in touch soon.
JamesC
Senior Internet Technology Adviser
Email: jamesc@totalweb-inc.com
ICQ# 49107171
Total Web-Inc Helping You Bring Your Business to the World
-----Original Message-----
From: allofus@srv02.jc-hosting.net
[mailto:allofus@srv02.jc-hosting.net]
Sent: Wednesday, May 24, 2006 11:33 AM
To: support@totalweb-inc.com
Subject: Information Request
***********************************************************
Name: Paula Helm Murray
Email: dragonet@kc.rr.com
Phone: 816-344-1341
Ecommerce:
Web_Design:
SEO:
Programming:
Hosting:
Scripting:
Consulting:
Other: Other Services
Send: Send
Remote Name: 65.23.42.2
HTTP User Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; U; PPC Mac OS X; en)
AppleWebKit/312.8 (KHTML, like Gecko) Safari/312.6
Date: Wednesday, May 24, 2006
Time: 11:32:58 AM
details:
Shutting down AbsoluteWrite on the call of one offended person's threats without checking them deeper is an outrage. You should let people know on your FRONT PAGE that you are willing to do this. If you'd looked,you would have learned that Barbara Bauer IS a known dishonest literary agent, she takes people's money, and hopes and dreams, and gives them nothing. And she's crude and nasty when she's confronted about it.
Shame on you!
Hello, my name is Argile Stox. I wrote an article about this AW thing, because what I had to say would not fit in this comment box. Please click on or paste the link below.
http://www.useless-knowledge.com/1234/06may/article201.html
Argile Stox
Ah yes, I didn't see the last date. Well, at least she spending so much time doing her damage control she doesn't have time to scam any more people!
I read/skimmed through the Verizon agreement which Verizon requires customers to virtually sign for service... it is majorly self-contradictory, in that it says that customer websites can be taken down on no notice for ANYTHING that ANYBODY finds objectionable--no definition of what constitutes objectionable, either, and the customer dumped.
That is majorly self-contradictory, because I can't think of anything that there isn't someone who would object to.
There are people who object to mentioning homosexuality, there are people who object to mentioning heterosexuality, there are people who object to celibacy, there are people who object to people leaving out all sexual content. "Catch-22" is minor in comparison, because, again, what is there that there isn't someone who would object to? "The French hate the Germans and the Germans hate the Pole..."
As to what that has to do with the subject at hand, if the ISP had terms like Verizon's... what is moral and decent and ethical to do, and what the contract terms are, are in the world run by Republicraps like the late Sonny Bono and the slime who pushed through DMCA (personally I feel that his gravestone deserves to be stained yellow/brown...] entirely different matters.
The website going down is just one more piece of "what free country? It's totalitarian tyranny land, and freedom of expression and speech have been effectively abrogated."
I have a hunch Babs is going to rue this latest temper tantrum. And she'll have company.
Just wondering another angle raised by a friend.
If AW was any sort of business, could the ISP be held responsible for lost revenue because of their shut-down?
Could BB be held responsible?
(I wish!)
I've posted about this almost everywhere I could think of. I posted about it in my LiveJournal, with repeated instances of her linked name (Barbara Bauer, like that). Then I went on MySpace and posted a "blog" about it, encouraging everyone who read it to post such a link as well. I sent a Bulletin (a mass message) to all my MySpace friends to the same effect. I posted on several MySpace Groups I belong to, again encouraging them to put it on as many pages as possible. There's also a mention on my profile page on that site.
I look forward to seeing the SFWA list as the first page when you Google Barbara Bauer.
I was going to recommend Dreamhost .com, but I see that all the other Dreamhost users already did. ;-)
Good company, skilled professional ISP, runs Debian Linux and more free goodies than you can shake a stick at even with the basic plan (basically, damn near everything you could want for a website that comes with an open source license, starting with LAMP and going from there.). I've been with them for quite a few years now, always been happy with their service. It keeps getting better every year.
Customer support is good, responsive, tech-savvy, and doesn't dumb it down if you let them know you are tech-savvy. Bandwidth allowance is huge.
They have a sensible, tolerant TOS, which was why I picked them in the first place, over several other cheap hosting services.
I'm anxious to see Absolute Write back up again. I've learned so much from Uncle Jim's writing thread, and I refer people to it constantly.
It looks like pulling the site was within the hosting company's Terms of Service, which states that they can suspend a site for any reason they choose. I'm not saying that it was the right thing to do, however.
FYI, I see that Miss Snark now has a post up about all of this, and her blog is HUGE in the visits that it gets -- the steamroller seems well underway. I post on AW as ColoradoGuy and have found it immensely helpful. And fun, too.
FYI, Miss Snark has now posted about this:
http://misssnark.blogspot.com/
Judging from the response i got from emailing MY complaint to the original Web host they think AW is the offender and not Ms. Bauer. See above. I think BB is a brass balled beotch and need to get whatever comeuppance she can get.
I take a dim view of scammers--my dear, lovely father gave my name to Vantage Press while I was in college and after I told him I was switching from pre-med to journalism. I know he didn't think it was spiteful, but the mail I got from them was just stupid. I started getting them when I was taking a book publishing class--one of our exercises was a 'read the contract, make one kind of underline for the publisher's requirements, make another kind of underline for the writer's requirements under the contract.' He was an honest man, at the time the Managing Editor of the U. Kan. Press, and knew that protecting the author meant respect for the publisher's works too.
It was very enlightening and made me very glad of Ms. Bradley's contracts. It also told me I should toss every single thing I got from Vantage into the garbage. They 'lost' me (oh darn) when I moved into Missouri from Kansas. (gee, oh, darn.)
So, is Argile Stox at all real or just a spammer? (I figure \somebody/ here has checked, and didn't care to give undeserved ]hit[ points.)
Comments on Absolute Write is gone: