Mike Greathouse [you decide]

It comes with great disappointment that I have to expose some evidence of an ethical issue by someone who I would have considered one of the top good guys in the business. But the evidence has been overwhelming, and apparently unless this is brought out into the open, it will not cease by Mike's own choice. There have been some notable trolls frequenting this site over the recent past, and the moderators and I have been keeping an eye on them to try to figure out who is responsible. Not saying ALL of them are Mike Greathouse, but we suspect a fair number of them might well be.

There was also an issue of a DDoS attack a little while back, while no evidence was collected to pin down the originator of the attack, I do have to consider not only who has the motive to launch such an attack, but who would also have the technical expertise as well.

First off let me copy a post I made in another thread in the Feedback forum (http://www.faunaclassifieds.com/foru...109005&page=10) at post #50):

Originally Posted by WebSlave

And to the other Mike......... Visiting Tampa today are we? This is the IP on your last post... The IP Address is: 72.187.158.29. The host name is: 29-158.187-72.tampabay.res.rr.com..

Guess I would want to get out of Chicago too......

This post presents pretty strong evidence via the IP used that Mike Greathouse was using this false registration (Walk of Life) on this site. Anyone interested can do a search on the posts made under that registration to get a feel for what sort of topics were discussed. But some of them were to promote one of more of his own websites, pretending to be a third party recommending them to others.

A while back, one of the moderators came up with some pretty strong evidence that Mike Greathouse was the person behind the troll "Shrillomn" who made quite a ruckus on this site by attacking many member, myself included, as well as this site. I felt the evidence was strong enough to contact Mike with a warning that the garbage needed to stop. Which it did. For THAT particular personna. There was another registration around the same time known as "Sledgehammer" which had pretty much the same tone of the postings, and a careful analyses will show that the writing style was pretty much identical. A check of the IP addresses did not show any direct match with Mike Greathouse, however, the anonymous proxy servers being used were so closely matched that it could not be a simple coincidence. That info was posted in this message in the above mentioned thread as well:

Originally Posted by Jim O

Mike, mike, mike, mike, mike...

I said this to you a bit back:


Looking back, I find this post interesting:
http://www.faunaclassifieds.com/foru...879#post553879 which directs people to www.BoaGenetics.com which points to http://www.digitalherper.com/forum/v...hp?f=125&t=135 which is on whose site?

Of course your attention to Boas and Redfoot tortoises is a bit of a giveaway too.

Mike, I'd have hoped for better from you.

Originally Posted by WebSlave

It gets better Jim.

Here is a series of IP logs from Mike Greathouse, Shillomn, and Sledgehammer.

You will note that we have TWO IDENTICAL IP matches between Mike Greathouse and Shrillomn, which pretty much nails this down a far as I am concerned. I believe there is an excellent chance that Mike has been behind quite a bit of the trolling on this site for quite a while now. The member name of "Sledgehammer", in my opinion is yet another guise of Mike Greathouse evidenced by the prefixes of those proxy servers used in comparison with Shrillomn, which we already have a positive match. Mike just didn't slip up using that account name as he did with Shrillomn and this "Walk of Life" registration. But what really tipped me off about Sledgehammer were the occasional pats on the back "he" have to Mike Greathouse every now and again. Much like his promoting his websites through the Walk of Life registration.

Mike, I warned you to cut the crap. There was no doubt in my mind all along that it was you, but you just wouldn't give it up. I thought you would get over this eventually and just leave it alone. But apparently not. There is a real good probability that I will copy all this info into a new thread on the BOI, because in my opinion, you are engaging in activity designed to cause strife and conflict on this website, and as such this is very plainly related to MY business running this site. I also want you to know that it is because of what you have been engaging in that I grew suspicious of some odd server loading problems while you had hosted domains on the same server that this site was on. As such, I decided to move ALL the hosted domains on to a separate and isolated server in order to protect THIS one from any games you might be inclined to play with CGI scripting on your domain. That was an EXPENSIVE, but NECESSARY move I had to make because of my suspicions about your abilities as well as your evident animosity towards this site. Honestly, Mike, I really thought better of you.

Yes, I know you can simply register as someone else since you are slick enough to know how to play with proxy servers even when I ban your main account here. But enough is enough, man. Just GO AWAY.

This disappoints me quite a bit. Yes, I held this evidence in confidence for quite a while, even though the mods and I had discussed this and decided to just table the info to see what would transpire. But Mike ignored my warning to cease and desist, and I really see no other choice but to lay this out on the table so people can make their own decisions about what to think about the evidence.

I will say this, though. In the past I have highly recommended Mike Greathouse to people looking for website design and other help with web related issues. Under the present circumstances, I can no longer offer that recommendation, and further officially withdraw any such recommendation I have given in the past. With the above in mind, I personally would not trust my website business to be in the hands of Mike Greathouse. You may feel differently, and more power to you, but that is my opinion on the matter.

Rich I understand if you answer this question with a NO but can Mike post replies here as Mike? Like I said I would not blame you for not allowing it.

I just am lost for words...............

This has to be some kind of mix up.

Originally Posted by Gary O

Rich I understand if you answer this question with a NO but can Mike post replies here as Mike? Like I said I would not blame you for not allowing it.

I just am lost for words...............

Mike has not been banned from the site, but I reserve that option for any time in the future with no notice nor additional reason.

Originally Posted by SPJ

This has to be some kind of mix up.

YOu know I am the first to say IPs are over rated. But there is just to much pointing at all these names being from one person. I hope I am wrong.

But the matches only being with the three accounts.......................... Just to much points in the direction of all one person and all goes back to Mikes account.................

Mike,

While I dont necessarily think coming here like you did with the fake names makes you a bad guy, however, I do think it was cowardly and completely hypocritical considering what you tried to make people think you stood for.

Man up and take responsibility for your words. Your words would have been taken much more to heart if you would have posted them as yourself instead of what we all knew was a sock puppet from the very beginning. Many things your sock puppets had to say had plenty of merit.... if they would not have been coming from a coward who did not have the balls to say how they really felt as themselves.

Again, I for one will not label you a bad guy just for the sock puppets, but I really am disappointed that you did not have the guts to say what you did as yourself. You aint the guy I thought you were that is for sure.

Oh I forgot one very important thing sentence in my post above....

IF these sock puppets are really you.

Originally Posted by SPJ

This has to be some kind of mix up.

Maybe he just wasn't to proud of owning up to some of the things he would have liked to have said to some folks around here as himself. Maybe he just got his rocks off in the feeling he was savvy enough to fool everyone.

So...is it a mix-up? Or maybe he's just mixed up in the head? How do you get so confused between being a great guy or being a liar and coward? Doesn't seem to be a mix-up at all when you look at it that way. Just seems to be a simple choice. A choice he made with ease and with little regard to how any of us may have ever felt about him.

It was actually Dennis Hultman who brought this latest disguise to my attention with this IP match:

* Mike Greathouse 72.187.158.29 [Find Posts by User] [View Other IP Addresses for this User]
* Walk of Life 72.187.158.29 [Find Posts by User] [View Other IP Addresses for this User]

And Dennis also researched those IP addresses for Shrillomn as well, just in case myself and the other mods may have made a mistake or jumped to an incorrect assumption:

Originally Posted by Dennis Hultman

Chuck, I disagree. I really didn’t like the fact the information was there in the first place. I really like Mike and have always respected his point of view but the questions were going to be addressed. As Rich pointed out

It would be important to note that of those two matches not a single other member has ever used either of those.

Search 71.41.57.154

* Mike Greathouse 71.41.57.154 [Find Posts by User] [View Other IP Addresses for this User]
* Shrillomn 71.41.57.154 [Find Posts by User] [View Other IP Addresses for this User]

Search 207.156.1.11

* Mike Greathouse 207.156.1.11 [Find Posts by User] [View Other IP Addresses for this User]
* Shrillomn 207.156.1.11 [Find Posts by User] [View Other IP Addresses for this User]

Honestly, I would not be disappointed to be proven wrong. And I had hoped it was just a passing phase Mike was going through and he would just move on. But the Walk of Life registration and subsequent postings pretty much shattered that hope.

Can't an IP be the same if both are using the same ISP provider?