sirenofthestorm said:
I think if you had deleted the thread for the reasons you stated, a paying member could have posted it in the BOI in a more articulate manner, correct?
Yes, someone certainly could have done that. But would they have? Beats me.
sirenofthestorm said:
And I think its been made clear that there was no changing of the rules, but rather that the understanding of who could and could not vote on GGC had changed. The instructions that you wrote stated that people should vote after business transactions. Jim pointed that out in the nerd thread to david and told him that a withdrawl of his negative vote was in order since he did not conduct a business transaction with them (it was the vote that led Jim O. to assume that david was a disgruntled customer). Then when people who had not done business with Bill Leverton started voting on his GGC poll, some people sought clarification of what was and was not allowed in the GGC polls. The registered members were again not allowed to vote, and it was interpreted by some people as trying to curtail registered members from voting negatively against a big breeder. You said that is not the case, and there's really nothing else to be said on the subject. No one knows your motivations except for you, and we have to take you at your word.
Where exactly IS that quote coming from stating about people voting after business transactions? I see it quoted, but darn if I can remember where it was original posted. Evidently other people can find it at will, however.
While certainly the Bill Leverton situation called my attention to the problem I had possibly created by allowing open access to the polls in that section, I never considered that anyone would think I was tightening it back up in an effort to protect Bill. I wouldn't know him if I fell over top of him, so sorry about that, I have no reason whatsoever to side either with him or against him in any issue whatsoever. Is Bill considered as a "big breeder"? Or is this about NERD again?
Speaking of NERD, I can't recall speaking even one word to anyone from NERD at all, for any reason. So I really have no reason at all to try to protect them, nor would I, even if they were my best friends. I really have no incentive whatsoever to do so. I have not stepped in to protect any of the biggest advertisers on this site, nor anyone who has paid money in any form for anything having to do with this site at all. I have fined and suspended advertisers, I have refused to delete posts that they found objectionable, and I have always treated them just like everyone else. I have LOST advertisers because I have not done what they wanted me to do for them, that I felt would call my ethics into question by doing so. Heck, we have a perfect example RECENTLY of my banning one of the biggest advertisers on this site at that time, knowing full well I would lose his advertising and his top level membership fee by doing so.
Neither Bill Leverton nor NERD are, or have ever been, advertisers on this site. Maybe if they were spending $100K per year here I might turn a blind eye to something that was questionable, but that just is not the case. Sorry, but I can't be bought for the price of a measly membership fee.
Anyway, sorry, but there were no motivations on my part beyond what I have stated here. I REALLY was mostly away from all of the BS on this site during that week I was gone. Matter of fact, if it hadn't been but for one of my mods calling things to my attention concerning the Bill Leverton thread, I wouldn't have even noticed it at all. Dennis Thomas posted a message stating that he had deleted Bill Leverton's BOI GGC thread, and THAT got my attention that something was unwinding that I needed to take a look at.
Sorry, it's late, and I am just not going to proof read this post. Please excuse any fumbled sentence structure.........