Now, I will tell you what really happened.

What really happened is that in about December 2006 I was having an
online debate here with Sevan Muradian, a person unknown to me at that
time but whom I have since met.

Sevan Muradian was insisting that the USCF send a team to compete in
the Woman's World Team Championship held May 19 - 30, 2007 in
Ekaterinburg, Russia.

I replied that this was out of the question, especially since the USCF
did not have any money.

It was not merely the cost of sending the players, but Sevan Muradian
was insisting that the players be paid. As the standard rate is $3,000
per player and there are 5 players on a woman's team, that meant an
expenditure of $15,000 for their salaries alone. (If you will look on
Susan's blog, you will see that she also came out in favor of paying
the players.)

At some point in this debate I pointed out that the USCF did not even
have the money to hold a US Woman's Championship. How could we
possibly consider sending a woman's team to Ekaterinburg, Russia if we
could not even afford to hold a woman's championship here?

As the debate continued, I asked Sevan Muradian if he was planning to
make a bid to hold the US Woman's Championship. It was an honest
question. I really did not know the answer. I had heard that a Chicago
organizer was planning to make a bid. I could see that Sevan Muradian
was from Chicago. Therefore, I wondered whether he might be the
person.

For merely asking this question, without any warning, I was suddenly
and abruptly suspended from posting to the USCF Forums for one week.

Then, Beatriz Marinello came online and she asked why I had been
suspended from posting merely for asking Sevan Muradian whether he was
intending to make a bid for the US Woman's Championship.

Since her question repeated my question, she too was suspended from
posting for one week for the same reason that I had been suspended.

Since the right of appeal at that time was to the Executive Board, we
both appealed.

Apparently, at first the board was inclined to uphold the suspensions,
but when Bill Goichberg finally got around to reading the posts for
which we had been suspended he realized that there had been nothing
wrong with our postings. Therefore, both suspensions were vacated and
the slate was wiped clean. It was primarily because of this incident
that Bill Goichberg got the rest of the board to create the FOC.

Of course, by the time this happened, Beatriz and myself had already
served almost our entire complete one week suspensions.

It seems from Joel Channing's comments above that he feels that the
suspensions should have been upheld.

Sam Sloan

On Aug 29, 9:44 pm, samsloan wrote:

Quote:

Originally Posted by joelchanning Quote: Originally Posted by SteveTN Quote: Originally Posted by joelchanning When the uncivil posters have been properly chastised or banned and this Forum reflects well on our commitment to civil discourse I will be happy to butt out. Joel Channing There was a very effective moderation system in place, it sanctioned two members, board members at that, and the Executive Board couldn't keep their hands off or their butts out. That happened about nine months ago and the politicians still can't seem to understand that as long as they tinker in moderation's business moderation will be a joke. The biggest problem with forum moderation is the politicizing of said moderation. If you truly want these forums to run as civilly as possible, appoint good people to moderate and then get your hands off of it. That means no more second guessing the people you appoint, no more threats to shut down the forum, no more pressure on the moderators to loosen up or tighten down. Guilty as charged! My recollection is that it involved something confidential that Sam had posted (about a potential sponsor, by the way) for which he was sanctioned and then Beatriz did the same thing and she was sanctioned (or going to be sanctioned) and she threatened to make it big political issue with the Delegates. I didn't want the matter of Forum moderation to be mixed up with political factions and I chickened out, making a motion to drop both cases, which passed. Mike Nolan has never forgiven me - and rightfully so. Joel

Now, I will tell you what really happened.

What really happened is that in about December 2006 I was having an
online debate here with Sevan Muradian, a person unknown to me at that
time but whom I have since met.

Sevan Muradian was insisting that the USCF send a team to compete in
the Woman's World Team Championship held May 19 - 30, 2007 in
Ekaterinburg, Russia.

I replied that this was out of the question, especially since the USCF
did not have any money.

It was not merely the cost of sending the players, but Sevan Muradian
was insisting that the players be paid. As the standard rate is $3,000
per player and there are 5 players on a woman's team, that meant an
expenditure of $15,000 for their salaries alone. (If you will look on
Susan's blog, you will see that she also came out in favor of paying
the players.)

At some point in this debate I pointed out that the USCF did not even
have the money to hold a US Woman's Championship. How could we
possibly consider sending a woman's team to Ekaterinburg, Russia if we
could not even afford to hold a woman's championship here?

As the debate continued, I asked Sevan Muradian if he was planning to
make a bid to hold the US Woman's Championship. It was an honest
question. I really did not know the answer. I had heard that a Chicago
organizer was planning to make a bid. I could see that Sevan Muradian
was from Chicago. Therefore, I wondered whether he might be the
person.

For merely asking this question, without any warning, I was suddenly
and abruptly suspended from posting to the USCF Forums for one week.

Then, Beatriz Marinello came online and she asked why I had been
suspended from posting merely for asking Sevan Muradian whether he was
intending to make a bid for the US Woman's Championship.

Since her question repeated my question, she too was suspended from
posting for one week for the same reason that I had been suspended.

Since the right of appeal at that time was to the Executive Board, we
both appealed.

Apparently, at first the board was inclined to uphold the suspensions,
but when Bill Goichberg finally got around to reading the posts for
which we had been suspended he realized that there had been nothing
wrong with our postings. Therefore, both suspensions were vacated and
the slate was wiped clean. It was primarily because of this incident
that Bill Goichberg got the rest of the board to create the FOC.

Of course, by the time this happened, Beatriz and myself had already
served almost our entire complete one week suspensions.

It seems from Joel Channing's comments above that he feels that the
suspensions should have been upheld.

Sam Sloan

I wouldn't join a moderated forum like this even I were a USCF
member. What a freaking joke.

On Wed, 29 Aug 2007 19:55:32 -0700, Bruce wrote:

I wouldn't join a moderated forum like this even I were a USCF
member. What a freaking joke.

The problem is, with the recent USCF election, there was a concerted
effort, evidently by one or more insiders, to make *this* newsgroup
completely unusable. It was flooded with posts by various fake
personalities, mostly fake Sam Sloans, but many others. Some of the
fakes were just noise, but others appeared real, with maybe one small
detail altered.

I'm reasonably certain the idea was to drive serious discussion to the
moderated forum, where there was at least some chance of controlling
it.

The fakes have also made usenet history searches much more difficult.

On Aug 30, 8:15 am, Mike Murray wrote:
On Wed, 29 Aug 2007 19:55:32 -0700, Bruce wrote:
I wouldn't join a moderated forum like this even I were a USCF
member. What a freaking joke.

The problem is, with the recent USCF election, there was a concerted
effort, evidently by one or more insiders, to make *this* newsgroup
completely unusable. It was flooded with posts by various fake
personalities, mostly fake Sam Sloans, but many others. Some of the
fakes were just noise, but others appeared real, with maybe one small
detail altered.

I'm reasonably certain the idea was to drive serious discussion to the
moderated forum, where there was at least some chance of controlling
it.

The fakes have also made usenet history searches much more difficult.

This problem started back several years ago and yes on an unmoderated
forum it is a bigger problem, but the way that this problem used to be
handled was by having lots of active discussions and active
participnats with interesting topics. There were trolls who tried to
disrupt but they were drowned out mostly and some of them were even
funny and contributed important points or ideas to the discussions,
even if they were troll like.

The point is that a moderated forum is going to be sanitized if no
controversy of any kind is allowed. That's not a political discussion
group, that's just a muzzle mouthpiece for USCF. I am amazed that
anyone would even bother to post over there if they are going to
censor people for being sarcastic. Heck Ken Sloan and I wouldn't last
a day over there.

Bruce wrote:

The point is that a moderated forum is going to be sanitized if no
controversy of any kind is allowed. That's not a political discussion
group, that's just a muzzle mouthpiece for USCF. I am amazed that
anyone would even bother to post over there if they are going to
censor people for being sarcastic. Heck Ken Sloan and I wouldn't last
a day over there.

Unfortunately the trend at moderated forums these days is to avoid
truths if they are at all unpleasant. The USCF Forums example is
extreme, but not surprising. For example, I've been asked to 'tone
down' posts at one weight loss site because a couple posters objected
to my pointing out common excuses, such as the "fat gene" nonsense,
people make for not losing weight. The moderator thought it might
scare away newbies, and a poster told me I obviously don't understand
what it is like to lose weight. I suppose losing 143 pounds is
nothing. :-)

On Thu, 30 Aug 2007 21:27:55 -0700, Bruce wrote:


The fakes have also made usenet history searches much more difficult.

This problem started back several years ago and yes on an unmoderated
forum it is a bigger problem, but the way that this problem used to be
handled was by having lots of active discussions and active
participnats with interesting topics. There were trolls who tried to
disrupt but they were drowned out mostly and some of them were even
funny and contributed important points or ideas to the discussions,
even if they were troll like.

I suspect recent activities were of a different nature. I don't
believe they were troll posts, but, rather, a Rovesque attempt to
influence USCF elections.

Just do a newsgroup search on "Sam Sloan" and you'll see what I mean.
The occasional witty parody, yes, but mostly huge numbers of short,
often obscene remarks about various chess personalities. Once one
determined the e-mail addresses of the fakes, they could be
bozo-filtered, of course, but many of them were "timely" in the sense
that they reflected close familiarity with current hot topics over on
the USCF moderated discussions and the BINFOs.

I'm starting to think the fakes were designed to fool or discourage
the casual web-surfer, perhaps a chess-parent or someone fairly
unfamiliar with issues of USCF governance, who might google, e.g.,
"Sam Sloan". Those people wouldn't think to search for valid e-mail
addresses, so they'll get flooded with all the fake posts, and
probably look no further.

On Aug 31, 1:14 pm, Mike Murray wrote:
On Thu, 30 Aug 2007 21:27:55 -0700, Bruce wrote:
The fakes have also made usenet history searches much more difficult.
This problem started back several years ago and yes on an unmoderated
forum it is a bigger problem, but the way that this problem used to be
handled was by having lots of active discussions and active
participnats with interesting topics. There were trolls who tried to
disrupt but they were drowned out mostly and some of them were even
funny and contributed important points or ideas to the discussions,
even if they were troll like.

I suspect recent activities were of a different nature. I don't
believe they were troll posts, but, rather, a Rovesque attempt to
influence USCF elections.

Just do a newsgroup search on "Sam Sloan" and you'll see what I mean.
The occasional witty parody, yes, but mostly huge numbers of short,
often obscene remarks about various chess personalities. Once one
determined the e-mail addresses of the fakes, they could be
bozo-filtered, of course, but many of them were "timely" in the sense
that they reflected close familiarity with current hot topics over on
the USCF moderated discussions and the BINFOs.

I'm starting to think the fakes were designed to fool or discourage
the casual web-surfer, perhaps a chess-parent or someone fairly
unfamiliar with issues of USCF governance, who might google, e.g.,
"Sam Sloan". Those people wouldn't think to search for valid e-mail
addresses, so they'll get flooded with all the fake posts, and
probably look no further.

We had them though back in the good old days too, but they often
started their own threads and everyone ignored them and they got bored
and went away.

On Aug 31, 1:14 pm, Mike Murray wrote:
On Thu, 30 Aug 2007 21:27:55 -0700, Bruce wrote:
The fakes have also made usenet history searches much more difficult.
This problem started back several years ago and yes on an unmoderated
forum it is a bigger problem, but the way that this problem used to be
handled was by having lots of active discussions and active
participnats with interesting topics. There were trolls who tried to
disrupt but they were drowned out mostly and some of them were even
funny and contributed important points or ideas to the discussions,
even if they were troll like.

I suspect recent activities were of a different nature. I don't
believe they were troll posts, but, rather, a Rovesque attempt to
influence USCF elections.

Just do a newsgroup search on "Sam Sloan" and you'll see what I mean.
The occasional witty parody, yes, but mostly huge numbers of short,
often obscene remarks about various chess personalities. Once one
determined the e-mail addresses of the fakes, they could be
bozo-filtered, of course, but many of them were "timely" in the sense
that they reflected close familiarity with current hot topics over on
the USCF moderated discussions and the BINFOs.

I'm starting to think the fakes were designed to fool or discourage
the casual web-surfer, perhaps a chess-parent or someone fairly
unfamiliar with issues of USCF governance, who might google, e.g.,
"Sam Sloan". Those people wouldn't think to search for valid e-mail
addresses, so they'll get flooded with all the fake posts, and
probably look no further.

Well one problem for Sam and I say this in all honesty is that he
brings some of it on himself and because he tends to say and do fairly
outrageous things anyway, people have trouble distinguishing between
outrageous real Sam and outrageous fake Sam.

On Aug 31, 6:06 pm, Bruce wrote:

Well one problem for Sam and I say this in all honesty is that he
brings some of it on himself and because he tends to say and do fairly
outrageous things anyway, people have trouble distinguishing between
outrageous real Sam and outrageous fake Sam.

Since you were not around you are not aware of this, but most of
postings by the Fake Sam Sloan were so objectionable that even you
will agree that I could not have written them.

In recent months the Fake Sam Sloan posted from two different email
addresses:



However, he usually posted in such a way that the posting disappeared
in a few hours. there were hundreds, possibly even thousands of these
postings, often 50 or 100 in one day.

Here is one typically obscene posting. I think you will agree that I
would have never posted this.

http://groups.google.com/group/rec.g...fcdf289a5c3c25

However, sometimes the Fake Sam Sloan would take something I actually
wrote on the USCF Forums and repost it here changing a few words to
change the meaning. Thus, sometimes it was quite difficult to tell the
difference between the Fake Sam Sloan and the real me.

The Real Sam Sloan

On Aug 31, 5:33 pm, samsloan wrote:
On Aug 31, 6:06 pm, Bruce wrote:

Well one problem for Sam and I say this in all honesty is that he
brings some of it on himself and because he tends to say and do fairly
outrageous things anyway, people have trouble distinguishing between
outrageous real Sam and outrageous fake Sam.

Since you were not around you are not aware of this, but most of
postings by the Fake Sam Sloan were so objectionable that even you
will agree that I could not have written them.

In recent months the Fake Sam Sloan posted from two different email
addresses:



However, he usually posted in such a way that the posting disappeared
in a few hours. there were hundreds, possibly even thousands of these
postings, often 50 or 100 in one day.

Here is one typically obscene posting. I think you will agree that I
would have never posted this.

http://groups.google.com/group/rec.g.../msg/18fcdf289...

However, sometimes the Fake Sam Sloan would take something I actually
wrote on the USCF Forums and repost it here changing a few words to
change the meaning. Thus, sometimes it was quite difficult to tell the
difference between the Fake Sam Sloan and the real me.

The Real Sam Sloan

I think that is unfortunate that someone feels the need to defame you
by pretending to be you. I used to write parodies of you but I did it
under my own name and not pretending to be you.