Here's the (my) thing:

We *never* got any answers because we never asked any questions. There was, "He isn't real." and then there was infighting among our members, there were hurt feelings and feelings of abject betrayal. There was no closure.

Even with Caroma, there was at least an effort put forth to get her into the conversation about her behavior on the board before ultimately banning her. There was some sense of closure there.

I feel like the affections of the people on this board were used. I feel as though the way that the events surrounding Gus' "death" affected how we, as a board, interracted with each other. There was, it seemed to me, to be less trust and more questioning of posters intent of being here if they were newcomers.

For some, it seems to me, the wound is still open because it never actually closed. Maybe calling him out publically and getting some answers to "Why?" and "What was the purpose?" might help in the healing process or the getting over it process.

THAT is why I think that sharing the story with The Mary Sue might be helpful in possibly getting some answers.

I will and am.

Cindy, I really wish you wouldn't. Please don't. It's a little unfair to come in and make some really compelling arguments, and then when ita or Allyson challenges it, you delete it.

Nobody's saying you can't own your words, but they're good words and they are valuable, and you deleting them makes it seem like you yourself don't value them, and I know that's not true.

You're likely to never get any answers, though. I'm all for someone writing about it and putting it out in the world, because it's interesting. WEREMONKEY!

But if the point of the story is anything other than "so the dude who runs TV Tropes has Munchausen's by Internet, and isn't that fucking weird?" I just don't think there will be much satisfaction.

All Cindy basically did was investigate Gus' posts. Those posts still exist, so it's not like anyone can't go back in and challenge the same things.

You're likely to never get any answers, though.

Very true. But for me, it would help close that wound if the story was put forth so that others could be careful.

What answers do you want? Why he did it? He has no motivation to tell us why or give us closure--he's a dick. That's the problem.

Airing the dirty laundry is just that--it's not cleaning anything up.

The closure for me would be him getting a broader audience of people reacting to the truth of his lack of scruples. Needing or wanting anything more I'd think is futile. And we might not convince a single person. The internet is like that. It could end up worse than it was before we said anything.

What answers do you want? Why he did it?

Yeah, totally. Not rational even a little bit and totally emotionally based, for dang certain. But I know that.

Airing the dirty laundry is just that--it's not cleaning anything up.

True that, but at least it keeps the house from smelling like dirty laundry.

The closure for me would be him getting a broader audience of people reacting to the truth of his lack of scruples.

Yes. I don't want him to be taken down or his site blown up and inundated with viruses or other Bad Things. And I sure as hell don't want that for us - we've had enough. He's affected us enough. But burdens become lighter when they're shared. Maybe sharing this with another group that he is involved with will make the load lighter.

And Cindy, I don't want to see your posts deleted, either. It was important. It was valuable to us. It is part of our history and something that shouldn't be erased.

I think it's probably likely that there have been other places on the net who have met a weremonkey, or a werebonobo, or a werecapybara who inexplicably invites the whole community over for a barbecue and then mysteriously died. But it's unlikely that we'll know about them, or that he can't continue to do it until he actually kicks off. So a warning shot wouldn't necessarily do any good.

People who do this sort of thing often hold down regular jobs and go to work building their wiki, in total compliance with normal rules of behavior.

Writing it all down is only an exercise in, "oh hey, here's a fucking weird story."

Some folks will think Fast Eddie is a tool, others will rally, others will think the writer is a tool, and most people won't really give a shit other than, "huh, that's interesting."

But I'm not running through the old Firefly thread to delete The Firefly Effect out of butthurt at Gus/Fast Eddie. It just adds to the weirdness.

There are many things I hate about this. High on the list are the pedophiles and sleaze that haunt TVT. I hate that Guy Straley is making money off of ideas that he gleaned from our spicy brains. I hate that he made people care about him and that he threw this place into such a bad emotional place.

But think his site is going to eventually self destruct because of his own inadequacies. I don't know that the story needs to be told again. I think the Penlind essay stands as enough of a warning out there that people are fucks and you can't always trust the anonymity of the net. But that there are also flesh and blood people who are what they say they are and are pretty fucking awesome.

I don't see how Gus gleaned anything significant from us. It's not like anyone had a decently fleshed out idea that he just slipped the code underneath. He took a tangent, made a website, some of us logged in and entered stuff, but at the point where it is now? It's a whole different community who are generating hundreds of entiries on a gazillion more tropes than any of us had provided.

I think he's a consummate asshole, but I think the board is clearly where/when he got the idea, but it's not something of someone else's. And he ran with it. Ran hard and far.

I interacted with Gus more than a lot of people and I don't have any after trauma from his pseudicide. To be honest, I don't feel like any long lasting online community has really earned it's stripes until they've gone through one. It's just an inevitable part of online communities, but it doesn't make me leery about them. It's just inherent to the beast that somebody will do that kind of shit.

Just as there will always be trolls and inevitably you will need to find a way to ban them. That's why we went through all the pain and agony of creating our voting procedures, instead of leaving everything loosey goosey.

We're still very self-policing, but we have ways to deal with bigger abuses.

I'd rather Cindy not delete her posts (may be too late) because they're a big part of our history and that moment.

I'd just as soon write it up in our FAQ and say this is what happened. It did happen.

We take it on faith that people are who they say they are - even when we know that sometimes they're not. One of the big lessons I learned from literature was from I.B. Singer's story "Gimpel the Fool" where he basically argued that to create community, to do good in the world you have to risk credulity. You have to extend some trust beyond what is necessarily earned.

Y'all may not agree with that but I also think that's part of the deal. Being open makes things possible, but it makes you vulnerable.

I don't get angry about Gus at all. It's just part of our story.