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.

Cindy, the reason I don't want you to delete everything is exactly the same as the reason I can't stop you (and wouldn't dream of it if I could): because it's yours. If history were at all prone to do-overs, the easiest possible outcome would be for Gus never to have been here. But our history -- OURS, as a community, who love each other but sometimes don't and have been through a lot more together than most flesh friendships I know -- is that it did.

But our history is also that you did that detective work FOR US. To help us. This is not at all about whether the facts could all be reconstructed again if someone wants proof, because I have exactly zero interest in going and sticking facts in some other community's face*. I care rather fiercely about your account of things because it's yours and it's ours. It (and just the fact of it) matters far more to me than anything TVT has ever touched.

* I lied. I don't have zero interest, I have seriously negative interest. I want it documented, and I want us to be open about it whenever anyone asks, and I think that going to tell them The Truth About Gus would lead to extremely bad outcomes. Hostile outcomes. People coming here on the attack outcomes. Not because TVT is especially nasty, but because that's how humans are when their tribes get poked. And the fact that we're even seriously talking about ripping out a whole account system to protect ourselves against it should be a be a big warning that we all kinda know how bad it could get.

Allyson, to be clear, I was only thinking about deleting my bureau posts, and only then, because they were only ever meant for you all, not for all the tubes.

I don't know. If Gus would come back here for a second, admit what he did and apologize, I might champion (ptui) him.

As it stands right now? I HATE what he did to us (and me, because... and) us. My ugly bits want him to hang. My principled bits want to let it go.

er...

Not because I think what he did was okay. It's because I don't want to be judged on my worst sins. I don't want you all to know my worst sins. I acknowledge that I've SUCKED beyond the telling of it, in so many areas of my life, and so when someone else sucks, I sort of want to let it go.

What Gus/Guy Straley/kimi/Fast Eddie/Janitor did to us? It sucked and still sucks. I WANT a lot out of that, but when I distill it, I just want the suck to stop and the love to prevail.

Jesus. No one actually died. We got trolled.

I just want the suck to stop and the love to prevail.

Aww, I think the love has prevailed. We're all still here, after all. Doing our thing, having a F2F, cheering on ita and Ginger, wishing Hec & JZ happy birthday, sending around the box of nail polish, sharing our book reviews & sending ita photos for Provocateuse. Gus caused some upset, and there is lingering indigestion, but we kept on, and he can't harm us any more.

My only real concern here (setting aside my aforementioned malice) is that he not cause the same kind of upset--or worse--to another community.

But I also think going to TVT is a bad idea. I do think maybe just putting it in the FAQ is the thing to do. So if the question ever comes up, we can say, "Here: this is what we know about Gus, and why we don't think you should trust him."

Well, that's sort of my point. He did no harm, other than emotional harm at his exit.

eta: the above was a response to Allyson, not Consuela.