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I recently received an earth-shattering PM in my inbox:

Agent Z wrote:Hello, Mr. Scratch. . . . I was responding to Juliann's post and was busy typing my message when I went to preview it to make sure my formatting was correct. Instead of getting the preview, I got a message which said I had been banned from responding or reading this particular thread. I just checked and I can still log on and read threads, just not the one I was responding on.

This was the thread about how the LDS should be careful whom they defend, meaning the FLDS. I would think that Juliann was watching me type my message before saving or previewing it and took steps to cut me off when she saw the point I was about to make.

Wow! I find this absolutely staggering. On the one hand, it seems we now have confirmation that the MADmoderating team has the ability to manipulate individual threads, thus helping them to create the impression that critics have "fled the scene." (Recall that Tarski was also "banned" from an individual thread in which he had begun to embarrass DCP.) I have to say, I am appalled that they would stoop to a cheap tactic such as this, though I can hardly say I'm surprised.

Secondly: Can you believe what this "informant" is suggesting? Is it really true that the MADmoderators can read critics' posts as they are being written??? I have to admit, I am skeptical about this bit, but it certainly does raise some significant concerns about the evolution of the aptly named MADboard. First, it came to light that they were spying on people's PMs; now it seems that (perhaps) they are reading posts as they are being written---a kind of messageboard prior restraint, if you will.

Yup. I was banned from posting on a thread about Joseph Smith's practice of polygamy.

Runtu wrote:Yup. I was banned from posting on a thread about Joseph Smith's practice of polygamy.

Did you get any sense that they were "peering over your shoulder" as you typed up your post?

Mister Scratch wrote:Secondly: Can you believe what this "informant" is suggesting? Is it really true that the MADmoderators can read critics' posts as they are being written??? I have to admit, I am skeptical about this bit, . . .

Wow. You mentioned Tarski's thread-ban; with that in mind, there's potentially a way to verify this allegation.

Remember that Tarski was banned after he had already made a few posts in the thread. Now, if "Agent Z" had already angered Juliann with prior posts in the thread, then it's the Tarski situation all over again.

On the other hand, if Agent Z had NOT made any previous posts in the thread, then Juliann couldn't have possibly known that he was about to make a cogent point UNLESS she was, indeed, reading his post as he wrote it.

So, in brief, to find out whether or not his allegation is true, PM him back and ask him if he'd already made a post in the thread or not.

Mister Scratch wrote:

Runtu wrote:Yup. I was banned from posting on a thread about Joseph Smith's practice of polygamy.

Did you get any sense that they were "peering over your shoulder" as you typed up your post?

What happened was that they warned people in the thread about speculating on Joseph's sex life. I didn't do that, and then when I tried to respond to a cinepro post, I got a message saying I had been banned from posting on the thread.

I didn't have the sense that they were watching me type. I don't think they can do that.

It is unlikely that they can watch you as you type because of the network bandwidth and delay issues involved. That said, I think it might be technically possible with some creative ajax programming. If so, this could easily be circumvented by disabling javascript.

Again, I doubt they do it. I think it would suck up too much extra bandwidth.

Ok, does anyone have a picture of Juliann?

Can I have it please?

Mister Scratch wrote:Secondly: Can you believe what this "informant" is suggesting? Is it really true that the MADmoderators can read critics' posts as they are being written??? I have to admit, I am skeptical about this bit, . . .

I'm skeptical too - on a technical basis. No board software I know of actually sends what you're typing to the server literally as you are typing. It's only sent when you hit submit.

Although, I suppose if the post was 'previewed' before it was sumbitted, then I'm pretty sure that would send the post to the server and then it's possible some board option could allow someone to take a 'peek' before it was sumbitted. Maybe that can be confirmed / denied? But even then - sounds kinda 'out there' to me. I think it's more likely that if they were banned from the thread, they were banned for either a previous post or based on a 'guess' of what they were about to post...

Infymus wrote:Ok, does anyone have a picture of Juliann?

Can I have it please?

I don't have an actual picture, but I was told by a reliable source that she bears a strong resemblance to "Pat" from the infamous Saturday Night Live "It's Pat" sketches.

Here's a photo taken at the last FAIR conference: