An Open Letter to the owner of AwesomeCon.net
So we’ve written a few things about Awesome Con here on Nerd & Tie, but believe it or not this isn’t about that particular organization (sort of).
No, this is about one of you.
You see, while checking through our referring link report on Nerd & Tie, I saw a surprising URL listed: AwesomeCon.net
At least while I’m writing this, typing in AwesomeCon.net in your URL bar takes you to this article I wrote a couple weeks ago. And while I stand behind that piece (and Pher’s more even handed follow up), there is one thing I want to make absolutely clear:
None of us at Nerd & Tie purchased that domain name, and we are not in control of it.
Here’s the thing – I’m not afraid to stir the pot. In fact, I kind of like kicking up controversy. But I also understand how to be even handed, and I do my best to make sure there are certain lines I don’t cross. And to me, this is one of them.
You have to understand, by buying that domain name, things start getting iffy. When put together with the fake Twitter account that claims ownership of that domain, this might be seen as a campaign of harassment. Now, maybe there’s a justified use of the domain as criticism, and if the person who bought the name had pointed the name towards their own article on the matter, it would be one thing. But they pointed it towards mine.
I now own http://t.co/DDFNqFFUEj now what to do with it…
— Not AwesomeCon (@AwesomeConWi) July 22, 2014
You see, they’ve made it look like I’m the one doing it.
We’ve already been accused of running that Twitter account (we don’t), and this really doesn’t help us or anyone. The very anonymous nature of the whole thing has me angry. You see, I’m all about accountability – if I say something, I slap my name on it. This person has effectively made statements and then instead of slapping their own name on it, pointed the finger at us.
Which is, in my book, cowardly.
So whoever you are, please… just stop. Man (or Woman or Androgynous Adult) up and do something on your own. If you’re going to run some systematic campaign against a convention’s organizers, leave us out of it. When we want to say more on the subject, we’ll do it ourselves. If we wanted to point high value SEO domains at our article, we would have done that already.
Do your own work, put your own name on it, and leave us the hell out of it.
“Anonymous nature” of these accounts? Srsly, bro? That’s like saying “We can’t figure out who the alleged baddie for this episode of Scooby Doo is going to be.” Also, it’s amazing what kind of posts suddenly disappear from other social media sites when these kind of articles pop up.
Unless a person’s life or safety is going to be directly under threat, I consider doing things like this cowardly if the person isn’t willing to put their name on it.
And even worse, the way this person has done things, it makes it look like someone ELSE did them.
In this case me.
Also, I’m curious as to “What kind of posts suddenly disappear” means?
Could you elaborate?
I’m going to delete my original comment and send a private message with details.
(Also, I know exactly who it is. I know exactly who *everyone* is. But if someone is suspicious of me, why would they believe me when I say “I didn’t do it, X person did?” We’ve told people explicitly we aren’t behind the twitter account, but they don’t seem to believe us)