Ron and List,
I have spent the better part of my day dealing with a virus problem that originated by an
innocent posting on my genconnect boards about an upcoming family reunion. At this hour
I have about 75 unanswered e-mails received today that I am trying to handle. One of the
e-mails is about a former cc that continues to cause problems in his county with the local
gen society folk a year after he left our project. He used our project and continues to
use the local connections to flagrantly further his own commercial interests, not
necessarily related to genealogy.
In my own family research, I am a subscriber to USGenWeb pages in Virginia, North
Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, and Mississippi. One of the South Carolina cc's
actively sells transcriptions of official documents on her page. One Georgia cc, has a
terse statement on the page paraphrased that "she has never been in the county, has
no connections there, and that she is not to be contacted about the county". One of
my relatives in Mississippi is the former cc of my home county. He used the site as a
springboard to forming his own genealogy network, "stealing" most of his
"research" from other relatives and leaving the new cc (also a relative) with a
monumental task of rebuilding the site.
My understanding of the USGenWeb bylaws is that all of the listed cases are to be classed
as "members not in good standing" if they are current cc's. The designation
to be determined by the applicable state coordinator. The bylaws do not consider the
problems former cc's cause and offer no protection if they decide to dupe another
state coordinator by "adopting" a county to further their personal interests.
Now, I do not subscribe to the DBS or the state coordinator list. I don't have time
and have enough problems keeping up with General Hospital! My knowledge of the
"blacklist" came as an aside to my conversation with Sharon this morning
regarding my virus problems and getting RootsWeb assistance.
But, my question is why shouldn't the USGenWeb project keep a "blacklist" of
disruptive former cc's and why shouldn't the SC declare disruptive current
cc's as "members not in good standing" as prescribed in the bylaws? After
all, every cc voluntarily agrees to the USGenWeb bylaws when they sign on to the project.
Seems to me that Sharon is doing the job that we elected her to do. And it seems that she
is addressing the "loophole" of former recalcitrant cc's.
Changing the subject, if any of you receive an e-mail from njewett(a)infoave.net or
rjjerks(a)plumasnet.com regarding a Hinson family reunion in Lancaster, SC with or without
an attachment, DO NOT RESPOND, DO NOT OPEN THE ATTACHMENT, notify the sender's ISP,
and delete the message from your e-mail, your query boards, your e-mail list, and block
the addresses from any other postings to your county pages. The sites are infected with a
particularly destructive virus that multiplies itself by obtaining the e-mail address book
on your computer.
Regards,
Paul
----- Original Message -----
From: Ron Eason <rkeason(a)tir.com>
To: <NCGENWEB-DISCUSS-L(a)rootsweb.com>
Sent: Friday, May 11, 2001 11:26 PM
Subject: [NCGENWEB-DISCUSS] Blacklists
Sharon,
I'm really ticked off right now so I will ask a simple question
without saying anything more about it until I get cooled off a little.
You are asking to be re-elected and yet on the STATE COORD.
list you are advocating creating a secret black list for problem CC's,
that you and the others feel should be kept from getting a county
based entirely on how you feel about any particular individual.
Is the address here what you wrote and why?
http://searches2.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/ifetch2?/u1/textindices/S/STATE-COORD+
2001+469846504+F
I just can't believe it.
Ron