"earth2" close to the truth about ATS hoaxes?

[uberarcanist]

http://www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/thread345410/pg1

In summary, user "earth2" claims that Mark is behind all of the hoaxes. Mark and Mark alone. It might be true, I haven't specifically analyzed Mark's writing style, but I thought I'd put it out here for you all to look at.

Whaddya think?

[Chorlton]

Well when I joined ATS and asked some questions of users, was told that they suspected Springer was responsible for some posts, simply to drum up more stats.

The problem is, he isnt very bright, which is pretty obvious to all.

[uberarcanist]

He wouldn't have to be. He could just tell very unconvincing lies and ban anyone who dared cross his path. But it makes you wonder, where is Simon and Bill (SkepticOverlord) in all of this?

[Chorlton]

Hiding behind Springers skirts.

[ryguy]

Well when I joined ATS and asked some questions of users, was told that they suspected Springer was responsible for some posts, simply to drum up more stats.

I don't follow the logic of that? I mean - why would he create more posts on ATS simply to drum up more visits to ATS?

Wouldn't a more effective approach be to visit other forums on the internet and post stuff about ATS, like OM does for their forum? Seems to me this would create new membership and build the forum (if that's your goal in running it).

Or better yet, publish quality content out there that people find interesting that either references or links to ATS.

I can't imagine Springer would be childish enough to create hoaxing posts on ATS just to drum up visits when there are so many more effective ways to do it?

Although - with that said (lol), I've noticed that when we have conflict here on our forum, our stats go through the roof. An unscrupulous forum-owner could potentially try to "fake" conflict through sockpuppets to generate drama and draw a crowd. If the staff of a forum aren't all sharing visibility and responsibility for policing that kind of behavior, problems can surely arise fairly quick.

I don't know...I hear what all of you guys are saying about the suspicious nature of some of the threads and posts over there, and I completely hear you regarding the sometimes heavy-handed nature of some of the bannings, however - from my own experiences with Mark, I just can't see why he would waste valuable time taking part in that kind of childish nonsense?

-Ry

[uberarcanist]

Well, Ryan, the jury is out for me as I indicated in my OP, nevertheless, it does seem to me that the ATS staff has failed to take a very needed hard line on hoaxing...I think that this is a theory that needs to be investigated and discussed.

[ryguy]

Well, Ryan, the jury is out for me as I indicated in my OP, nevertheless, it does seem to me that the ATS staff has failed to take a very needed hard line on hoaxing...I think that this is a theory that needs to be investigated and discussed.

Yes - the issue of whether or not they are hard enough on hoaxers is a valid point. Obviously, I have to believe that, or there wouldn't have been much sense in Steve and I going off and starting up our own forum to do just that.

So I definitely agree that too much insanity is allowed - I was only commenting on the angle that Mark himself might have been involved in creating some of those hoaxes. I'm not saying it isn't a valid hypothesis to explore, I just am not sure I would call it the most probable.

-Ryan

[Shawnna]

See this site regarding ATS and the Chicago O'Hare UFO 'sighting'.

Fair Skeptics
AboveTopSecret.com
and the
November 7, 2006 UFO sighting over
Chicago O'Hare Airport


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Let me begin by saying that I do indeed believe that 'something happened' at the Chicago O'Hare Airport on November 7, 2006.

What that 'something' was is any ones guess.

The following data set is by no means meant to detract from whatever it was that went down on that day.

Rather, the following data set and comments are meant to document a rather curious chain of events that took place on the AboveTopSecret.com forum regarding this event, and to present additional data either not available or not presented on that site.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

On December 14th, 2006, AboveTopSecret.com member thelibra began a thread entitled The Fair Skeptic Registry:

http://www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/thread237317/pg1

This is his opening post:

posted on 14-12-2006 at 06:43 AM (post id: 2677123)

The Fair Skeptic Registry

It occurs to me that more and more skeptics are getting a bad name because of hecklers who will always cry "photochop" or "hoax" without even a cursory examination of the evidence. Likewise, there are those who will cry "brilliant" or "genuine" without even doing a contrast check to see the string holding the paper plate in the photo. This schism is really starting to tear apart some of the membership here.

I'd like to extend this thread as a sort of olive branch between the UFOlogists and the Skeptics.

What I propose is that skeptics, like myself, whom are willing to give UFO cases a fair go, examine the evidence, and present an unbiased finding, drop their card in this thread. We can police our own easily enough, and hopefully we can draw a definitive line between the automatic "nay-sayers and yes-men", and those whom would give UFO cases an honest hard look at the facts, and then present a lucid case as to why we arrived at our conclusions.

Then, if a UFOlogist honestly believes they have something genuine, they can U2U the people on this list a link to their thread and ask for their analysis. Or, I suppose, alternately, they could just post a link in this thread.

Anyway, if the "Fair Skeptics" would like to put themselves on the list as good representatives of the skeptic community, maybe we can start bridging the gap that's forming. Feel free to list any special talents you have or qualifications for verifying or debunking cases.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Shortly after starting this thread, also on December 14th, 2006, AboveTopSecret.com member and co-owner Springer posted the following in The Fair Skeptic Registry:

posted on 14-12-2006 at 05:08 PM (post id: 2678310)

"Sign me up. I am skeptical but I know of a few cases that I can't go into that have some people I UTTERLY RESPECT completely stumped and therefor leave me VERY OPEN to the possibility there is a "core data set and or story" that we simply don't understand.

My qualifications are 15+ years being involved in one way or another with sites like this one, hundreds of conversations and or interviews with many of the "upper crust" of UFOlogy and the mythos surrounding it, and of course I, at least (maybe no one else does), consider being one of the three owners of AboveTopSecret.com a qualification of some merit.

I LIKE THIS IDEA and "thelibra" just scored 50,000 ATS POINTS for coming up with it!

Springer..."


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The entire The Fair Skeptic Registry thread is only eight pages long and ended on January 2, 2007.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Some things to note:

===
When The Fair Skeptic Registry thread was started, the O'Hare Airport UFO Sighting thread was only ten posts (less than one page) long.
When The Fair Skeptic Registry thread was closed, the O'Hare Airport UFO Sighting thread was only on its fifth page. Most of these pages were generated on January 1st (a holiday)
===
On January 2nd, 2007, AboveTopSecret.com member etshrtslr posted in The Fair Skeptic Registry thread :

posted on 2-1-2007 at 10:45 AM (post id: 2852015)

"I would like to post this recent UFO incident at O'Hare airport for consideration of the form"

with a link to a Chicago Tribune newspaper account of the incident.

No one in The Fair Skeptic Registry thread posted any comments regarding this issue. In short, it was ignored.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

On January 2nd, 2007, AboveTopSecret.com member jritzmann posted in The Skeptic Registry thread:

posted on 2-1-2007 at 11:26 AM (post id: 2852087) - single - this post

"Is this becoming nothing more then a dividing force within the ATS community? So far thats all I'm seeing. In fighting, pointless round-robin "defintion" posts, and already group detractors before anything is even started??

Please...

This is why I so rarely get involved in "groups". They cannot be held together, and often get splintered into smaller groups with their own agenda.

As we go forward (if we do) how comfortable are group members going to be when one disagrees with another? Especially when our comms are publicly viewable, complete with peanut gallery comments to be widdled through to see our own "members" posts?

It's a valiant effort, make no mistake about it. I'm kinda surprised it's even still here considering the moderators stopped me from forming a similar group on here some months ago (under a violation of ATS TOS). All that aside, if all this is going to do is add more noise to the already lopsided signal to noise ratio of the UFO research community, then we best drop it now.

So, are we going to have some area of this site to privately review work and discuss issues before presentation?"

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

For whatever reasons and despite the fact that AboveTopSecret.com member jritzmann was not allowed to form a similar group under the ATS T&C, the staff and management of AboveTopSecret.com created a private, password protected sub-forum within the AboveTopSecret.com domain entitled "Fair Skeptics" and created a unique domain name for the founding members of The Fair Skeptics to do whatever we wanted with.

http://www.fairskeptics.org

The founding members of The Fair Skeptics are as follows:

armap
beachcoma
behindthescenes
captainlazy
cheepnis
dracotic
eaglewingz
fredt
gazrok
ignorant_ape
irma
jritzmann
lost_shaman
outrageo
scramjet76
sigung86
skepticoverlord
skip_brilliantine
sophismata
spines
spreadthetruth
springer
supercheetah
swatmedic
thelibra
toasty
torbjon
wswbkbroiler

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


Enter the Fair Skeptics Forum



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Fair Skeptics forum located on AboveTopSecret.com is a private, password protected forum. In theory it is open only to the above listed members, however I think it would be safe to assume that the third AboveTopSecret.com site owner, Simon Grey, would be able to access it, and perhaps AboveTopSecret.com Moderators and Super Moderators.

Since the information contained within that forum is not available to the general public, I would advise readers to take the following data set 'with a grain of salt'. It is impossible for you to independently 'vet' this information without the assistance of one or more of the above mentioned members, or the site owners and/or moderators.

Also, even if you do manage to gain access to that forum, IF there is any 'hanky panky' going on by the site owners and/or moderators, there's no real guarantee that the information contained within that forum has not been edited or altered.

The only assurances that I can offer you is that I am a Fair Skeptic, that I am Not a disgruntled ATS member 'out to get revenge', I seek only the truth of the matter, and that I Swear on my daughters life and my fathers grave that the information contained within this document is 100% true and accurate to the best of my knowledge.

I do most of my writing in a word processor and keep copies of my work on my computer. This includes most of my posts for AboveTopSecret.com. I no longer have access to the Fair Skeptics forum, so my following Fair Skeptics posts are from my original copies. The upshot of this is that they will not contain the post ID number that is assigned to posts by AboveTopSecret.com.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Story


On January 2nd, 2007, the Fair Skeptics forum began.

Needless to say, I (and others) were rather excited to have our own private forum to work in and our own domain name (fairskeptics.org) to do whatever we wanted with.

The first order of business was to decide just exactly who and what we were and how we were going to go about conducting business.

We spent some time chit chatting about mottos, creeds, methods of operation, how best to use the fairskeptics.org web site. In short, Boys with New Toys spinning their wheels.

Within a week our Founding Father and leader, thelibra, told us he was going to have to step down as our leader due to the fact that he was expecting a new member to his family and simply would not have the time or energy needed to lead our group.

More discussions and elections followed. It was decided that Fair Skeptic members jritzmann and cheepnis would be our co-leaders.

By this time it was apparent that many members of the group either never had or were no longer participating in the group. Interest was waning. We had yet to decide upon a case to work on, how we were going to work on it, and what to do with our results when we were done.

Some members were suggesting cases such as The Rosewell incident or The Phoenix Lights incident for our first case. Myself (and others) felt that those cases would not be suitable for us to 'sharpen our teeth' on, and that something less high profile and not 'quite so beat to death' would be better suited to our needs.

Cheepnis had discovered an old newspaper clipping tucked away inside a book he was reading documenting a UFO sighting in the 1990's in his part of the world. According to the clipping, there were witnesses and at least one of those witnesses was a law enforcement officer. A quick internet search showed that this case had not yet been seriously analyzed by any UFO groups. This seemed like a good UFO case for us to start with.

Early on in the formation of our group, SkepticOverlord let it be known that it would be a good idea for us to include more than just UFO cases in our studies.

For this reason I suggested that we also investigate what I dubbed "Springers Haunted House" in order to cover a paranormal incident. "Springers Haunted House" is based upon a thread authored by Springers wife, valhal, entitled "Have I Disturbed Something?" I suggested this topic because Springer was a Fair Skeptics member, valhal is an AboveTopSecret.com member, and both would be available for questioning at a leisurely pace. Also, since they lived in the house, they would be able to assist us in gathering additional data.

I would link to the thread in question, but in the course of writing this I made a rather interesting discovery. The thread title is really "Have I Disturbed Some One? (Revisited)", it was started in July of 2003, was still active as of January of 2007, and, if you followed that link, you will see that it has just recently been delegated to the AboveTopSecret.com TRASH BIN.

I find this interesting because it was a long thread, it has been on AboveTopSecret.com a long time, it was full of good information and good research, and Springer himself makes reference to it on the February 11, 2007 The Paracast podcast located here. (The comment is located approximately 25 minutes into the program)

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

On January 14th, 2007 SkepticOverlord made the following post in the Fair Skeptics forum:

posted on 14-1-2007 at 03:40 PM (post id: 2878313)

"Not to influence you guys or anything but...

Someone just jumped into the O'Hare UFO thread who claims to be an eye witness.

(hint hint nudge nudge)"

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Even with this 'witness', the story still seemed rather Blah to us, and, as with AboveTopSecret.com member etshrtslr (see above) SkepticOverlords suggestion was ignored by The Fair Skeptics.

More chit chat by the Boys with their New Toys in their private play pen followed. We were having a hard time getting started. For some reason the staff and management of AboveTopSecret.com was not granting us access to the fairskeptics.org web site so that the Fair Skeptics co-leader cheepnis could post a scan of the newspaper clipping he had found. None of the 'powers that be' were responding to his requests. Some more days passed...

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Then, on January 21st, 2007, Fair Skeptics co-leader jritzmann posted the following in the Fair Skeptics forum:

posted on 21-1-2007 at 04:54 PM (post id: 2893993)

"Turning over to Cheepnis

If it's ok with him. For the next 6 months I'm going to be heavily involved in co-authoring a book, and having to do a fair amount of traveling.

This was a completely unexpected turn for me, and sadly I'm not going to have alot of online time to track down or get info on cases.

I still think this is a worthy endeavor, but I wont be able to participate like I had previously thought.

I'll still check in, and if anyone needs help I'm just an email away xxxxx.xxxxxxxx@gmail.com

My apologies for bowing out, it's truly unavoidable, and unexpected."

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Now we were down to the one leader, cheepnis. However, we weren't really doing anything or accomplishing very much and fewer than ten of the original 28 members seemed to be participating in the group.

Then, just two days later, on January 23rd of 2007, The Picture was posted in the O'Hare UFO thread by a new member called 00000000.

posted on 23-1-2007 at 01:29 PM (post id: 2898150)

http://www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/thr ... pid2898150

Within a few hours of being posted this picture was Product Branded by the staff of AboveTopSecret.com with the words "abovetopsecret.com". This type of Product Branding is not standard operating procedure for AboveTopSecret.com. Most "fuzzy pictures of UFOs" are completely ignored by the staff and management of AboveTopSecret.com.

For some unexplained reason, the staff and management of AboveTopSecret.com felt that this "fuzzy picture" of an alleged UFO purportedly seen over the Chicago O'Hare Airport on November 7, 2006, was 'special' enough to require Product Branding with an "abovetopsecret.com" logo.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

On January 24th, 2007 jritzmann began an analysis of the 00000000 picture: ((posted in open forum http://www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/thread236709/pg1))

posted on 24-1-2007 at 06:19 AM (post id: 2899674)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 06:31 AM (post id: 2899702)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 06:52 AM (post id: 2899766)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 07:06 AM (post id: 2899807)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 07:08 AM (post id: 2899816)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 07:12 AM (post id: 2899824)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 07:20 AM (post id: 2899851)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 07:23 AM (post id: 2899858)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 07:28 AM (post id: 2899870)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 07:33 AM (post id: 2899882)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 10:29 AM (post id: 2900314)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 11:11 AM (post id: 2900413)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 11:12 AM (post id: 2900414)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 12:27 PM (post id: 2900598)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 02:51 PM (post id: 2900887)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 03:46 PM (post id: 2901016)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 04:36 PM (post id: 2901111)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 06:07 PM (post id: 2901224)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 06:45 PM (post id: 2901268)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 07:45 PM (post id: 2901381)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 08:02 PM (post id: 2901411)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 04:34 AM (post id: 2901960)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 08:51 AM (post id: 2902668)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 08:54 AM (post id: 2902677)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 08:57 AM (post id: 2902685)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 09:03 AM (post id: 2902709)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 09:26 AM (post id: 2902776)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 09:34 AM (post id: 2902794)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 09:38 AM (post id: 2902805)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 09:46 AM (post id: 2902831)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 09:53 AM (post id: 2902855)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 03:05 PM (post id: 2903658)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 04:56 PM (post id: 2903916)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 05:06 PM (post id: 2903938)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 05:11 PM (post id: 2903948)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 05:27 PM (post id: 2903981)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 05:44 PM (post id: 2904013)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 06:04 PM (post id: 2904045)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 06:12 PM (post id: 2904056)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 06:42 PM (post id: 2904105)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 06:54 PM (post id: 2904118)
posted on 26-1-2007 at 06:31 AM (post id: 2904983)
posted on 26-1-2007 at 07:50 PM (post id: 2906807)
posted on 27-1-2007 at 07:08 AM (post id: 2907534)
posted on 27-1-2007 at 09:22 AM (post id: 2907757)

...and so on.

This is the same jritzmann who, a few short days before, was saying;

"For the next 6 months I'm going to be heavily involved in co-authoring a book, and having to do a fair amount of traveling. This was a completely unexpected turn for me, and sadly I'm not going to have alot of online time to track down or get info on cases."

And yet, here he is, practically living online, tracking down and getting info on cases.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

During the beginning of his investigation I was in u2u contact with jritzmann regarding an analysis of the "00000000" image. (u2u is a private 'instant messaging' service provided by AboveTopSecret.com for its members) When I pointed out that I really could align the "congestion" photo with the "ufo" photo (it just required some 'tweeking') he stopped communicating with me.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

By this time various AboveTopSecret.com members were beginning to express some concern over the O'Hare UFO story and how it was unfolding on AboveTopSecret.com. Many felt that the image was a 'fake', the witnesses were 'fake', and that certain members were 'sock puppets'. None of these members had access to the information contained within the Fair Skeptics forum and were basing their conclusions solely upon the information available in open forum.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Since I did have access to the Fair Skeptics forum, on January 27th, 2007, I made the following post in the Fair Skeptics Forum:

(NOTE: Much of this data has already been presented above, I include it again here as this is my original post in its entirety)

Okay, just some Observations from a Fair Skeptic.

Posted by Skeptic Overlord:

posted on 14-1-2007 at 03:40 PM (post id: 2878313)

Not to influence you guys or anything but...

Someone just jumped into the O'Hare UFO thread who claims to be an eye witness.

(hint hint nudge nudge)

. . . . .

Posted by jritzmann:

posted on 21-1-2007 at 04:54 PM (post id: 2893993) - single - this post REPLYQUOTE

Turning over to Cheepnis

If it's ok with him. For the next 6 months I'm going to be heavily involved in co-authoring a book, and having to do a fair amount of traveling. This was a completely unexpected turn for me, and sadly I'm not going to have alot of online time to track down or get info on cases.

I still think this is a worthy endeavor, but I wont be able to participate like I had previously thought. I'll still check in, and if anyone needs help I'm just an email away jeff.ritzmann@gmail.com

My apologies for bowing out, it's truly unavoidable, and unexpected.

. . . . .

A picture was posted by 00000000

posted on 23-1-2007 at 01:29 PM (post id: 2898150)

and was pretty much immediately stamped with “abovetopsecret.com” by the staff… this product branding appears to be lacking in most of the other image on this site….


On 24-1-2007 jritzmann began an analysis of the 00000000 picture:

posted on 24-1-2007 at 06:19 AM (post id: 2899674)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 06:31 AM (post id: 2899702)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 06:52 AM (post id: 2899766)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 07:06 AM (post id: 2899807)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 07:08 AM (post id: 2899816)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 07:12 AM (post id: 2899824)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 07:20 AM (post id: 2899851)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 07:23 AM (post id: 2899858)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 07:28 AM (post id: 2899870)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 07:33 AM (post id: 2899882)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 10:29 AM (post id: 2900314)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 11:11 AM (post id: 2900413)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 11:12 AM (post id: 2900414)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 12:27 PM (post id: 2900598)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 02:51 PM (post id: 2900887)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 03:46 PM (post id: 2901016)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 04:36 PM (post id: 2901111)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 06:07 PM (post id: 2901224)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 06:45 PM (post id: 2901268)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 07:45 PM (post id: 2901381)
posted on 24-1-2007 at 08:02 PM (post id: 2901411)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 04:34 AM (post id: 2901960)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 08:51 AM (post id: 2902668)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 08:54 AM (post id: 2902677)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 08:57 AM (post id: 2902685)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 09:03 AM (post id: 2902709)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 09:26 AM (post id: 2902776)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 09:34 AM (post id: 2902794)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 09:38 AM (post id: 2902805)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 09:46 AM (post id: 2902831)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 09:53 AM (post id: 2902855)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 03:05 PM (post id: 2903658)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 04:56 PM (post id: 2903916)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 05:06 PM (post id: 2903938)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 05:11 PM (post id: 2903948)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 05:27 PM (post id: 2903981)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 05:44 PM (post id: 2904013)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 06:04 PM (post id: 2904045)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 06:12 PM (post id: 2904056)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 06:42 PM (post id: 2904105)
posted on 25-1-2007 at 06:54 PM (post id: 2904118)
posted on 26-1-2007 at 06:31 AM (post id: 2904983)
posted on 26-1-2007 at 07:50 PM (post id: 2906807)
posted on 27-1-2007 at 07:08 AM (post id: 2907534)
posted on 27-1-2007 at 09:22 AM (post id: 2907757)

which brings us up to the moment.

A read of those posts shows that the jmann has been doing an in-depth analysis of the photo, including consultation with a photo expert and conducting an interview with a witness (thumbs up, btw)
This is just a data set. No implications, accusations or conclusions are implied.

Stage left, Fair Skeptic, zoom in on bozoboy.

Okay, alla this crap is in a private little sandbox away from prying eyes, and I, for one, intend to keep it that way.

BUT

I think we are all clever enough to know that if the above little hummer was dumped into open forum it might actually generate some DRAMA. Maybe a Lot of Drama.

There would be questions. Lotsa questions. Not from me, I don’t care, but other folks Might ask why S.O. was so interested in the o’hare thing then? Why did That picture get product branded while others did not? Where did the jmann find sooo much time to devote to a project when he clearly stated that he had No Time to devote to a project?

Silly stuff like that. The kind of crap that destabilizes a community *shrugs*

If an idiot like me can whip up a funky data set like that, imagine what a Real Brainiac could do. *shudders*

Again, I don’t know, I don’t care, ‘ell, I might even be able to Help…

But I can’t help but recall those oh so infamous words I uttered about a year ago now….

So, Bill, Was It Microsoft Word??? *laughs*

I’m going away for a while. Torbtown is dead so I don’t even have email anymore.

Mull, ponder, delete, ignore, discuss, comment, ban.

Catch ya on the flip side.

And, as always,
Rock on
twj

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I spent the next four days doing research and investigating the O'Hare UFO story.

When I returned to the Fair Skeptics forum I was fully expecting some sort of reprimand, comment, or explanation from the persons I had named in the above post.

Instead all I saw was a short response from our leader, cheepnis. The exact wording of that comment is not available to me, but the gist of it was that he agreed with my observations.

The next post by me was made on January 31st of 2007. It was more of the same, observations and the culmination of my few days of research.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

posted on January 31st, 2007 by me in the Fair Skeptics forum:

Four days worth of badly written notes…

Another data set:

jritzmann posted on 28-1-2007 at 05:24 PM (post id: 2910080)

(This is in reference to The picture)

“…we have found others of that area…”

I did a search for more shots of that area as well, this is just the google data:

google image search (no quotes were used in the search terms)

ohare airport - page 14 has congestion pic, all rest zip (33 pages)

ohare - zip (28 pages)

o'hare - zip (33 pages)

chicago airport - zip (33 pages)

airport congestion - page 2 has congestion pic, all rest zip (9 pages)

airport - zip (43 pages)

runway - zip (43 pages)

chicago ohare airport - zip (29 pages)

airplanes - zip (28 pages)

air traffic - zip (38 pages)

I also did the same on Yahoo and Devilfinder, my results were ZIP. Thousands of Pics. I have been unable to locate additional shots of that area from that vantage point on the internet.

(jmann, you might wanna bookmark those shots you said you found or revise your statement before some other bozo decides to tag you with Where’s the Beef?)

. . . .

Eyewitness posted on 29-1-2007 at 06:37 PM (post id: 2912786)

"I do believe that there are craft in our skies that humans... at least present-day humans --- aren't piloting."

This May make the witness a 'nutty crunchy ufo believer' in the eyes of many…. May wish to reconsider using the ‘credible’ word in regards to that witness *shrugs*
. . . .

Springer posted on 30-1-2007 at 12:13 PM (post id: 2914420)

(basically getting ticked at serpo and aussiebloke cracks)

Springer posted on 31-1-2007 at 12:53 PM (post id: 2917093)

(basically blowing off Dr Love for making serpo cracks)

jritzmann posted on 31-1-2007 at 12:22 PM (post id: 2917005)

(basically slapping Dr Love around a bit for making serpo cracks)

The Concern over the similarities between the handling of this incident and Serpo are genuine…. Blowing them off is only going to feed the drama mob. May wish to reconsider revising tactics to deflect detractors.

. . . .

Onward;

Springer posted on 30-1-2007 at 12:30 PM (post id: 2914468)

(basically 'we are doing alla this stuff to get more data, what else can we do?')

Cold Calls. They cost money though... (and time). I've made over 30 so far this week, random calls to the Chicago area. Zero results. *shrugs*

. . . .

Bhadhidar posted on 31-1-2007 at 11:06 AM (post id: 2916802)

(basically a good observation)

ya, weird, huh? Fiverz goes to the airport and gets kicked out for asking some questions, whereas something that floats over the runway and delays flights gets 'ignored'. IF flights were delayed, even for the weather, then there should be a report:

http://www.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/cfrassemble.cgi?title=200314

Title 14 makes it pretty clear that there should be a paper trail for this event. If there is no paper trail then someone somewhere is in violation of a variety of sections within Title 14. Someone somewhere needs to hang for something. They've had enough time to deliver a Judas goat.
. . . .

Flight Delays (fill in the location and the dates from drop down menus)

http://www.transtats.bts.gov/OT_Delay/o ... ype=3&pn=1

Better view of the data.

http://www.transtats.bts.gov/OT_Delay/o ... =data&pn=2

Note that 0.27% of the delays out of O'Hare between June and November 2006 (smallest data set I could find, the site won't give just November) were from "Other" causes.... this might be Important.

. . . .

Fourth quarter FAA Enforcement Reports not in yet:

http://www.faa.gov/about/office%5Forg/h ... /Quarters/


Be Very interesting to see what they have to say when they come out…
. . . . .

More helpful links: (pack a lunch)

Who’s who in gov’ment:

http://www.gpoaccess.gov/gmanual/browse-gm-06.html

All the laws o’ the land:

http://www.gpoaccess.gov/uscode/browse.html

. . . .

To date I have been unable to find any official paper trail relating to this event. Internet and media hype, yes. ‘Official’ documentation, no. It’ll be summer before gov’ment quarterlies trickle into internet data bases….

. . . . .


Query:

why do HectorRmz edits have funky links that go nowhere??

[edit on 053131p://010756 by HectorRmz]

[edit on 053131p://010727 by HectorRmz]

no one elses edits seem to have this glitch in them...

. . . .

The Picture:

Numbers and Math.

uf00000000

jpg
100 px/inch
640X480
RGB 8bits/channel
aspect ratio 1.3333

congestion shot

jpg
200 px/inch
267X200
RGB 8bits/channel
aspect ratio 1.3350

2.4 size variation in uf00000000 and congestion shot:

2.4 X 267 = 640.8
2.4 X 200 = 480

The .8 variation in the width Might be what is throwing the photograph 'experts' off, and Might be attributed to aspect ratio complications and the tools and skills the ‘experts’ are employing.

I CAN align the two images Perfectly, it just takes a little tweeking, that’s all. (said as much to jmann in a u2u)

However, I’m a MOVIE Guy, not a Photograph guy… different tools, different skills *shrugs*

On a side note, jmann, I’m a little surprised to see you say that a Hoaxer wouldn’t know ‘something’ about image manipulation…. (like messing with specific channels etc. .. post id: 2904983)

That’s a pretty big assumption for a Fair Skeptic to be making…. If You know about certain aspects of image manipulation it might be safe to assume that Others Might know about that too… and ways to avoid detection….

Something to think about. *shrugs*

. . . . .

Cheepnis, a Lotta folks seem concerned about the turn of events regarding this story… and none of them have access to the info in our little sandbox, either *laughs*

Like I said before though, I, for one, intend to keep my observations and comments behind closed doors for now. There’s enough drama and stress in open forum already, I ain’t gonna add to it out there.

Okay, I go again.

Mull, ponder, ignore, yadda, yadda, yadda.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

On February 1st, 2007, I made the following post in the Fair Skeptics forum. It was in reply to another Fair Skeptics member who felt that they were the only one who perceived that something odd was going on. I cannot remember who made the comment (although I suspect cheepnis) nor exactly what the comment was.

This is my February 1st, 2007 post in the Fair Skeptics forum:

It ain't you comrade.

You may recall that early on in the thread a dude dubbed photochopz contributed some info....

posted on 24-1-2007 at 06:55 PM (post id: 2901292)

"My Conclusion:
Yes it could easily be duplicated but that doesn't mean that its fake."

upon a few more minutes of playing with it he says:

posted on 24-1-2007 at 07:30 PM (post id: 2901359)

"I'm absolutely %100 positive that the "UFO" pic was made from that other picture. Its the same picture with a few minor edits added to it. I could completely reproduce this "ufo" picture from that original in about 5 minutes very easily."

then he goes on to say:

posted on 24-1-2007 at 07:38 PM (post id: 2901368)

“If your looking as to who posted that picture on here. The first place I would look would be your own members.
Remember; this is an internet forum and sometimes people take things way too far. "

(Rather astute observation, that)

For the most part nobody pays any attention to this guy or attacks him or anything (a little praise at the git go then Zilch)

Despite not being included, he still contributes:

posted on 24-1-2007 at 07:44 PM (post id: 2901378)

And when it becomes clear that nobody wants to hear what he has to offer, he splits:

posted on 24-1-2007 at 07:58 PM (post id: 2901406)

*shrugs*

Nice guy. Polite, patient, professional, and very open about who and what he is.

And he was an independent ‘expert’ giving his analysis of this situation (and not just an ‘expert’ on the picture but also as an ‘expert’ as an administrator of an online forum)

Nobody in that thread seems to really Want independent confirmation or denial of anything. I think they just want their daily dose of diversion.

As an aside;

The whole ‘expert’ thing is bothering me anyway. It has been my completely and totally Worthless life experience that the people who design the tools and ‘write the book’ on the tools know less about the tools than the ‘blue collar idiots’ who ‘only’ use the tools for fun or profit.

It’s idiots like me who push the tools to their limits and then Break the bloody things. (and then find new uses for the broken bits)

It’s idiots like me who use a hammer as a can opener and a chisel as a screw driver… procedures not found ‘in the book’, they don’t teach that in Shop Class, but using those tools in that way is quite effective nonetheless.

Video games are a great example. How many thousands of ‘expert’ man hours go into creating and debugging a video game? And how long does it take that kid on the corner to crack the thing and find every glitch, bug, trick, etc?

Bah.

Duty calls.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

On February 3rd, 2007, I made the following reply to Fair Skeptics member ArMaP. I had been having a hard time finding a list of arrivals and departures for flights into and out of the Chicago O'Hare Airport for November 7th, 2006, and he had found one.

Posted on February 3rd, 2007 by me in the Fair Skeptics forum:

ArMaP,

Great Find! I’ve been all over that freekin’ website looking for a comprehensive data set to no avail, THANKS!

My machine has locked up twice now while trying to play with the data from that site (called up the data for the entire month for United Airlines… looking for patterns…)

However a quick peek showed me that a large number of flights landed and took off DURING the times the ‘ufo’ event took place… in short, traffic was not put on hold or grounded during this event… business as usual *shrugs*

Which doesn’t mean anything other than the ‘powers that be’ didn’t perceive anything out of the ordinary then and just kept right on working…

I’m also not seeing any abnormal spikes in arrival or departure delays for the time of the event or just after…

But I also have tired old eyes and a screaming kid on my lap who thinks this type of ‘playing around’ is BORING *laughs*

Perhaps someone else would like to pursue this avenue of research… I think it’s a dead end as far as finding Supporting Evidence for the event.

As far as the Funky Edits go, again, Nice Find. I hadn’t seen those before until the o’hare thread. Regardless, I Still find it interesting and am curious Why some folks have those and others don’t… ALL of this Hector dudes edits are glitched that way, not just a random few here and there… it’s the webmaster in me, tha’s all *shrugs*

As far as the comments go, *laughs* it wasn’t really You I thought I’d be hearing from, but, um, ‘others’, ya know? No biggy, everything is data.

As an aside:

I sent some queries off to my ‘peoples’ to see if any of them would hook me up with Mr. Akroyds agent (they all Can, it’s a matter of whether or not they Will) to see if he would be willing to make a statement regarding the o’hare pics / footage he supposedly is in possession of…

However, my guys are all in tech now and I’m NOT playing my ‘big cards’ for something as ‘small’ as this.

But I did ask *shrugs*

Time will tell.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

A few hours later, also on February 3rd, 2007 I made my last post in the Fair Skeptics forum:

So,

I’ve just been chatting with SkyWay. As you may recall, he/she made a comment in open forum about FS that caught my eye… so I asked ‘em (very professionally) ‘what the ‘ell was That all ‘bout?’

To wit they replied:

Hello there Torbjon, how's it goin'?

My reference to the "Fair Skeptics" was in regard to a specialy assembled group of members of ATS were going to join their best efforts at impartial analyses of ufo reports to determine if they were authentic or not. They had designated themselves as the "Fair Skeptics". The group was the idea of a member known as The Libra, and it held great potential to provide us with very sound and informitive reports on ufo phenomena.

The members of the Fair Skeptics who had volunteered to participate seemed very sincere and determined to be as objective as possible in trying to bring about a better understanding of ufos as well as other extraordinary phenomena. Some of them had experience and expertise in fields which could be very valuable in examining evidence such as photos and videos of ufos.

So, when this exceptional case of a ufo appearing at O'hare airport in Chicago came to our attention here at ATS, and generated a great deal of interest and intense discussion, I thought it would be a perfect chance for the Fair Skeptics to apply their expertise and scientific analysis to try to present a better understanding of that incident. In fact, I found it rather bewildering that the Fair Skeptics didn't even look into the case. I thought...What are they waiting for? Do you know?

Glad to hear from you
SkyWay

Nice, ey? So we ain’t invisible and folks do indeed know about us. Anyway, I had signed that u2u as Torbjon Jensen, Fair Skeptic. So when I got the above message I, of course, bust a gut laughing.

I replied to the dude / dudette (again all professional like) and said that I was one of those people you just described, some of us actually Are working on this case, but the group as a whole has suffered a few set backs.

To whit they replied:

Awww! What a disappointing bit of news. Sorry to hear about the setbacks. It was such a great idea and seemed so promising. Oh well....Rome wasn't built in a day...good things take time to build.

SkyWay

Very Astute observation from someone who totally Missed the ‘Fair Skeptic’ tag after my name.

For those of you who may be becoming a little disenchanted and disheartened over the ‘lack’ of instant orgasms within this little sandbox of ours, let me tell you a story.

I can lift one million pounds.

No, REALLY.

One MILLION Pounds.

I know I know, you’re saying the idiot finally found some grass and is now whistling Dixie out of his sphincter, but I swear to you, I Know I Can.

I Know I Can because I have done it before. More than once, actually.

But I didn’t do it all at once.

I did it one 55 pound box at a time.

800 boxes per cargo container…

Container after container, year after year…. It adds up.

Fair Skeptics is a looooong ways away from the million pound mark… ‘ell, we don’t even have a full container yet…

But we have Some boxes loaded… there are more boxes Waiting to be loaded, and we CAN do this.

But we’ll Never do it if we keep looking at how far away the end of the van is or think about how Heavy one million pounds is.

The tortoise Will kick the rabbits ass in the long run ‘cause ‘slow and steady’ does indeed win the race.

All we have to do right now is load ONE more box.

That’s it. Just One more box.

Just One more box…

Just One more…

Just One…

One…

…

..

.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

That was my pitiful attempt to try to breath some life into the group.

I stayed away from the web site (and the internet in general) for a few days to clear my head.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

On February 7th, 2007 I tried to log in to AboveTopSecret.com but kept getting redirected to an error page. Being a Fair Skeptic and willing to entertain any and all possibilities before jumping to any conclusions, I had recalled that some time before SkepticOverlord had mentioned that he might change the 'look' of AboveTopSecret.com from its current "Dark Matter" theme to something called "Plasma". I decided that I would just assume that the site was down for maintenance and upgrades and would check back later.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

On February 9th, 2007 I still could not log in to AboveTopSecret.com. This seemed suspicious to me. I began a Google investigation and discovered that the website AboveTopSecret.com was indeed up and running. I tried to figure out why I couldn't see any pages or log in. A few hours of poking around later and it dawned on me to clear out my cookies from my browser.

Once I did this I was able to view the web site.

Once I was able to view the web site I tried to log in, and was immediately redirected to a blank error page.

Again I cleared my cookies and again I could view the web site.

Assuming it was just some sort of glitch in the system, I used the AboveTopSecret.com approved Contact Us button at the bottom of the home page specifically designed for just this sort of thing.

On February 9th, 2007 I sent the following note to the site owners of AboveTopSecret.com via their Contact Us button.


I appear to have been banned, which is fine, but if so then some sort of explanation would be nice (when time permits)
If that is not the case then there is something 'wrong' with the web site. I can view the site just fine until I try to log in, at which point I get a cookie dumped on me that blocks all content from ATS.
Thanks!
Sincerely,
Torbjon W. Jensen

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I received an auto reply that same day stating that all three site owners had received a copy of my question/comment and that someone would get back to me within 48 hours.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

On February 17th, 2007, I had yet to receive a reply to my inquiry from any member of the AboveTopSecret.com staff. So, again using their Contact Us button, I resubmitted my original request with the added line:

I'm still awaiting a comment upon this issue.
Let's just remove the "when time permits" line and try again...
Thanks!
twj

I received another auto reply but nothing more.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

On February 20th, 2007, I had yet to receive a reply to either of my original inquiries from any member of the AboveTopSecret.com staff. So, once again, still using their Contact Us button, I resubmitted both of my original requests along with the added line:

Third time's a charm, right?
You would think that 288 hours would be sufficient time to create a response to this inquiry.
You guys are clever, make something up.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

As of February 22nd, 2007 I have yet to receive a response from any member of the AboveTopSecret.com staff or management regarding this issue.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

In order to see the status of a member, you have to log in to the web site. Since I can't log in, I can honestly say that I don't know if I have been banned or if this is just some glitch in the system.

I can also honestly say that the customer service department at AboveTopSecret.com needs a lot of help.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Since I find this whole fiasco to be somewhat fascinating, I've been keeping tabs on the Chicago O'Hare UFO story as it unfolds on AboveTopSecret.com even though I can't log in or participate.

In early February 2007 it was announced on AboveTopSecret.com that Springer, one of the three site owners, would be working with the Discovery Channel in the production of a documentary based upon the alleged UFO purportedly seen over the Chicago O'Hare Airport.

On February 14th, 2007, Springer made the following post in a thread entitled "Coming Soon: ATS & the O'Hare UFO on TV"

Posted by Springer ((in open forum http://www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/thr ... pid2954345))

posted on 14-2-2007 at 11:26 AM (post id: 2954345)

The "deal"

For all those who are concerned about the "direction" of this documentary let me do what I can to ease your fears.

For the last 2 months I have been in daily contact with the producers, basically putting the whole show together with them. Because of that, I am the only "talking head" on the O'Hare incident, there won't be anyone else who will have the opportunity to "ridicule" the event, me, or any of the witnesses. I planned it that way.

I intend to simply let the witnesses, the State Director of MUFON, and Jon Hilkevitch tell their stories. THE FACTS as recounted by those who were there, and those who have studied this is all I am interested in.

We have two additional witnesses who came forward long before this event happened with reports of THE SAME BLOODY OBJECT, over O'Hare back in 2001 and 2004!

I know these people are NOT trying to get on the "bandwagon" because as stated above, they came forward BEFORE the November, 2006 incident. THAT is stunning to me.

There is certainly something going on over Chicago and its environs and if this documentary can help us get more data, images, testimony then it's worth my time and efforts.

Fear not about me getting "sold" by people trying to get their "15 minutes of fame". The witnesses we know are the ONLY people we will be interviewing. I'm not going to canvas the ramp workers or anyone else for that matter.

Hopefully it won't be freezing like every other time I've been to Chicago, man when the wind howls off that frozen lake down Michigan Ave. it's the coldest place on Earth to me!


Springer...


[edit on 2-14-2007 by Springer]

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The line:

"For the last 2 months I have been in daily contact with the producers..." caught my eye.

A little simple math and a peek at the calendar tells me that two months prior to his February 14th, 2007 post would be December 14th, 2006.

And on December 14th, 2006 the O'Hare Airport UFO Sighting thread was a grand total of ten rather boring and empty posts. No witnesses. No pictures. And no comments by any staff members of AboveTopSectret.com that THIS is the story of the century.

I find this odd.

But I'm a Fair Skeptic. Perhaps that was just a typo on his part and what he 'really' meant was two hours, or two days, or maybe two weeks.... two months seems odd to me though.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Something else I've noticed this past week. AboveTopSecret.com has a list of Who Is Online at the bottom of their home page. I have not noticed any activity from Fair Skeptics leader cheepnis in this past week. Some time ago now I made a request from a friend who can log in to the AboveTopSecret.com web site to please notify the leader of the Fair Skeptics and notify him that the problems at torbtown.com had been solved and that the 'freebie' email accounts that I had set up for the Fair Skeptic members were once again back in action. However, I have not heard from cheepnis or any other Fair Skeptics via the 'freebie' email accounts I set up for them.

I make no conclusions from this but it 'feels' reasonable to assume that perhaps he may have suffered the same fate as me, a.k.a. unable to log in to AboveTopSecret.com (and therefore never got the message).


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Note that I have not accused anybody of anything. Observations, comments, and data sets, that is all that is here, and it is not enough for me to reach a conclusion about anything other than I need more data.

I do find the following items interesting though:

The near instant Product Branding of the fuzzy image submitted by "00000000"
Jritzmanns' comment about having no time to spend online or research cases followed by his continued work and research online.
Springers' "2 months" comment.
SkepticOverlords' desire to have the Fair Skeptics get involved with the O'Hare story before it was much of a story.
My unexplained ability to log into the web site and lack of replies to my inquiries.
The possible disappearance of Fair Skeptics leader cheepnis (one of the few other Fair Skeptics to voice concerns over this issue)
The fact that jritzmann stated that he could (and did) find other images of the O'Hare Airport taken from the same vantage point as the 00000000 picture but has not produced them, nor can I locate any.
The removal of valhals' thread "Have I Disturbed Some One? (Revisited)" shortly after I suggested we (the Fair Skeptics) examine it and shortly after Springer made comments about it on the Paracast podcast.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Addendum: February 23rd, 2007

I've just been informed by a third party that the Fair Skeptics leader, cheepnis, also cannot log in to the AboveTopSecret.com website. Apparently, we are not technically 'banned' from the site, we just can't log in, check our private messages, or participate in the forum. How this does not equate to 'banning' is a bit beyond me.

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Addendum: February 24th, 2007

When I discovered that I could no longer log into AboveTopSecret.com (and the Fair Skeptics) I was actually in the process of delivering the following information to further their analysis. Very little research had been done to obtain a visual record of weather conditions in Chicago on November 7, 2006. After many hours of searching I managed to find the following images.


MORNING
4 images taken with Kodak EasyShare CX7300 http://www.flickr.com/cameras/kodak/cx7300/

This is a blog. Scroll down to the November 7th entry. There are five images. Four of them show weather conditions. Note the "little glow balls" in two of the pictures.

Original Image Source:
http://howardwatchers.blogspot.com/2006 ... chive.html

AFTERNOON
2 images taken with Canon PowerShot SD500 http://www.flickr.com/cameras/canon/powershot_sd500/

Original Image Source:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/alspic/298 ... otostream/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/alspic/299 ... otostream/

EVENING/NIGHT
2 images. No camera information was given.

Original Image Source:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/dshot/2961 ... otostream/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/dshot/2961 ... otostream/


LATE NIGHT
1 image taken with Canon EOS 20D http://www.flickr.com/cameras/canon/eos_20d/

Original Image Source:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/tinajean/292620714/

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Addendum February 28th, 2007

This was just emailed to me:

...


Sorry for the belated response, so many things going on in my Real Life right now...

Anyhoo, I happened to watch this go down. Where SO just jumped in after a reply from jritzmann and banned torbjon and appearently cheepnis.

I still have access to the Fair Skeptics forum. Here is the post by SO on torbjons O'Hare data set thread ...

posted on 7-2-2007 at 06:27 PM (post id: 2935963)

This is the first time I saw this thread... been busy with RL stuff and offline ATS stuff.

And I must say... WTF?

Where does this crap come from?

You guys aspire to be crtical-thinking "researchers"? Seems more like you're moving well down the path of becoming "conclusion jumpers".

1) I pointed out the O'Hare thread at a time when you were still wondering what to do with yourselves.

2) I labeled images that were sent directly to ATS that I deemed headed toward massive online attention... and they were, and now the source is preserved.

3) You offended real researchers with real credentials, not the intent of ATS nor this group... I'm closing this forum in 24 hours and killing the project. If you want the domain, let me know.

This is a shame.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Addendum: March 3rd 2007

I've been trying to get an 'official' answer as to why I can't log onto AboveTopSecret.com anymore since February 9th, 2007. So far all I have received from them are auto responses...

(note: I just sent my fourth request for information to AboveTopSecret.com today, in the process of updating this page I see that today is the third and not the fifth of March)


Thank you for your email. We appreciate your effort to contact us.Your message has been sent to each of the three members of the executive staff.Please allow up to 48 hours for our response...Contact form submission user's IP: 24.168.134.31Contact form submission user's name: Torbjon W. Jensen ===========================================================March 5th, 2007You know, we can continue to document the incredibly poor response time of your customer service department for years, if that is what you want to do. Regardless, I am still awaiting a response to my inquiry as submitted on February 9th, 2007.Thanks!Torbjon W. JensenDate: Tue, 20 Feb 2007 17:33:35 -0600Message-Id: <200702202333.l1KNXZco004848@chickpea.denyignorance.com>To: torbjon@labtheater.orgSubject: ATS CONTACT: Follow UpFrom: ATS Business Office <business@abovetopsecret.net>Thank you for your email. We appreciate your effort to contact us.Your message has been sent to each of the three members of the executive staff.Please allow up to 48 hours for our response...Contact form submission user's IP: 24.168.134.31Contact form submission user's name: Torbjon W. Jensen===========================================================Third time's a charm, right?You would think that 288 hours would be sufficient time to create a response to this inquiry.You guys are clever, make something up.Date: Sat, 17 Feb 2007 17:42:00 -0600Message-Id: <200702172342.l1HNg0KK023336@chickpea.denyignorance.com>To: torbjon@labtheater.orgSubject: ATS CONTACT: follow upFrom: ATS Business Office <business@abovetopsecret.net>Thank you for your email. We appreciate your effort to contact us.Your message has been sent to each of the three members of the executive staff.Please allow up to 48 hours for our response...Contact form submission user's IP: 24.168.134.31Contact form submission user's name: Torbjon W. Jensen===========================================================I'm still awaiting a comment upon this issue.Let's just remove the "when time permits" line and try again...Thanks!twjTo: torbjon@labtheater.orgFrom: ATS Business Office <business@abovetopsecret.net>Reply-To: ATS Business Office <business@abovetopsecret.net>Date: 09 Feb 2007, 05:05:47 PMSubject: ATS CONTACT: banned?Thank you for your email. We appreciate your effort to contact us.Your message has been sent to each of the three partners in AboveTopSecret.com,LLP.Please allow up to 48 hours for our response...Contact form submission user's IP: 24.168.134.31Contact form submission user's name: Torbjon W. Jensen===========================================================I appear to have been banned, which is fine, but if so then some sort of explanation would be nice (when time permits)If that is not the case then there is something 'wrong' with the web site. I can view the site just fine until I try to log in, at which point I get a cookie dumped on me that blocks all content from ATS.Thanks!Sincerely,Torbjon W. Jensentorbjon@labtheater.org


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Addendum: March 21st, 2007.

Still awaiting a response from the staff of AboveTopSecret.com. My last request for information was submitted five days ago. This time I stated that I wanted my avatar removed from their website and assurances that my avatar (which is a picture of my daughter) was truly gone from the AboveTopSecret.com website.



Thank you for your email. We appreciate your effort to contact us.Your message has been sent to each of the three members of the executive staff.Please allow up to 48 hours for our response...Contact form submission user's IP: 24.168.134.31Contact form submission user's name: Torbjon W. Jensen===========================================================Let's reiterate, shall we?a) I have not been able to log onto my account with ATS since February 9th.b) I have used the official ATS contact form to notify the site owners of this problem on numerous occasions and have never received a response addressing this issue.c) IF I have been banned, then someone needs to sight the specific section of the ATS T&C that was violated by me.d) This item is non-negotiable. Effective immediately, my avatar will be removed from your website.e) The incredibly poor response time demonstrated by this department has done nothing to instill trust and or faith with me. Therefore, I will require some type of access to your web site to insure that my avatar has been completely removed from ATS.Thanks and best of luck with your future endeavours!Sincerely,Torbjon W. Jensenlogin: torbjonpassowrd: drwhoemail: torbjon@torbtown.com or torbjon@labtheater.orgATS Business Office wrote:
>Thank you for your email. We appreciate your effort to contact us.>>>Your message has been sent to each of the three members of the executive staff.>>Please allow up to 48 hours for our response...>>Contact form submission user's IP: 24.168.134.31>>Contact form submission user's name: Torbjon W. Jensen >>===========================================================>>>>March 5th, 2007>>You know, we can continue to document the incredibly poor response time of your customer service department for years, if that is what you want to do. >>Regardless, I am still awaiting a response to my inquiry as submitted on February 9th, 2007.>>Thanks!>>Torbjon W. Jensen>>Date: Tue, 20 Feb 2007 17:33:35 -0600>Message-Id: <200702202333.l1KNXZco004848@chickpea.denyignorance.com>>To: torbjon@labtheater.org>Subject: ATS CONTACT: Follow Up>From: ATS Business Office <business@abovetopsecret.net>>>Thank you for your email. We appreciate your effort to contact us.>>Your message has been sent to each of the three members of the executive staff.>Please allow up to 48 hours for our response...>Contact form submission user's IP: 24.168.134.31>Contact form submission user's name: Torbjon W. Jensen>===========================================================>>>Third time's a charm, right?>You would think that 288 hours would be sufficient time to create a response to this inquiry.>You guys are clever, make something up.>Date: Sat, 17 Feb 2007 17:42:00 -0600>Message-Id: <200702172342.l1HNg0KK023336@chickpea.denyignorance.com>>To: torbjon@labtheater.org>Subject: ATS CONTACT: follow up>From: ATS Business Office <business@abovetopsecret.net>>Thank you for your email. We appreciate your effort to contact us.>Your message has been sent to each of the three members of the executive staff.>Please allow up to 48 hours for our response...>Contact form submission user's IP: 24.168.134.31>Contact form submission user's name: Torbjon W. Jensen>===========================================================>>I'm still awaiting a comment upon this issue.>Let's just remove the "when time permits" line and try again...>Thanks!>twj>To: torbjon@labtheater.org>From: ATS Business Office <business@abovetopsecret.net>>Reply-To: ATS Business Office <business@abovetopsecret.net>>Date: 09 Feb 2007, 05:05:47 PM>Subject: ATS CONTACT: banned?>Thank you for your email. We appreciate your effort to contact us.>Your message has been sent to each of the three partners in AboveTopSecret.com,>LLP.>Please allow up to 48 hours for our response...>Contact form submission user's IP: 24.168.134.31>Contact form submission user's name: Torbjon W. Jensen>===========================================================>>I appear to have been banned, which is fine, but if so then some sort of explanation would be nice (when time permits)>If that is not the case then there is something 'wrong' with the web site. I can view the site just fine until I try to log in, at which point I get a cookie dumped on me that blocks all content from ATS.>Thanks!>Sincerely,>Torbjon W. Jensen>torbjon@labtheater.org>>>



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Addendum April 26, 2007

Still no response from ATS regarding my requests for information, which doesn't surprise me but at least I have given them the option of acting like adult professionals. If they choose to ignore that option, well, more power to them, right?

What I do find Totally Hilarious though is that, despite the fact they don't seem to want me to be a part of their little club, they seem more than eager to SPAM me with junk emails telling me how Great their web site is and how I should come on down and join the fun (only, of course, I can't because they won't let me)

[Chorlton]

Well when I joined ATS and asked some questions of users, was told that they suspected Springer was responsible for some posts, simply to drum up more stats.

I don't follow the logic of that? I mean - why would he create more posts on ATS simply to drum up more visits to ATS?

Wouldn't a more effective approach be to visit other forums on the internet and post stuff about ATS, like OM does for their forum? Seems to me this would create new membership and build the forum (if that's your goal in running it).

But his braincell realises that drumming up business from other sites would also make him disliked, so he sets out to increase post levels which justifies his posting stats to his advertisers.
Yes in an ideal world getting new punters in would be best, but doing that can sometimes have adverse effects.

I can't imagine Springer would be childish enough to create hoaxing posts on ATS just to drum up visits when there are so many more effective ways to do it?

If he's been in 'Real estate' (Ive never worked that description out, preferring the UK 'Estate Agent' label) then he knows the statement 'any publicity is good publicity' does work.

Although - with that said (lol), I've noticed that when we have conflict here on our forum, our stats go through the roof. An unscrupulous forum-owner could potentially try to "fake" conflict through sockpuppets to generate drama and draw a crowd. If the staff of a forum aren't all sharing visibility and responsibility for policing that kind of behavior, problems can surely arise fairly quick.

I just noticed at one point that a lot of posts were too 'similar' in many ways, and when I asked a question received replies indicating Springer.

I don't know...I hear what all of you guys are saying about the suspicious nature of some of the threads and posts over there, and I completely hear you regarding the sometimes heavy-handed nature of some of the bannings, however - from my own experiences with Mark, I just can't see why he would waste valuable time taking part in that kind of childish nonsense?
-Ry

Because a few extra posts here and there dont hurt the stats?

[Chorlton]

Thanks for that Shawna.
It reinforces a lot of my own thinking.

[ryguy]

Thanks for posting Shawnna.

All I have to say is - wow. AD has been presenting a lot of pieces of this kind of stuff recently (as have others), and I've resisted for multiple reasons. One of which is that I've been in a position where I've made some serious accusations against ATS before and have been blown out of the water for not having enough "evidence". It's not a good position to be in, and a horrible feeling.

I want to talk to Steve and AD...it may be time to brainstorm how to go about handling this controversial topic a bit differently...

We might need to create a preliminary "working group" of sorts...to have some discussion and serious investigation concerning some of these events.

Best,
-Ry

[caleban]

Depending upon how widely you define drama, Torbjon Jensen seems to have a handle on it. (You out there reading this Torbjon ?) The problem is that the drama there was all internal with no accessability to the general members. Who did it entertain and for what purpose ?

There are some false paths in this rabbit hole, and since Springer is a member here, seems that he has an equal right to representation I would think. And his history with ATS is shorter than most here seem to believe. He joined ATS as a member on June 7, 2003 and participated as a NORMAL member for well over a year before becomming a business partner.

Lets get a few of the false paths out of the way so we don't trip all over ourselves going down the hole. The worst false path for those concentrating on bad things is NOT a fault of ATS, but coincidental because of topic venues. I believe that Bill Irvine handled the aftermath very well and kept it low key. This in my mind would be a very bad thing to have happen to any self-respecting site. What am I talking about ?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeff_Weise

Notice that under the links section, the links to Weise's posts on ATS is not working. That is probably recent, since ATS held these as reachable for a long time after the incident. He used his real name on ATS, UID 7664 Weise, joined Dec 21, 2003 and made 137 posts there before taking his own life and that of others. His posts and Avatar are worth examining since they seem to indicate, to me, a set of symptoms that are retrospectively troubling. In this sense, I think the ATS response was appropriate to the circumstance, and helpful.

Should I continue? Perhaps not.

[Access Denied]

Depending upon how widely you define drama, Torbjon Jensen seems to have a handle on it. (You out there reading this Torbjon ?) The problem is that the drama there was all internal with no accessability to the general members. Who did it entertain and for what purpose ?

There are some false paths in this rabbit hole, and since Springer is a member here, seems that he has an equal right to representation I would think. And his history with ATS is shorter than most here seem to believe. He joined ATS as a member on June 7, 2003 and participated as a NORMAL member for well over a year before becomming a business partner.

Lets get a few of the false paths out of the way so we don't trip all over ourselves going down the hole. The worst false path for those concentrating on bad things is NOT a fault of ATS, but coincidental because of topic venues. I believe that Bill Irvine handled the aftermath very well and kept it low key. This in my mind would be a very bad thing to have happen to any self-respecting site. What am I talking about ?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeff_Weise

Notice that under the links section, the links to Weise's posts on ATS is not working. That is probably recent, since ATS held these as reachable for a long time after the incident. He used his real name on ATS, UID 7664 Weise, joined Dec 21, 2003 and made 137 posts there before taking his own life and that of others. His posts and Avatar are worth examining since they seem to indicate, to me, a set of symptoms that are retrospectively troubling. In this sense, I think the ATS response was appropriate to the circumstance, and helpful.

How's that?

Should I continue? Perhaps not.

Agreed. Unlike ATS this is NOT your personal psychological playground and trying to defend it with that psychobabble BS you posted above isn’t going to cut it here.

People are NOT toys to be played with and the GAME theory you use to look at them with is not only unethical it ought to be criminal!!!

Should I continue? Perhaps I will.

[Chorlton]

There are some false paths in this rabbit hole, and since Springer is a member here, seems that he has an equal right to representation I would think. .

I disagree.
He's refused to let others be represented on ATS
He's refused others the right to reply on ATS
He has stifled free speech on ATS
He has banned and censored people on ATS
He has defended and protected liars and hoaxers on ATS

I and and I suspect others here dont believe a word he says.
He's a sort of Paul Burrel of ATS

[caleban]

Agreed. Unlike ATS this is NOT your personal psychological playground and trying to defend it with that psychobabble BS you posted above isn’t going to cut it here.

Take a deep breath AD........and think a bit. I gave you almost pure fact. You read it as psychobabble. Why ? Sleep on it if you need to. What set you off ?

People are NOT toys to be played with and the GAME theory you use to look at them with is not only unethical it ought to be criminal!!!

Heavy on the assumptions, accusations, and emotions. Zero on facts. Not your usual style at all.

Chorlton, none of the reasons you offer have anything to do with his activities HERE. Every reason you list ends with "on ATS", except your "suspicion". You and AD appear to share an impact to logical thinking with regard to Springer ON ATS that could be resolved here or spiral out of control here. If I am to be a villian for pulling out this "drama", so be it. This one does need resolution, one way or the other.

We are in the latrine. Resolve it, then flush it. Get it out of your system once
and for all.