OMG.. My site's a dump site?

Hard · Post by **Hard** » Thu Mar 10, 2005 3:55 am

Phalanx wrote: And I repeat, the reason the site was pulled was NOT because it was 'all porn'. It was pulled because it was perceived to be 'non-comic'.

A quick peek at whatever's in the image directory before deleting it would have cleared that up.

And is common sense.

The archived links that Space has above are pretty clear what was on the site before it got deleted (obviously without the content being checked, I will add).

X space coyote X · Post by **X space coyote X** » Thu Mar 10, 2005 4:00 am

faub pointed out the art gallery and said, "it has a fairly large archive of artwork on it that you could find through the sexy losers main site."

This is where the link to that gallery is:
http://sexylosers.com/links.html

Why was there attention brought to the art gallery, which is the last thing listed in that section, but not to "AHMOG" and "Spike!", which are both listed first and are clearly hosted on the uwakimono.keenspace.com account?

Hard · Post by **Hard** » Thu Mar 10, 2005 4:02 am

The reason why is that my site got mentioned on what was becoming a witchhunt thread, so it got deleted without even being checked.

X space coyote X · Post by **X space coyote X** » Thu Mar 10, 2005 4:10 am

I'm still confused as to why they couldn't at least give a warning before deleting the site. Then this whole misunderstanding could've been easily prevented.

Hard · Post by **Hard** » Thu Mar 10, 2005 4:33 am

Because Keenspace is hosted in <I>America</I>. That should answer everything right there.

I heard they were either going to delete it or send it to Guantanamo Bay.

I think they did the humane thing.

Phalanx · Post by **Phalanx** » Thu Mar 10, 2005 7:10 am

hard wrote:
Phalanx wrote: And I repeat, the reason the site was pulled was NOT because it was 'all porn'. It was pulled because it was perceived to be 'non-comic'.
A quick peek at whatever's in the image directory before deleting it would have cleared that up.

And is common sense.

The archived links that Space has above are pretty clear what was on the site before it got deleted (obviously without the content being checked, I will add).

My point was that the site was NOT being deleted because of the nature of the content or because it was 'all porn' like it was being implied as the reason in the complaints.

My point was that the admin thought it did not contain comic content, and while I agree that this proved to be incorrect on his part, I would rather people not start going off on tangents and saying "They took my site off because the thought it was all porn!" because that was NOT the reason and anyone saying that would be guilty of spreading a untruth.

X space coyote X wrote:I'm still confused as to why they couldn't at least give a warning before deleting the site. Then this whole misunderstanding could've been easily prevented.

Sadly, I have to agree with you 100% on this one.

I'm not sure why Kelly didn't do a normal warning and wait before removing the site like he normally does. I presume he had his reasons, but I do agree that that was hasty and should not have occured. AND I am trying to get that fixed for you, but Kelly's simply not online right now, and he is the only one with access to this.

Of course, a lot of this ruckus would have been even better avoided with a simple post on this forum or PM saying "Dude, I think you made a mistake, I do have comics there."

After which presumably the admin would go "Oh my bad. Sorry I'll put that back."

Now if the admins had been unreasonable and said "Screw you, I'm nuking your site anyway" then by all means, all the complaints and raising of the livejournal brigade would be warranted, but as far as I know, it hasn't happened yet so be one better and give Kelly a chance to say his part first.

Yeah I know you're going to say Kelly didn't give you your chance before nuking the account, and fair enough, I agree with you.

But what's done and done, the I highly doubt you want to be making the same mistake you accuse someone else of doing.

Look, there are two alternatives:

1) You show him the mistake, he realises the mistake and rectifies it.

2) Everyone starts bitching about everything until the whole thing is blown out of porportion, the original reason forgetten and both sides accuse each other of witchhunting and what not until the whole of Keenspace blows up into a black hole.

Maybe it's just me being practical, but I'd like to at least try option 1) before 2).

hard wrote:The reason why is that my site got mentioned on what was becoming a witchhunt thread, so it got deleted without even being checked.

Look, I can understand your frustration, and I'm trying my best to help you here, so try and make it easier for me to help you, ok?!

The best I can do is make sure Kelly checks the account and if he find he's made a mistake, then most probably he'll restore it.

If he doesn't, then sure, go ahead and complain and start declaring a conspiracy theory and that America is responsible for all ills of the world (even though I have no idea what that has to do with anything.)

But wait for the response before, please.

TheGoobla · Post by **TheGoobla** » Thu Mar 10, 2005 7:48 am

Phalanx wrote:If he doesn't, then sure, go ahead and complain and start declaring a conspiracy theory and that America is responsible for all ills of the world (even though I have no idea what that has to do with anything.)

It has everything to do with anything my dear Ping!

In all seriousness however, let's all mellow out. Clay is clearly using his sense of humour to overcompensate for the sweet, salty tears he's holding back.

Let us understand each other that we may resolve our differences.

I'm sure having his work called "porn" once more before getting one of his sites deleted, apparently without a warning or doublecheck, did nothing to prevent or alleviate the tensions that have arisen here today.

Further, Clay, and the fanboys posting on his blog right now, need to relax themselves. (Flame) Wars are never the first resort, and indeed, many believe (flame) wars should not be a resort at all.

Everyone makes mistakes, let us not punish so harshly the innocent ones.

Let us all speak calmly as Ping has sort of politely suggested, with insults brandied neither at Clay nor Space, either directly or through subtle sarcasm and through mutual respect we shall address the problems we share alike.

Post by **STrRedWolf** » Thu Mar 10, 2005 8:39 am

Clay, these are the reasons why I've removed your site:

Faub reported me to the account, and I checked it. While you may have had ads on every page, there was no comic on the main page itself, nor any accessible archives from the main page. Reports say it was being heavily linked to, and that for me (and Kisai here) triggers a "This is a dump site/file locker" which is a violation of the TOS -- KeenSpace is for comics, not for a file locker, warez, or movies.

If you had comics on the account, but seperate lines of comics, you are welcome to apply for seperate accounts and use Autokeen to manage their archives. If you had fan artwork relating to those comics, and they were linked with those comics, they would be OK -- I nor Kisai wouldn't mind them. BUT if you didn't have them linked via the front page, then you were trying to hide something. The bandwidth usage tipped Faub off, who reported it. I checked it, and terminated it.

Your account was archived before it was removed. It is our policy to do so -- I know some folks may be wrongly removed. I also know some folks send up files that clog up our HD, or some may want their art back.

You have not been banned from KeenSpace. We've had you here before, and I'm not going to boot you out when something can be worked out. The best thing you can do now is contact me. I'll leave a message in your PM box here, or see about emailing you, so we can discuss a solution.

Post by **STrRedWolf** » Thu Mar 10, 2005 8:44 am

One last thing for everyone -- the forums get a warning of abuse. Your accounts on the comic server do not. That is in the TOS, and is standard in the ISP industry. Some things which can be eazily fixed (ad placement problems, minor things) I'll drop a line. Spamvertizement of your account (and not joe-jobbed or framed) gets an investigation and removal where warranted, although it's not limited to spam.

Risky · Post by **Risky** » Thu Mar 10, 2005 9:57 am

STrRedWolf wrote:One last thing for everyone -- the forums get a warning of abuse. Your accounts on the comic server do not. That is in the TOS, and is standard in the ISP industry. Some things which can be eazily fixed (ad placement problems, minor things) I'll drop a line. Spamvertizement of your account (and not joe-jobbed or framed) gets an investigation and removal where warranted, although it's not limited to spam.

I read the TOA as saying "30 days notice". Is this TOS something different than the TOA, and in some way superceding the TOA?

Post by **STrRedWolf** » Thu Mar 10, 2005 10:25 am

The TOA is what we mean.

We'll check it.

Rakishi · Post by **Rakishi** » Thu Mar 10, 2005 10:34 am

The TOA (http://siteadmin.keenspace.com/cgi-bin/signup.cgi) as currently available when you sign-up for keenspace (the TOS link at the bottom of the page does not exist so this seems to be the only agreement) reads as follows:
"2. Agreement KEENSPACE agrees to give the submitting CARTOONIST free webhosting and promotion. CARTOONIST agrees to place KEENSPACE'S ad banners and promotional materials on CARTOONIST'S website in the proper locations.
3. Term The term of this agreement commences upon the execution of this Agreement and shall terminate (30) days after the delivery of a notice of termination by one party to the other."
Also listed on the bottom, although it looks weird not being listed with the test of the terms is:
"Any comic site not activated in 14 days is deleted automatically.
Any comic site, which does not update within 90 days will be removed automatically if there are less than 3 comics in total."

This seems to indicate that there is a 30 day notice given before termination of someone's account (assuming they have three comics on the account, front page linkage is not mentioned anywhere), furthermore it seems that such a notice must be given assuming that the required ads are placed (and the two additional conditions are met). Although Section 4 does allow Keenspace to remove any content it deems "bad".

For those wondering a webhosting TOS usually reads something like (copied from http://www.made2own.com/index.php?id=tosaup):

"We reserve the right to refuse, cancel, or suspend service at our sole discretion. All Sub-Networks, distributive hosting sites and dedicated servers of Made2Own Hosting must adhere to the above policies. Failure to follow any term or condition will be grounds for immediate account deactivation. Made2Own Hosting reserves the right to deny the refund of any monies paid thus far if these policies are broken."

Just my 2 cents.

edit: It's not mentioned anywhere in the TOA that your comics need to be linked from the front page, or that such a page must even exist although if the ad requirements mention a front page then one must exist. It also oddly enough doesn't say that dump sites are not allowed as long as the material would not increase Keenspace's "risk of liability" and there are 3+ comics on the page. In other words, it seems like the TOA needs to be clarified/revised. If for some reason I'm mistaken then the terms really should be clarified since I doubt I'm the only one who misread them. Potentially there are other agreements later on that you need to agree to however since I don't have a keenspace account I wouldn't know about them, and if they exists they really should also be in the TOA.

I'm still amazed there is no "we can terminate you for any reason" clause, so I'm still assuming I'm missing something.

Faub · Post by **Faub** » Thu Mar 10, 2005 10:52 am

I REALLY did not mean to point to your site as a dump site and I REALLY did not mean for it to get deleted. I was trying to point it out as a site that does not show up in the guide as being updated because you do all your own HTML. Whether the comic was linked from the index page or not, it WAS linked by a keenspace site when Sexy Losers was still here. I can't say that I ever saw the comic, though. I only remember the artwork which is why I thought it was an art site related to Sexy Losers.

I sorry I caused this. It was not my intention in the least. a little white lie had caught my attention because it was so high in the guide and I couldn't figure out why because there was no comic. It wasn't until well after Sexy Losers left keenspace that I even found out there was content on the site.

I have absolutely nothing against hard or his comics and I hope this gets resolved fairly.

Again. I sorry I caused all this. I didn't mean it.

Ghastly · Post by **Ghastly** » Thu Mar 10, 2005 11:04 am

Once again Clay has fallen victim to busy-body syndrome.

Thank god it wasn't my fault this time.

Seems to me the easiest thing to do right now, since the site is backed up would be.

A) Restore the site to it's original condition.

B) Appologize for having been so hasty to delete the site without properly investigating it (given Clay's reputation as a webcomic artist (and one who prefers more often than not to use all his own code) it's pretty safe to assume he'd have been running a webcomic there).

C) Remain ever vigilant so that in your zeal to punish those who wish to turn Keenspace into a MP3/Warez bin you don't end up punishing comic artists who step outside the norm to produce their page. There's absolutely nothing in the TOS which says artists MUST use AutoKeen, only that every page MUST have the ***advertisement*** tag. The fact that Keenspace does NOT restrict it's users to one and only one engine (like sites like Drunk Duck do) is part of what makes it such a popular choice.

Three simple steps and problem solved.

C'mon gang, this isn't rocket science here.

RemusShepherd · Post by **RemusShepherd** » Thu Mar 10, 2005 11:50 am

faub wrote:Again. I sorry I caused all this. I didn't mean it.

If it helps any, Faub, I think I'll take some of the blame with you as the busy body who started this.

X space coyote X · Post by **X space coyote X** » Thu Mar 10, 2005 12:29 pm

STrRedWolf wrote:BUT if you didn't have them linked via the front page, then you were trying to hide something.

Clarify this? They were linked on the SL site, which gets more visitors than the uwakimono front page. I don't see how that's hiding anything. Also, you can see in the archived site that they were all once linked on the main site, but Little White Lie got scrapped along with the index page, which he was just too lazy to rebuild.

ETA:

TheGoobla wrote:I'm sure having his work called "porn" once more before getting one of his sites deleted, apparently without a warning or doublecheck, did nothing to prevent or alleviate the tensions that have arisen here today.

Exactly. This is an old issue that seems to get revisited once in a while. Can we PLEASE stop dismissing Clay's artwork as "porn"? He's an artist, not a pornographer.

Phalanx · Post by **Phalanx** » Thu Mar 10, 2005 1:47 pm

RemusShepherd wrote:
faub wrote:Again. I sorry I caused all this. I didn't mean it.
If it helps any, Faub, I think I'll take some of the blame with you as the busy body who started this.

Oh no you don't!

The site you pointed out (which was NOT hard's site) was a real dumpsite, and should have been reported and removed anyway.

So you can stop beating yourself on the head now, Remus. You for one, are not to blame for this storm in a teacup.

Hard · Post by **Hard** » Thu Mar 10, 2005 2:24 pm

STrRedWolf wrote:Clay, these are the reasons why I've removed your site:

Faub reported me to the account, and I checked it. While you may have had ads on every page, there was no comic on the main page itself, nor any accessible archives from the main page. Reports say it was being heavily linked to, and that for me (and Kisai here) triggers a "This is a dump site/file locker" which is a violation of the TOS -- KeenSpace is for comics, not for a file locker, warez, or movies.

If you had comics on the account, but seperate lines of comics, you are welcome to apply for seperate accounts and use Autokeen to manage their archives. If you had fan artwork relating to those comics, and they were linked with those comics, they would be OK -- I nor Kisai wouldn't mind them. BUT if you didn't have them linked via the front page, then you were trying to hide something. The bandwidth usage tipped Faub off, who reported it. I checked it, and terminated it.

Where are these rules? Can you show me them, because they're not on your ToS. According to your ToS, I get a 30 day notice, nothing about a title page, and it doesn't mention anything about "different lines of comics". You're just making this up as you go along.

Tell you what. YOU decide on a set of rules AND WRITE THEM OUT CLEARLY, YOU follow them, I'LL follow them, and we'll all be happy! Because I asked how my site violates ToS and you're just making stuff up on the spot. We're not QUITE that gullable.

Hard · Post by **Hard** » Thu Mar 10, 2005 3:00 pm

STrRedWolf wrote:KeenSpace is for comics, not for a file locker, warez, or movies.

I agree. That's why I had only comics and comic images on my site, no files for personal use, warez or movies. Didn't you look? I don't think you did.

If you had comics on the account, but seperate lines of comics, you are welcome to apply for seperate accounts and use Autokeen to manage their archives.

Is this a rule now? No using the same account for more than one comic, you HAVE to use Autokeen? Where is this? Can you link to the part of the ToS where it says this for me?

If you're referring to the autokeen that uses the templates, no I didn't use that. If you're referring to the autokeen that takes the raw HTML and puts ads on them before throwing them online, YES I DID USE THAT. But if the ToS strictly says you must use indextemplate etc, THAT'S NEWS TO ME.

If you had fan artwork relating to those comics, and they were linked with those comics, they would be OK -- I nor Kisai wouldn't mind them. BUT if you didn't have them linked via the front page, then you were trying to hide something. The bandwidth usage tipped Faub off, who reported it. I checked it, and terminated it.

Now you accuse me of trying to hide something. Like I could hide something from the admins *sigh*.

You keep using "Kisai" in this, I suppose this action of yours is with her approval as well?

We've had you here before, and I'm not going to boot you out when something can be worked out. The best thing you can do now is contact me. I'll leave a message in your PM box here, or see about emailing you, so we can discuss a solution.

Isn't this contact enough? Or how about another E-mail that says "Look at these threads before replying" and nothing else?

Post by **STrRedWolf** » Thu Mar 10, 2005 3:37 pm

Ghastly wrote:Seems to me the easiest thing to do right now, since the site is backed up would be.

A) Restore the site to it's original condition.

B) Appologize for having been so hasty to delete the site without properly investigating it (given Clay's reputation as a webcomic artist (and one who prefers more often than not to use all his own code) it's pretty safe to assume he'd have been running a webcomic there).

C) Remain ever vigilant so that in your zeal to punish those who wish to turn Keenspace into a MP3/Warez bin you don't end up punishing comic artists who step outside the norm to produce their page. There's absolutely nothing in the TOS which says artists MUST use AutoKeen, only that every page MUST have the ***advertisement*** tag. The fact that Keenspace does NOT restrict it's users to one and only one engine (like sites like Drunk Duck do) is part of what makes it such a popular choice.

Three simple steps and problem solved.

C'mon gang, this isn't rocket science here.

A) Harder said than done. I need to revise the TOS first.

B) The problem is that folks going to the site out of the blue, and not off of Sexy Losers, would not find any content imedately. There was a front banner and nothing else. No archive, no links, no nothing but an ad banner. Granted, a bit of editing would fix that.

C) It's being edited. I'm working on it now.