Friday, December 15, 2006
Late To The Party

All dressed up...it's Your Daily Board Show!

COMMUNICATION BREAKDOWN: Scooter breathlessly announced yesterday that the Board
will be moving its formal business to the chatty list while some problem or other with Board-L is
fixed. Seems the list is "currently not forwarding mail." Of course, as Scooter just suddenly
"found out", the chatty list has its own problems. It hasn't archived anything since early October.
Although several people told us they have written to our NC about it over the last month, he
apparently doesn't bother reading mail from the little people. It looks like Root$web's vaunted
switchover to a fabulous new mail system is not so fabulous as they would like you to believe.

AT YOUR SERVICE: Among Board business of lesser import [Motion 06-20 passed, the
Newsletter Committee sent along a semblance of a report], Scooter passed along a major
announcement from EC Grand Poobah Ellen Pack. It appears that our usage of the Indiana
University servers for our business has finally made people nervous, so we have to find another
server on which to run our shady elections. Not to worry though; the EC has it all figured out. A
month ago, they moved the EC site to this host: http://hostmysite.com/hosting/builder/, where it
will share the private space owned by Larry Stephens. This option of course is not free, but the
cost has already been covered by an "anonymous donor." [Why is it that donors of large sums of
money to USGW almost always insist on anonymity? Is it really that embarrassing?] The
usgwelections.org domain will be pointed to this site and everything but the EC's home page and
mail list [both hosted by the hapless Root$web.com] will live there. Larry, who everyone trusts,
will be the only person with access to the software, so the EC can't get its meddling little hands
on such things as voting records and passwords.

Of course, an announcement like this would not be complete without promises of spectacular
new things that will make everyone's life easier. Says Ellen, "...it is now possible to create an
online member dataset...that will replace the outdated and manually maintained Excel files
currently used by the EC for maintaining voter and membership lists...In addition to alleviating
the workload of the EC members, and increased reliability, the general USGenWeb membership
will benefit from the dataset by being able to access/view/edit his/her own personal
information...A further advantage is that such a dataset can work in tandem with the voting
software, and the registration form...registration will be considered global within the project, in
that members will no longer have to re-register each time participation or email address
changes...The dataset will also be programmed to generate a complete membership list when
needed for use with the national mail list (which will remain on the IU server.) The EC will no
longer be required to manually prepare a list for each mailing."

It all sounds just amazing. However, none of these fabulous things will be available for a few
months, since the EC is still testing it and the registration form has been disabled for the duration.
This basically means that no one has been able to register to vote for a month and explains why
the EC has graciously bowed out of assisting states with their elections.

We are particularly curious as to what this means for the proposed bylaws amendment, although
it does explain why the oomph seems to have gone out of the urgency. After all, the EC will not
be able to run an election for some time, possibly two months or more. Once the Board finalizes
Scooter's precious amendment they have a matter of days before it must go before the
membership for a vote. So this urgent matter, which is profoundly affecting each and every
member each and every day, causing untold suffering such that the Board voted to promise
immediate relief over four months ago, must now wait yet a few more months while the EC
tinkers around with its new toy. It's a good thing that nothing actually depends on this "urgent"
amendment, because it sure doesn't seem all that urgent anymore.

BETTER LATE THAN NEVER: We got curious as to why there's been no word from the SOP
Committee, which should have begun their deliberations two weeks ago. We moseyed on over to
the USGW_WEB mailing list to find that they have in fact begun their deliberations, way back
on December 3. Thus far postings are limited to a welcome message from committee Chair Mike
Petersen and two posts from a couple of weeks ago laying out the current SOPs and proposing
some excellent revisions to them. [It appears that RAL Mike is once again channelling Scooter.]
If there was a public announcement about the opening of the list, we must have missed it. We
subscribed to it this morning and we'll keep you posted on developments.

-Teresa Lindquist
Editor & Publisher, Daily Board Show
Understanding the meaning of urgency since 1998

Posted by merope at 6:05 AM 1 comments    

Wednesday, December 13, 2006
Is There Anyone At Home?

Lights on...its Your Daily Board Show!

RING IN THE NEW: A couple of days ago, Scooter called the vote on Motion 06-20. The voting
period closed yesterday morning and the entire Board has now voted, but the results have not yet
been officially announced. Surprisingly enough, the vote was not unanimous; Linda Barton and
Karen de Groote-Johnson voted against the EC's proposed slate for reasons most likely having to
do with the unacceptable security risk posed by one of the proposed members. [Yes, they do lose
sleep over these things.] The motion passed handily, however, with twelve Yes votes.

We aren't sure just why it has taken Scooter so long to finalize Motion 06-20, but we've heard a
rumor that the Board is finally hearing a months-old grievance against the SC of NM. Apparently
there's been some disagreement over who on the Board will be permitted to vote in this grievance
and it's bogged business down a bit. We've noticed before that Scooter can apparently only do
one thing at a time so we guess he's been distracted by the Sekrit Sandbox yet again. At least he
has his priorities straight.

-Teresa Lindquist
Editor & Publisher, Daily Board Show
Nobody home since 1998

Posted by merope at 5:15 AM 1 comments    

Thursday, December 07, 2006
Risky Business

Member of the club...it's Your Daily Board Show!

MAKING A LIST: Greta apologized for publicly impugning the integrity of one of the EC's
picks for its slate, noting that she should have insulted Linda Lewis behind her back instead.
Bettie seconded the motion to approve the proposed slate and Scooter opened the motion for
discussion. There has been none on the Board, although some folks have been discussing it on
the SW regional list.

CHECKING IT TWICE: Meanwhile over on the DISCUSS list, Ellen Pack provided a list of
innocuous reasons for the draconian secrecy imposed on the EC members, but managed to leave
out the more interesting reasons, like the occasional clandestine investigation of various Project
members. David Samuelsen popped in from his version of reality to erroneously claim the EC's
gag order is somehow our fault and that our eternal MNIGS status stems from our actions on the
EC. While it generally never pays to respond to idiots, Tina "Nothing Personal" Vickery posted
helpful links to her motion of nearly five years ago which resulted in imposition of the MNIGS
status for "total disregard and disrespect as evident in her public posting of executive session
correspondence." [We never violated the confidentiality of the EC, although that somehow seems
to have become firmly fixed in some people's heads as one of our many crimes.] When a list
member wondered aloud when the list rules changed to allow discussion of people and not issues,
she disappeared back into whatever hole it is she hides in.

-Teresa Lindquist
Editor & Publisher, Daily Board Show
Over, under, sideways, down since 1998

Posted by merope at 5:20 AM 0 comments    

Tuesday, December 05, 2006
Cockroaches In The Light

Taking the wheel...its Your Daily Board Show!

GUILTY BY ASSOCIATION: Moving directly to the "new business" section of the agenda,
Scooter posted a slate of proposed new EC members and asked for a motion to approve the slate.
Mike so obliged, but as of yet there has been no second. Normally, this process would be hugely
uninteresting, since the slate is usually chock full o' the usual suspects and will pass with barely a
flick of the Board's limp wrist. This time, however, one of the proposed slate members is one
Linda K. Lewis, our co-host on the Johnson County KSGenWeb site [and definitely not THAT
Linda Lewis]. This minor association is a problem for Greta, who noted, "I'd be comfortable
about her nomination if the EC is aware of this connection with Teresa and has decided that it's
not a risk...Does anyone on the AB know Linda and have an opinion about her being on the
EC?...I know how important confidentiality is to the committee, and I'm troubled by the risk of a
leak from the EC straight to Teresa. I hope someone can tell me that it's not an issue."

We would say its not an issue, but who knows what the future may hold. We admire Linda's
work and her drive enormously, but we've also noted that she appears to be an honest person and
probably the sort who wouldn't sit still too long for any shenanigans. The EC and the Board value
secrecy over integrity and sometimes that is a problem for the honest types. We would also
assume that the EC is exceedingly, if not painfully, aware of Linda's connection with us, they've
already discussed the issue with her, she has assured them that it's not a problem, and they
believe her. Plus, you never know who is going to be sickened by the foul things they find in the
dark corners of USGenWeb, and Greta might want to worry just a wee bit more about the other
person on the list we are friends with. Anyways, it's utterly pathetic to let us continue to dictate
the Board's business this way; if Ellen Pack didn't want Linda on the EC she wouldn't be on the
slate.

OUR READERS WRITE: A reader has written asking why the Board no longer publicly
archives its informal list. We don't know. The list archives abruptly terminate on October 4, and
although Root$web claims that all the problems caused by its ill-considered move to new
software have been resolved, the list is still not archiving. The list itself still appears to available
for public subscription, although if Scooter had decided to make another Sekrit Sandbox and
failed to announce this, how would we know?

-Teresa Lindquist
Editor & Publisher, Daily Board Show
Running the Board since 1998

Posted by merope at 5:30 AM 3 comments    

Monday, December 04, 2006
Of Cabbages and Kings

Where the one-eyed man is king...its Your Daily Board Show!

SCOT FREE: After deliberating for a few days, the Board has officially washed its hands of the
MIGenWeb stolen records incident. Archives mouthpi..er, Representative Cyndi Enfinger got to
do the honors on the Board's formal list, where she announced, "The Advisory Board received a
complaint involving transcriptions posted in the Archives...The AB brought this issue to the
Archives Representatives who...investigated and worked to resolve the issue with the
appropropriate State File Manager. All parties have been contacted and the AB considers this
matter to be resolved by the Archives Representatives and closed."

How nice for them. The astute reader, however, will note that 1) the Board does not acknowledge
that materials were stolen by a Project member and posted to her website, referring instead to an
amorphous "complaint involving transcriptions"; 2) the Board gives absolutely no indication of
how the issue was resolved. Were the purloined materials removed from the site? Was the guilty
party reprimanded or otherwise sanctioned in any way? Has Maggie apologized to Debbie and
the other volunteers whose work she "borrowed"? Have there been any real consquences to
anyone involved? Or did they do nothing and decide that was good enough? There is no mention
of the fact that the "appropriate State File Manager" is Board member Jan Cortez, so all this
foofaraw of "bringing it to the attention" of the right people is ridiculous. She's also Maggie's SC.
The "right people" are in this up to their eyeballs.

As it turns out, some not very involved footwork will show that most of the offending materials
been removed from the Tuscola, MIGW site and Maggie is no longer listed as a co-coordinator
for that county. However, the template for the book remains online, awaiting the standard
Archives treatment of proofing and reposting, and we doubt Maggie is very far behind the
scenes. We await her next Project-wide embarrassment with anticipation.

THE MAN HIMSELF: Scooter popped into the formal meeting last night to post the December
agenda. Here it is:

"Announcement of the posting of the minutes

Committee Reports Due: Newsletter Committee's 3rd Qtr Report [3rd quarter? Do they ever
submit reports?]

Unfinished business: Finalizing the proposed bylaw amendment [still], Pending Grievances,
Fraudulent Registration Procedures, Discussion of updated CC guidelines, Discussion of
Financial Procedures Committee, FGS Membership, Request from Teresa Lindquist - RE:
Motion 02-12

New Business: Election Committee, County Spotlight Logo

Announcements: Seating of Grievance Committee [this ought to be good]

Adjournment"

Then he disappeared again.

-Teresa Lindquist
Editor & Publisher, Daily Board Show
More than you know since 1998

Posted by merope at 5:50 PM 0 comments    

Sunday, December 03, 2006
Snow Day

Walking in a winter wonderland...its Your Daily Board Show!

SNOWED IN: Our prediction yesterday that Scooter would pay a courtesy visit to the Board in
order to adjourn the November meeting and open the December meeting proved incorrect. It was
RAL Mike Peterson who paid the courtesy call. Due to recent storms where he lives, Scooter is
apparently living in the dark ages in more ways than one.

SNOW JOB: Several members have wondered what happened to the SOP revision committee,
which was supposed to start up on December 1 on a publicly archived mailing list. Well, that
didn't happen and until late last night, when Bettie sent notice to the SWSC regional list, no
public announcement had been made to the project. In response to a question from a member,
Mike Peterson dropped in on the DISCUSS list to announce that "We'll be getting it kicked off
soonest." Of more interest, however, are some comments made by the committee's other member,
Alice Allen. The discussion of the recent Archives shenanigans on the alternate CC list has
caused some consideration of a code of ethics and during that discussion, Alice stated that she
hoped that they "can address ethical behavior in the SOP committee." She also curiously noted "I
have a feeling...that the SOP Committee will be addressing the rest of the SOP's, not just the AB
ones. Else why would we be given until April to get this done? AB SOP's could be taken care of
in a matter of days."

This, of course, represents a substantial departure from the charge given the committee by NC
Scooter just a couple of weeks ago. There are no other published SOPs to revise, unless they
mean to fiddle with either the mediation procedures [which the new grievance procedures were
meant to replace] or the EC guidelines.

PURE AS THE DRIVEN SNOW: The saga of the purloined book continues. Debbie Axtman
posted some information over on the alternate CC list bringing everyone up to date on actions
taken thus far. She noted, "...My co-cc received an email from Jan Cortez informing him Carol
Szelogowski had no part in the theft of my book. It was Maggie Stewart Zimmerman who stole
the work...I have written to Carol and apologized for falsely accusing her of being a part of
this...I've received a note from Joy Fisher, who has apologized for Maggie's actions and has
assured me the problem is being dealt with."

Debbie has also thanked the Board for taking the matter seriously, but how seriously they take
such blatant "borrowing" remains to be seen. If anything deserves consideration for MNIGS
status within USGenWeb, we would think it would be stealing another's work. Archives minions
have been doing this sort of thing for years and apparently see nothing wrong with it until
someone gets caught. Even when presented with compelling evidence, no Board has ever done
anything other than look momentarily concerned and then pretend it never happened. All this talk
of ethics, grievances, aliases, and bylaws is fun, but USGenWeb's basic integrity is involved
when its members brazenly steal from other members and from other projects. If the Board does
not openly sanction Maggie "Second Story" Zimmerman it will be hard to argue that USGenWeb
even follows its own rules when it comes to recognizing and protecting its members' valuable
contributions to online genealogy. After all, if you can stand the brief sting of a pretend slap on
the wrist, the internet is ripe for the picking.

-Teresa Lindquist
Editor & Publisher, Daily Board Show
Completely snowed since 1998

Posted by merope at 6:35 AM 2 comments    

Friday, December 01, 2006
Bat Country

Somewhere around Barstow...it's Your Daily Board Show!

ANOTHER DAY ANOTHER DOLLAR: Another month has come and gone and the Board has
been MIA for the last several days, although we expect Scooter to make a courtesy appearance
later today to hurriedly adjourn the old meeting and open a new one. Left mostly untouched on
the Board's plate are the September and October minutes and the extraordinarily urgent bylaws
amendment.

HONOR AMONG THIEVES: The latest buzz around the DISCUSS water cooler is a recent
snatch-n-grab of someone else's work by Maggie "Light Fingers" Stewart-Zimmerman. Since the
DISCUSS gossipers aren't allowed by Whip Mistriss Tina to actually discuss the particulars of
the incident [she prefers instead a generic discussion of copyright that doesn't weigh so heavily
on her good friend and co-conspirator Maggie], here they are:

USGenWeb member Debbie Axtman, long a member of MIGenWeb as well as of AHGP and
AHLN, transcribed a nearly 1100 page book in conjunction with several other people. The book
was original photocopied in its entirety by Pam Rietsch and both she and Debbie spent several
hundred dollars of their own money getting the book transcribed and put online as part of the
Tuscola, MI AHGP/ALHN website. Their original transcription remains online at:
http://www.usgennet.org/usa/mi/county/tuscola/book/ .

As strange coincidence would have it, the exact same book recently appeared on Maggie Stewart
Zimmerman's Tuscola, MIGenWeb page. And we do mean exact. When Debbie posted her
version online, she changed every instance of the word "to" to "too". A simple change and one
that stands out like a sore thumb if you peruse even a page of her transcription. Maggie, however,
apparently didn't bother to proofread the book and posted it as is, with every instance of "to"
appearing as "too." We are as a big a believer in coincidence as anyone else, but we have a hard
time believing that anyone either 1) also transcribed this book from scratch, and 2) managed to
mistype every instance of the word "to." As of early yesterday, Maggie's miracle copy of the
book was online here: http://www.rootsweb.com/~mituscol/1892.htm, but it has since been
removed and only the links to portraits and drawings from the book remain. No doubt the book
will shortly reappear with the offending typos corrected, but something tells us that the to/too
ploy isn't the only clue salted away in the book. Many people who are aware of the Archives'
sticky fingers have made it a point to hide smoking guns in their transcriptions in case of just this
sort of occurrence.

After her unsettling discovery, Debbie visited other of Maggie's archives and has since found
numerous instances of materials that apparently originated on Debbie's site. Most of the original
transcribers of these materials state they have not submitted them to either Maggie or to the
Archives, yet there they are. This isn't the first time Maggie has been caught with her drawers
around her ankles. Many years ago, she cheated her way onto the Board by having her SC
backdate her membership in USGenWeb so she could qualify to run for national office. During
the Census Wars, she was caught creating fake file managers [helped by Tina Vickery and
current Board member Sundee Maynez] so that the real Census Project could not sneak moles
into her project. She actually ran one of these fake file managers for a Board seat, but was
discovered before the election was over. She, along with other Archives loyalists, have been
discovered over the years rampantly reposting other people's work, most notably the extensive
census files transcribed by Pauline Leitner and reposted under someone else's name by Maggie's
census project. Maggie was also caught in a chat with another file manager discussing pulling
someone's records and reposting them under a different name. And yet, there Maggie remains, in
a highly place position, apparently untouchable.

Anyways, Debbie has now filed a formal complaint with the Board, asking not only that the
"borrowed" materials be removed immediately, but also that Maggie and her co-host be removed
from the Tuscola, MIGenWeb page. Jan Cortez, MIGW SC and File Manager for the MI
Archives, is included in the complaint. [A few years ago Jan fired Pam Rietsch from MIGenWeb
in a fit of pique, and forever lost Pam's many contributions to USGenWeb. Apparently, they've
hit on another way to get them.] We've heard from the grapevine that the Board is taking all this
very seriously, although Archives representative Cyndi Enfinger is being rather inconspicuous in
the discussion. Our guess is that now that the files have been mostly removed, the Board will
consider the issue closed. It can't force Jan to fire Maggie and there are no rules explicitly
forbidding the harvesting of another's work. Maggie may, if the Board is feeling its oats, get a
pro forma slap on the hand, which she will ignore.

Once the news broke on DISCUSS, Tina moved swiftly to forbid discussion of particulars and
sent a few private nasty grams to people who have made comments so far. Archives consigliere
Joy Fisher claimed publicly no have no knowledge of the incident and also claimed that "The
Archives does not condone piracy, plagiarism, theft, or harvesting." [Well, it was good for a
laugh, at least.] So now the circle is complete. It wouldn't be a USGenWeb scandal without
people claiming to be shocked, shocked! that this is going on under their noses, and Tina
forbidding anyone to openly discuss it.

-Teresa Lindquist
Editor and Publisher, Daily Board Show
On a savage journey since 1998