What a Beautiful Noise

Well, I'm officially impressed.  I'm not sure exactly in what sense I mean the term, but there it is.

A month or two ago I was in that interview with NerdCulturePodcast and, within a few days, someone posted the link of it to our old friends at StarDestroyer.Net.  

Back in the day, this would have resulted in no end of wailing, gnashing of teeth, and assorted fabrications and insults over the course of, oh, say, maybe somewhere around five forum thread pages.  I was, after all, the Official Boogeyman there for many years after my departure, with assorted threads about my activities and with the site's Hate page about me being continually updated with new bogus claims about my goings and doings for a few years after the last contact I had with the site author.   Per a count I made in December 2002 referenced on one of my pages, I was directly mentioned by name 1100 times in a three month period there.  It was so bad that even the curators there decided in 2007 . . . five years later! . . . to put in a ban of further discussion of me.

In any case, once I put a voice to the words, I actually expected some low-brow effort at audio editing, or at least the usual round of insulting flamey-ness, claims of bias, psychosis, and puppy-eating, and the usual old hat stuff, and said so around the time at StarfleetJedi.Net's forum.  After all, though some people fail to realize it, when you put yourself out there in any medium, you invite criticism of your presentation, good-natured or otherwise.  By "otherwise" I refer to the point a wise man once made, in that the internet means idiots are no longer secured within their own village.  (More to the point, one can hardly criticize the looks of an actress in one breath then take offense at discussion of one's own accent in another, unless one is to be inconsistent.)

But, to the credit of SDN (assuming the thread is not locked in some non-obvious fashion), there's been nary a peep.   Of course, the only identifier attached is insofar as what my initials are, rather than my old SDN nom de plume, but I am giving the benefit of the doubt that even the old-timers could figure out who was being referred to, and while it's possible the years-old rule about not discussing me directly resulted in self-enforcement, I somehow doubt it . . . the original post got through, after all.

So, let me take the opportunity here to thank the folks at StarDestroyer.Net for the blessed silence.

However, I must also apologize to those old-timers who have exercised self-control.  As part of another project I'm currently working on, I will be trying to condense some of the data from assorted current pages, along with other historical highlights, into a single section.  By both necessity and, in some cases, prior omission (e.g. the term "Talifan" only appeared once, undefined, on the main site prior to a recent update of the Intro page), there are certain things I haven't mentioned from years ago which I soon will be, as briefly as I am able (which as we know isn't very, but still).  In other words, many of the old pages were written in a certain historical context which is no longer valid, so it would be best to tidy up the old interpersonal nonsense and put it over in a separate place.

This is not meant to goad or rekindle the old obsessive flamey-stalky stuff . . . the history is what it is, and given the blessed silence I am hoping it is just history to you guys, as well.  My telling of it will, by necessity, be told from a certain point of view . . . my own.   But for the most part it is just history, and if you guys can show the same self-control you've shown earlier this year, then maybe we can keep the bad behavior there, where it belongs, briefly referenced but otherwise best forgotten.    

And fear not . . . this is no olive branch.   This is merely a compliment, a declaration of neutral zone, and a note about its proper borders and the way in which I intend to respect them.   No response is required, and indeed, further blessed silence is encouraged.

Thanks again,

G2k, ST-v-SW.Net