Thursday, November 04, 2004

Beware People on the Internet, Truly

I've seen the good and bad side of people recently. Working out of my home I tend to forget how vicious people can be. In 'real life' I can choose to avoid them, ignore them or deal with them. However, it is a different story online. You don't see them. They are a silent enemy and can appear like a lamb or a friend and do great harm.

Case in point. It sounds so silly when I think about it. However, I joined a Yahoo Group to see if I could find a better outlet for the white organdy I'm purchasing to make my 'Vintage Style Holiday Aprons'. The Group was known as Sewing_Paradise and their was a very popular Moderator who helped me and many others. One day, the owner of the group came online and announced that she was interested in Quilt Making and didn't like the direction of the group. Almost immediately, the well-liked Moderator abruptly said "Good-bye" and was gone. Being new to the group, I was rather confused. The owner said she really didn't care how people felt, she wanted to change the direction of the group. The group's name changed to Quilting_Paradise.
All is now happy with that group.

Meanwhile, feeling quite kicked out I wrote to the well-liked Moderator and never heard from her. I decided it might be a good idea to try to get a group together so we could still pass ideas and talk sewing. I immediately opened a group called 'Sewitalls'. All was going okay and I was adding files, photos and links when I was contacted through my regular email by a 37 year old named Denice from Texas. Her story was confusing. To make a long story short, she joined our group as moderator (she had said that she had left her group on bad terms) and quickly began 'nesting' by uploading files and information which was great. Then she added a poll asking our members if they wanted to basically shut down this group and go to a different group with more members.

I didn't vote at first because not everyone had. I didn't even realize that you could see how everyone had voted! Then, yesterday I did see it. I realized that the majority had already spoken and left. Denice had undermined me without me knowing it. I had been made a fool.

I'm disappointed in myself, certainly not because I don't have to moderate a Yahoo Group! But because I let some stranger do this. Beware.

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