free software resistance

 the cost of computing freedom is eternal vigilance

### the-treachery-of-tr *originally posted:* nov 2023 i wrote more than 200 articles for tr- im sorry. it was not so openly bigoted and transphobic as it is now, in fact until recently it was hosted as a favour, by a trans woman. then it was pulled offline by the same woman, after tr repeatedly doxxed, bullied and harassed a friend of mine. both she and i are former contributors. this is how tr treats the people who helped. i am not afraid of you knowing the website im referring to. if youve already been there, you know what tr is. if you dont, youll have to find it yourself. i may refer to it by name elsewhere, but i am striving to correct this. tr victimises both its writers and its audience. for two years, i did a number of things to help the owner of the website. when i was tired, he pushed me to do more- many times i was encouraged to do more. this was all as a favour to him, there was no compensation but the owner manipulates people into thinking this is part of a good cause. when i left, after two years, i was subject to a months long smear campaign. at first i didnt nothing, then i pleaded with the owner to cease, then when he kept going i spent the next TWO YEARS returning the favour and working to both expose his dishonesty and manipulation while warning other contributors to be careful about the way he used them. i even poached one of his more talented contributors. more people have left since then, including some who were there years before i was. tr just keeps getting worse, and the past few weeks or more have done a lot to expose the sites true nature to a broader group of people. though some people have always said it was awful. the owner insists that he is up against perjurers. this isnt true, both because what was said about him was demonstrably true (he denies this, but the evidence is still online on his own website for anyone to see!) and also the reporting of this information was not subject to penalty of perjury EVEN IF it were false. why does the owner insist that its perjury again? because it sounds more criminal that way. its not, and it cannot be- but he insists. when tr was taken down it lost a SWEET deal with an incredibly skilled and hands-on admin (someone who knew him for years) whose hand was essentially forced when tr itself broke laws that exist where the server was located. as far as i know the admin had no choice, but it was her decision and no one elses (she says this herself) that led to the sites termination. without that sweet deal, tr is now limited to relatively cheap hosting with far fewer resources, so he has done like he was always advised to do and moved from a site based on wordpress and wikimedia to one based on static pages. he has also moved from a server based in washington state (subject to and in violation of the revised code of washington pertaining to doxxing) to one based in the uk. his new webhost has already been served with a lawsuit over the site. the owner of tr is highly unprincipled, manipulative, narcissistic and spiteful. i really would have preferred to simply leave- to not go to war with the owner. but during that time he made it clear he was going to attack me personally either way, including with things that were twisted and simply fabricated. the fabrications included blaming me for things that never actually happened and taking credit for things i had worked on without his help. the reason i left in the first place was that my research was being twisted, misrepresented and appropriated to suit the owners own agenda, while being dishonest about me personally. that was while i was still writing for tr, and its the reason i left- but i am not the only contributor who has to worry about this sort of mistreatment. what tr has done to my friend (who contributed years before i did) is far worse. when i said i spent the next two years fighting tr, i did eventually get tired of doing this. i wanted to go back to focusing on free software, leaving the fight against tr behind. about a year passed i think, and i rarely mentioned it. i picked up the fight again when my friend was being attacked, but i can definitely say that tr is closer to being purely evil than it ever was before. there were always pretenses of fighting the good fight, which have thinned considerably. open and undisguised bigotry now makes it to the pages of tr as if it were nothing. apologies are never made- and would not be sincere if they were. some people- probably not many though- want to know what really makes tr tick. i can tell you that, plainly: 1. the author believes in himself more than any DECENT person would. when youre hurting people, and you dont have a damned good reason, you should not believe in some inalienable right to do this. 2. the author doesnt care about mistakes, or correcting mistakes- and will only do so very rarely when its absolutely necessary. most of the time when its still absolutely necessary, he will do nothing. 3. the author believes he is entirely above critique, and responds to virtually all critique with smear campaigns and repetitive accusations of ties to microsoft. some of the people he accuses actually are connected to microsoft, but all facts presented by tr are there to create the slightest credibility, upon which a web of mostly sheer nonsense is constructed. just as importantly: he is expert at convincing people to do things for him. they are taken in by what once appeared to be anti-establishment, and anti-establishment types are convinced they can help him fight monopolies (this is a farce which he constantly reinforces) and they eagerly volunteer hours and hours of time to basically doing free research, writing, proofreading and sometimes recruiting new contributors. if this sounds cult-like, it absolutely is. tr is nearly a cult of personality. the only difference is that a real cult of personality has more cohesion, and tr is routinely falling apart and losing people. it just cant hold on to its believers. this is the only thing that might separate it from most cults. but the damage it does and the number of victims continues to grow, which makes tr a real problem for the free software community. tr is a hazard, and tr exploits people then turns against them. now, ive been saying this literally for years. i left the matter behind me when it felt like the thing to do, and went to fight it again when it started attacking my friend. i was indeed very hurt and very angry about the betrayal of being exploited and then smeared for my efforts. today, tr pushes a number of agendas that began when i pushed for them in articles i wrote (with a free license, so anyone is free to reuse them). today i am a more seasoned opponent of the website. some of my positions have changed, that happens sometimes- but tr is not sincere about anything it says or does; it is not sincere about its fight. it simply exploits positions i had first (which it misrepresented and smeared me for) but now it uses those positions i brought to the table as bait for new victims. my positions are used to make people think tr cares about anything. it matters a lot that tr never really cared about these issues. the only thing the owner of tr really cares about, is the owner of tr. it is not about free software. rather it uses the issue to get people to feed the owners ego- then it throws them away and takes everything for itself. by smearing former contributors, people are led to believe they have no right to their own opinions and advocacy. it is through this process that tr appropriates everything, and creates a monopoly for its performative, larpish "activism" at the expense of people who have sincere positions and actually care about issues. i have already devoted significant efforts to giving examples. you dont need to take my word for it. let this article serve as fair warning, as well as a statement regarding my stance on that website. license: 0-clause bsd ``` # 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023 # # Permission to use, copy, modify, and/or distribute this software for any # purpose with or without fee is hereby granted. # # THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS" AND THE AUTHOR DISCLAIMS ALL WARRANTIES # WITH REGARD TO THIS SOFTWARE INCLUDING ALL IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF # MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS. 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