There’s been a great deal of exposition over the last twelve hours regarding the ownership dispute over the High Road forum. At the moment, Derek Zeanah seems to be the only one with permissions to access the database, and Oleg’s admin privileges have been suspended.
At first, I refrained from casting judgment. I didn’t know all the facts, and at this point, I still don’t. However, exiled moderators, some of whom I know, have begun sharing a bit more information, and although there were mistakes on both sides, certain things are clear.
Rich Lucibella founded both the Firing Line and the High Road. When it came time to transfer the domain, Rich gave it to Derek under the impression that Derek was acting as Oleg’s agent.
It’s quite clear from Rich’s statements, both at the beginning and presently, that Oleg was meant to be the owner of the High Road. Despite Derek’s significant efforts (for which he seems to have been compensated, at least in part), Oleg still had stewardship of the whole forum.
Earlier this summer, Oleg decided to entertain the idea of involving a third party in order to obtain some financial independence for the board. Though opinions were divided, people were still talking to one another.
At some point during this, Derek revealed that he owned the domain registration, and that he had the sole backup of the database. I’m not sure why nobody noticed or questioned this previously, but that’s beside the point.
In any case, Derek was easily able to take sole control of the forum, and he’s not been kind to those who disagree with him. TheBluesMan has been banned outright, and Henry Bowman has been stripped of moderator priveleges.
He may have a valid disagreement with Oleg, and the substance of it may be something truly important, but his actions in the wake of their falling-out are very unsettling. THR is a product of a wide-ranging community, but in its current form, it is a private fiefdom run by Derek and a few folks who have taken his side.
This isn’t the way it’s supposed to be, and it breaks my heart. I’d hoped cooler heads might have prevailed, but apparently this has been brewing for quite some time.
Regardless of the circumstances, I don’t like the idea that a community forum is being held hostage by someone who feels slighted. I don’t plan on posting anything on THR, since it’s likely I’d be banned as well and the content deleted.
It may be quite some time before things are back to normal, as it appears the matter will have to be settled through legal channels. Some folks I truly respect, like Tamara and Xavier, seem to be sitting this out until it blows over, and I think I’ll join them.
To put it shortly, the High Road is not the forum we know at the moment, and I urge anyone reading this not to frequent or support it until this situation is resolved.
THR and its sister forum The Firing Line have been a paragon of how a good gun board (or any discussion board, for that matter) should be run. Things were kept civil and on-topic through even-handed moderation. It was a welcome change from the unmanageable chaos that was Usenet and from the cronyistic style of moderation that plagues many other such boards.
More to the point, it was a place where you could find people who’d really been there. There was a wealth of real experience and tangible information, and it had become an invaluable resource for me.
And it saddens me deeply that I find myself referring to it in the past tense.