An Announcement

[William Danforth]

Hello,

Some of you have met me before on the Micras forums where you knew me as William Danforth. Never mind how the name change came about, I have a very important message to all of you. The community you know as MicroWiki, to be found at http://microwiki.co.cc/ is currently headed by a dictatorial conglomerate of micronationalists who are not to be trusted. These micronationalists are, by name:

1. Philip Fish
2. Peter Bralesford
3. William Soergel

These micronationalists have repeatedly shown that they think they are better than everyone else and make decisions that completely disregard any and all democratic process. My evidence is that I was banned from this community on the grounds that Peter Bralesford, owner of the domain, doesn't like me.

Yes, that is indeed the justification given, more or less. The justification for the original ban was that Bralesford could ban me or not ban me as he pleases, just because he owns the domain. After this decision was made, there was a vote, the introduction to which was clearly biased in favor of banning me. It accused me of unproven charges such as hacking the MicroWiki server which I deny under oath ever to have committed.

That same introduction also quoted misdemeanors I had committed in the past for which I had been pardoned. Being pardoned usually means that the crimes are never brought up again - anything else is not a pardon but a parole.

Furthermore, most of the more seasoned and experienced members of the community who had been there for the longest time voted against my ban, whereas junior members of the community, many of which never even had contact with me, voted in support of the ban. This vote is clearly not representative of me, but of a twisted, biased propagation of what I am supposedly like.

I wasn't even given a chance to defend myself, because, as I said previously, I had already been banned, the vote was just there to confirm that. Whatever you want to call this sort of action, you can't call it democratic, because voting on something after it has been done is never democratically justifiable. It's like killing a few people and then setting up a trial determining whether they should have had the death sentence. It is a ludicrous, farcical mockery of what democracy truly stands for.

And what reason was given for my ban? The MicroWiki forums say: "Reason given: Enough". If you pardon the pun, "Enough" is not enough of a justification for a lifetime ban.

Now here's the real shocker: I, as you must know, am the First Minister of Zealandia. The King of Zealandia, who has nothing to do with the entire issue, was told that he may either remove me from my ranks, titles and positions or be banned as well. However, the King of Zealandia does not have the legal power to depose an elected official - which is exactly what I am. In the elections, 20 people voted for me, and only 7 people voted for the other candidate. Evidently, this means that the Zealandian people support me, and demanding that I be "fired" is an illicit intervention in the internal affairs of a foreign micronation, committed by Messrs Fish, Bralesford and Soergel.

Following suit to their blackmail, these people then proceeded to ban HM King Anthony - even though he had never committed any infringements in his entire stay in the MicroWiki community. There was, again, a vote after this ban was imposed and the vote ended up in King Anthony's favor. However, we speculate there were plans from this conglomerate to actually ignore the outcome of the vote on some minor technicality or loophole.

This signifies beyond the shadow of a doubt that these people are relentless, will crush any opposition and are more than happy to completely ignore the decisions of an entire community in order to fulfil their own wishes.

The Zealandian Ministry of Intermicronational Partnerships has branded Philip Fish, Peter Bralesford and William Soergel as Micronational Terrorists.

We recommend that contact with these persons should be avoided at all costs and that they should not be supported in any way, shape or form.

Yours most sincerely,

H.M.S.M., The Most Honourable Lord, Sir Sebastian von Linden PhD KE OC OCr OS OWC BSACBA, First Minister of the United Kingdom of Zealandia, Prince of Eleytheria and Zealandia, Sovereign of the Order of Eleytheria, the Order of the Chevron and the Order of the Crown, Defender of the United Kingdom, etc. etc. etc.

[Craitman]

Ouch!

Time for some micronational diplomacy, methinks...

[Nick]

*is reminded of Andreas' removal from the council*

I am afraid I must take some time to absorb this information better to give a more accurate opinion.

[Austenasia]

This is HIH Crown Prince Jonathan of Austenasia (yes, of Wikipedia fame ), and I must say that I do agree that the three persons mentioned do seem to have almost complete control over the MicroWiki community.

[William Danforth]

Umm, if I may quote some of these people

cunt

Exhibit A.

fck you

Exhibit B.

wrong and rude

Exhibit C.

All of these were to or about me. Peter Bralesford said I would never again be allowed into MicroWiki as long as he lives. I think it is a bit late for diplomacy.

[Nick]

I recall this now. I read about it on the A1 news service. While I believe that such unilateral decisions are detrimental to a community, justified or not, from what I hear there was some douchebaggery on your part. However, I will not comment as to whether or not this actually happened. You seem like a sensible enough person, and micronationalists do have a penitent for over exaggerating, so perhaps in time when this situation cools down you can make an appeal.

I find it a bit silly (but by no means shocking) that internal politics are dictating external organizational policy. There have been many cases where the MicroWiki community has shown itself to be very pretentious and arrogant. But Mr. Fish seems like the least likely candidate to start waving his scepter, however I can't say I know the guy well. He's always been nice to us so....

[Guido Zambelis]

You are more than welcome to participate here if that's what you wish! I'm afraid we're not about to intervene in the affairs of another forum for you though.

[William Danforth]

I completely understand that, it is just our government's recommendation to avoid contact with those people. Thanks for the warm welcome

[William Danforth]

I recall this now. I read about it on the A1 news service. While I believe that such unilateral decisions are detrimental to a community, justified or not, from what I hear there was some douchebaggery on your part. However, I will not comment as to whether or not this actually happened. You seem like a sensible enough person, and micronationalists do have a penitent for over exaggerating, so perhaps in time when this situation cools down you can make an appeal.

I find it a bit silly (but by no means shocking) that internal politics are dictating external organizational policy. There have been many cases where the MicroWiki community has shown itself to be very pretentious and arrogant. But Mr. Fish seems like the least likely candidate to start waving his scepter, however I can't say I know the guy well. He's always been nice to us so....

He's been nice to you now. A few months ago the guy went on a rampage throughout the OAM forums, trying to convince people that Micras is not micronational and Micras nations should under no circumstances be recognised by OAM nations.

Yes, I did release Mr. Fish's surname, but only after he had several times called me by a name I explained several times that I did not wish to be called, a malevolent character (and it was a character, nothing more) that I was arguably more or less forced into portraying by another micronational bad guy named Robert Lethler. It's as though somebody repeatedly called you Hitler. I figured he called me by a name I dont want to be called, so I'll call him by a name he doesn't want to be called. You call that douchebaggery, I call it "getting even".

And before you do, I anticipate your quoting Mohandas Gandhi saying "An eye for an eye, and we're all blind" and counter you with the fact that it's fairer if we're all blind than if we condemn only one person to be blind.

[ari]

* grabs popcorn *

[Nick]

Personally, if you feel that if you were in the right, you should appeal it. Although Mr. Fish's anti-MCS campaign is news to me, as we've lately been trying to foster relations between the OAM and MCS, but that failed (perhaps I see why now).

But I echo Guido's words, you have our sympathy but there isn't much we can do (there is, but we are not inclined to because that is a separate community's internal affairs). However, you're more than welcome to hang out here, we're not too fond of banning and we're generally more open.

[Scott Alexander]

Oh, this guy has a SHINE dossier a mile long.

Sebastian von Linden is widely considered to be the same person as Mark Dresner/Ann-Marie Myers/Friederic, a notorious sock puppeteer wanted across the micronational world for backstabbing, hacking, and revealing people's real names without their consent. The MicroWiki community has quite reasonably decided to ban him after having to ban several of his other aliases. King Anthony of Zealandia has been the only person to completely defy the ban, having chosen to harbor von Linden in his nation. The MicroWiki administration agreed to ban King Anthony for breaking the interdict on Dresner.

(it is a little known historical fact, but our own community has a similar interdict: several of us are bound by treaty to not only declare war on Thomas Hubert wherever and whensoever he shows himself, but to declare war on anyone who harbors or engages with Thomas Hubert. It's for the best, trust me.)

Anyhow, Philip Fish has decided to put the ban on King Anthony to community-wide vote and the ban on Dresner/etc. has already been approved by community-wide vote. After several weeks of exploring the MicroWiki community, I have seen nothing but good things about Fish and the other admins, and nothing but horror stories about Dresner.

I believe everyone deserves a second chance (except Hubert, Sager, Bob Silby, and several other people I can't be bothered to think of at the moment), and I would not necessarily support von Linden's immediate ban from this community, but I would urge Spangle to sleep with one eye open (assuming Spangle sleeps, which I am by no means certain about) and for the rest of the community to trust nothing he says.

[ari]

Hey now, Shireroth harbored Delphi and Jacobus and Philip Locke and.... hell, Thomas Hubert's been gone for so long that I would even give him a chance as a citizen. But Shireroth *is* a bit of a special case like that, I guess.

(though, speaking of Hubert, those who remember him know that the "I was just playing a character" defence is the oldest one in the book)

[William Danforth]

It may be old, but that does not mean it isnt true. I am Marco Dresner no more than Tom Cruise is Claus Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg.

[Nick]

"I was just playing a character"

I find that one slightly annoying as it is always pulled out after someone calls them on being an asshole. "Oh I was just in character, I wasn't being a dick, my character was". I've seen it happen quite a few times (almost verbatim) and on occasion they get away with it.