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By Xavier Mohr
SLReports.net (Please note that this is a blog post, hence the heading... not an article.) Boy, oh boy! Talk about being knocked off your high horse back to reality! If – for one fleeting moment over the past 48 hours – I had started to miss my old involvement in Second Life, I was quite forcefully pushed back into a state of loving disdain last night. You know, there are so many other... more serious... issues I could have blogged about over the past couple days: the power struggle over halted stock POW at CapEx, the ever-expanding deadline of the WSE reopening and 4.0 upgrade, the backlash over Arbitrage Wise's CTO equity partnership announcement, or... just in general... how the post-banking behavior on both customer and management ends just generally dumbfounds me. Who in God's name would have thought for a single microsecond that reposting a publicly-available, "old news" announcement like Arthur Burma's claimed intention to file a class-action suit against BNT Financial would have brought me so much grief? Not me.
In defense of all SLR's non-schizophrenic readers, I received a lot of good feedback... both in support of Burma's actions and against. Kristie H., for instance, was kind enough to email me her opinion on the matter. "Arthur is stating 10 people have admitted in 1 day yet saying it equals up to 12300usd which is a total of 3 million lindens," she said. "There’s no actual proof of the deposits made. In this situation and from an accountant point of view the mathematical formula isn’t adding up. Unless you got the actual mathematical faqs straight before hand there isn’t something too build a case on." I have also received some feedback that's not so friendly. One former banker directly involved in this story accused me of "illegal slander," citing "legal repercussions," accusing me of being the mouthpiece for JTF, SLW, and CapEx. In addition to pointing out that other website operators felt this to be a "non-story," this former banking official also whined that I did not seek out their side of the argument. All of the comments were made in the "holier-than-thou," tone I would expect from this particular person... with a slight hint of "I'm the smartest legal expert alive and politically superior to all." Speaking indirectly to those that felt it necessary to point out my flaws, let's take a chill pill and set a couple of things straight. First of all, if I went around the SL news circles telling people that someone was a child molester who'd served prison time before coming to Second Life, and I had no legitimate information to back my claims, that would be "illegal slander." Or, real legal experts would call it "libel." The BNT Financial lawsuit post I penned was actually a repost of information publicly available on the web, and old news at that given it has been posted elsewhere as a repost of the original. Furthermore, if you had read anything I have written – here or elsewhere – over the past couple days, you would realize that I am the furthest thing from being a mouthpiece for any virtual banker or exchange head. I am not even going to defend that one. The next big newsflash is that you have no say in what is and is not a story. I did not ask for your opinion or permission, nor am I required to do so. I choose the content for my posts, and those that read them decide on their own accord whether or not to deem credible the information presented. In short, you were not invited to be part of the content selection process... nor will you ever be. Now, let's talk about what I wrote. Originally, I offered broad, vague comments on the reposted material originally obtained from Mr. Burma's website. And along those lines, if you feel that my criticisms of this lawsuit did anything but benefit YOU personally, you would appear to have a problem with basic literary comprehension. All of that being said, I posted the content under the conspicuous heading of "Blog." It was not meant as factual information, but rather a commentary on public information. It was not an article. I did not contact Arthur Burma prior to making the post, nor did I contact you. Perhaps, in the interests of more important real life scheduling, I created a unilateral commentary rather than the in-depth article that I should have. But tell me something, whatever happened to being proactive? Mr. Burma put a lot of time and effort into creating and syndicating a press release that stated his side of this matter. Yet, you have the nerve to attack me for posting it... when you did not reciprocate his actions by spreading your side of the story? Right or wrong, Mr. Burma did exactly what a person should do when they have important news to get out... he posted it online in such a manner that it would be noticed by other news websites. Unless I am trying to pass off original research as factual information via an actual article, you have no entitlement to be contacted... nor does Mr. Burma. And that being said, what I wrote was clearly an opinion to be taken with your own respective grain of salt. End of story. What do I personally think of all this? Well, here's the OPINION. I am holding my breath to see what happens, but am not overly biased one way or the other. For good or ill depending on your own beliefs, I personally feel that when a person buys Linden Dollars from Linden Lab, they forfeit all the legal rights and protections that they may have had when the currency was still in the form of U.S. Dollars, Euros, or the applicable legal tender of the jurisdiction. Long before the banking ban, I always encouraged "significant depositors" to take their "significant deposits" to real-life, regulated banks. I have contempt for banks that went bust avoidably, but my remorse for those that lost tens of thousands of dollars worth of Lindens is very limited. Why were you keeping that much inside Second Life to begin with? I also feel like the recent BNTF resolution plan is more than mainstream given the actions of other banks, and more than equitable given the circumstances that IntLibber Brautigan has been tossed by Linden Lab. If the BNTF situation is in some way different or less fair than that of JTF, SLIB, BCX, or LLBT, please correct me. Apparently, according to reports, many of the top depositors at BNTF have already agreed to the plan. There are also reports that Mr. Burma was offered an undisclosed compensation package, which he in turn refused. But, that's not the issue. The issue here is, you have no right to complain about the reposting of information if you have done nothing to get your own side of the story to the public. Ignoring a situation does not make it go away, as many in this little financial circle can tell you. You also have no right to accuse me of falsehoods created in your own warped little mind, based on financial community dramas within which I no longer play an active role. I hold no financial interest in any exchange or bank, aside from about L$3,000 in various stock at the SL Capital Exchange that I trade for fun. I have not been an active employee of any financial entity for four or five months. I'm sorry you got your feelings hurt when Mr. Burma wrote and posted his press release, but that issue is between you and him... and has nothing to do with me. If it makes you feel any better, prior to becoming aware of your comments last night... I had no intention of revisiting this subject. Even now, unless this persists as some hot-button, public issue, this will probably be my last post on the matter. The ironic part of all this is... quite simply... if I were leaning towards anyone's side in this matter as recently as yesterday afternoon, it would have been towards the side of BNT Financial. Yet, it was the very management side of this matter that attacked me, and attacked this website. All the while, the very person I criticized – Arthur Burma – showed true heart, openness, and friendliness out of sheer passion for telling his side of the argument. How's that for a life lesson? ~ Xavier Mohr
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