a fantasy story..

let's pretend I am admin at a bulletin board.

I share the task with two other admin. One of them has annoyed me, and I'd like to get rid of him. How do I do it?

Come on now! You might have to deal with this. it's the digital new-age, bulletin boards are popular, folks not only hang out in them, but pour out their worries and dreams there too, evolve, decide.. This is important. No, forget all that, this dude just nips my head. He keeps reminding me of my own weaknesses and foibles, and I'm not entirely certain whether it's because he too suffers them, or he's just reminding me. Pisses me right off. In short, it would be easier if he was out of the way. Or disgraced or something, killed..

The big problem with all this is that with a bulletin board, everything is in black and white. Someone, if they had a mind to, could follow the chain of events and prove or more likely disprove, anything I say against this guy. He probably keep his own logs too! Damn! And Yes I know this is all supposed to be about running a bulletin board, and this diversity is the great strength and all that, but if I play by those rules and actually debate this, well, folks will see right through it! I'll need help here.

it's a challenge. The biggest trouble is, members like him! bastards! I mean, being witty and intelligent individual, good looking and lots of fun too, not to mention dedicated and hard working, well, no way I could ask the members to de-rail him. Wouldn't happen. He's bloody popular! FECK! You should see the fan-mail he gets! fucker.

I ponder this for an age, which of course was completely unnecessary, the answer is staring me right in the face! It may all be in black and white, but it's existence relies upon people. Humans. All it takes is a few good men, some old-fashioned rumour-mongering, sprinkle in a little FUD and Bob's my Uncle! Of course! A phpbb witch-hunt! This is beautiful, my three part plan..

1: Announce that I must step down, extra work-load, family, excuse is optional. Recommend a replacement admin, and instate him right away.

2: don't Go! This is important. After the initial, "Oh, we'll miss you, can't you find it in your schedule and your heart to stay a while", I'll just bloody stay! No one will mention it again, so I won't have to either. Guaranteed. And now I have another admin on my side.

3: Meet with this new admin, and convince him I am sooo right to want to remove my enemy, and recruit, or more likely get the new admin to recruit, yet another admin! Meet for more rumours and work them up a bit. Inform the enemy that he missed the meetings. Repeat until I have enough admins for a clear majority!

No, this isn't ludicrous! This is humans. If beardy George V could get millions of men in the prime of their life to jump into a muddy trench to have their head shot off, surely I can whip a few guys into a virtual storm, folks risking no more than the neck of their beloved smileys.

It'll be easy. I'll invite anyone who'll back me up, ex-lovers, sacked cleaners, anyone at all with something to say, bring them along to the staff meetings too (mr. enemy's piercing sense of humour has pissed off almost everyone at one point or another, this part will be a cinch) I can paste IRC logs (editing out the bits I don't need, everyone believes logs) and other wee snippets of data to convince them. Then I'll make a few wild cries about it being HIM OR ME - folks respond to this, a mothering instinct, perhaps. Within a few days, the whole (now quite sizable) admin team, emotionally bribed and gagged, will march right into my line, believing that the whole world is about to end.

Then we sack him, and with the full blessing of the whole admin team! it's beautiful. He hasn't got a hope!

Now all this relies on some pretty sleepy mods and members, of course, or maybe apathetic is a better word, and having a bulletin board with no rules whatsoever, and I also have to ensure that he's not recruiting admins at the same time too, (surely no one else could come up with brilliant and dasterdly plan!) else it would get like agent smith, people could get virtually hurt. It could go on forever! Where's the fun in that?

But in the main, folks rarely complain, and you can take the most outrageous liberties with the facts before they will even consider piping up about it. Politics. An old neighbour of mine used to say "it's just a game of cards".

And if that smart bastard ever tries to clearly and concisely argue the many many individual out-of-context hearsays I have concocted, well, who's gonna read more than the first couple of paragraphs of that! Most folk have the attention span of a goldfish anyway. No, propaganda has taken over at this point. A quick "no, that's bullshit m8" posted after it knock's that on the head right away. Peeps like the last post best, I find. Seeds of doubt bear fruit almost overnight, given the right conditions.

And if he gets, okay justifiably, angry about all this, well, there you have it, I told you he was a trouble-maker all along!

that's it!
I'm the president! You will kneel now!

No! Come back! Please! You didn't kneel! COME BACK!!!

Well, anyway, I was going to say..
All that's left is to hope no one points out the one other obvious solution to my fantasy crisis.. grow up cor!

Wadda ya mean you've stopped reading already!?!

:o) The Writing Entity @ corz.org