Tuesday, February 20, 2007

Investor Village Et al Limits Sam E. Antar from Asking Questions on Overstock.com - Shame on Them!

Note: As of 12:39 AM several hours later I have been apparently been barred from posting on Investor Village (read bottom of post).

I received the following "private message" from Investor Village relating my activities on that message board where I have been asking questions mostly to Patrick Byrne (CEO of Overstock.com) and Judd Bagley (Director of Social Media at Overstock.com) and others possibly acting in concert with them about their activities relating to Overstock.com and the smear web site antisocialmedia.net:

From: Admin
Date: 02/20/07 5:20:09 PM
Subject: Admin Notice: your posting privileges have been restricted

Sam:

This notice is to inform you that based on a review of numerous reports against your account for clogging and other violations of our User Agreement, we have decided in our sole discretion to limit your posting privileges to three messages per 24-hour period, subject to the terms and conditions of use of our service. If you would like to set up your own private or semi-private board at InvestorVillage, you are welcome to do so. We can arrange it so that you can have unlimited posting on your own board, again, subject to our terms and conditions. However, we are putting our foot down on the misuse of our OSTK board for your own agenda, which, for whatever reason, seems to include clogging our forum to conduct an informal and unofficial campaign of "deposition-style" messages targeting other members of InvestorVillage.

If you have any issues with our decision, please take them up with our attorney, Paul Kaplan:

Paul J. Kaplan
Alston & Bird LLP
1201 West Peachtree Street
Atlanta, GA 30309-3424
TEL: (404) 881-4684
FAX: (404) 253-8679
paul.kaplan@alston.com

Respectfully,

Ralph "Blue" Kidd
Co-Founder, Chief Community Advocate
InvestorVillage
504-250-0021
blue@investorvillage.com

Your Voice Inside IV

NOTE: All material contained herein is intended for the recipient only and is strictly private and confidential and may be legally privileged. If you have received this message in error, please delete it and any copy thereof and report the matter to me as soon as possible at blue@investorvillage.com. Thank you


My immediate response:

I recently joined the Investor Village Board to post questions of Patrick Byrne (CEO of Overstock.com) and Judd Bagley (Director of Social Media at Overstock.com) mainly about their activities and their relationship to the smear web site antisocialmedia.net which Mr. Byrne claims Overstock.com has nothing to do with and that Mr. Bagley claims operate in his spare time.

My questions have annoyed other members of the board and especially both Patrick Byrne and Judd Bagley who both are members of the Investor Village board. Patrick Byrne posts on this board under the alias “Hannibal” and Judd Bagley posts under the alias “De Daumier-Smith.”

My questions have been probing and direct. I have been the subject of personal attacks by Patrick Byrne, Judd Bagley, and others on the Investor Village board. Unlike the significant majority of unanimous posters I clearly disclose my full name and the fact that I am the former CFO of Crazy Eddie and a convicted felon on every post. (I used to write ex-felon until a poster on the Wall Street Law Journal blog suggested I change my designation).

On February, 1, 2007, Investor Village tried to silence me after Patrick Byrne and others expressed annoyance at my questions but quickly reinstated me.

On February 2, 2007,  Patrick Byrne, posting under the alias Hannibal,  responding to an anonymous smear attack on me, wrote:

“Hey Blackbart,

“I laughed so hard at your message….

Is there anyone here who suspects that Sam is just trying to clog, or waste my time, or misdirect this discussion board? If you agree, please recommend this post. If we get over 20, I say that is proof that it is time we all agree to ignore Sam forever.”

Judd Bagley (Director of Social Media at Overstock.com) has posted comments on the Investor Village Board on various days and 24 hour periods in excess of the posts I have made but is not subject to any limitation. Patrick Byrne (CEO of Overstock.com) is not subject to any limitations on posting. I invite you to read the vile nature of both some of both Byrne and Bagley's posts below (see links provided). Other persons posting malicious attacks have not been subject to the same limitations as me.

Below are links to some questions I have asked Patrick Byrne and Judd Bagley:

On 02/18/07: To Patrick Byrne AKA Hannibal (CEO of Overstock.com) Re: Judd Bagley & Antisocialmedia.net

On 02/19/07: To Judd Bagley AKA De Daumier Smith (Director of Social Media at Overstock.com) Re: Patrick Byrne

For a complete set of my posts on Investor Village link below:

https://web.archive.org/web/20070702124606/http://www1.investorvillage.com/smbd.asp?pt=m&SearchBy=Author&SearchFor=sam+e+antar&clear=1&mb=3532&Search=Go

For a complete set of Patrick Byrne’s posts under his alias Hannibal on Investor Village link below:

https://web.archive.org/web/20070526101415/http://www1.investorvillage.com/smbd.asp?pt=m&SearchBy=Author&SearchFor=hannibal&clear=1&mb=3532#sss

For a complete set of Judd Bagley’s posts under his alias De Daumier-Smith on Investor Village link below:

https://web.archive.org/web/20070702122929/http://www1.investorvillage.com/smbd.asp?pt=m&SearchBy=Author&SearchFor=De+Daumier-Smith&clear=1&mb=3532&Search=Go

More to follow.

To Investor Village:

Your actions are disgraceful and shameful.

Respectfully,

Sam E. Antar (former Crazy Eddie CFO & convicted felon)

PS: Take your best shot.

Link to Gary Weiss Weiss Blog: Sam Antar Gagged Again

Late news:

My new post on Investor Village was deleted after they permitted me to post again since I had 2 available posts. When I tried to re-post my questions they did not appear. (as of 12:39 AM)

I am now apparently banned from posting on Investor Village.