Further to that hacking ...

[blamebrampton]

I joined marmalade_fish  to check out updates on the hacking of sarahtales , and two important points were raised.

The first is that if you have sarahtales  friended, the hackers currently have access to all of your private posts. So it may be a good idea to defriend for a little while.  ETA, she's back, but you should still consider the fishies, it looks like a fun comm, too!

The second is that there is a suspicion the hacker is not an opportunistic Russian con artist, but someone from fandom acting malevolently. Given some of fandom's history, that does not seem as unlikely as we might hope. Why some people feel it's necessary to pour crap on those who add hard work to their talent in order to become successful is a mystery to me. Wankers, the lot of them.

Comments

[blamebrampton.livejournal.com]

Is that really her, though?

[meredyth-13.livejournal.com]

That was totally my first thought. :)

[furiosity.livejournal.com]

That strikes me as a teensy bit paranoid, since she's commenting back to people instead of just making posts. If it was not her but rather some tech-savvy con artist (Russian or not), it would be utterly stupid (from an online/tech POV) to make comments and essentially give away their IP.

[blamebrampton.livejournal.com]

Reasonable paranoia give that a post of less than four paragraphs is something I did not think her capable of.

If the malicious fandom person theory that SRB advanced holds water, then I think there are many prior examples showing that there is actually no limit to the stupidity that can be involved.

Which makes sense, because smart people who don't like someone just ignore them rather than gleefully rubbing their hands together and declaring 'YES! I shall take my revenge ON THE INTERNET!'

[furiosity.livejournal.com]

a post of less than four paragraphs is something I did not think her capable of
Do you seriously think she's going to sit there typing out four paragraphs in what's clearly an emergency situation (i.e. there are awfulness-inducing links in her LJ, and people need to be alerted)? I would not say that's a reasonable thing to expect of anyone, least of all Sarah, but okay, if you think so.

[blamebrampton.livejournal.com]

If she's regained control of her lj and the emergency is over, then yes.

[furiosity.livejournal.com]

ffs, she's not a robot.

[blamebrampton.livejournal.com]

No, she is a writer. She has always written out issues in her lj before, even ones that have been stressful, and her language has never been that bare bones.

It could very well be her, I am not saying that it is certainly not. But in and of itself, that message is not enough to make me say 'Oh, good, that's sorted.'

[furiosity.livejournal.com]

Like I said, the message doesn't matter. Giving away her IP via comments -- to anyone who knows how to grab IPs from other people's posts -- does.

[blamebrampton.livejournal.com]

Can you just confirm that it's Sarah's then? I would love to think it was all sorted!

[furiosity.livejournal.com]

Wait, you're the one with suspicions and I should do the work? lol.

[blamebrampton.livejournal.com]

I'm the Luddite! And happy to live with my suspicions! :-P

[furiosity.livejournal.com]

Hahaha, okay -- it'll take a bit of time 'cause I'm at work and have to do it the lo-tech way.

[blamebrampton.livejournal.com]

Or we could both just hang around for an hour or two until someone updates the sticky post at marmalade_fish ...

Get back to work, and thanks for the offer, I was momentarily terrified I might need to learn more tech: I'm in my 40s! Every young person skill I learn is another set of French verbs I forget!

[blamebrampton.livejournal.com]

It's HER!

[furiosity.livejournal.com]

Well, I knew that anyway. >.>

[blamebrampton.livejournal.com]

Yes, you are wise and I have spent far too much time demanding three or four pieces of corroborating evidence in my life ;-P (But I do prefer being sceptical and slow to the alternative!)

[furiosity.livejournal.com]

My tracker also just came back and the IP is definitely hers. So that's two pieces of corroborating evidence. XD

[blamebrampton.livejournal.com]

She had me at loquacious.
:-)

[sarahtales.livejournal.com]

Um, it is me - since I was on the phone with a zillion people, and trying to reply to the many emails from concerned folk in my inbox, and emailing everyone I know as all my emails were deleted too, I thought it best to throw up the briefest and most informative post possible.

I do plan on putting up a more loquacious post that sounds more like me, but being funny (or indeed words of more than one profane syllable) is something that's coming kind of hard just now. But there's no need to worry anymore!

[blamebrampton.livejournal.com]

OK, now THAT sounds like you ...

As would two paragraphs of words of one profane syllable.