SCP Foundation - Creepypasta with roid rage - now ITT: SCP fans

[Furret]

if I get 45 I can be within 500 yards of a playground or elementary school.

...They're going that easy on you? I have 125 and I still can't see my kids! What gives?

 

[Infl8edEgo]

I am late to the party everyone, but I wanted to talk about SCP-166. The amount of early skips that are straight fetish porn has always been amusing to me, with the milk that caused breast expansion or the blob that made people masturbate or this one which is canonically the daughter of the author DrClef. The original version of 166 can be found pretty easy on the way back machine or just digging through the articles history, but to summarize the original,
SCP-166 is a blonde nun who has deer antlers but cannot wear clothes or she will get bedsores. Also all men to want to rape her. Also she needs to DRINK CUM to survive.

https://web.archive.org/web/20200810183205/http://www.scpwiki.com/scp-166

This was changed rather recently to exclude any aspects which are sexual in nature, removing the mandatory cummie intake, no clothes rule, and the whole bit about men trying to rape her all the time. The comments are filled with people either upset or defending the rewrite, although the rewrite basically just makes this scp some kind of nun who makes plants grow. What was the point of not just deleting it? They took out everything that gave this fapfuel its name but left a husk. It was cringe in the first place, and even more cringe now that they are shitting their pants about all the kids who are gonna read about Hugh jackmans cock and nubile breasts.

 

[Cow-Chan]

I am late to the party everyone, but I wanted to talk about SCP-166. The amount of early skips that are straight fetish porn has always been amusing to me, with the milk that caused breast expansion or the blob that made people masturbate or this one which is canonically the daughter of the author DrClef. The original version of 166 can be found pretty easy on the way back machine or just digging through the articles history, but to summarize the original,
SCP-166 is a blonde nun who has deer antlers but cannot wear clothes or she will get bedsores. Also all men to want to rape her. Also she needs to DRINK CUM to survive.

https://web.archive.org/web/20200810183205/http://www.scpwiki.com/scp-166

This was changed rather recently to exclude any aspects which are sexual in nature, removing the mandatory cummie intake, no clothes rule, and the whole bit about men trying to rape her all the time. The comments are filled with people either upset or defending the rewrite, although the rewrite basically just makes this scp some kind of nun who makes plants grow. What was the point of not just deleting it? They took out everything that gave this fapfuel its name but left a husk. It was cringe in the first place, and even more cringe now that they are shitting their pants about all the kids who are gonna read about Hugh jackmans cock and nubile breasts.

Because, coincidentally, while the article was obvious wank bait originally, most people actually genuinely liked the original article because it was actually good and provoked more than just "Hee hee cum drink" reactions. When you take into account that the character is a nun who was born a Succubus, the cum drinking requirements aren't shocking and cum almost expected, and instead makes you focus on the idea that the article could more be about nature vs. nurture.

 

[Gar For Archer]

Because, coincidentally, while the article was obvious wank bait originally, most people actually genuinely liked the original article because it was actually good and provoked more than just "Hee hee cum drink" reactions. When you take into account that the character is a nun who was born a Succubus, the cum drinking requirements aren't shocking and cum almost expected, and instead makes you focus on the idea that the article could more be about nature vs. nurture.

I wouldn’t say it’s really nature vs. nurture - it’s actually really similar to the “teenage Chthulu”, where an anomalous being is resentful of their “abilities” which predominantly manifest in humans trying to bother them (unwanted worshippers doing gross rituals for the Cthulhu, rape for the succubus) when they really just want to be left alone.

 

[Infl8edEgo]

Because, coincidentally, while the article was obvious wank bait originally, most people actually genuinely liked the original article because it was actually good and provoked more than just "Hee hee cum drink" reactions. When you take into account that the character is a nun who was born a Succubus, the cum drinking requirements aren't shocking and cum almost expected, and instead makes you focus on the idea that the article could more be about nature vs. nurture.

Which is evident in the comments, and is a good point. Many long time authors are upset about the sudden mandatory sanitization of the site to fit modern “standards.” While I personally think the article is bad even in its original state, I find it worse now that it has had even the shred of personality it once possessed stripped from it in order to make it safer for children to read. Why keep it at all other than to pay homage to the ego of clef? It reads like many of the more stale newer skips which are less mysterious and thought provoking and more “superhero exists for character development of DrClef.” Now that is I mean, originally it did have purpose to exist on its own given the inherent conflict between mandatory cummies and St Patrick.

 

[Furret]

I am late to the party everyone, but I wanted to talk about SCP-166. The amount of early skips that are straight fetish porn has always been amusing to me, with the milk that caused breast expansion or the blob that made people masturbate or this one which is canonically the daughter of the author DrClef. The original version of 166 can be found pretty easy on the way back machine or just digging through the articles history, but to summarize the original,
SCP-166 is a blonde nun who has deer antlers but cannot wear clothes or she will get bedsores. Also all men to want to rape her. Also she needs to DRINK CUM to survive.

https://web.archive.org/web/20200810183205/http://www.scpwiki.com/scp-166

This was changed rather recently to exclude any aspects which are sexual in nature, removing the mandatory cummie intake, no clothes rule, and the whole bit about men trying to rape her all the time. The comments are filled with people either upset or defending the rewrite, although the rewrite basically just makes this scp some kind of nun who makes plants grow. What was the point of not just deleting it? They took out everything that gave this fapfuel its name but left a husk. It was cringe in the first place, and even more cringe now that they are shitting their pants about all the kids who are gonna read about Hugh jackmans cock and nubile breasts.

Oh boy, this article again. If it makes you feel any better, Clef personally approved the 166 rewrite and was asking for someone to rewrite it for a long time. He received other potential rewrites before the one that he ended up approving, but he rejected those for not being close enough to his original vision for the article, so it can be inferred that the current version of 166 does everything Clef wanted the original to do.

 

[Punished “Venom” pH]

Oh boy, this article again. If it makes you feel any better, Clef personally approved the 166 rewrite and was asking for someone to rewrite it for a long time. He received other potential rewrites before the one that he ended up approving, but he rejected those for not being close enough to his original vision for the article, so it can be inferred that the current version of 166 does everything Clef wanted the original to do.

I was always struck by Clef as someone who used taboo to shock his readers rather than creating masturbation/fetish work as an end unto itself. Take that with whatever grain of salt you like.

As for something else that is unsettling, I feel like the list of things dr bright is not allowed to do takes a turn around entry #40. Marital aids, banned from cons, and orgasm muffins, oh my.

Spoiler

The List of Things Dr. Bright is one of the most popular pages on a website primarily read by children. It has not been yet included as one of the pages requiring an “adult content” splash screen so it can be assumed it is intended for readers of all ages by virtue of its exclusion.

oh and this should be useful for anyone spelunking for problematic content from the early days that has escaped notice because of who wrote it (until now!)

 

[Witthel]

so it can be inferred that the current version of 166 does everything Clef wanted the original to do.

Despite this, I still stand by my belief that "Christian succubus who despises her sexual nature" is way more creative and interesting than "deer furry that destroys inorganic stuff".

 

[ToS]

Long post warning. We are arriving at the end of the usefulness of Roget/Harmony's logs, but are still coming across things here and there that while not earth-shattering, are still interesting and revealing. @Lil' Misogynist stumbled across this exchange for us.

Here, staff + the non-staff-but-cool-kids (like kaktus and nusquam) are in staff chat discussing Metaphysician (one of their favorites to shit on) and his early woes with plagiarism. This is back in 2017. I've modified the order of some of these lines because they tend to talk past one another and have several parallel conversations at once, which can be hard to follow:

Spoiler: Selected chat logs

<djkaktus> So this meta thing
<Cimmerian> Decibelle: From my own licensing perspective, I can tell you same as the racoon that his is clear cut case of moral plagiarism.
<ProcyonLotor> and also literal plagiarism
<Cimmerian> But it's gotta come down.
<Decibelle> i hope this doesnt spark outrage or controversy in the channels or w/e but
<djkaktus> Do make sure they are banning him before that page goes up.
<Decibelle> djkaktus: before i put up an 05 thread?
<djkaktus> I don't really care if there's a secret backroom vote here
<djkaktus> He needs to not have control before that post goes up
<djkaktus> Because we don't want him to rage pull his pages before they can be sorted
<Cimmerian> you mean to edit and delete his own works?
<djkaktus> Yes.
<Cimmerian> you can solve that by locking the pages though
<djkaktus> Sarkicism is a pretty big part of site culture atm
<djkaktus> Something about that needs to remain.
<djkaktus> If he freaks and pulls everything, we need to have something in place to replace it
<ProcyonLotor> djkaktus: banned users can delete their works so long as their account exists
<djkaktus> That would be incredibly unpopular
<Roget> djkaktus: unpopular but it could be the only right option
<Cimmerian> ProcyonLotor: Can they delete locked pages?
<Roget> no
<Roget> locked pages are only mods/admins
<ProcyonLotor> I would caution against that. We do reserve the rights of authors to remove their works.
<ProcyonLotor> If we want to end that, that's a whole different policy question.
<djkaktus> I talked to moose the other day about this
<djkaktus> One of two things need to happen here
<djkaktus> Either we need to make sure that there is a replacement ready for these pieces of a, for better or worse, very popular GOI, or, we need to revoke the author's right to remove their own works
<djkaktus> But you need to prepare for a fishmonger situation
<ProcyonLotor> I have a compromise option.
<ProcyonLotor> That retains the works while not literally breaking site policy (at least not by the black letter)
<ProcyonLotor> and comports with policy
<ProcyonLotor> CC-BY-SA 3.0 allows for reuse with attribution.
<ProcyonLotor> We're perfectly allowed to reuse on our own site.
<ProcyonLotor> Staff can grant special dispensation to repost unedited.
<Nusquam> But that's a total dick move.
<Nusquam> And we're not actually honoring that policy then.
<Nusquam> Of the author having control.
<Lily> It's a dick move but legally it's cool
<Nusquam> We're just being cunts about it acting like we do.
<Nusquam> And then not.
<Nusquam> So let's not do that.
<ProcyonLotor> Nusquam: we're settling between dick moves here
<Nusquam> I'd rather we do the honest dick move.
<ProcyonLotor> I'm happy to let them die if that is what Meta so chooses, but if we must go with the preservation option
<ProcyonLotor> I think that is the least awful option
<djkaktus> ProcyonLotor: I actually support that tbh.
<ProcyonLotor> The only thing plagiarized here is an admittedly long but not incredibly foundational bit
<ProcyonLotor> It is a passage of dialogue
<Nusquam> This work he quotes is apparently a thing from like, 300 AD?
<Cimmerian> Nusquam: Yes. Correct.
<ProcyonLotor> Nusquam: Meta is either active in bad faith or acted so incredibly recklessly that it's irrelevant
<Cimmerian> Nusquam: Meta said they were inspired by a work and then quoted that work almost exactly. That's not what inspiration means.
<ProcyonLotor> And plagiarism isn't a time sensitive thing
<Cimmerian> yeah and it's not a legal issue, it's moral
<Cimmerian> almost certainly
<Decibelle> Nusquam: yes but as lordstonefish said
<Decibelle> [17:51] <LordStonefish> also this is a grey area because while the texts are public, this specific translation may not be
<djkaktus> I might mention here that whether or not this thing is in the public domain is irrelevant
<ProcyonLotor> I also might strain to point out that we are using an academic definition of plagiarism here
<ProcyonLotor> and not a legal one
Cimmerian nods
<Cimmerian> there are two facets to plagiarism
<djkaktus> The rules for plagiarism aren't the same as our licensing rules.
<Cimmerian> the inspired works can be attributed properly, Meta's works gotta go.
<djkaktus> This is literal copying of text
<djkaktus> There is no question here.
<djkaktus> All I'm trying to say is that it would behoove us to come with a backup plan
<djkaktus> The articles with plagiarized material can be edited
<djkaktus> But nothing can happen to them if they're deleted.
<ProcyonLotor> If we decide, very unwisely I think, on preserving them against Meta's wishes, I would prefer that we do the one that comes the closest to comporting with our policy.
<ProcyonLotor> Assign it to rewrite team.
<djkaktus> Yes
<djkaktus> Yes yes yes [djkaktus was on rewrite team at this time. His desire to assimilate others' works to pump up his upvote numbers is well documented.]
<ProcyonLotor> Assign them all to rewrite team.
<djkaktus> Rewrite them to remove offending material
<djkaktus> Ban meta
<ProcyonLotor> Make copies of every work he has right now.
<djkaktus> Everyone is happy
<ProcyonLotor> If he does not delete everything, rewrite the plagiarizing ones
<ProcyonLotor> .au metaphysician
<jarvis> procyonlotor: Metaphysician ( http://www.scp-wiki.net/metaphysician ) has 15 pages (15 Originals) (14 SCP Articles, 1 Tales). They have 2311 net upvotes with an average of +154. Their latest page is SCP-2912: Clowny Clown Clown at +86.
<Decibelle> im gonna go
<Decibelle> and save all his pages
<Decibelle> dont worry about that
<djkaktus> Roget: can I confer with you.
<Roget> djkaktus: sure
<djkaktus> Roget: admin chat? I'd like the rest of you to see this as well.
<Decibelle> yeah kaktus head into admin chat
<Decibelle> you have my permission
<Roget> Decibelle: you can't give that permission I think
<Roget> didn't you move yerself to mod [Roget calls out Decibelle for attempting to do something their limitations in power are supposed to keep them from doing.]
<Decibelle> i havent internalized that
<Decibelle> let him do it for tonight
<ProcyonLotor> anyway, does anyone have any objections to rewritting?
<Lily> How about we ban him and immediately all staff block him so he's unable to contact us in order to request it pulled and thus it's all sorted
<Nusquam> And I'm having trouble assuming bad faith here, because, given the age of the texts, he could have just been looking at this the same way as quoting the bible. [It is worth noting that numerous famous works on the site, such as Clef's 001 proposal, use direct quotations from the Bible, without attribution.]
<Jekeled> If I just can pop in-the site has survived having incredibly popular users pull their work before. I would INFINITELY rather allow meta to remove all his shit from the site than have staff pull some staff preservation effort
<Cimmerian> Nusquam: If you quote the bible and it's not super clear that's where it's from you should attribute it.
<rumetzen> I think at this point in it's grown into as much of a part of the site that he has no right to claim it as his work
<ProcyonLotor> even if he did have that right
<ProcyonLotor> he has released it under CC-BY-SA 3.0
<ProcyonLotor> so his only recourse is "too bad so sad"
<Nusquam> I think we're fucking up if we go straight to banning before confronting him about it and getting an explanation out of him, at any rate. My support for rewriting depends on how that's done and whether it's got his blessing.
<ProcyonLotor> This is plagiarism, Nusquam.
<ProcyonLotor> Plain and simple. There isn't even a debate.
<ProcyonLotor> It's the kind of shit that'd get you expelled from a university.
<Cimmerian> We have a clear policy on what to do with plagiarists.
<Decibelle> id say "refer to how we handled the mewts article" [The Mewts article is an old entry at the SCP-1926 slot that blatantly plagiarized the copyrighted text of an etsy shop (see: the O5 thread). Similar things happen and have happened, like with SCP-111 which plagiarized an artist's image of some dopey dragon-snails. [see: the O5 thread, the stolen image]. In both cases, instead of removing the work, or giving it to rewrite to shred for upvotes, they contacted the copyright owner and made an agreement with them. The Mewts article and the author remained on the site, until Metaphysician was actually banned in Feb 2020. Then, they removed the Mewts article, I guess to be consistent.]
<Decibelle> but honestly
<Decibelle> that itself was a slog
<ProcyonLotor> Supporting keeping mewts is my greatest staff regret
<Cimmerian> ProcyonLotor: Mewts is over, we have an agreement with the creator. We should just honor that agreement.
<ProcyonLotor> fair enough, but it sets a toxic precedent we're going to have to keep crawling out from under
Cimmerian> but even though we couldn't fucking figure out what to do about the article, we knew *exactly* what to do about berg
<ProcyonLotor> oh yeah
<ProcyonLotor> This ends with Meta hanging from a proverbial high tree
<Nusquam> Again, of a 1700 year old text. That's not really equivalent at all to Mewts. This is more like if someone used bible verse in certain sections of their stories.
<ProcyonLotor> Nusquam: plagiarism is plagiarism is plagiarism
<Lily> Nusquam: still plagiarism
<Cimmerian> you can totally plagiarize the bible
<Cimmerian> it don't usually come up cause people generally quote chapter and verse when they quote the bibble
<Nusquam> I'd argue it'd depend on how similar to the rest of whatever passage the story was. Because if someone's adapting a biblical verse to the Foundation setting, and that's obvious, calling that plagiarism just seems daft. They're obviously not trying to assert that they created it.
<ProcyonLotor> Calling it plagiarism is accurate
<Nusquam> Even if he is technically in the wrong here, I'm saying I see a way to end up such without having the intent of doing so.
<ProcyonLotor> no offense, Nusquam, but you seem to have a fundamnetally flawed understanding of what plagiarism is
<ProcyonLotor> and we're a site who's very literal lifeblood is the creation of original content, and that demands our content be attributed properly when used by others
<Nusquam> No, I understand it, but I think it's moronic of us to default to the most extreme response and not consider possible nuance to this specific situation.
<ProcyonLotor> there is no other acceptable option
<ProcyonLotor> None.
<ProcyonLotor> Zero.
<ProcyonLotor> this isn't like replying to closed staffposts where we can pussyfoot around with our response
<Cimmerian> You know what though it's plausible we're echochambering here.
<Cimmerian> someone besides the two of us have an opinion on this?
<Lily> but seriously, agreeing with you
<djkaktus> Look
<djkaktus> I did study this
<ProcyonLotor> and there is clear intent
<djkaktus> And worked in the field for a while.
<djkaktus> The singular benefit of the English major
<djkaktus> It doesn't matter intent or context, if somebody takes text and then, verbatim, uses it in a work of their own as if it is their own words and not somebody quoting the original source material, that is as clear cut as it can get.
<djkaktus> This would get meta thrown out of any institution.
<djkaktus> We took it crazy seriously.
<ProcyonLotor> I mean, this would have gotten me failed back in high school
<Nusquam> I'm not saying it wouldn't.
<Nusquam> If the issue is that it's unattributed
<Nusquam> couldn't we just
<Nusquam> attribute?
<ProcyonLotor> but now that everyone's here, I'd like to recommend we decide on a response, or at least two avenues of response, before we jump into the sea
<ProcyonLotor> Option one, obviously, is indisuputably "let it burn"
<ProcyonLotor> The other option I found most palatable is rewrites
<Cimmerian> If we absolutely *must* retain the works then they should be rewritten
<Lily> ProcyonLotor: honestly it may be better to go with option 1, bc this is his fault and if he wants to be petty he'll only be made out as the one in the wrong, much like fish- we'll manage, he might not
<Lily> ProcyonLotor: rewrite, assuming it's deleted by him
<Roget> I don't think we need to decide this now
<Nusquam> Lily: If it's deleted by him, we should leave it gone.
<Roget> I'd rather we have some formal discussion on 05 at least because this is a pretty important choice both for direct consequences and the precedent it sets
<Cimmerian> yeah no kidding
<Cimmerian> and this needs to be set down as policy going forward
<Cimmerian> next time this happens, we don't want to have this same problem of trying to figure out what to do
<ProcyonLotor> we have a plagiarism policy that was never written into code
<Cimmerian> "how to handle meta" is already understood
<Cimmerian> the policy thing can wait a day
<Nusquam> I think it's a mistake to pigeonhole ourselves into always responding the same way to a situation.
<ProcyonLotor> NOT WHEN IT'S FUCKING PLAGIARISM
<ProcyonLotor> jesus
<Nusquam> There's no reason to treat something containing two plagiarized lines the same as something entirely predicated upon the theft.
<Cimmerian> Nusquam: Why not, I'm wondering?
<Nusquam> You prove the positive, not the negative, Cimm.
<Decibelle> this is an echo chamber
<ProcyonLotor> it's an echo chamber because the solution is obvious
<ProcyonLotor> christ
<ProcyonLotor> there aren't any two ways about this, Decibelle
<Cimmerian> You licensing team can tell you this.
<ProcyonLotor> From the Licensing mods, it's plagiarism [you guys are LARPers]
<ProcyonLotor> the English major agrees
<Decibelle> ProcyonLotor, Cimmerian: id rather be overly cautious and still come to the same conclusion than not be
<Cimmerian> The problem is that knowing about it and not acting adds culpability to us
<ProcyonLotor> If it's not done by tomorrow at noon I make the post as Licensing Team head myself.
<ProcyonLotor> And I don't care if you get frustrated about it, or capslock at me about it. I'm going to act properly here. [you're the only one who capslocked, dipshit]
<Cimmerian> we know now, we have to act and swiftly
<Roget> Decibelle: I support you, I don't think the world will come crashing down while you get your confirmation
<Roget> ProcyonLotor: please don't draw ultimatums and lines in the sand here, we can cooperate and not be antagonistic towards each other
<Decibelle> Roget: nah, let him do that. i just wont be a part of whatever comes as a result of that
<ProcyonLotor> Roget: I am actively disgusted with how the issue's being handled, and it will directly taint licensing team if we continue to drag our feet.
<Cimmerian> This is a licensing issue.
<Roget> ProcyonLotor: that's fine to feel that way but we're all on the same side here [are you?]
<ProcyonLotor> Because we're knowingly passing off plagiarized material as CC stuff //as we speak// [you did this for 5 years; from 2008-2013]
<ProcyonLotor> And I cannot even begin to describe how //not on// that is.
<djkaktus> I tend to agree, but we can probably still back the rhetoric down a notch.
<thedeadlymoose> ProcyonLotor: Then I will recommend from your removal from staff. I'm tired of getting repeated complaints, as a /Reserve/ admin, of your handling situations aggressively or badly. Now you're trying to strong-arm admins to deal with something faster?
<ProcyonLotor> And, again, I sign my name to legal paperwork, which can //actively// get me hauled in for contempt of court [this guy thinks he is a lawyer]
<thedeadlymoose> ProcyonLotor: Honestly, can't you /ask/ people for a reasonable time frame without the threats? I'm not kidding, I've been kept up at night several times over the past few months worrying I'm going to get called to step in regarding you
<djkaktus> Let's all enjoy the schadenfreude of meta actively working to usurp staff while not being aware if what plagiarism is.
<Roget> djkaktus: meta tried to get you and a cabal of people to overthrow staff right
<djkaktus> Roget: ye verily
<djkaktus> WHICH I NOBLY REFUSED, I MIGHT ADD
<djkaktus> As a brave show of loyalty.
<djkaktus> I was never shaken by his temptations
<ProcyonLotor> oh yeah, that was fucking great
<ProcyonLotor> well, meta through... thetataur
<Roget> amazing
<thedeadlymoose> Roget: meta tried to get a cabal of people to overthrow and remove /me/ specifically and personally
<Nusquam> sophos tried to get me behind something similar years ago
<Decibelle> you need to tell us this story
<ProcyonLotor> oooh, I haven't heard the sophos one
<Roget> yes let us hear the story
<Nusquam> tl;dr Sophos felt pretty alienated by staff and owned the scp-wiki.net domain so he approached me about making that lead to a clone of the site run by himself, me, and anyone else he could get to run it with him to basically dupe people into believing it was the actual one
<Nusquam> He twice came to me about pulling shady shit to get back at people he felt had wronged him, the other much less grievous than, "let's legit try to steal the site out from under everyone."
<Nusquam> I kept agitating about it for a while, Roget, that we needed to get ownership of the domain out of his hands, so you probably remember at least part of it.

(This goes on, you can read it if you are really interested. thedeadlymoose comes in and obliterates the insanity being spewed by ProcyonLotor and even threatens to remove him from staff. He changes his tune after that. They make some very great points and this is a sympathetic read for thedeadlymoose, whose leadership here is actually pretty damn good.)

<thedeadlymoose> Anyway, let me weigh in on Meta outside of admin conversation
<thedeadlymoose> I'm highly concerned this is an overreaction
<thedeadlymoose> If it wasn't Meta specifically (or someone like Djoric), I suspect that the general reaction would be to talk to him and tell him he needs to credit the text he lifted, and assume he did so as a clever in-joke, since he never hid the origins of Sarkicism etc
<thedeadlymoose> And keep in mind, please, that no one that I know of on this site has more of a reason to hate Meta than me. I could be wrong, but i don't think he helped engineer a nearly successful removal of anyone else from staff + possible ban
<Cimmerian> Moose: We've actually been talking about codifying action like this going forward. Beyond what is already done.
<thedeadlymoose> Cimmerian: Yes, but it's really not that unusual to wholesale copy public domain stuff with no credit, expecting people smart enough to Get It. The main issue here legally speaking *as far as I know* is the translation possibly being not public domain, but that's way more reasonable to not notice.
<Cimmerian> thedeadlymoose: They called it inspiration. That's literally drawing a line and saying "but this version is mine"
<thedeadlymoose> That's just splitting semantic hairs, though. Personally speaking, if Decibelle did this, or you, Procyon, I would assume good faith, roll my eyes, and tell you to go credit the stuff properly.
<thedeadlymoose> ProcyonLotor: Technically? The right answer here would be to make it a public discussion.
<thedeadlymoose> but y'all don't want to do that, understandably, because you don't want Meta to delete all his own shit.
<thedeadlymoose> Which, by the way, he has every right to do.
<thedeadlymoose> So the reason for the secrecy isn't because of Licensing, or legal issues.
<thedeadlymoose> It's because you don't want Meta to know yet.
<thedeadlymoose> That's okay by me, but only if we don't rush the assessment of the situation.
<Cimmerian> we gotta get over 'this is super popular so we gotta be careful with it' when it comes to plagiarism
<ProcyonLotor> I do believe that in many cases- both for users we really like, and users we really dislike- we grant them special things that other users don't get
<thedeadlymoose> The popularity only matters in that it matters more if we fuck it up or rush it.
<Cimmerian> yeah we just as often to avoid accusations of bias end up giving extra chances to the people we don't like
<thedeadlymoose> Nusquam: Sounds like we're on the exact same page here. Any other user we would have talked to /already/.
<ProcyonLotor> I'm actually happy to talk to Meta if no one else will, because I do not actually dislike the guy, and my anger here (besides the standard "contempt for plagiarism") is more directed at the staff for keeping it secret, I'm cool as a cucumber on meta
<Nusquam> We can make this a lot easier for ourselves if we just talk to meta and get it straight from him.
<thedeadlymoose> I studied literature on an academic level and while I have a shitty memory and can't cite examples, it's common to lift stuff like this as a reference in a larger work of literature. This is more than that, but it's a matter of degree.

(Couple more great little bits here

<WrongJohnSilver> LOL, Cyan had to ban Meta from NSFW [#site12] chat.
<Sax> ... the NSFW channel is still up?
<Sax> What's the channel again?
LOL!

(And...)


<Decibelle> djkaktus: the reason why im specifically looking for opinions from people in the fishmonger era by the by is because this site survived getting like, a large chunk of it gutted from fishmonger's shit
<Nusquam> It was better for it, imo, Decibelle.


[archive]

Spoiler: Discussion

So we see a discussion about Metaphysician and his potential ripping his works down that probably very very closely mimics what went on behind closed doors with Roget/Harmony's works. Noteworthy here is that the grunt work for compiling the evidence and case against Metaphysician was done by LordStoneFish, author of the wildly successful SCP-3999. This was several months after this article's success. So we see the common mechanics of staff who take the high and acceptance someone is feeling from a successful work and use it to cajole them into joining and working for staff.

We also see individuals like kaktus, procyon, and Cimmerian who here are salivating for the ban of Meta, at the expense of their rationality. Cimmerian got his come-uppins and is a shamed, discarded idiot to staff and the site. ProcyonLotor has avoided any and all karma (recall he was the one who calls other gays "faggot" and doxxes kids IRL to call their parents, and participated in a staff chat the symbol of which was a (backwards) swastika). This is no mistake. He is protected by fellow staff in the same way Bright was housed.

Kaktus' motives are, like him, very simple. Just remember; Kaktus can't think past the upvote. For all his bloviating about him being a based god, he is truly a worshiper, and the god is really the upvote. Meta was one of the prime competitors for Kaktus, and probably one of the only ones who posed a legitimate threat to his upvote totals ranking. His works regularly got ratings like Kaktus' do; unquestioned hundreds per article. Here, in addition to using this as as way to remove his only legitimate rival (not in quality mind you, my dear retarded kaktus), but he advocates for denying Metaphysician control of his own works... something he also advocated for with Harmony before mysteriously and suddenly flipping very publicly on that issue.

Lily is a staff member and 001 author who I've noticed is a particularly repugnant individual. Previous chat logs I've posted here show that well. In this one, she recommends banning meta immediately and have all staff block him so that he can't contact them to appeal or discuss what is to become of his work. Has this happened before? How many times has a banned user attempted to contact SCP staff to get their works down, but fail to because they've pulled this move... the public none the wiser? This is your staff?

Nusquam seems to be one of the only reasonable voices here, yet despite being apparently very respected by staff, his opinion really doesn't get anywhere or mean much in the end. The rest of the staff seem to be incredibly selective of their logic, and if I had to guess, are aware of it, although immorality of this sort can be accompanied by pretty vacuous self-awareness. Pretty typical of SCP staff.

They actually admit that the only thing needed to keep the articles on the site is just to edit the plagiarized material. They also acknowledge that some injury like the one Fish left actually and long-term was better for the site than keeping his works out of spite would have been. The logs show that they were highly aware of this potential issue years and years before Roget became Harmony and pulled what she did. They failed to get any policy passed in this time and sat with dicks up their asses. When it finally came knockin' they couldn't admit they had missed their chance.

The amazing hypocrisy here is that Metaphysican's plagiarism was technically legal. The text he was ripping from were from 300 AD - public domain. Yet, at this time, and in order to enact punishment on someone they didn't like, they ignored the legal side of the argument and put forth one from a moral position.

This is the opposite of what they did with Roget/Harmony. They ignored the moral argument when it applied to them (even though it is clear from this log that they know full well how much of a dick move it is) and leaned 100% on the legal argument.

By their logic, are Harmony's articles up on SCP plagiarism? If being in the public domain doesn't excuse the moral accusation of plagiarism, why would creative commons?

If they had an argument against Metaphysician for his plagarism of public domain works, then Harmony should have one as well for the CC BY-SA 3.0 redistribution of her works. They take the argument when it suits their likes. But they won't give it.

They have knowingly and explicitly revoked the author's control of their works, both morally and legally. If they don't give a shit and let you delete it, that's because they don't think very highly of you.

This is something staff was forecasting and brooding about for years prior to Harmony did it, and that's why she did. Maybe if only subconsciously, but this conversation and others like it are probably why Harmony thought to very intentionally do what she did.

What they did in the last month is the complete undoing of any morality, honor, integrity, or respectability the staff has. Period. Their stock is at zero. Anyone writing for SCP should be aware of this. There are other sites and projects out there that will be better stewards and give you the respect your willing and free contribution deserves.

That they've washed their hands of this and walked away scot-free should be understood as the rhetorical move it really is -- using the userbase as a shield from the boomeranging of their own use of moral arguments. They sulked away and threw the popular vote into their witness stand when it was their turn.

This is a disgusting and reprehensible group of "leaders", and I for one say they can go shove a dick up their asses and fuck themselves.

I also want to point out the amount of discussion and dissection that has taken place here about the CC BY-SA 3.0 license. I want to remind anyone reading this that the staff themselves didn't understand what it meant until arguably 2017 (here we see ProcyonLotor saying that he's "thought of something new, a way to keep the articles and comply with policy). So how in the fuck are average users and the regular "I want to contribute" Joe-Schmo supposed to understand it? The staff take advantage of this knowledge gap, and are aware of that. (See our discussion about how there's zero license acknowledgement statement in joining the site.)

I'd like to also point out that staff is aware (so is kaktus) that a cabal acting towards a coup of staff is not a crazy thing that hasn't been attempted before. Here, kaktus is in staff chat despite being referred to by dexanote the next month...

03:51:18: <Dexanote> Kaktus was audibly disappointed [Metaphysician was not banned for this incident]
03:51:39: <Dexanote> I don't give a quarter fuck, because if he doesn't like it it doesn't matter, because as far as I know he's no longer staff.

... and yet a mod lets him into an admin-only chat. So yes, staff are coddling Kaktus and have been for a long time. It is reasonable, given the evidence, that kaktus is involved in such a coup as Harmony identifies in "the Yurt". He has clear motive, and a history that defines it in a laser-sharp fashion; he was so close to adminship, advocated that for himself, but was kicked off of staff after mishandling the Summer 2018 fiasco. He has been desperate to claw his way back in and then to the top of the staff since.

These people really are a bunch of skeksis, literally draining the life energy of their captive lessers to prolong their own life and luxury.

Pathetic. Cowards. SCP Staff gives LGBTQ a bad name. You are very intelligent people who know how to write. But your collective moral IQ is in the single digits and it makes you into easy-to-pick-off retards.

 

[Witthel]

Long post warning. We are arriving at the end of the usefulness of Roget/Harmony's logs, but are still coming across things here and there that while not earth-shattering, are still interesting and revealing. @Lil' Misogynist stumbled across this exchange for us.

Here, staff + the non-staff-but-cool-kids (like kaktus and nusquam) are in staff chat discussing Metaphysician (one of their favorites to shit on) and his early woes with plagiarism. This is back in 2017. I've modified the order of some of these lines because they tend to talk past one another and have several parallel conversations at once, which can be hard to follow:

Spoiler: Selected chat logs

<djkaktus> So this meta thing
<Cimmerian> Decibelle: From my own licensing perspective, I can tell you same as the racoon that his is clear cut case of moral plagiarism.
<ProcyonLotor> and also literal plagiarism
<Cimmerian> But it's gotta come down.
<Decibelle> i hope this doesnt spark outrage or controversy in the channels or w/e but
<djkaktus> Do make sure they are banning him before that page goes up.
<Decibelle> djkaktus: before i put up an 05 thread?
<djkaktus> I don't really care if there's a secret backroom vote here
<djkaktus> He needs to not have control before that post goes up
<djkaktus> Because we don't want him to rage pull his pages before they can be sorted
<Cimmerian> you mean to edit and delete his own works?
<djkaktus> Yes.
<Cimmerian> you can solve that by locking the pages though
<djkaktus> Sarkicism is a pretty big part of site culture atm
<djkaktus> Something about that needs to remain.
<djkaktus> If he freaks and pulls everything, we need to have something in place to replace it
<ProcyonLotor> djkaktus: banned users can delete their works so long as their account exists
<djkaktus> That would be incredibly unpopular
<Roget> djkaktus: unpopular but it could be the only right option
<Cimmerian> ProcyonLotor: Can they delete locked pages?
<Roget> no
<Roget> locked pages are only mods/admins
<ProcyonLotor> I would caution against that. We do reserve the rights of authors to remove their works.
<ProcyonLotor> If we want to end that, that's a whole different policy question.
<djkaktus> I talked to moose the other day about this
<djkaktus> One of two things need to happen here
<djkaktus> Either we need to make sure that there is a replacement ready for these pieces of a, for better or worse, very popular GOI, or, we need to revoke the author's right to remove their own works
<djkaktus> But you need to prepare for a fishmonger situation
<ProcyonLotor> I have a compromise option.
<ProcyonLotor> That retains the works while not literally breaking site policy (at least not by the black letter)
<ProcyonLotor> and comports with policy
<ProcyonLotor> CC-BY-SA 3.0 allows for reuse with attribution.
<ProcyonLotor> We're perfectly allowed to reuse on our own site.
<ProcyonLotor> Staff can grant special dispensation to repost unedited.
<Nusquam> But that's a total dick move.
<Nusquam> And we're not actually honoring that policy then.
<Nusquam> Of the author having control.
<Lily> It's a dick move but legally it's cool
<Nusquam> We're just being cunts about it acting like we do.
<Nusquam> And then not.
<Nusquam> So let's not do that.
<ProcyonLotor> Nusquam: we're settling between dick moves here
<Nusquam> I'd rather we do the honest dick move.
<ProcyonLotor> I'm happy to let them die if that is what Meta so chooses, but if we must go with the preservation option
<ProcyonLotor> I think that is the least awful option
<djkaktus> ProcyonLotor: I actually support that tbh.
<ProcyonLotor> The only thing plagiarized here is an admittedly long but not incredibly foundational bit
<ProcyonLotor> It is a passage of dialogue
<Nusquam> This work he quotes is apparently a thing from like, 300 AD?
<Cimmerian> Nusquam: Yes. Correct.
<ProcyonLotor> Nusquam: Meta is either active in bad faith or acted so incredibly recklessly that it's irrelevant
<Cimmerian> Nusquam: Meta said they were inspired by a work and then quoted that work almost exactly. That's not what inspiration means.
<ProcyonLotor> And plagiarism isn't a time sensitive thing
<Cimmerian> yeah and it's not a legal issue, it's moral
<Cimmerian> almost certainly
<Decibelle> Nusquam: yes but as lordstonefish said
<Decibelle> [17:51] <LordStonefish> also this is a grey area because while the texts are public, this specific translation may not be
<djkaktus> I might mention here that whether or not this thing is in the public domain is irrelevant
<ProcyonLotor> I also might strain to point out that we are using an academic definition of plagiarism here
<ProcyonLotor> and not a legal one
Cimmerian nods
<Cimmerian> there are two facets to plagiarism
<djkaktus> The rules for plagiarism aren't the same as our licensing rules.
<Cimmerian> the inspired works can be attributed properly, Meta's works gotta go.
<djkaktus> This is literal copying of text
<djkaktus> There is no question here.
<djkaktus> All I'm trying to say is that it would behoove us to come with a backup plan
<djkaktus> The articles with plagiarized material can be edited
<djkaktus> But nothing can happen to them if they're deleted.
<ProcyonLotor> If we decide, very unwisely I think, on preserving them against Meta's wishes, I would prefer that we do the one that comes the closest to comporting with our policy.
<ProcyonLotor> Assign it to rewrite team.
<djkaktus> Yes
<djkaktus> Yes yes yes [djkaktus was on rewrite team at this time. His desire to assimilate others' works to pump up his upvote numbers is well documented.]
<ProcyonLotor> Assign them all to rewrite team.
<djkaktus> Rewrite them to remove offending material
<djkaktus> Ban meta
<ProcyonLotor> Make copies of every work he has right now.
<djkaktus> Everyone is happy
<ProcyonLotor> If he does not delete everything, rewrite the plagiarizing ones
<ProcyonLotor> .au metaphysician
<jarvis> procyonlotor: Metaphysician ( http://www.scp-wiki.net/metaphysician ) has 15 pages (15 Originals) (14 SCP Articles, 1 Tales). They have 2311 net upvotes with an average of +154. Their latest page is SCP-2912: Clowny Clown Clown at +86.
<Decibelle> im gonna go
<Decibelle> and save all his pages
<Decibelle> dont worry about that
<djkaktus> Roget: can I confer with you.
<Roget> djkaktus: sure
<djkaktus> Roget: admin chat? I'd like the rest of you to see this as well.
<Decibelle> yeah kaktus head into admin chat
<Decibelle> you have my permission
<Roget> Decibelle: you can't give that permission I think
<Roget> didn't you move yerself to mod [Roget calls out Decibelle for attempting to do something their limitations in power are supposed to keep them from doing.]
<Decibelle> i havent internalized that
<Decibelle> let him do it for tonight
<ProcyonLotor> anyway, does anyone have any objections to rewritting?
<Lily> How about we ban him and immediately all staff block him so he's unable to contact us in order to request it pulled and thus it's all sorted
<Nusquam> And I'm having trouble assuming bad faith here, because, given the age of the texts, he could have just been looking at this the same way as quoting the bible. [It is worth noting that numerous famous works on the site, such as Clef's 001 proposal, use direct quotations from the Bible, without attribution.]
<Jekeled> If I just can pop in-the site has survived having incredibly popular users pull their work before. I would INFINITELY rather allow meta to remove all his shit from the site than have staff pull some staff preservation effort
<Cimmerian> Nusquam: If you quote the bible and it's not super clear that's where it's from you should attribute it.
<rumetzen> I think at this point in it's grown into as much of a part of the site that he has no right to claim it as his work
<ProcyonLotor> even if he did have that right
<ProcyonLotor> he has released it under CC-BY-SA 3.0
<ProcyonLotor> so his only recourse is "too bad so sad"
<Nusquam> I think we're fucking up if we go straight to banning before confronting him about it and getting an explanation out of him, at any rate. My support for rewriting depends on how that's done and whether it's got his blessing.
<ProcyonLotor> This is plagiarism, Nusquam.
<ProcyonLotor> Plain and simple. There isn't even a debate.
<ProcyonLotor> It's the kind of shit that'd get you expelled from a university.
<Cimmerian> We have a clear policy on what to do with plagiarists.
<Decibelle> id say "refer to how we handled the mewts article" [The Mewts article is an old entry at the SCP-1926 slot that blatantly plagiarized the copyrighted text of an etsy shop (see: the O5 thread). Similar things happen and have happened, like with SCP-111 which plagiarized an artist's image of some dopey dragon-snails. [see: the O5 thread, the stolen image]. In both cases, instead of removing the work, or giving it to rewrite to shred for upvotes, they contacted the copyright owner and made an agreement with them. The Mewts article and the author remained on the site, until Metaphysician was actually banned in Feb 2020. Then, they removed the Mewts article, I guess to be consistent.]
<Decibelle> but honestly
<Decibelle> that itself was a slog
<ProcyonLotor> Supporting keeping mewts is my greatest staff regret
<Cimmerian> ProcyonLotor: Mewts is over, we have an agreement with the creator. We should just honor that agreement.
<ProcyonLotor> fair enough, but it sets a toxic precedent we're going to have to keep crawling out from under
Cimmerian> but even though we couldn't fucking figure out what to do about the article, we knew *exactly* what to do about berg
<ProcyonLotor> oh yeah
<ProcyonLotor> This ends with Meta hanging from a proverbial high tree
<Nusquam> Again, of a 1700 year old text. That's not really equivalent at all to Mewts. This is more like if someone used bible verse in certain sections of their stories.
<ProcyonLotor> Nusquam: plagiarism is plagiarism is plagiarism
<Lily> Nusquam: still plagiarism
<Cimmerian> you can totally plagiarize the bible
<Cimmerian> it don't usually come up cause people generally quote chapter and verse when they quote the bibble
<Nusquam> I'd argue it'd depend on how similar to the rest of whatever passage the story was. Because if someone's adapting a biblical verse to the Foundation setting, and that's obvious, calling that plagiarism just seems daft. They're obviously not trying to assert that they created it.
<ProcyonLotor> Calling it plagiarism is accurate
<Nusquam> Even if he is technically in the wrong here, I'm saying I see a way to end up such without having the intent of doing so.
<ProcyonLotor> no offense, Nusquam, but you seem to have a fundamnetally flawed understanding of what plagiarism is
<ProcyonLotor> and we're a site who's very literal lifeblood is the creation of original content, and that demands our content be attributed properly when used by others
<Nusquam> No, I understand it, but I think it's moronic of us to default to the most extreme response and not consider possible nuance to this specific situation.
<ProcyonLotor> there is no other acceptable option
<ProcyonLotor> None.
<ProcyonLotor> Zero.
<ProcyonLotor> this isn't like replying to closed staffposts where we can pussyfoot around with our response
<Cimmerian> You know what though it's plausible we're echochambering here.
<Cimmerian> someone besides the two of us have an opinion on this?
<Lily> but seriously, agreeing with you
<djkaktus> Look
<djkaktus> I did study this
<ProcyonLotor> and there is clear intent
<djkaktus> And worked in the field for a while.
<djkaktus> The singular benefit of the English major
<djkaktus> It doesn't matter intent or context, if somebody takes text and then, verbatim, uses it in a work of their own as if it is their own words and not somebody quoting the original source material, that is as clear cut as it can get.
<djkaktus> This would get meta thrown out of any institution.
<djkaktus> We took it crazy seriously.
<ProcyonLotor> I mean, this would have gotten me failed back in high school
<Nusquam> I'm not saying it wouldn't.
<Nusquam> If the issue is that it's unattributed
<Nusquam> couldn't we just
<Nusquam> attribute?
<ProcyonLotor> but now that everyone's here, I'd like to recommend we decide on a response, or at least two avenues of response, before we jump into the sea
<ProcyonLotor> Option one, obviously, is indisuputably "let it burn"
<ProcyonLotor> The other option I found most palatable is rewrites
<Cimmerian> If we absolutely *must* retain the works then they should be rewritten
<Lily> ProcyonLotor: honestly it may be better to go with option 1, bc this is his fault and if he wants to be petty he'll only be made out as the one in the wrong, much like fish- we'll manage, he might not
<Lily> ProcyonLotor: rewrite, assuming it's deleted by him
<Roget> I don't think we need to decide this now
<Nusquam> Lily: If it's deleted by him, we should leave it gone.
<Roget> I'd rather we have some formal discussion on 05 at least because this is a pretty important choice both for direct consequences and the precedent it sets
<Cimmerian> yeah no kidding
<Cimmerian> and this needs to be set down as policy going forward
<Cimmerian> next time this happens, we don't want to have this same problem of trying to figure out what to do
<ProcyonLotor> we have a plagiarism policy that was never written into code
<Cimmerian> "how to handle meta" is already understood
<Cimmerian> the policy thing can wait a day
<Nusquam> I think it's a mistake to pigeonhole ourselves into always responding the same way to a situation.
<ProcyonLotor> NOT WHEN IT'S FUCKING PLAGIARISM
<ProcyonLotor> jesus
<Nusquam> There's no reason to treat something containing two plagiarized lines the same as something entirely predicated upon the theft.
<Cimmerian> Nusquam: Why not, I'm wondering?
<Nusquam> You prove the positive, not the negative, Cimm.
<Decibelle> this is an echo chamber
<ProcyonLotor> it's an echo chamber because the solution is obvious
<ProcyonLotor> christ
<ProcyonLotor> there aren't any two ways about this, Decibelle
<Cimmerian> You licensing team can tell you this.
<ProcyonLotor> From the Licensing mods, it's plagiarism [you guys are LARPers]
<ProcyonLotor> the English major agrees
<Decibelle> ProcyonLotor, Cimmerian: id rather be overly cautious and still come to the same conclusion than not be
<Cimmerian> The problem is that knowing about it and not acting adds culpability to us
<ProcyonLotor> If it's not done by tomorrow at noon I make the post as Licensing Team head myself.
<ProcyonLotor> And I don't care if you get frustrated about it, or capslock at me about it. I'm going to act properly here. [you're the only one who capslocked, dipshit]
<Cimmerian> we know now, we have to act and swiftly
<Roget> Decibelle: I support you, I don't think the world will come crashing down while you get your confirmation
<Roget> ProcyonLotor: please don't draw ultimatums and lines in the sand here, we can cooperate and not be antagonistic towards each other
<Decibelle> Roget: nah, let him do that. i just wont be a part of whatever comes as a result of that
<ProcyonLotor> Roget: I am actively disgusted with how the issue's being handled, and it will directly taint licensing team if we continue to drag our feet.
<Cimmerian> This is a licensing issue.
<Roget> ProcyonLotor: that's fine to feel that way but we're all on the same side here [are you?]
<ProcyonLotor> Because we're knowingly passing off plagiarized material as CC stuff //as we speak// [you did this for 5 years; from 2008-2013]
<ProcyonLotor> And I cannot even begin to describe how //not on// that is.
<djkaktus> I tend to agree, but we can probably still back the rhetoric down a notch.
<thedeadlymoose> ProcyonLotor: Then I will recommend from your removal from staff. I'm tired of getting repeated complaints, as a /Reserve/ admin, of your handling situations aggressively or badly. Now you're trying to strong-arm admins to deal with something faster?
<ProcyonLotor> And, again, I sign my name to legal paperwork, which can //actively// get me hauled in for contempt of court [this guy thinks he is a lawyer]
<thedeadlymoose> ProcyonLotor: Honestly, can't you /ask/ people for a reasonable time frame without the threats? I'm not kidding, I've been kept up at night several times over the past few months worrying I'm going to get called to step in regarding you
<djkaktus> Let's all enjoy the schadenfreude of meta actively working to usurp staff while not being aware if what plagiarism is.
<Roget> djkaktus: meta tried to get you and a cabal of people to overthrow staff right
<djkaktus> Roget: ye verily
<djkaktus> WHICH I NOBLY REFUSED, I MIGHT ADD
<djkaktus> As a brave show of loyalty.
<djkaktus> I was never shaken by his temptations
<ProcyonLotor> oh yeah, that was fucking great
<ProcyonLotor> well, meta through... thetataur
<Roget> amazing
<thedeadlymoose> Roget: meta tried to get a cabal of people to overthrow and remove /me/ specifically and personally
<Nusquam> sophos tried to get me behind something similar years ago
<Decibelle> you need to tell us this story
<ProcyonLotor> oooh, I haven't heard the sophos one
<Roget> yes let us hear the story
<Nusquam> tl;dr Sophos felt pretty alienated by staff and owned the scp-wiki.net domain so he approached me about making that lead to a clone of the site run by himself, me, and anyone else he could get to run it with him to basically dupe people into believing it was the actual one
<Nusquam> He twice came to me about pulling shady shit to get back at people he felt had wronged him, the other much less grievous than, "let's legit try to steal the site out from under everyone."
<Nusquam> I kept agitating about it for a while, Roget, that we needed to get ownership of the domain out of his hands, so you probably remember at least part of it.

(This goes on, you can read it if you are really interested. thedeadlymoose comes in and obliterates the insanity being spewed by ProcyonLotor and even threatens to remove him from staff. He changes his tune after that. They make some very great points and this is a sympathetic read for thedeadlymoose, whose leadership here is actually pretty damn good.)

<thedeadlymoose> Anyway, let me weigh in on Meta outside of admin conversation
<thedeadlymoose> I'm highly concerned this is an overreaction
<thedeadlymoose> If it wasn't Meta specifically (or someone like Djoric), I suspect that the general reaction would be to talk to him and tell him he needs to credit the text he lifted, and assume he did so as a clever in-joke, since he never hid the origins of Sarkicism etc
<thedeadlymoose> And keep in mind, please, that no one that I know of on this site has more of a reason to hate Meta than me. I could be wrong, but i don't think he helped engineer a nearly successful removal of anyone else from staff + possible ban
<Cimmerian> Moose: We've actually been talking about codifying action like this going forward. Beyond what is already done.
<thedeadlymoose> Cimmerian: Yes, but it's really not that unusual to wholesale copy public domain stuff with no credit, expecting people smart enough to Get It. The main issue here legally speaking *as far as I know* is the translation possibly being not public domain, but that's way more reasonable to not notice.
<Cimmerian> thedeadlymoose: They called it inspiration. That's literally drawing a line and saying "but this version is mine"
<thedeadlymoose> That's just splitting semantic hairs, though. Personally speaking, if Decibelle did this, or you, Procyon, I would assume good faith, roll my eyes, and tell you to go credit the stuff properly.
<thedeadlymoose> ProcyonLotor: Technically? The right answer here would be to make it a public discussion.
<thedeadlymoose> but y'all don't want to do that, understandably, because you don't want Meta to delete all his own shit.
<thedeadlymoose> Which, by the way, he has every right to do.
<thedeadlymoose> So the reason for the secrecy isn't because of Licensing, or legal issues.
<thedeadlymoose> It's because you don't want Meta to know yet.
<thedeadlymoose> That's okay by me, but only if we don't rush the assessment of the situation.
<Cimmerian> we gotta get over 'this is super popular so we gotta be careful with it' when it comes to plagiarism
<ProcyonLotor> I do believe that in many cases- both for users we really like, and users we really dislike- we grant them special things that other users don't get
<thedeadlymoose> The popularity only matters in that it matters more if we fuck it up or rush it.
<Cimmerian> yeah we just as often to avoid accusations of bias end up giving extra chances to the people we don't like
<thedeadlymoose> Nusquam: Sounds like we're on the exact same page here. Any other user we would have talked to /already/.
<ProcyonLotor> I'm actually happy to talk to Meta if no one else will, because I do not actually dislike the guy, and my anger here (besides the standard "contempt for plagiarism") is more directed at the staff for keeping it secret, I'm cool as a cucumber on meta
<Nusquam> We can make this a lot easier for ourselves if we just talk to meta and get it straight from him.
<thedeadlymoose> I studied literature on an academic level and while I have a shitty memory and can't cite examples, it's common to lift stuff like this as a reference in a larger work of literature. This is more than that, but it's a matter of degree.

(Couple more great little bits here

<WrongJohnSilver> LOL, Cyan and I had to ban Meta from NSFW [#site12] chat.
<Sax> ... the NSFW channel is still up?
<Sax> What's the channel again?
LOL!

(And...)


<Decibelle> djkaktus: the reason why im specifically looking for opinions from people in the fishmonger era by the by is because this site survived getting like, a large chunk of it gutted from fishmonger's shit
<Nusquam> It was better for it, imo, Decibelle.


[archive]

Spoiler: Discussion

So we see a discussion about Metaphysician and his potential ripping his works down that probably very very closely mimics what went on behind closed doors with Roget/Harmony's works. Noteworthy here is that the grunt work for compiling the evidence and case against Metaphysician was done by LordStoneFish, author of the wildly successful SCP-3999. This was several months after this article's success. So we see the common mechanics of staff who take the high and acceptance someone is feeling from a successful work and use it to cajole them into joining and working for staff.

We also see individuals like kaktus, procyon, and Cimmerian who here are salivating for the ban of Meta, at the expense of their rationality. Cimmerian got his come-uppins and is a shamed, discarded idiot to staff and the site. ProcyonLotor has avoided any and all karma (recall he was the one who calls other gays "faggot" and doxxes kids IRL to call their parents, and participated in a staff chat the symbol of which was a (backwards) swastika). This is no mistake. He is protected by fellow staff in the same way Bright was housed.

Kaktus' motives are, like him, very simple. Just remember; Kaktus can't think past the upvote. For all his bloviating about him being a based god, he is truly a worshiper, and the god is really the upvote. Meta was one of the prime competitors for Kaktus, and probably one of the only ones who posed a legitimate threat to his upvote totals ranking. His works regularly got ratings like Kaktus' do; unquestioned hundreds per article. Here, in addition to using this as as way to remove his only legitimate rival (not in quality mind you, my dear retarded kaktus), but he advocates for denying Metaphysician control of his own works... something he also advocated for with Harmony before mysteriously and suddenly flipping very publicly on that issue.

Lily is a staff member and 001 author who I've noticed is a particularly repugnant individual. Previous chat logs I've posted here show that well. In this one, she recommends banning meta immediately and have all staff block him so that he can't contact them to appeal or discuss what is to become of his work. Has this happened before? How many times has a banned user attempted to contact SCP staff to get their works down, but fail to because they've pulled this move... the public none the wiser? This is your staff?

Nusquam seems to be one of the only reasonable voices here, yet despite being apparently very respected by staff, his opinion really doesn't get anywhere or mean much in the end. The rest of the staff seem to be incredibly selective of their logic, and if I had to guess, are aware of it, although immorality of this sort can be accompanied by pretty vacuous self-awareness. Pretty typical of SCP staff.

They actually admit that the only thing needed to keep the articles on the site is just to edit the plagiarized material. They also acknowledge that some injury like the one Fish left actually and long-term was better for the site than keeping his works out of spite would have been. The logs show that they were highly aware of this potential issue years and years before Roget became Harmony and pulled what she did. They failed to get any policy passed in this time and sat with dicks up their asses. When it finally came knockin' they couldn't admit they had missed their chance.

The amazing hypocrisy here is that Metaphysican's plagiarism was technically legal. The text he was ripping from were from 300 AD - public domain. Yet, at this time, and in order to enact punishment on someone they didn't like, they ignored the legal side of the argument and put forth one from a moral position.

This is the opposite of what they did with Roget/Harmony. They ignored the moral argument when it applied to them (even though it is clear from this log that they know full well how much of a dick move it is) and leaned 100% on the legal argument.

By their logic, are Harmony's articles up on SCP plagiarism? If being in the public domain doesn't excuse the moral accusation of plagiarism, why would creative commons?

If they had an argument against Metaphysician for his plagarism of public domain works, then Harmony should have one as well for the CC BY-SA 3.0 redistribution of her works. They take the argument when it suits their likes. But they won't give it.

They have knowingly and explicitly revoked the author's control of their works, both morally and legally. If they don't give a shit and let you delete it, that's because they don't think very highly of you.

This is something staff was forecasting and brooding about for years prior to Harmony did it, and that's why she did. Maybe if only subconsciously, but this conversation and others like it are probably why Harmony thought to very intentionally do what she did.

What they did in the last month is the complete undoing of any morality, honor, integrity, or respectability the staff has. Period. Their stock is at zero. Anyone writing for SCP should be aware of this. There are other sites and projects out there that will be better stewards and give you the respect your willing and free contribution deserves.

That they've washed their hands of this and walked away scot-free should be understood as the rhetorical move it really is -- using the userbase as a shield from the boomeranging of their own use of moral arguments. They sulked away and threw the popular vote into their witness stand when it was their turn.

This is a disgusting and reprehensible group of "leaders", and I for one say they can go shove a dick up their asses and fuck themselves.

I also want to point out the amount of discussion and dissection that has taken place here about the CC BY-SA 3.0 license. I want to remind anyone reading this that the staff themselves didn't understand what it meant until arguably 2017 (here we see ProcyonLotor saying that he's "thought of something new, a way to keep the articles and comply with policy). So how in the fuck are average users and the regular "I want to contribute" Joe-Schmo supposed to understand it? The staff take advantage of this knowledge gap, and are aware of that. (See our discussion about how there's zero license acknowledgement statement in joining the site.)

I'd like to also point out that staff is aware (so is kaktus) that a cabal acting towards a coup of staff is not a crazy thing that hasn't been attempted before. Here, kaktus is in staff chat despite being referred to by dexanote the next month...

... and yet a mod lets him into an admin-only chat. So yes, staff are coddling Kaktus and have been for a long time. It is reasonable, given the evidence, that kaktus is involved in such a coup as Harmony identifies in "the Yurt". He has clear motive, and a history that defines it in a laser-sharp fashion; he was so close to adminship, advocated that for himself, but was kicked off of staff after mishandling the Summer 2018 fiasco. He has been desperate to claw his way back in and then to the top of the staff since.

These people really are a bunch of skeksis, literally draining the life energy of their captive lessers to prolong their own life and luxury.

Pathetic. Cowards. SCP Staff gives LGBTQ a bad name. You are very intelligent people who know how to write. But your collective moral IQ is in the single digits and it makes you into easy-to-pick-off retards.

Friendly reminder that staff banned someone over using someone else's fucking test log idea without permission , and yet they went and performed a highly impressive feat of mental gymnastics so they wouldn't have to honor an author's request to have their work pulled just because they were highly prolific.

So yeah, staff's stance on stuff like author's rights and plagiarism is about as consistent as a schizo's delusions.

 

[Valstrax]

You are very intelligent people who know how to write.

>Very intelligent

 

[Punished “Venom” pH]

Long post warning. We are arriving at the end of the usefulness of Roget/Harmony's logs,nt individual. Previous chat logs I've posted here show that well. In this one,

don’t get the ss hopes up again, we haven’t even gotten into SCP RP misadventures yet. Tamlin House alone... an SCP RP run by Bright more or less unsupervised. ‘Nuff said.

 

[BurnerPhone]

don’t get the ss hopes up again, we haven’t even gotten into SCP RP misadventures yet. Tamlin House alone... an SCP RP run by Bright more or less unsupervised. ‘Nuff said.

Then get into it, retard

 

[Punished “Venom” pH]

Then get into it, retard

I just got home from work and I’m tired, but it’s the first IRC channel on the list, #307ale, for those of you with access to the log list. I’ll look into that and maybe into the unmasking of Mr. Wilt to give a microcosm of how abuse happens in a large satellite of the SCP community. Kind of a precursor to people like Gabriel Jade, writer of 049, co-author of the kaktus rewrite which got swept under the rug when his abuse came out so kaktus could have glory unimpeded. Anyways, off to bed for me but rest assured with me that we have plenty left to unpack here.

 

[Baubius]

don’t get the ss hopes up again, we haven’t even gotten into SCP RP misadventures yet. Tamlin House alone... an SCP RP run by Bright more or less unsupervised. ‘Nuff said.

Seconding BurnerPhone. If you actually have shit to show us, spit it out. The last time you paused for dramatic effect was before the Yurt Cabal """leaks""".

 

[Punished “Venom” pH]

Seconding BurnerPhone. If you actually have shit to show us, spit it out. The last time you paused for dramatic effect was before the Yurt Cabal """leaks""".

Touché, you all do demand strong proof even when being told the truth which is quite admirable and I don’t ever mind being called to account but I am fucking gassed so ain’t nothing coming from me tonight

 

[Lil' Misogynist]

Uhhh. So without doxing my account over there, I’m a semi-active contributor to the SCP wiki. Like, author page and all that. I was content to just soak in the secondhand drama; the staff’s “fuck you” to harmony with the deletion request has been way too jarring to tolerate. I’m glad that DDD got deleted - it shows that they’re at least sensitive to optics when someone embarrassed them or threatens the appearance of the wiki being a safe place. If we get rid of enough things that threaten the image, it might mean getting rid of some of the more pressing, contemporary threats. Yay!

My open question to all: What more can be done by the active userbase to help fix the culture of the site?

And for the fellow SCP members reading this thread: don’t worry, i’m no more a nazi than you are. im not an infiltrator working for KF - if anything it‘s sort of the reverse - and i’m not trying to sabotage anyone or anything. I’m extremely leftist. I’m also extremely unhappy with site staff continually breaking trust and running the wiki into the ground.

Lastly, for the SCP site staff reading the thread: come the fuck on, people.

Do you want a real answer to this, or....?

- The SCP community has a real problem with fake friendships and clout chasing. It sucks for everyone involved and the direct community as a whole would be a lot less toxic if everyone wasn't so entangled.

- Quit it with the tribalism/hostility towards other writing communities. This isn't even a subtle nod towards RPC, some people take shit wayyy too seriously and I've seen many instances over the years of SCP writers sabotaging other people's projects because they think it's funny. It would also be nice if there wasn't such a kneejerk reaction to criticism of the SCP Wiki and/or its writing from people outside of it.

- Better acknowledge the SCP Wiki burnout/mental breakdown problem. The SCP community should not serve as a replacement or stand-in for real life social circles but there are far too many people who treat it that way with or without realizing it. It's not healthy at all and it's a big part of the reason why it's so difficult for people to leave when they badly need to. A lot of the users who try to open up about it get laughed out by people caught in the same cycle.

Lily is a staff member and 001 author who I've noticed is a particularly repugnant individual. Previous chat logs I've posted here show that well. In this one, she recommends banning meta immediately and have all staff block him so that he can't contact them to appeal or discuss what is to become of his work. Has this happened before?

I didn't get blocked but Lily has been on AH since the reform and was the one who ignored me when I asked for updates on something I was trying to report. It might be a pattern.

What's so ridiculous about this is that authors aren't even making money off their work. All this drama is over something that has no physical link to the real world, it's just people going rabid over fake internet points

For the vast majority of the SCP fandom this is true but there are exceptions. I remember the time Bluesoul casually mentioned that he spent $1,000 or so on buying equipment to make merch for his SCP-themed podcast. I think the reason was that he didn't want to use Redbubble. Sometimes I wonder if he ever broke even? I'm kinda impressed by his confidence.

 

[Furret]

Cut because I got cucked by the character limit, but you know which post I'm responding to here.

A couple things stand out to me here:

1. Procyon's vitriol. It's well-established at this point that Procyon is an acid-spitting lunatic who takes his extreme anger out on undeserving users, but this is the most irrationally pissed I've ever seen him. It's acknowledged multiple times in this discussion that they could just ask Meta to remove/rewrite the bits he plagiarized or attribute them properly, but this solution doesn't scorch the earth hard enough for Procyon, so he threatens to abuse his power as Licensing Captain and do everything unilaterally against the wishes of literally everyone else in the room.

"Meta would have been thrown out of any institution for this."

Sure, but you're not any kind of proper literary institution. You're not a university, or even a high school English class. There's no rational reason for you to punish plagiarists as harshly as they do. This isn't a big deal, just tell him to attribute and move on. How Procyon remains on staff is beyond me.

2. Moose, who was already retired ("on Reserve") at this point, is the one who eventually has to step in and tell Procyon to calm the fuck down, and then has to pull the discussion together and work out an actual solution. When the biggest voice of reason among your high-ranking staff is actively trying to be around less often, there's a problem. This was years ago, so I imagine Moose is there to stabilize things even less often now.

These logs are yet more evidence to confirm what we already knew: staff are cowards who only act like they care about precedent/legality/morals when it suits them, and they will abandon all three without hesitation when they think it'll work out for them. SCP authors who I know lurk this thread, are these really the people you want managing this project? These people who will abandon all their principles to shaft you if you do something they don't like? I certainly wouldn't want to write for a community with these people in charge.

Also,

Lily is a staff member and 001 author who I've noticed is a particularly repugnant individual. Previous chat logs I've posted here show that well. In this one, she recommends banning meta immediately and have all staff block him so that he can't contact them to appeal or discuss what is to become of his work. Has this happened before? How many times has a banned user attempted to contact SCP staff to get their works down, but fail to because they've pulled this move... the public none the wiser? This is your staff?

I'm neutral on Lily and don't know much about her, but I'm almost certain that the thing about banning and immediately blocking Meta was a joke.

 

[ToS]

I'm neutral on Lily and don't know much about her, but I'm almost certain that the thing about banning and immediately blocking Meta was a joke.

Maybe you are right.

 

[Cow-Chan]

1. Procyon's vitriol. It's well-established at this point that Procyon is an acid-spitting lunatic who takes his extreme anger out on undeserving users,

How Procyon remains on staff is beyond me.

Procyon is on staff because nobody can tell him no. He has on multiple occasions used IRC data to contact banned members' ISPs, work, school, and parents to harass them in some manner or to scare them, and has openly bragged about it on numerous counts in public channels. You probably don't understand how accurate you are when you call him a lunatic. Bright is dangerous because he's a sex predator. Procyon is dangerous on a completely different level without even needing to be a predator. That should tell you all you need to know about him.

Now, add all of that to the fact that ALL staff can now actively access all of that information, as well as their geographic approximate location now with their new SCP IRC server.