Another Top50 Casualty

By Juez N. Jurado

The very popular JokersUpdates is M.I.A. on the Big Brother Top 50 Network. While waiting for a comment from Top 50, we asked Jokers if they cared to explain what happened. Joker replied, “I have to politely decline your request. . .” That leaves us all to speculate. Why would a site consistently ranked number two leave Top 50?

On Jokers’ Questions board we found this brief reply from Joker to a poster’s inquiry about the Top 50, “There are several reasons... not one strong one but lots of little ones. I'd prefer not to get into them right now. However, those pages should all load quicker now.” (Posted Sun Sep 9 07:05:16 2001) Without saying much Joker implied the exit from Top 50 was voluntary and that linking to the Top 50 slowed down his boards.

We checked out the Top 50 “Rules and Regulations” lists to see if there could be a reason for Top 50 to remove Jokers. The number one rule raised our eyebrows, “You can not join if your site is in one of the following categories: Warez sites, Adult content, Message boards, Auction sites.” Any of these would be “Reason for removal” without a warning.

Since JokersUpdates is primarily a message board for Big Brother live-feed and discussion messages, perhaps the site was removed for violating rule number one. But if that is true, I have two questions. Why did Top 50 leave them on the site for so many weeks especially since they “spider all sites every 24 hours”? And why are so many other "message board" sites unaffected?

If we find out whether Jokers left voluntarily or was given the boot from Top 50, we will let you know!
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The Top 50 Network began in 1997 and is operated out of The Netherlands. They report to be the largest Top site on the Internet today with 12,500 sites and 1.5 million daily banner impressions.

Xyth Wath Zeb

We were quite interested to see the appearance of a particularly nasty troll on the BBInsider message board after the World Trade Center attack. Writing under the names of the admin and moderators of the TVClubhouse, the poster tried to make readers believe that TVCH promoted terrorism. At least one BBInsider regular, JEM, was pulled into the hoax and checked out TVCH to see what the heck it was all about.

Flint, another moderator at TVCH responded on the board. It seems the poster could not resist e-mailing him and the admin to let them know he had posted his slander on the BBInsider board and the P/X board at Jokers Updates (though the P/X post was moderated). Flint confirmed the poster was Xyth/Zeb/Tukuul/Guruchaz, and Xyth responded soon after with a declaration of war.

We were curious about the sudden rancor displayed, so we went to TVCH and popped up Xyth's user profile, only to find that the user had been deleted. We surmised, and have had it confirmed by several sources, that Xyth, aka Zeb, Guruchaz, Tukuul and who knows who else (our bet is The Bird on BBInsider), had begun "acting up" on the TVCH boards after the WTC attack, and had been banned. His revenge, which is becoming prettty predictable now, was to go to an unmoderated board and begin lambasting those he thought stupid enough to ban him - this time all of TVCH. This time his true colors show through by his use of an American tragedy to attack those he thinks wronged him. One sick individual.

We also received from another source this set of postings from TVCH which we found interesting:
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Xyth Tuesday, September 11, 2001 - 08:55 am
Ok, now check this information out: http://www.usatoday.com/life/cyber/tech/2001-02-05-binladen.htm
Dilligaf Tuesday, September 11, 2001 - 09:01 am
Zeb, that story was dated June 19th. Don't confuse us!!
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By the time we reached the site, the name Zeb had been changed to Xyth! Seems a lot of people knew the real identity of Xyth, but weren't talking.

Finally our good friend paid our new message board a visit and left some of the same trash he has been spewing elsewhere. Of course we deleted it - even we have our standards - but of course we still have the message ensconced safely away, with its corresponding IP address.

Reality Trash Installs Message Board

After our star reporter Juez's report on Server.com, we decided it was time for us to join the craze and establish a message board for our site.

We followed the lead of Jokers Updates, installing a server.com discussion application into our site. Reach it by clicking on the message board link above, or go here.

Our rules are pretty simple. Discuss anything you like, but we would like it to be more about reality sites than the actual reality shows. We will be moderating the usual stuff - hate posts, racist posts, etc. - but will try to leave as much as we can on the site.

And to help keep trolls away and from impersonating others, the poster's IP address is always available if you view the source of the page.

Enjoy!

Moderator Overload

As we cruise the reality site message boards, we can't help but notice the surge of discussions on moderation. Seems since the World Trade Center crisis that everyone is on edge, and the moderators are being lambasted for everything they do. People are being moderated and posts and entire threads are being deleted. Posters are complaining about the deletions, moderators are responding, sometimes angrily, people are being banned, and posters are leaving the boards.

Big Brother is coming to an end soon, and we hope that this will bring a brief respite to what we see as an escalating war. In so many cases what were good discussion communities have degenerated into battlegrounds between moderators and their supporters and the "free speechers" who can't understand why their voice is not heard.

Yes this is a trying time, but please members of the reality internet world, CHILL OUT!

Favorite Poster: Reality 411's MyssteryOne

One of the "Certifiable" posters at Reality 411, our favorite poster this week is MyssteryOne.

Being a stalwart supporter of the site, she continues to post even in this dreary final week of the Big Brother competition. A real trooper to the bitter end.

We salute you!

Have some trash? Send it to us!

If you have some good scoop on the reality web scene, or want to nominate a favorite poster, send it to us at realitytrash@yahoo.com and we will try to get it into our next issue. And thanks to all of you who have contributed!

We are also looking for article submissions from our readers. We will give you your own byline and let you be part of our "Who Runs Reality Trash" game!

Reality Trash is published twice weekly on Tuesday and Friday if we get enough dirt. Please bookmark us and send us some TRASH!