Ironic, isn't it?

Engineering Potpourri Pat's Pub
#1

I have no idea why after being on Eng-Tips for 17 years I’ve been stripped of my Pats’ Pub proprietorship and kicked out of Eng-Tips’ Round Table and Pats’ Pub. I have been helpful to other members, especially in the ChE sections. I’m confused, sad, and can’t get a simple explanation.

ET member LRJ posted in the Pub they were invited to SE and one of their ET threads were there. I looked, saw nothing, and deleted the post. It was off-topic in the Pub, I’m not Skylar, and, besides, the link was broken. Maybe, I was late to the game? Skylar said I invited LRJ to SE using his e-mail address from ET, but I did not.

I wonder what LRJ would do if he saw that Engineering.com has created a bogus account for him, complete with profile, username, password, AND his e-mail address. I.e. his identity has been stolen. Not just for him, but dozens of other ET MVPs and members. For example, LRJ is in two threads; one is here:

https://makeprojects.com/project/-a-coming-engineering-shortage------who-agrees-

Scroll down to the first post on March 1, 2018 and find him. And, ET created bogus profiles, usernames and passwords for some good folks who joined SE, like @MikeHalloran @IRStuff @moltenmetal @JAE @Maui @Scotty @compositepro @GregLocock @Lomarandil @artisi and @lacajun. These good folks are in the above thread too.

So, ET just thinks I did something, I didn’t, and they boot me, but they actually did what they accused me of, dozens, maybe hundreds, of times, and nothing! Ironic, isn’t it?

They’ve stolen our identities to give the false impression the engineering community supported and were active in their new site. We don’t, and we aren’t. IMHO, the site sucks, which I told them, and, then, never went back to participate.

#2

Through this I just found out that I apparently have a Make: Projects account and have posted a thread and replied there. I also apparently put a link to my personal website there for some reason…

I just logged into it. I can seemingly edit and delete the thread and even other people’s replies to it.

I removed the link to my website from that thread “I started”. I’m trying to figure out how to delete the account now.

#3

I had and have no interest in what ever it was they were pedalling, seem to remember something vaguely about it coming up, didn’t join and no intention in doing so.
I would simply move on, cut your losses - there are bigger and better things to do.

1 Like
#4

I agree. I just want to get the account deleted so I don’t have my personal email in, yet another, database I’m not interested in it being.

#5

I think you are conflating two separate things. Engineering.com owns ET, and as such, they own the ET email list. This is different than someone else on ET who has access to email addresses to use them to promote a non-Engineering.com website. At least, that’s what I understand the situation to be. I don’t know whether you were involved with that or not; it may be completely moot, often, late-comers are painted with the sins of their predecessors.

#6

Make:Projects is the successor to ProjectBoard, which some of us participated in to generate feedback for future projects

#7

I think Make:Projects is a joint venture with Make: and Engineering.com. I know JVs can be fire-walled and separated from the two parties, but were they in this case?

#8

Yeah I’m aware of that. I know the terms of use give them rights to share the content from ET pretty much wherever they want. That’s fine, I agreed to that when I signed up on ET. I’m just not interested in an account or links to my website on ProjectBoard, or Make: Projects, or whatever it ends up being in the end.

Edit: Something that did actually grate me is this. That link to my website used a thumbnail made from some of my own artwork on my site. I don’t know why they would’ve taken that picture and thought it was ok to copy. I deleted that along with the link since I could.

#9

For the record, I did not, and do not, have LRJ’s e-mail address. Being proprieter of Pats’ Pub did not give me access to any e-mail addresses. Their reasons for booting me were not true.

#10

Should we begin offering ethics classes? :slight_smile:

#11

I sent an email to makeprojects.com asking them to remove my handle, profile and replies. I doubt they will actually do this as they perhaps feel that JAE and replies are all the property of Engineering.com.

#12

@JAE…I just did the same. Here’s what I put in the message:

Please remove my handle (Ron), email address and posts that were ported from Eng-Tips to ProjectBoard and Make:Projects. I do not participate in either and do not support the implication that I am a proponent of either.

I also doubt that they will do anything. My guess is that some of us are on Skylar’s list to boot from the E-T site at some point. What she did to Latexman is just plain wrong!

#13

My request this morning was a little more polite :sweat_smile:

I’m still waiting on a response. Though it says 48-72 hours for a reply, so I guess the absolute minimum is 2 days before I’ll hear anything.

#14

Maybe they need lessons in Moral Science,or they did not attend Sunday School.

#15

Attending Sunday school and numerous church services don’t impact many I’ve known. Sad state of affairs.

#16

So I never did get a response by email, but the account with my username appears to be deleted now. If you search for it, it comes up as a user, but actually clicking on that search result gives an error message.

Interestingly, the topic that had been attributed to that account also comes up as a result, but is now a blank page when clicked on. It totally deleted the entire conversation which had a lot of contribution from others.

#17

I got an email response from Make…said my request was granted and all of my stuff was deleted. I checked…all gone

#18

I just saw I got the same later in day yesterday.

#19

With the success that Ron and SuperSalad had erasing their identity on MakeProjects, I just ask them for the same thing.

#20

I did a little more searching and found that they still have threads to which I contributed; however, they changed my handle “Anonymous”…funny though…some of the subsequent posts refer to me by name for my previous “Anonymous” post!

In any case, they have deleted, at my request, the information they pirated from Eng-Tips that contained my personal information, including specific posts. There are still posts in there by a lot of you that remain, which indicates that your personal information (email address, password, and posts) remain on their site, which is not what any of us agreed to.

I would encourage each of you to request that they remove all of your information, including posts, from their site. It was wrong of them to take the information without our approval or knowledge and considering their pursuit of trying to find something that works for them, we don’t know how they will use that information in the future.