Hello Ubuntu Developers, hello Linux Fans, you might wonder why I address this mailing list with my problem. And on first sight my points are off-topic on a developer mailing list. But since I try to do work for the Linux and Ubuntu Community, and since care a lot for freedom _and_ privacy I want to address all you people out there on this mailing list to have a look at my problem. Because the Ubuntu Project uses Freenode IRC as their official communication platform. I cant speak for my own reputation on this list. Some people want to see me as a troll. Some people want to spread stories about my person. And I cant prevent them from doing that. Especially if they are female and leading a chat network. And I also dont want to achieve that I am able to visit Freenode again after private conflicts with a few people. What I do want is to express one serious problem with privacy. Before private conflicts happened on Freenode IRC I had plans to run a project channel and to be able to register it I had to add my phone number to my nickserv record. This phone number is secret. It is not listed in any directory service. Only my parents, my doctor and my boss at work know this number. To keep this phone number secret I used the nickserv settings to hide it. Only senior staff members are able to look it up. On #freenode-social I ran into an argue with a person called "trelane". This person got my secret phone number via private message by Christel Dahlskjaer, the head of Freenode Staff. You think this is not real? I also had the feeling that I am part of a movie when I was called on the phone at 4 am by trelane, because he thought christel gave him _her_ number. You think christel accidently looked up my secret phone number and accidently pasted it into the private chat window of that person who attacked me before on IRC? Possible. But here is the result when you try to contact Freenode Staff: 22:30 -!- Irssi: Starting query in freenode with RichiH 22:30 <RichiH> hi 22:31 <RichiH> are you still here? 22:32 <noria> hello 22:35 <RichiH> hi :) 22:35 <RichiH> i wanted to talk about the kline 22:35 <noria> ah 22:36 <RichiH> we do not discuss reasons for klines with third parties, so i can't tell you anything about the reasons why the other user was klined 22:37 <RichiH> you were klined because from what you said and how you said it, it was very similar to the other user 22:37 <RichiH> the other one has been banned from using the network. a fact which he does not accept and tries to circumvent 22:38 <noria> okay 22:38 <noria> but what he said is pretty scary 22:38 <noria> and he said he has proof 22:39 <RichiH> we do not give out private information 22:39 <RichiH> that applies to him as well as everyone else 22:39 <noria> how can he have proof then that private information like his phone number was given out by christel? 22:40 <RichiH> i do not know and do not wish to speculate why he would claim such a thing 22:40 <noria> somebody could have asked him instead of booting his arse 22:41 <noria> at least that is what i would do if i run a network like this 22:41 <noria> touching privacy is definetly a no go 22:42 <RichiH> as i said, we do not give out private information 22:43 <noria> dude 22:43 <noria> trelane who attacked paddy has a private message in his chat log from christel with the phone number of paddy. and you are trying to tell me a story this is not reality? 22:44 <noria> this phone number is secret and it is in no directory service anywhere 22:44 <noria> only added to nickserv 22:44 <noria> and only senior staff members can look it up 22:45 <noria> what kind of game are you trying to play here? 22:49 <RichiH> Please do not contact freenode staff directly, but direct all correspondence to Elyssa M. Schnurr - Law Offices of Elyssa M. Schnurr - 6750 West Loop South - Suite 500, Bellaire, Texas, 77401. 22:49 -!- You may not connect to this server: Clones, exploits and flooding are offtopic on freenode. Please contact <a href="mailto:staff@freenode.net">staff@freenode.net</a> (2007/05/28 20.46 ) 22:49 -!- ERROR Closing Link: ...dip.t-<a href="http://dialin.net">dialin.net</a> (K-lined) 22:49 -!- Irssi: Connection lost to <a href="http://irc.freenode.net">irc.freenode.net</a> --- This looks to me like conflict management on any other IRC network out there. Even some warez networks have a more trustable policy. And I wonder why people like me have to deal with abusive staff members on IRC networks if they want to get involved with Free and Open Source Projects like Ubuntu. I wonder why privacy does not count. I wonder why people with special priviledges are unable to live proper conflict management and why they mix private interests with moderation. greetings, Patrick Frank