Some Unfortunate New Data:
To review, I'm a former contractor for SPWF that has assisted in many, many of their endeavors for years, but exited all work for Jeff Mach/JME in 2013-2014 after being racially profiled and threatened with assault by their then-head of security and operations, and out of JM's own deeply morally bankrupt business practices and profound ineptitude. The evolving story with Steampunk Con by VampireFreaks has sparked my curiosity, as a member of the community with a self-admitted passion for Business Ethics, and having done a fair bit of event-promotion myself...
There was the initial cognitive dissonance that was seeing the JME's policies quoted verbatim, line-for-line, on SteamPunkCon's website, as the new event that had *just* (from public perception) displaced COGS at the Raddison Piscataway location for 2019. That, which some might armchair quarterback as "poor form" and ill-advised, is entirely VampireFreaks' prerogative. Jet friended me with my initial posting about this and was kind enough to address my concerns there with grace, panache and clarity. To this, I sighed in relief, thinking these matters drawn to a close.
I had sincerely hoped we could all relax about this, given the long, tiresome and dramatic road that our community has been subjected to with that clown-shoe carnival barker with delusions of competence, Mr. Mach, and his entire five-ring latrine fire of a circus that I had walked away from 4 years ago. I, of course, was wrong. Shortly after the prior incident, and if I'm being honest, in the background of it, I began hearing rumors of performers who were being Approached for SteamPunkCon by JM directly. Of course, this was 2nd Hand, and no one seemed willing to come forward, so I wrote this off as here-say, at best, or inactionable intel, at worst.
Then I was forwarded the following screenshot of DarkSide of the Con 3, with folks being invited directly by Jeff Mach himself, as recently as on June 16th. [See Image 1]. "Okay *", I say to myself, "that's not actually damning outright, albeit being DEEPLY the appearance of impropriety." Then, as others have recently commented and remarked, there was a mass email about SteamPunkCon, using even MORE prior JME script, that hasn't been addressed. [See Image 2] "Okay, still not damning per se." However, this, back to back, seemed to be a BIT too coincidental to ignore, so I started investigating.
I'm friends with Tammy Shipps. We're not SUPER close, and I certainly didn't quite know what to think during the Silver Phoenix Society's P.R. Nightmare, and I had an agenda to look out for the Vendors and Contractors. Even that, I got a fair bit of negative press from the pitchfork & torch-wielding set, and Ms. Shipps and I have commiserated a bit, and compared notes on the capriciousness of the Wisdom of Crowds. During the course of that, Tammy showed me a deeply caring individual who wants to make certain that the predators who have so damaged this scene, are never allowed to sneak back in through reticence or lack-of-vigilance. So we decided to dig, and look at SteamPunkCon. And look HARD. I had not realized what we would find would be so blatant, nor so damning and OBVIOUS.
Tammy, curiosity piqued by the Constant Contact reveal, merely told me she'd look into some leads. I had no idea that she had previously worked with Jet, and had access to his server that was never revoked. As such, and with no impropriety or wrongdoing whatsoever, she cross-checked the website access logs with logs from JME's email server. And look what she found. I spit-taked when she showed me, and told me the extent of this, further corroborated by an IP trace [See Images 3 & 4]
Judging from all this evidence, it is my sincere belief that Jeff Mach is involved in SteamPunkCon. It is absurd, at this point, for him to be logging into the server successfully, especially with the frequency in question, without a direct correlation to some of these rumors. I don't know if that's without Jet's knowledge. I find that deeply, deeply hard to believe. I've not met Jet in person. I've people I've respected for years vouch deeply for him. I'm not going to judge his character on the basis of this per se. I'll say, it strains suspension of disbelief beyond breaking point to see JM THIS MUCH UP in said business/event, without that business owner's knowledge. I will not engage in speculation beyond that.
Here's what I do know. I know that Tammy Shipps has been victimized by the community for statements that were ill-chosen, and were made in haste. I do know, that she has provided HARD EVIDENCE, and significant quantities of it, in exposure of JM's continued involvement with VampireFreaks (Knowing Or Otherwise). I do know the look of someone trying to make good. Thus, I believe her. I was raised with the belief that there is "never one cockroach". People can make mistakes, sure. But there is never one SINGULAR flaw, when revealed to be a pattern of behavior, that will stop at just one incident.
So, I look to ...
1. The Initial Use of JME Policies (arguably in EXTREMELY CRASS and rather short-sighted Form).
2. The Un-homing of COGS Expo with EXTREMELY SUSPICIOUS timing.
3. The Rumors of JM ACTIVELY RECRUITING PERFORMERS FOR YOU FOR YOUR EVENT.
4. The Snafu with the Constant Contact Emails, wherein you once again, are using JME systems and databases to promote your new event, as seen if someone clicks upon the 'Why did I get this?' Link.
Finally, 5. The Smoking Gun. VF's Servers own login records from Jeff Mach himself.
I don't know you, Jet VF. I don't know your quality, for good or ill. I've heard literally, -NOTHING- but good things, from a number of colleagues and profoundly trustworthy individuals that I respect. So, I want to believe better. That said, screenshots don't lie. I know you've invited me to approach you with any questions I may have. I have quite a few, i suppose that boil down to these two:
a. Did you know that Jeff Mach is apparently DEEPLY, innately still involved with your business and this event... And if not, how did you miss that?
b. What do you intend to do about it, now that it's been outed?
I have no dogs in this fight. No profit to gain. I've never worked with VF, nor do I have any existing beefs with anyone involved. My sole motivation is to see to it that JM is never allowed to return to the event community again, in light of his many, many misdeeds. Not via sheltering within another organization. Not via proxies. There’s no witch-hunt here (nor would I ever Co-sign one), just facts. What the Community opts to do, is entirely up to you all as individuals. But I would hope that all that recent outrage and fury that we saw misdirected in recent months is not so fickle, as to let this go unnoticed. I am nothing, if not fair. Read Jet’s response, then vote with your feet.
Where there is Smoke, there is Fire.
Regards,
Wrathful Redacted
#HuntingTheHobbit #NotThisTimeBaggins
P.S. Folks,
It has come to my attention that a block of text, and a critical part of the data connected A to B didn't upload on my original post. As such, I've modified the postscript of the OP to match this post directly. Rather than relating the data secondhand, I am turning the 'floor' over to Tammy Shipps to address all this directly, rather than us suffering from a game of telephone.
Please Standby for her clarification.
P.P.S. As this -is- broken up a bit, quite outside of my initial intent, feel free to see the cogent mirror on Brenna’s blog.
Which gives it all some context in regards to JME.
Updated 7:11 pm, 6/20
To review, I'm a former contractor for SPWF that has assisted in many, many of their endeavors for years, but exited all work for Jeff Mach/JME in 2013-2014 after being racially profiled and threatened with assault by their then-head of security and operations, and out of JM's own deeply morally bankrupt business practices and profound ineptitude. The evolving story with Steampunk Con by VampireFreaks has sparked my curiosity, as a member of the community with a self-admitted passion for Business Ethics, and having done a fair bit of event-promotion myself...
There was the initial cognitive dissonance that was seeing the JME's policies quoted verbatim, line-for-line, on SteamPunkCon's website, as the new event that had *just* (from public perception) displaced COGS at the Raddison Piscataway location for 2019. That, which some might armchair quarterback as "poor form" and ill-advised, is entirely VampireFreaks' prerogative. Jet friended me with my initial posting about this and was kind enough to address my concerns there with grace, panache and clarity. To this, I sighed in relief, thinking these matters drawn to a close.
I had sincerely hoped we could all relax about this, given the long, tiresome and dramatic road that our community has been subjected to with that clown-shoe carnival barker with delusions of competence, Mr. Mach, and his entire five-ring latrine fire of a circus that I had walked away from 4 years ago. I, of course, was wrong. Shortly after the prior incident, and if I'm being honest, in the background of it, I began hearing rumors of performers who were being Approached for SteamPunkCon by JM directly. Of course, this was 2nd Hand, and no one seemed willing to come forward, so I wrote this off as here-say, at best, or inactionable intel, at worst.
Then I was forwarded the following screenshot of DarkSide of the Con 3, with folks being invited directly by Jeff Mach himself, as recently as on June 16th. [See Image 1]. "Okay *", I say to myself, "that's not actually damning outright, albeit being DEEPLY the appearance of impropriety." Then, as others have recently commented and remarked, there was a mass email about SteamPunkCon, using even MORE prior JME script, that hasn't been addressed. [See Image 2] "Okay, still not damning per se." However, this, back to back, seemed to be a BIT too coincidental to ignore, so I started investigating.
I'm friends with Tammy Shipps. We're not SUPER close, and I certainly didn't quite know what to think during the Silver Phoenix Society's P.R. Nightmare, and I had an agenda to look out for the Vendors and Contractors. Even that, I got a fair bit of negative press from the pitchfork & torch-wielding set, and Ms. Shipps and I have commiserated a bit, and compared notes on the capriciousness of the Wisdom of Crowds. During the course of that, Tammy showed me a deeply caring individual who wants to make certain that the predators who have so damaged this scene, are never allowed to sneak back in through reticence or lack-of-vigilance. So we decided to dig, and look at SteamPunkCon. And look HARD. I had not realized what we would find would be so blatant, nor so damning and OBVIOUS.
Tammy, curiosity piqued by the Constant Contact reveal, merely told me she'd look into some leads. I had no idea that she had previously worked with Jet, and had access to his server that was never revoked. As such, and with no impropriety or wrongdoing whatsoever, she cross-checked the website access logs with logs from JME's email server. And look what she found. I spit-taked when she showed me, and told me the extent of this, further corroborated by an IP trace [See Images 3 & 4]
Judging from all this evidence, it is my sincere belief that Jeff Mach is involved in SteamPunkCon. It is absurd, at this point, for him to be logging into the server successfully, especially with the frequency in question, without a direct correlation to some of these rumors. I don't know if that's without Jet's knowledge. I find that deeply, deeply hard to believe. I've not met Jet in person. I've people I've respected for years vouch deeply for him. I'm not going to judge his character on the basis of this per se. I'll say, it strains suspension of disbelief beyond breaking point to see JM THIS MUCH UP in said business/event, without that business owner's knowledge. I will not engage in speculation beyond that.
Here's what I do know. I know that Tammy Shipps has been victimized by the community for statements that were ill-chosen, and were made in haste. I do know, that she has provided HARD EVIDENCE, and significant quantities of it, in exposure of JM's continued involvement with VampireFreaks (Knowing Or Otherwise). I do know the look of someone trying to make good. Thus, I believe her. I was raised with the belief that there is "never one cockroach". People can make mistakes, sure. But there is never one SINGULAR flaw, when revealed to be a pattern of behavior, that will stop at just one incident.
So, I look to ...
1. The Initial Use of JME Policies (arguably in EXTREMELY CRASS and rather short-sighted Form).
2. The Un-homing of COGS Expo with EXTREMELY SUSPICIOUS timing.
3. The Rumors of JM ACTIVELY RECRUITING PERFORMERS FOR YOU FOR YOUR EVENT.
4. The Snafu with the Constant Contact Emails, wherein you once again, are using JME systems and databases to promote your new event, as seen if someone clicks upon the 'Why did I get this?' Link.
Finally, 5. The Smoking Gun. VF's Servers own login records from Jeff Mach himself.
I don't know you, Jet VF. I don't know your quality, for good or ill. I've heard literally, -NOTHING- but good things, from a number of colleagues and profoundly trustworthy individuals that I respect. So, I want to believe better. That said, screenshots don't lie. I know you've invited me to approach you with any questions I may have. I have quite a few, i suppose that boil down to these two:
a. Did you know that Jeff Mach is apparently DEEPLY, innately still involved with your business and this event... And if not, how did you miss that?
b. What do you intend to do about it, now that it's been outed?
I have no dogs in this fight. No profit to gain. I've never worked with VF, nor do I have any existing beefs with anyone involved. My sole motivation is to see to it that JM is never allowed to return to the event community again, in light of his many, many misdeeds. Not via sheltering within another organization. Not via proxies. There’s no witch-hunt here (nor would I ever Co-sign one), just facts. What the Community opts to do, is entirely up to you all as individuals. But I would hope that all that recent outrage and fury that we saw misdirected in recent months is not so fickle, as to let this go unnoticed. I am nothing, if not fair. Read Jet’s response, then vote with your feet.
Where there is Smoke, there is Fire.
Regards,
Wrathful Redacted
#HuntingTheHobbit #NotThisTimeBaggins
P.S. Folks,
It has come to my attention that a block of text, and a critical part of the data connected A to B didn't upload on my original post. As such, I've modified the postscript of the OP to match this post directly. Rather than relating the data secondhand, I am turning the 'floor' over to Tammy Shipps to address all this directly, rather than us suffering from a game of telephone.
Please Standby for her clarification.
P.P.S. As this -is- broken up a bit, quite outside of my initial intent, feel free to see the cogent mirror on Brenna’s blog.
Which gives it all some context in regards to JME.
Updated 7:11 pm, 6/20
So folks, as * mentioned, there were some critical pieces missing to the above, for which we (mostly I) apologize. As for WordPress 'logging' or no, the server logs GET and POST requests, which can be illuminating.
Screenshot on WHERE on Jet's server I got the files from:
http://prntscr.com/jxc3jw
As you can see, here is the proof of my access to Jet's server. The ftp account is in my name as Jet gave me a login during partnership with JME to work on the site. Also, whenever JM needed to login to Jet's server for any reason, he used to login as me, lacking an FTP account of his own (that he remembered). For whatever reason, he had asked me to use mine and I said yes.
Here is a file with some side by sides showing the logs I found:
http://prntscr.com/jxc6e7
I've drawn on this one a little bit so it’s a bit easier understand. I have copies saved locally so if anyone needs clean versions, I can produce them on demand.
As you can see, there's a group log, compiling 30 days of logs. Zoomed in, line number 2006, highlighted, for Steampuncon.com > Dark Side of the Con, 14th of June, etc etc. There's a highlighted notation, of one specific line. The IP Address matches a SEPARATE one I've uncovered as JM's. Some critics made a good point that this was the ISP’s so I dug deeper just in case I was in fact wrong.
The important think in this log is the POST action. You can only POST to admin if you are logged in as an administrator (obviously). Which proves that Jeff (or the holder of that IP address) is an admin, or has logged in to an Administration account).
Here is a screenshot of the Google Admin page, which is what controls all JME emails, etc, etc for all business matters. I've been an admin since being promoted. What it shows is a guaranteed, correct IP address, that JM is known to use, logged by Google.
https://prnt.sc/jxc7ul
Does this match with the prior log? 74.104.20.237 ... yup. All over the VF Server. Here's a side by side.
http://prntscr.com/jxc8ia
If one were to do an IP Lookup on that particular address (I've used an API rather than just going to a free website so that this is more legit) you’d get IP trace:
http://prntscr.com/jxcafn
Essentially what I was able to do was to break it down to a single IP address for JM that was logged and verified by Google. I then looked at the Access Logs for SteamPunkCon.com and matched the IP address in the access logs to someone who is accessing the admin on your WordPress account, Jet VF.
Can I clarify anything?
*Edited because I duplicated a link*
the policies thing was already addressed. the email list thing i addressed somewhere else. we had emails we collected during our time working with JME and the internal list was named 'JME', when somebody unsubscribed from one of these emails apparently it showed the email list name. I have since fixed this. the email clearly is coming from vampirefreaks. as for the 'server logs' thing again i have no idea what that is, that looks like something from JME or SPS but definitely not anything related to vampirefreaks. if you have any other questions let me know.
ReplyDeleteas for jeff mach inviting somebody to the event, i'd hardly say that's evidence we are working with him. clearly this is propoganda by a member of the COGS team to try to sabotage steampunk con. Vampirefreaks has been nothing but respectful towards COGS and we even tried reaching out to them to try to work together and got no response. We've been staying very professional about the whole thing but if you're just going to start spreading false information that is not acceptable.
Jet, if you could please have your tech person clarify the log in access for the SteampunkCon site, I would be more than happy to update the information. It appears that the SPC website is a reused JME site, but I am getting that information second hand, as this guest post states.
DeleteThis has nothing to do with COGS. I did not attend their event. Meanwhile, I have attended VF events since 2001.
Any information to help clarify is much appreciated.
How is C.O.G.S being blamed for this. As far as i am aware they have a whole new place to hold their event and have dropped the radisson subject all together after the enital statement.
ReplyDeleteI dont understand how any of this is Cogs fault. Can anyone elaborate. Because from what im gathering the person who did this artical wasnt from cogs.
ReplyDeleteHi! This post has nothing to do with COGS.
DeleteThe interesting thing is, however, that VF is doing a Steampunk event at the Raddison INSTEAD of COGS doing it.
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteI appriciate the comment!
DeleteI don't know much about the IP log, etc, but I posted this because a) I was asked to by the author of it and b) to let the community make their own choices.
DeleteComment removed. Reason being it is based on an usubstantiated rumor which is traceable to a disgruntled former employee of the guest author. Said former employee is someone who has been removed from multiple events for paramilitary garb and stalking.