It's happend

Originally Posted by Nick

The thing to do is to distinguish real and cyber.

This is where the problem lies.

This is not just a cyber board. I have met many many people and consider many of you my friends. It's not just a game.

This brings me to my next point. Jon Caputo is a real person as well. Like him or hate him this is not a game to him. He has invested a lot of money and time into this venture. Agree with his business or not this is real life to him. To us maybe it's a stupid forum. To him it's a lot more than that. If you met someone in person and came into their business and started harassing them and saying bad things about them to their clients. You would probibly be sued for slander. How is this any different? Why are we treating another human being this way?

You don't have to agree with it. You don't have to subscribe to the Puff lifestyle. Weather we think he deserves this or not. It's not really our call.


let it go..

[madurolover]

Originally Posted by Andyman

This is where the problem lies.

This is not just a cyber board. I have met many many people and consider many of you my friends. It's not just a game.

This brings me to my next point. Jon Caputo is a real person as well. Like him or hate him this is not a game to him. He has invested a lot of money and time into this venture. Agree with his business or not this is real life to him. To us maybe it's a stupid forum. To him it's a lot more than that. If you met someone in person and came into their business and started harassing them and saying bad things about them to their clients. You would probibly be sued for slander. How is this any different? Why are we treating another human being this way?

You don't have to agree with it. You don't have to subscribe to the Puff lifestyle. Weather we think he deserves this or not. It's not really our call.


let it go..

Well said Andy!

[Nick]

Originally Posted by Andyman

This is where the problem lies.

This is not just a cyber board. I have met many many people and consider many of you my friends. It's not just a game.

This brings me to my next point. Jon Caputo is a real person as well. Like him or hate him this is not a game to him. He has invested a lot of money and time into this venture. Agree with his business or not this is real life to him. To us maybe it's a stupid forum. To him it's a lot more than that. If you met someone in person and came into their business and started harassing them and saying bad things about them to their clients. You would probibly be sued for slander. How is this any different? Why are we treating another human being this way?

You don't have to agree with it. You don't have to subscribe to the Puff lifestyle. Weather we think he deserves this or not. It's not really our call.


let it go..

OK. There is always a right way and wrong way to do business.

By the way I never slandered Jon to any member on that forum before I was banned, I expressed my concerns to him in a message.

[King James]

Originally Posted by Andyman

This is where the problem lies.

This is not just a cyber board. I have met many many people and consider many of you my friends. It's not just a game.

This brings me to my next point. Jon Caputo is a real person as well. Like him or hate him this is not a game to him. He has invested a lot of money and time into this venture. Agree with his business or not this is real life to him. To us maybe it's a stupid forum. To him it's a lot more than that. If you met someone in person and came into their business and started harassing them and saying bad things about them to their clients. You would probibly be sued for slander. How is this any different? Why are we treating another human being this way?

You don't have to agree with it. You don't have to subscribe to the Puff lifestyle. Weather we think he deserves this or not. It's not really our call.


let it go..

Although you make good points Andy.... in order to be slander something must be untrue and as far as I've read nobody has posted anything untrue about Jon publicly.

And to continue the office analogy it would be like fellow employees getting upset with a Boss who comes in and without explanation removes multiple long time and well respected supervisors and allows for no discussion about it.

Although some people are over there posting stuff to intentionally get banned, which isn't really my cup of tea but to each their own, Jon brought alot of this tension upon himself IMHO.

Maybe I'm wrong....and I still do agree that we should just let it go.

[Starscream]

Originally Posted by Andyman

This is where the problem lies.

This is not just a cyber board. I have met many many people and consider many of you my friends. It's not just a game.

This brings me to my next point. Jon Caputo is a real person as well. Like him or hate him this is not a game to him. He has invested a lot of money and time into this venture. Agree with his business or not this is real life to him. To us maybe it's a stupid forum. To him it's a lot more than that. If you met someone in person and came into their business and started harassing them and saying bad things about them to their clients. You would probibly be sued for slander. How is this any different? Why are we treating another human being this way?

You don't have to agree with it. You don't have to subscribe to the Puff lifestyle. Weather we think he deserves this or not. It's not really our call.


let it go..

I'm almost on board with you, Andy.

Originally Posted by andysutherland

I'm almost on board with you, Andy.

Good enough for me. Theres a good point in there someplace. Just look for it!!!

[white_s2k]

Originally Posted by andysutherland

I'm almost on board with you, Andy.

Almost. What Jon did to CS and his attitude afterwards deserves no respect. No matter who says it. Business or not, you don't disrespect people who have been there 5+ years and who helped build the sitethe way he did. But who cares, it will come back to bite him in the ass.

[Starscream]

http://www.puff.com/forums/vb/genera...nd-please.html

I'm now fully on board. It's too late for me to not be mad at the actions of the man who banned so many BOTLS, but I'm gonna follow Darrel and use the golden rule here. Although he doesn't deserve it by his actions, we should still treat the man as we would like to be treated. Yesterdays posts were legitimate questioning and he shut them down. Today's posts over there are just stirring the pot. I'm calling for a temporary ceasefire to all interested.


With that said, it's way past my bedtime. I got caught up in all the drama/comedy tonight. See you brothers/sisters in the morning.

[DrDubzz]

Originally Posted by andysutherland

http://www.puff.com/forums/vb/genera...nd-please.html

I can't read this, anyone feel like letting me know what it says


oooh the forbidden fruit!

[DrDubzz]

Originally Posted by white_s2k

Almost. What Jon did to CS and his attitude afterwards deserves no respect. No matter who says it. Business or not, you don't disrespect people who have been there 5+ years and who helped build the sitethe way he did. But who cares, it will come back to bite him in the ass.

there's been like 2-300 posts in this thread alone today

have they had that much activity total on the forums over there?

don't worry, Jon's actions will work themselves out

[Asher]

Originally Posted by RX2010

don't worry, Jon's actions will work themselves out

It puts a smile on my face just to think about how much money he must be losing.

[madurolover]

Originally Posted by Asher

It puts a smile on my face just to think about how much money he must be losing.

For some reason I do not think that Jon is hurting financially.

[DrDubzz]

Originally Posted by madurolover

For some reason I do not think that Jon is hurting financially.

well he certainly never spent much on cigars, anyone else remember that weak-A humidor? (in terms of what was in it, the humi wasn't half bad)

Originally Posted by madurolover

For some reason I do not think that Jon is hurting financially.

Well, not yet anyway.

This just goes to prove a point, you can buy a forum and webspace and serverspace. You can buy a logo and a list of users but you CAN'T buy people. We are not slaves or endentured servants and we the people will revolt, or is that we the people are revolting? Anyway, you catch my drift.

Cheers,
Rob

[a2vr6]

Originally Posted by madurolover

For some reason I do not think that Jon is hurting financially.

Not as former head sales for Sun, he was easily pulling in high 6 figures plus bonuses.

[Asher]

Originally Posted by madurolover

For some reason I do not think that Jon is hurting financially.

Maybe not, but between the costs of buying the sites (I don't know how much he paid for CS, CL, and CR, but his $50k offer for CigarPass is public knowledge), the "puff.com" domain name, graphic design, hosting, etc., I highly doubt that his investment is paying off the way he had hoped.

[white_s2k]

Originally Posted by madurolover

For some reason I do not think that Jon is hurting financially.

As we have seen in the past months.. money does not buy members. You may, or may not be a testament to that (publicly). But it is apparent.

[AAlmeter]

Originally Posted by Andyman

This is where the problem lies.

This is not just a cyber board. I have met many many people and consider many of you my friends. It's not just a game.

This brings me to my next point. Jon Caputo is a real person as well. Like him or hate him this is not a game to him. He has invested a lot of money and time into this venture. Agree with his business or not this is real life to him. To us maybe it's a stupid forum. To him it's a lot more than that. If you met someone in person and came into their business and started harassing them and saying bad things about them to their clients. You would probibly be sued for slander. How is this any different? Why are we treating another human being this way?

You don't have to agree with it. You don't have to subscribe to the Puff lifestyle. Weather we think he deserves this or not. It's not really our call.


let it go..

Agreed. I've actually been in contact with Jon a few times tonight (I'm just a gotta have the last word kinda guy).

After a request for "constructive feedback", I laid out much of this to him. Many resented him for taking over on the basis of profit. I think this is silly. The board had grown to the point where it could no longer be a hobby for anyone but the wealthy. It is silly to think that it wouldn't turn into that.

However, I did greatly criticize his actions in handling this initial backlash.

In my opinion, he is handled it with very little professionalism. I like to think of it as Walmart moving in on mom and pop. It sucks, but its the nature of the beast. However, for Walmart to start blacklisting people for not liking the change, asking what aisle the depends are in, etc is absolutely horrible business. From the standpoint of the community as well as the business that Jon now runs, its a bad move on his part.

However, I can fully understand Jon's frustration and anger in dealing with many...especially at the outset of the change, who in my opinion took every opportunity to cause trouble in the name of the community...a community which many of them had only been members of for a short period of time.

In my opinion, there has been altogether too much flexing of phony muscle on CS/Puff, from both sides of the aisle.

None of this detracts, in my opinion, from what I have witnessed with Jon, mainly his acting like an asshole, as well as any claims of his dishonesty, which I cannot verify or disprove.