"Targeted for telling the truth"

A blogger who was targeted in a co-ordinated attack against websites such as Facebook and Twitter has told the BBC he blames Russia for the assault.

The pro-Georgian blogger, known as Cyxymu, said he had been targeted for "telling the truth about the Russian-Georgian war" in his writings.

The attack caused a blackout of Twitter for about two hours on Thursday.
Despite the blogger's claims, security researchers say there is "no suggestion the attack was state-endorsed".

Google, Facebook and blogging platform Live Journal - all sites where Cyxymu had accounts - were also affected.

"I write the truth about the Russian-Georgian war and somebody did not like these truths - these people in Russia," the blogger told BBC News. "I don't know which people," he added.

The blogger, real name Georgy, has posted videos and blogs which criticise Russia over its conduct in the war over the South Ossetia region, which began one year ago.

"It's a big surprise to me that my blog has meant that 250m people have not been able to enter Facebook," he said.

Rhodri Morgan Appreciation Society revisited

From time to time I keep my eye on Rhodri's fans on Facebook. You may remember my report back in August 2008:

Back in September 2007 a Facebooker set-up the group 'Rhodri Morgan Appreciation Society'. The group had 20 members when the above snapshot was taken in January 2008.

"This group is for people who think that Rhodri Morgan has been a great leader of the Welsh Labour Party and a Brilliant First Minister of Wales. Rhodri Morgan has lead Wales a progressive direction over his years as First Minister. With good socialist policies like free prescriptions, or his support for the Welsh Language, Rhodri Morgan has done a lot to improve Wales, and help the worst off in Wales."

Still at 20 members at today's date, it seems that not many Facebookers agree with the above statement. Glad to see that Alun Davies AM and Joyce Watson AM are members. Are the other Labour AMs trying to tell us something?

On the plus side for our great leader, only 4 Facebookers belong to Rhodri's other group, 'Is it just just me or does Rhodri Morgan need a new suit?'

"A group totally dedicated to the fact old Rhodri has looked shabby in his
suit for years. Surely its high time the old man of welsh politics bought a new
suit?"

In Rhodri's final (depending on expected and unexpected circumstances) year, the membership has risen to 32, and 6 respectively. Makes you wonder why more Labour AM Facebookers haven't joined up with the growing number of fans.

Who'll be the first to set up the Carwyn Jones or Huw Lewis Appreciation Society?

Up a network ladder and down a slippery Facebook snake

During my prolonged absence from blogging - from reading blogs, writing blogs, talking about blogs and sometimes even dreaming about blogs or bloggers - I continued to play about with my second attempt at Farcebook membership.

Sadly (boo, hiss!), my second attempt ended up in the same black hole as my first attempt, but without all the fuss.

Hey! Ho! There's still a Blog Network to join. Perhaps I should revert to my maiden name for my third and final attempt, and slip below the radar.

Facebook slip forces juror dismissal

A juror has been dismissed from a trial in the UK after sharing details of the case on her Facebook profile.

Apparently she was unable to decide whether the defendants in a child abduction and assault case were guilty, so thought the best course of action would be to ask all her friends and relatives.

And, given her privacy settings were apparently not activated, the whole of the internet as well.
"I don't know which way to go, so I'm holding a poll" she wrote.

Dismissed

She was obviously dismissed for breaching one of the fundamental rules of jury service, after court officials received an anonymous tip-off.

While Facebook has been the source of numerous embarrassments over the years for countless people, it has also caused real trouble for people in their jobs, including the footballer who accidentally let slip he was going for a trial at another club, and an Australian man who was caught skiving off work when pretending to be ill.

[Pippa Wagstaff is currently on a blogging break]

Anniversary

Today is my blogging anniversary or birthday

12 months
330 posts
368 labels

63,102 hits
2,556 Facebook friends before disablement
5 awards
3 bans

5 offers of coffee by the bay
2 threats of legal action

1 offer of dinner
1 offer of marriage

and countless cases of abuse and sexual harassment

Whoever said blogging is dull?

One day of the year when you can be seen as special

It just happens to be a long solitary walk to retirement and a handsome pension waiting for little achievement, and an even lower public and political respectability from your peers and critics, for one person.

It also happens to be the the First Minister's 69th birthday tomorrow. This blog wishes him a happy birthday. Put your feet up on the office sofa with your glass of orange juice to read your papers. Delegate more to others for just one day. Sit back and enjoy the one day of the year that you can be seen as special.

Are you sitting comfortably? Good.

I have some bad news!

Not only has someone summed up your ministerial career in a way that makes you Wales' very own Gordon Brown:

Damn right: Rhodri Morgan is the biggest disappointment to happen to Welsh Labour devolutionary hopes since Ron Davies had his moment of madness. At least
Ron hasn't given up on politics, which Rhodri clearly has. They sat on him over the Richard Commission, they undermined his ministership at every turn. He was so demoralised and knackered he had to sit back and watch while London Labour
launched its viciously anti-Welsh hacks, and now he's waiting to retire so he can watch some golf. What a waste of undoubted talent. The man has become invisible and irrelevant.

The party had high hopes of him, those of us at least who thought the future was devolution. He's like Gordon Brown: spent all his time wanting the job, then when he gets it is a big soggy squib.

Don't be downhearted, it gets better. In August I reported that Rhodri's Facebook group "Rhodri Morgan Appreciation Society" had remained static in membership. September 2007, 20 members; August 2008, 20 members. There's good news in that the membership has risen to 22 in time for his birthday.

I hear you say there must be a BUT.

The bad news is that Welsh Labour's Communications Officer Martyn Williams, and Luke Ellis 'number two' of Minister Carwyn Jones have both left the society.

Life can sometimes be difficult. Congratulations must be given to Assembly Members, Alun Davies and Joyce Watson for remaining members.

Happy Birthday for tomorrow, First Minister.

Spies like us

I always seem to find something to read after clearing out the rubbish and old newspapers when recycling. This leads me on to a type of recycling of my own - old posts.

The following piece is from the South Wales Echo and just happens to have been published on the same day as I announced that Facebook had erased my account. After reading the following article, I suddenly realised that Mr Wagstaff will have to check Jnr's web activity when he's old enough to use a computer. My experience of Facebook may have been one of eradication, but at least the experience didn't go as far as another young mum of Cardiff. Brings a whole new meaning to the modern philosophy of "Every little helps".

CHILDREN as young as eight in South Wales are logging on to social network sites like Facebook, forcing concerned parents to go online to spy on them.

Thousands of schoolchildren claim to be using the popular sites, despite the minimum age for registration on the majority being 13. And nearly two thirds (60%) admit to posting personal information online, such as mobile phone numbers, addresses and where they go to school.

Fears over young social networkers have prompted two thirds (66%) of parents to take matters into their own hands by secretly logging on to their children’s networking page to snoop on them.

An astonishing 34% have even gone as far as setting up their own social networking page to spy on their children, according to research out today from online identity experts Garlik.

Today there were calls for the three biggest sites – Bebo, MySpace and Facebook – to take their age restriction policies more seriously.

But online experts say it is too easy for children to lie about their age on the internet, and instead urged parents and teachers to educate their children about the dangers of using websites for social networking.

Rhodri Morgan Appreciation Society

Back in September 2007 a Facebooker set-up the group 'Rhodri Morgan Appreciation Society'. The group had 20 members when the above snapshot was taken in January 2008.

This group is for people who think that Rhodri Morgan has been a great leader of
the Welsh Labour Party and a Brilliant First Minister of Wales. Rhodri Morgan
has lead Wales a progressive direction over his years as First Minister. With
good socialist policies like free prescriptions, or his support for the Welsh
Language, Rhodri Morgan has done a lot to improve Wales, and help the worst off
in Wales.

Still at 20 members at today's date, it seems that not many Facebookers agree with the above statement. Glad to see that Alun Davies AM and Joyce Watson AM are members. Are the other Labour AMs trying to tell us something?

On the plus side for our great leader, only 4 Facebookers belong to Rhodri's other group, 'Is it just just me or does Rhodri Morgan need a new suit?'

A group totally dedicated to the fact old Rhodri has looked shabby in his suit for years. Surely its high time the old man of welsh politics bought a new suit?

The Radio Audio of blogging civil servants, and Miss Wagstaff on Facebook

In case you missed the discussion on 'Good Evening Wales' about recent events in the Welsh blogosphere and Facebook, Matt Wardman has kindly placed the audio on his blog.

We were talking about the restrictions on blogging Civil Servants in Wales, in the light of Miss Wagstaff’s expulsion from Facebook.

I’m delighted that Peter Black AM was more controversial than I was. Welsh Assembly Government “stalinist” indeed - ouch!

The only missing point that perhaps needed to be made was a detailed one that the Christopher Glamorganshire sacking case happened before the “Principles for Participation Online” were officially adopted in England.

I also didn’t get the chance to suggest that the Welsh Assembly Government are perhaps having their internal culture inspired too much by the Torchwood programme episodes set in the 1940s. A problem of working too close to a film set, perhaps.

Peter Black’s final point about the need for consultation with employees is excellent, and it seems to me that - if the Welsh Assembly Government can adopt the Civil Service Code itself with virtually no changes - then it can’t be very difficult to adopt a 79-word set of principles (warning: pic of Government Minister at end of link !).

Live at 17:30 - Good Evening Wales: Welsh Blogging and Facebook

Unfortunately, I'm unavailable for comment, however, my old blogging friend Matt Wardman will be taking part in the radio programme, Good Evening Wales a little later today (just after 5:30) talking about Welsh Political Blogging by Civil Servants from the point of view of an “outsider”, as a result of the coverage he has been giving to the Christopher Glamorganshire case in Wales, and also the Civil Serf case before that.

Matt writes:

I expect to be talking about the difference in attitudes to political blogging by Civil Servants in England and Wales. I am told that Peter Black AM will be joining us.

I think this is the first time in my life that I will have been on the Radio with a real politician. Is that good or bad?

I wonder if I can get a statement from Tom Watson by 5:00pm that the Principles for Online Participation apply in Wales as well as England?

Farcebook
Good Evening Wales are doing this piece because a Welsh Political Blogger - Miss Wagstaff - has been thrown off Facebook because allegations had been made that she was running a “Fake Account”.

You can read the account here. The serious point was that they just swallowed the allegations hook, line and sinker and took action with even checking. That looks far too reminiscent of what many webhosts do in respond to letters alleging defamation for me to be comfortable with it.

As Miss W says, "Why not raise the question with me of the possibility of ‘real and fake names’ in the first instance - before deactivation."

Research Question
Anyway - do you know anyone else that this has happened to, since Facebook seem to be making more than a little of an arse of themselves on this one. The problem seems to be one of action taken on the basis of allegations with no fact checking. I’ve been digging for a few minutes and I have found:

Last December Facebook told Steve Webb MP that he was an imposter and deleted his account. That may be true of the new Lib Dem satellite tracking policy pretending not to be Big Brother, but I think I believe that Steve Webb MP is himself.

Valleys Mam has also had problems.

Does anybody know of any others that are interesting or amusing?

I note that Genghis Kahn has an account. Presumably he is impersonating Alistair Campbell.

Any more for any more?

Wiped from the Face (book) of the earth

"Facebook is a social utility that connects you with the people around you." No longer, thanks to the Facebook fascists!

It seems that due to a number of complaints from Labour party members [including a reasonably well-known UK blogger; a Labour Special Adviser; and a member of the National Assembly] and one from a member of Plaid Cymru, my Facebook account is no more.

Those that want to spread a little affection can still join the Miss Wagstaff Presents blog network.
I noticed on 17 July that my account had been disabled:

Dear Sir/Madam,

I have just been informed that my account has been disabled without a warning or explanation. Would you be so kind as to explain the reason why.

Yours,

Pippa Wagstaff (Wales)

On 21 July 2008 I received this response from Facebook:

Hi,
Fake accounts are a violation of our Terms of Use. Facebook requires users to provide their real first and last names. Impersonating anyone or anything is prohibited. Unfortunately, we will not be able to reactivate this account for any reason. This decision is final.

Thanks for your understanding,

Bella
User Operations
Facebook

Fair enough, I thought! Wrong use of "Thanks for your understanding" was another. But why not raise the question with me of the possibility of 'real and fake names' in the first instance - before deactivation.

I wrote back with the following:

Thank you for getting back to me. I can assure you that I am not impersonating anyone or anything. Pippa Wagstaff is my real name, and I have even noticed - to my surprise - that there are others with that name on Facebook.

I hope that you will reconsider.

Kind regards,
Pippa

I should have known better and atleast I'm happy with the name Pippa Wagstaff. I'm slightly disturbed that they haven't even asked me if this is my real name. As I've mentioned, there are others with this name on Facebook - I was curious and looked them up. In fact, there are plenty with some weird and wonderful names on Facebook that haven't been deleted, and I say good luck to them.

I can only imagine that this will put others off from joining Facebook, if their genuine names and account can be deleted without a hint of warning, and with such contempt for the person who joined in the first place. I just hope that like me they don't rely on the social network to keep in touch with others, or they could be in for a shock some day.

In the real world they shouldn't have done this without checking all the facts first. I expect it's too late to reinstate in my case.

Banned internally by the Welsh Assembly Government. Now erased from Facebook without them even questioning me about my identity. I don't know what the world is coming to, but admit that thankfully I will now have an extra 20-30 minutes spare each day. This got me thinking about how much time some of us dedicate to online networking, and maybe we should take note and all free up some extra time in our daily lives and do something more meaningful.

This is a non-aligned blog, but the evidence demonstrates that it must be getting under someone's skin. It's just a shame that I know who - it spoils the surprise!

Assembly IT: Surf's up for staff

Senior management of the Welsh Assembly Government are taking an increasingly harsh approach to abuses of the Assembly IT system; and even to information put up on the internet by staff in their own time or at home.

Throughout 2007 many staff have received final warnings for forwarding risque pictures by e-mail, and already this year PCS is supporting members facing disciplinary actions due to their use of IT. Management aren't interested in debating what is an inappropriate image. When it comes to IT they are the reincarnation of the Puritans. Understandably, they want to avoid what happened in the DVLA, where explicit images were circulated, leading to 18 sackings and another 148 staff being disciplined following a huge amount of negative media coverage.

Assembly Minister Brian Gibbons' act of online listening to 'The Archers' during a Senedd debate would have landed him with a disciplinary - were he an Assembly member of staff.

One of the biggest online developments in recent years has been the growth of social networking sites such as MySpace, Bebo and Facebook. Here people create online profiles of themselves, exchange public messages and post photos and videos online. PCS strongly advise members not to declare that they work for the Assembly, especially if their members post compromising photos of themselves or make political statements.

Some companies even check peoples' online profiles, to vet if they are suitable for employment; and once an online profile has been set up it can be very difficult to remove. PCS urge members to be very careful as to what they say online, as some of their members have run into trouble and been subjected to disciplinary proceedings following comments made on blogs.

[Source: PCS Wales]

Why won't Plaid AMs/MPs be my friend?

I started writing this post a few days ago and wanted to post when it was time for a lighthearted moment.

Some of you will probably notice that I have joined Facebook, particularly as I've a link to my profile on my blog (top right). Most of you have been generous and have welcomed becoming my friend, however, I just can't seem to convince a Plaid AM/MP to join my family of new friends.

To date, members from all parties have joined me as 'Facebook friends'. Since originally typing this, to my delight Bethan Jenkins AM confirmed friendship on Tuesday, however, she's the only one.

There was talk in the comments section of an earlier post today that my account had been suspended, but I'm sure that it was just a technical hiccup and not down to a complaint as suggested. This lady is offering the hand of friendship to all, and as we know, there's nothing wrong with that. Anyway, to my further delight the account is now active again.

It's been said on Facebook that I'm taking you all out for a drink when I reach 200 friends - gulp - my purse isn't big enough for all that loose change!

Remember that the hand of friendship has no colour or party affiliation.