NO, I guess I wasn't clear.
When you 'send' an e-mail through gardenweb to someone a couple things happen. Even though you write the message in a web interface, YOUR personal e-mail account is attatched to it, and it is sent to your recipients PERSONAL e-mail account.
Point of origin on private messages does NOT give you the right to scan a message for spam, for instance, if I were to write an e-mail using a hotmail account, even though all the mail transactions are being handled by their server Hotmail does NOT have the right to scan my e-mail for content. They CAN check to see if I am sending it to 50,000 people without invading private content, that is fine. But what is happening here is not scanning for SPAM, it is more akin to a prison opening an inmates mail. Last I checked, none of us were gardenweb convicts. THey simply don't have the right under the law to scan e-mail based posts.
They can scan what goes up on their public boards to their hearts content, all perfectly legal. I do not have a problem, nor does anyone here I think, witht he fact that after the 'drive by spamming' gardenweb went in and removed every reference to petflytrap. They should have and did do the right thing in that instance. (As much as I don't like it)
However as has been stated before, the mention of petflytrap was banned BEFORE any drive by spamming, petflytrap was banned because Spike for some reason doesn't like two of the nicest guys I like, Phil and jEf,f owners of petflytrap. Petflytrap is a competitor, the only other viable commercial cp operation that offers forums, and those forums steal his business, i.e. spike no likey. It is realyl quite simple.
Look at it this way, there are a lot of other plant nurseries out there that are allowed to be mentioned on gw, and the posts are not removed. why do they remove petflytrap posts (BEFORE) the 'drive by spamming'? simple, the reasons stated above.
That fact can not be worked around, circumvented, or challenged in any way. It's simple. CAUSE AND EFFECT. the use of the words petflytrap were banned, a members private e-mail was scanned, delivery most likely stopped, and the user banned, and then an outcry of public support for that banned member which unfortunately took the shape of a 'drive by spamming'. the issues that all of us have with Gardenweb come from BEFORE all of this.
Heck, this forum became REALLY REALLY ACTIVE because Phil, Jeff, and myself went out and hunted down the people that had been banned from GW for offering freee seed, discussing trades, and linking to petflytrap over a YEAR ago. Many of the core members here, peopel who helped pump this forum into the giant it is today, are all 'garden web rejects.'
And let me point something else out... You can take it to heart that our feelings for gardenweb are all in the past, prior to our very public show of support for Pyro, because at this given moment in time, I dont think very many of us give a flying flip about spike and his forums. I check in every month or so just to see how slow things have really gotten. It would take Garden Web a YEAR to accumulate a weeks worth of posts on Petflytrap. The place is history, spike ran off most of his users, and has only himself to blame for it.
Now, not to sound like a petflytrap propoganda merchant, but plain and simple, this place is the future of Carnivorous Plants, it is the only CP nursery I know of that makes regular donations for CP habitat restoration and protection. It has a vibrant and growing community, and a web presence, that quite frankly, blows away every one else, sure, there are other great nurseries out there, and many of us like them, they are guys and gals who sell their plants and make a good living off something they love, and that is GREAT, but petflytrap strives to be more, we want to tell the WORLD about these plants, we want to make as many species available to everyone as we can, all in a very responsible manner.
Moreover, we want to share that information as freely as possible, and it is that very thing that makes this place great, the fact that anyone can come here, and within 24 hours, almost every single time have a high quality answer to their questions, that they can come here and be a part of a community, a family if you will, of people who plain and simple love these plants, not how much is made off the advertising banners on their site.
I think that pretty much covers it.