On November 23, 1999, Derek Smart had the Anatomy of a Flame War (http://www.access1.net/huffman) web site taken down. The purpose of this page is to give my personal thoughts on the matter during that time.

In my assessment of the situation, I gave absolutely ZERO credibility to Derek's claim that he had the FBI, the local authorities, and California lawyers all working on the case. I believe Derek to be a pathological liar. He had been making impotent threats very frequently and for years. This is the story of the boy who cried wolf and cried wolf again and again, recorded the crying of wolf on a dozen tapes and played them all back simultaneously and continuously. This is an area where Derek has pulled out all the stops in his fabrication of lies. He had been saying that he had California lawyers working on the case since at least early July. I'd expect to hear from any lawyer that Derek hired within a few days of him being retained. Derek's complaints were baseless. I know of no law against Internet stalking and harassment. Even if there were such laws, all I had done is truthfully point out that Mr. Smart doesn't have the PhD that he claims in his posting signature. His claims of libel are totally bogus and without merit because the truth is a complete defense to libel. He is a flat out academic fraud. I consider it highly unlikely that he has even earned a bachelor degree. I've offered to take down this web site and disappear from the flame war if he'd name the school he got an accredited bachelor degree at.

My thought at the time was that Derek had simply violated my right to freedom of speech. I saw three reasonable paths I could take. One, I could just give up my flame war hobby. Two, I could fight Mr. Smart in court. Three, I could bounce my web site from place to place while Derek and his lawyer kept taking it down. The third choice I immediately rejected. It would just be a bunch of uninteresting boring work on my part. It also seemed unattractive from the point of view that Derek had drawn a line in the sand and was daring me to step across it. The third choice would just be stepping around the line and ignoring the challenge. So, the third choice was immediately rejected for multiple reasons. I had pretty much set my mind on the second choice, fighting for my right to freedom of speech. I figured that I've spent more than a few thousand bucks on some of my other hobbies. Also, there were many offers from other participants and flame war lurkers to assist in any legal fees. This was my mindset when Derek called.

On November 24, Derek called me at work. His main theme was, "I just want this all to stop!" He repeated this theme many times and in many different ways, "I'm not doing any chest beating. I just want it to stop." "This is just a hobby for you but I can't afford for it to go on." I repeated to Derek that it really was within his power to end it on his own. I told Derek on the phone that I wasn't interested in trying to put up my web site someplace else. I also told him that I didn't think I would be posting in the flame war any more, at least not for a while. I tried to make it clear to him that I was doing this on my own and not because I was making a deal or was concerned about his impotent threats. My thought was that if I did start legal proceedings it would not be wise to post in the flame war during that period.

At the time I had not heard from Access1. My assumption was that Derek had used his lawyer to indemnify Access1 from any possible legal action on my part. This of course meant that he had to accept that responsibility. This was my assumption based on what I understood AOL's response to be when Derek was trying to get Fthx's site pulled down. Later that evening I called Access1, to my surprise they had terminated my account on their own without even contacting me first! I wrote them an email. They called back and were much more accommodating. I think that they would have put the site back up if I hadn't given them the option of refunding my money. I thought that since the freebie Angelfire site was down anyway I'd have to do most of the link editing anyway. I might as well get out from under the Access1 bill now. I'd been using a cable modem company for months. The only purpose for the Access1 site was that I was too lazy to move the site. So Derek claimed that he'd taken down the sites because they were harassment and/or libel. Well the jokes on me, I believed a Derek lie! he-he It turns out that the little exploding head at the top of both sites was copyrighted by Mr. Smart! I believe it was still actually protected by freedom of speech but I would have been suing Access1 and Angelfire not Mr. Smart.

That means that the line drawn in the sand by Derek was not even really there. So I decided to draw my own line in the sand by putting the site back up under my Road Runner cable modem account. Rest assured that if Mr. Smart tries to take this site down he will have a fight on his hands that I believe he cannot win.

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