Yesterday, I was disgusted when a post by Thunder offering sympathy for his brother's serious medical problems was deleted.

Today, I am equally shocked that a thoughtful and unoffensive post by Weatherlight is being deleted, apparently merely because it points out that a moderator is unethical.

It's time for the Utopian people to take back their message boards!!! And the Utopian Council for the Defense of Freedom of Expression (UCDFE) is here to guide you in what YOU can do to help bring about positive changes in the administration of the message boards.

These are our demands:

1. Moderators be limited in number to ten.

2. Moderators be instructed to delete ONLY such posts as may be considered obscene, posts that feature communications that are banned by the laws of Texas or the United States (for example, a pedophile attempting meet children,) posts that are clearly spam (i.e. repetitious and/or nonsensical posts originating from a single user or group of users with the intention of disrupting the boards), and finally posts that are of a commercial nature (those morons who post about alladvantage et. al.)

3. Moderators who fail to follow those deletion guidelines be summarily dismissed.

4. A system of tracking which moderator deletes what be implemented.

5. A trusted person be allowed to verify that such a system is indeed in place and that moderators are indeed dismissed when they break the rules.

This is our program for forcing these changes to occur.

1. Publicity

C. We ask that you contact other players (a mass message on ICQ would do nicely) informing them of your membership in the UCDFE and asking them to join.

2. Passive Resistance

A. The UCDFE is calling for a general strike against the following Utopian message boards: General Talk, Strategy, and Bugs and Suggestions. We ask that members who are addicted to posting limit their activities to Politics for the duration of the general strike, except for the publicizing of the UCDFE cause.

B. The UCDFE asks that each member write one e-mail to [email protected] asking Mehul Patel to reform his use of moderators in accordance with the demands of the UCDFE.

How many industries have been forced to accede to the demands made by strikers? How many countries have been overthrown by groups of well-intentioned citizens struggling against corruption and oppression in the same manner that we are? We HAVE the power to succeed. We HAVE the program that will lead us to success. If every Utopian player who wants to see a positive change invests just a few minutes of his time in following the program of the UCDFE, we will make that positive change.

Thank you for reading. Let's make Utopia better for everyone.

A sample post for the Utopian message boards.

Tired of unjust and unfair mods? Disgusted with moderators who have no respect for others' rights? Join the Utopian Council for the Defense of Freedom of Expression. Visit our website at http://www.fortunecity.com/business/redstone/1383/. Together we can make a difference!

A sample ICQ mass message.

Hi everyone! Just thought I'd let you know that I've gotten fed up with the moderators on the main message boards. I've joined the UCDFE and would like you to join it too, so that we can get Mehul and the mods to clean up their act. If you are interested, please visit http://www.fortunecity.com/business/redstone/1383/ so that you can help us make things better.

A sample e-mail to Mehul Patel (send to [email protected])

Dear Mr. Patel,

I am writing to you because I am concerned about the abuses that are continually being perpetrated by some of your moderators. I would like to ask you to discontinue the practice of letting mods ban posters, to limit the number of moderators you employ, and to restrict moderator activities to deleting 1.) obscene or illegal posts, 2.) commercial posts, and 3.) spam. Please show that Utopia is big enough for freedom of speech.

Sincerely,