US Hawks Hang Gliding Association

On March 7th, 2011, Axo (posting to hanggliding.org) wrote:Logged in tonight and the site's got so many invasive ads breaking the interface.
I understand the need but can't they be placed in a way that does not interfere with the functionality of the site?

Had to spent 3 minutes blocking the frames and DIVs.. now its clean back for me...

That's a problem for sites that exist to build a profit ... rather than to build a community.

When I was on hanggliding.org, I got several messages from Jack warning me about not posting too many "political" topics because they turned people off. I'm sure that's true for some people, but news and information about the problems at Torrey and later at USHPA needed a place where they could be heard. I was always walking a tight rope there (and on the Oz Report). Eventually Jack squashed any opposing views by kicking people off his forum and threatening people who even mentioned the names of those he'd banned.

Imagine ... banning people and forbidding anyone from even mentioning their names. Sounds like "1984" ... in progress.

Google Stalking the "Band of Brothers" For Profit


Here's Jack Axaopoulos' extortionist reply. The thread will probably be deleted
Tue Mar 08, 2011 10:37 am Post subject: #4

Jack Axaopoulos:
Without the AD's this site would not exist, because only a tiny tiny percentage of people donate.
Blame the people who never donate.
Threads like this make me want to shut it down.

Also, Davis Straub's Misleading Disclaimer:

The Oz Report will never sell or give away your e-mail address (which is all we have) to any outside party, ever! We will never send you any other unrequested e-mail (other than a thank you for donations), besides the daily Oz Report. All unsubscribe requests will be honored as soon as humanly possible. Of course, you can unsubscribe at any time on your own.

Davis Straub, specifically talks about e-mail addresses but fails to mention how he gets direct income from data mining, stalking/targeting people on his commercialized "Oz Report" blog.
No telling how much Davis Straub earns just from his porn ads, alone..

From hanggliding.org (http://www.hanggliding.org/viewtopic.php?t=21179), Jack responds:

"Without the AD's this site would not exist, because only a tiny tiny percentage of people donate. Blame the people who never donate. Threads like this make me want to shut it down."

First of all, the premier forum for hang gliding should be supported by someone who loves hang gliding ... not someone who's trying to make a buck by selling ads to the highest bidder.

Second, I actually sent Jack a good chunk of cold cash to show my support a while back. What did I get in return? I got kicked off for using the phrase "SGAA" to refer to his heavy handed tactics on the HGAA forum. Then I got slandered by Jack who defaced our club's web site which he registered and refused to return to us (visit torreyhawksforum.org some time to see how he's treated our club).

Third, he continues to threaten to shut down hanggliding.org like a spoiled child who's going to take his ball and go home. Boo hoo Jack. That's a hollow threat because if you shut it down then people would find other sites ... like the US Hawks. In fact, it's funny that the existence of the US Hawks ensures that Jack will NEVER shut down hanggliding.org again because he couldn't stand to see people come here.

So rather than shut it down, he'll just keep on selling out his members to the highest bidder.

Oh, and one more comment. Jack goes on to say how little he makes on the site "I make about 11 cents/hour on this site". Well the flip side of that is that he's essentially saying that he'll happily annoy his members with ads for a measly 11 cents an hour. What does that say about how much he values his members? I guess they're each worth about 11 cents an hour ... divided by the number of members. Go ahead and do the math.