Press Release - Michela Ecks folds, FLF gloats
RDRivero
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The following message is brought to you buy the astute reporter, Kinch
Gallagher. Here is the information he has compiled on the latest events.
Michela Ecks Folds, Fanfiction.net Liberation Front Gloats
This week it was announced that Michela Ecks, former Fanfiction.net
administrator and founder of Writers University, had declared herself
"dead."
Ecks's decision to discontinue use of her name did not come as much of a
surprise to both Fanfiction.net administrators and the Fanfiction.net
Liberation Front who had been following Ecks's rather unseemly actions for
months.
Writers University (www.writersu.s5.com/what.html) issued a statement this
week dealing with the figurative "death" of Michela Ecks. "Michela Ecks is
dead? In a sense, yes," the statement read. "In reality, the person who is
Michela Ecks has given up Writers University and decided to take a break
from the Internet because of professional, academic, personal and Internet
related reasons."
The statement did not specify on these reasons. Instead, this was offered:
"The net related stuff made participating in on-line culture unpleasant and
added additional stress that Michela Ecks didn't need at the moment."
The statement concluded with this blunt assertion: "Michela Ecks is
estenially dead."
Michela Ecks was best known for her inception of Writers University, a site
devoted to educating young writers on fanfiction, the legal aspects of
fanfiction, and the nature of fandom.
Writers University had a brief stint with Fanfiction.net, its original host
site. However, a widely publicized falling-out between Ecks and Ff.net
administrators left Writers Univeristy essentially out in the cold.
Ecks is remembered for her rather brash statements to the administrators and
to the Ff.net community at the time of the split in January 2001. In a
seven-page manifesto published on every message board at Fanfiction.net,
Ecks declared, "My resignation is not just a resignation from the site but a
complete dissociation with the site. Because the actions were so upsetting,
offense and petty, I want NOTHING to do with FanFiction.Net at this point."
Ecks proclaimed that she had endured abuse at the hands of Ff.net
administrators. Ecks wrote, "I have been repeatedly lied to by Steven
Savage. I do not tolerate liars. I will NOT be associated with liars."
No evidence was ever found to support this allegation against Steven Savage.
Fanfiction.net did not dignify Ecks's comments, but simply issued a
statement on their sadness over the departure of Writers Univeristy.
Speculations on Ecks's mental health at the time still loom. A week ago, a
person using the name "smear me" reported that "the creator of Writer's
University actually had a nervous breakdown and had to be hospitalized for a
few weeks."
This claim was unfounded, and Ecks asserted that it was untrue. "The part
that STEAMS ME AND STEAMS ME BAD is that fanfiction.net Writers University
connection," she said in a statement issued under the name "Spaz." "One of
your [...] posts said I was hospitalized for several weeks. I CATERGORICALLY
DENY THAT. I was not, nor have I been hospitalized during the past eight
months."
These allegations over Ecks's mental state may have furthered the decision
to dispose of the Michela Ecks alias. Members of the Fanfiction.net
Liberation Front had reportedly taken to calling Ecks "Princess Prozac" for
her erratic behavior and willingness to impersonate others on message
boards.
The Fanfiction.net Liberation Front is a faction devoted to protecting user
rights and privacy on Fanfiction.net, as well as encouraging more freedom of
speech in the Fanfiction.net forums.
The FLF was "extremely saddened and disappointed" in Ecks's earlier
behavior. In May, Ecks sided with Fanfiction.net in the decision to ban
long-time author RD for the crime of "flame-bait", despite the fact that
Ecks was no longer a part of the Ff.net staff.
According to Lucifer Daimaou, "The final Strike, of course, came about the
time of RD's departure from fu.net, and the rest of us following close
behind--when Michela denounced me as making a 'threat' when all I was asking
for was a cease-fire. After that, things fell into place pretty much the way
they should have to begin with--all of us smart people on one side, Ecks and
Fu.net on the other."
The FLF expressed joy at the fact that Ecks had declared herself "dead."
Toasts were made earlier this evening.
"And so, as we bid farewell to Ecks," said Daimaou, "we bid farewell not to
just a person, or a shaft-kisser, but to an era--an era of elitism and
stupidity."
RD was more blunt: "we have, in less than five months, caused the total and
complete destruction of one of the shaft's biggest ass-lickers. and if you
thought that victory was enough to satisfy our blood lust then you'd be
wrong, you'd be very wrong [...] we shall bury you in obscurity!"
SharasEgypt was perhaps the most tactful, issuing this statement: "Oh well,
see ya Michela. Glad I hardly knew you...wish it could have been never knew
you."
The FLF was angry at Ecks's latest transgression, using access to accounts
to impersonate Lucifer Daimaou on a public message board in an attempt to
ruin his reputation. These suspicions were confirmed when Ecks's ISP number
matched the imposter's.
On the "Godawful Message Board," (www.voy.com/13774/) others were found
discussing Ecks's death.
A person by the name of StapledC said, "She has done a lot of awful things
in the past few months like tarnishing the Mary Sue Whipple name (borderline
plagiarism, no?), starting a war with Steven Savage at fanfiction.net, and
impersonating people on this board. The internet is a much better place
without her. She supposedly preaches tolerance, but then goes and plays
awful tricks on people. I'm glad to see her go."
Ecks's reputation proceeds her. Author Alice Karvonen Allonway and creator
of Mary Sue Whipple was upset when she discovered that Ecks was using the
Mary Sue Whipple pen name.
From www.sff.net/people/thyme/howandwho.htp --
"And most especially," Allonway writes, "I want to disassociate from Mary
Sue the petty behavior of one member of the writing collaborative, who had
been the self-appointed MSW of FanFiction.Net-due to a personal argument
with the owner of FF.Net, she removed all Mary Sue content (without asking
and/or mentioning it to any of the other authors) and declared herself the
One True Mary Sue (likewise without consultation or notification of any
other author). I wasn't even a witness to these events; I only heard second
hand, months after the fact, and not from her."
Undoubtedly, fans of Writers University and Ecks's work will be saddened by
her departure. But others, namely the FLF, are thrilled by this sudden turn
of events.
Ecks's penchant for humor will not be forgotten. Today, a member of the FLF
commented, "What I like best about the deceased Ecks is how she managed to
write her eulogy in third-person. Either she aspires to be Bob Dole or she's
clearly lost her mind."
News compiled by Kinch Gallagher, the friendly neighborhood muckraker.