Mr. Sam Sloan, a board member of the USCF, recently posted a link to a porn site to 5 different forums, including the official USCF forum where children do have full access to. He worded his post in a way to create curiosity to the readers to purposely get them to click on the porn link. Members would have no way of knowing that the link would lead to something bad because the name of the link is a chess name.
I wrote to the Executive Board and as usual, they have done nothing. Countless people have complained about this and again no actions are taken.
What actions should be taken for a sitting board member promoting pornography to minors?
This was the original post:
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Having spent approximately one million dollars to finance ###, the ### Chess Foundation has finally decided on a new way to raise funds and improve its finances.
It is hoped that this plan will be successful and that the ### Chess Foundation will be able to start funding ###.
To see the new plan of the ### Chess Foundation to improve its finances, just go to the ### Chess Foundation website, which is at: #######
I clicked on the link. I could have been fired if I would have done that at work. This is a criminal activity. He needs to be suspended from the USCF for 10 years.
If a person knowingly placed a porn link on a site frequented by minors, he should be removed indefinately from the forum.
Sometimes people forget exactly what the Internet is. Because of this they tend to ignore common sense.
Let me make this analogy. Imagine if someone walked into a Chucky Cheese and laid a porn magazine in the middle of the skeeball area. What would happen to them? I would guess not only would they be banned from the establishment, but police would become involved.
The USCF EB should have contacted the FBI and let them deal with him. This is a criminal act. Don Schultz and company should also resign immediately for failing to do anything.
I don’t get it… why is this guy allowed to continue to post after all of his shenanigans?
I was darned close to clicking on that link while at work during lunch. I am glad that I didn’t.
Thanks for raising this issue.
Sincerely,
Gregory Alexander
What I’m amazed the most is other candidates didn’t seem to care either. The only people who said something were Susan, Mikhail Korenman and Paul Truong. Well, I know who I will vote for, don’t I?
The person responsible should be barred from the board for life and criminal charges pursued. Any attempt to expose children to anything of this type is absolutely deplorable. Parents nowadays have a difficult enough emphasizing to their children to stay true to their morals and upright beliefs and do not need guys like this around. The ongoing cheating problem also speaks volumes to the decay in today’s society. Thankfully, not all people are low lifes. Thank you for bring it to our attention.
Dan in Cleveland
Abhorent! Criminal charges should be pursued with FBI and banning s/b done immediately.
It’s the duty of the board to contact the authority such as the police, FBI, etc.
If they didn’t do this to protect one of their own, they should all resign. And Schultz wants another 4 years?
No way!
Has it been absolutely established that Sam Sloan posted the information? Forum posts and the like may be spoofed (depending on the forum software).
IF it can be reliably traced back to Sam Sloan, he should be banned for life from USCF and the proper authorities must become involved.
I dont have access to the real USCF site to check any of this…
Kerry,
It is 100% that Mr. Sloan made that post. I saw it in the USCF forum. He also posted to his own forum.
Best wishes,
Susan Polgar
http://www.PolgarChess.com
For a USCF board member to post a link to a porn site on the official USCF forum shows extremely poor judgment, too poor and too bizarre to continue at the USCF in any capacity. This person should resign or be forced out.
Thanks Susan. The main reason I asked was because there are a huge number of posts on the usenet group rec.games.chess.computer (for example) that are supposedly from Sam Sloan but are too disgusting even for him (assuming that is possible!?) Of course, rec.games.chess.xxxx is not moderated so anyone can post anything and make it appear to be from anyone else.
I would hope the USCF forum (and the other forums in this case) are all forums where proper logs are kept of the IP addresses and logins of every post.
In any case, I would trust you implicitly.
I am sure the FBI could find some inter-state statute to go after him and incarcerate him once and for all.
The board has the power to suspend Mr. Sloan. But Don Schultz refuses to do anything so Sloan can do the dirty works for him by attacking other candidates. This is the same game that went on for 30+ years. We need new blood.
>>The only people who said something were Susan, Mikhail Korenman and Paul Truong. Well, I know who I will vote for, don’t I? >>
Why don’t they contact the FBI then, since nobody on the board will? Then Schultz can explain why he didn’t do it himself. Everybody talks about the weather…
What was the title of this post, and which category was it in? I haven’t seen it yet.
Isn’t this ironic? My post was deleted in the USCF forums when I quoted the post that is placed in the front page of Susan’s blog. Furthermore, the whole thread was deleted up to my post that had criticism of Sam Sloan.
Maybe I will be banned from the USCF forums for making a stink regarding his post.
Gregory Alexander
Don’t expect Schultz to do anything. He voted to undo any past sanction against Sloan. This is a criminal act and the board has to report this to the authority. No one else can do this.
Re: Sloan’s recent bad post
The claim by quite a few people that they either opened the link at work or almost did reminds me of a current situation involving a substitute teacher (Julie Amaro) who turned on a class room computer that immediately started opening popups for p*rn sites… The teacher in question had nothing to do with the popups being on the computer but she faces 40 years in prison because it happened while she was in control of the class.
Interesting read here:
http://windowssecrets.com/comp/070222/
When I clicked on the link in the same note Sloan posted to FIDE-CHESS I didn’t see the p*rn because I have FireFox configured to block questionable content. I did get enough of the text to know I didn’t want the page to stay open. Employees and students don’t have the options I have to block objectionable content, and as we can see from the story about the substitute teacher, that lack and a post like Sloan’s can land the victim in jail for decades.
Shame on you once again, Sam Sloan. Kudos to the moderators who erased this and many other objectionable posts by Sam Sloan.
Unless he is fired (which I think he should be) or resigns (which I don’t think he will do), I think we have to deal with this sad person until his term runs out.
However, he takes up too much of the conversation and is a distraction from what is positive in chess.
Those who are USCF members here, imo, should vote for qualified candidates later this year.
Posted: Thu Mar 08, 2007 7:51 pm Post subject: Sex, Lies, and USCF Politics
——————————————————————————–
I wish I had time to give this topic the discussion that it warrants, but I’m a little rushed right now and I’m just going to hit the highlights (or low-lifes, depending on your perspective).
Recently a certain poster violated the rules on these forums in numerous respects: posting links to pornographic sites, telling a number of harmfull lies about other people, making false claims about political rivals, …
Some of this person’s rule-breaking remarks have been deleted, but not all of them by any means. When I pointed out one of his false statements, my post was censored because I used “the L-word” (as the moderator put it).
Since when has it been wrong to call a LIE what it is — a LIE. And the person that makes a habit of telling lies IS a liar. The moderators have become confused between form and substance. They are deleting true statements about a serial rule-breaker and leaving his transgressions largely untouched. The self-evident accuracy of my characterization of this person should be enough of a defence. If a person has repeatedly lied about other people then it’s time we all admitted as much and quit the mealy-mouthed, convoluted rhetoric about “false statements”. I think it’s perfectly clear when a person is INTENTIONALLY lying when he does it repeatedly. Deleting my post because I said so is a ridiculous degree of censorship from our anonymous “forum police”.
Lets quit beating around the bush. If a person IS a liar, let’s say so. If a person has admitted to (as an adult) having sex with teenagers, then lets say so. If a person is totally inept in politics except for his mud-sling attacks on his rivals, then let’s get rid of him! If a person does all of this and brings nothing to the table that benefits the USCF in any way then ban him from the forums, defeat him in the election, and then throw him out of the USCF! His mere presence would taint us all by association.
_________________
There ain’t no such thing as a free lunch.
The post was from Sam. I don’t know why Susan removed the name of the chess federation (it’s not the USCF, it’s a local federation of one of the US northwestern states) but I won’t type it here, you can find the message on Google Groups easily enough. Sam’s point was that it was a legitimate URL of a legitimate chess federation, but it expired and a porn site got it, which means that federation didn’t to such a good job taking care of its own administrative issues. It was essentially a wisecrack about the competence of that organization, which until recently ran the US Championship. Sam picked a tasteless way to make this particular point however I think the above details are relevant to the situation.
Sam Sloan should be suspended from the USCF immediately. If the EB is not taking actions, they should all resign. This is inexcusable.
Mr. Sloan needs to be suspended promptly. Mr. Schultz needs to withdraw from the upcoming election.
Hal Bogner does NOT support Sam Sloan. The anonymous poster who posted that posted a prevarication.
First of all, all posts to the USCF Issues forum are secured by a login, so there is no question as to the fact that the real Sam Sloan made this terrible post to the forum.
Second, whether Sam was trying to making a sly point about the Foundation’s inability to manage its domain name, or trying to play a trick on readers, is irrelevant. The judgment he displayed is so astonishingly poor that he clearly does not belong on the Executive Board of any non-profit organization, and certainly not of an organization like the USCF that has a large scholastic membership.
Third, I disagree on the calls for police involvement. The act was reprehensible, but the FBI and other law enforcement organizations are not charged with ensuring that anyone conforms to the rules about posting on a private forum. I and other members of the forum have suggested that Sam be stripped of the right to post to the forum, and I hope the USCF moderation committee will listen.
Finally, let’s not start a boycott against anyone. The individual mentioned in a slight earlier comment (hmb) happens to agree more frequently than I do with Sam Sloan’s views, but he is not campaigning for him, not by a long shot. I think Susan would agree with me that his chess business provides valuable services, and we should not be advocating against his business.
I agree with many things Mr. Falter said. I do disagree with 2 items:
– The USCF should notify the authority. This is a criminal act.
– If Mr. Hal Bogner chooses to play dirty politics, people should have the right to speak out against him.
Mr. Bogner is bidding for a major project with the USCF. He should stay out of the political debate and attacks.
I had to tend a build job in my software shop, then I came back and posted my comment. Meanwhile, Susan had already done the right thing by deleting the malicious comment about Hal Bogner! Thanks, Susan, for modeling how people should treat one another.
Sloan’s post was obviously sarcasm about the #### Chess Foundation’s management of its domain name. Nevertheless, it showed poor judgement to post the link to the foundation’s web site in the USCF Issues forum knowing that the domain-name had been taken over by a pornography site, especially without any warning, There are all sorts of reasons why people would not want pornography appearing on their computer screens without warning.
However, people should calm down a bit about Sloan exposing children to pornography, it being a crime, calling the FBI, etc, etc.
The USCF Issues forum is open only to USCF members. Furthermore, you must specifically request access to that forum. You don’t have access to that particular forum automatically just by gaining USCF member access to the rest of the uschess.org website. When you sign up for the USCF Issues forum you are asked whether you are over 18. I don’t believe that you can receive access if you are not over 18.
My opinion about this is based on personal experience. I am not a USCF member, but my daughter is. She is a scholastic player. I tried to gain access to the USCF Issues forum using my daughter’s USCF Id, and PIN, because I wanted to see for myself the behaviour of the USCF politicians that Susan refers to frequently on this blog. When I registered I stated that I was over 18, but the system apparently recognized that the ID I was using was a scholastic member, and shortly after registering, I received an email stating that my/her registration had to be reviewed by the USCF office. This was at least a week ago, and and I have heard nothing further. My daughter’s account still does not have access to this forum. Because of all this, I don’t I think registrations for that forum from scholastic members of USCF are going through. I don’t know this for a fact, but I doubt there are kids accessing this forum, at least not as a routine matter.
If you search with http://www.google.com the word “porn” there are about 85 million web sites with this type of things.
In anycase, probably each one has a clear name and if someone choose those links he/she knows exactly what is going to find.
But it is a shame to find that in a forum of your own chess federation, posted by a board member.
People,american chess players,chess fans…you have a sinking federation and now your current board members are laughting about you and all your problems!
If you do not vote against someone doing that is because you have not hot blood at all and you allow the politics everything.
Maybe is a problem to say that in a country where only 40% people vote one candidate as president of their nation, but if you do nothing later you have not right to say “I do not agree with that”.
You can choose now if you want the same shit or not.
can someone post an exact url that will bring it up. the posting by sam.
I want to see this for myself. I will not click on the porn site. I just want to see what sam posted.
It will be needed to push for criminal evidence. I want to see if it looks criminal.
Sam has to go.
I bet AF4C is sure glad they bailed out of supporting the USCF. Will anyone ever help in the future.
USCF is getting flushed down the sewer by Sam S.
I went to the trouble to register over at the uscf forums. and it is simply incredible and unbelieveable this guy what he posts. He belongs in a mental institution. He has deep deep problems.
How he got on and how he stays on is impossible to believe. I can only shake my head in disbelief. Everything is out of control with him around.
I don’t have access to the USCF Issues forum, but I did find the “samsloan” post on Google groups, and tried the link for the Seattle Chess Foundation that was posted. This is the former name of America’s Foundation for Chess, the former sponsor of the U.S. Chess Championship.
I’m not posting the URL, but if you figure it out and enter the URL, or find the post in Google groups and click the link, your browser will be redirected to the entry page of a hardcore porn site.
When I tried it, there were two broken images on this page. Otherwise, there weren’t any images. There was some text and at the bottom in large letters “Hardcore Sex”, and a link with the word “Enter”.
If you click Enter, you come to some very raunchy hardcore images. However, on the page with the “Enter” link, the entry page, there were no images, and it is very clear that this page is the entrance to a pornography site.
I don’t know what the two broken images are, though, or how long they have been broken. But if it has been like I found it for a while, it isn’t exactly true that Sloan’s link took someone directly to hardcore stuff. I still wouldn’t want the page he did link to be on my computer screen at work, and I think Sloan displayed bad judgement in not giving more warning. But it isn’t quite as bad as Susan’s post makes out. I dare say she didn’t click the link.
I get it NOW !!!
The link Sam Sloan posted was to a lapsed USCF domain name that was aquired by a pornographer. He was trying to show how sloppy the USCF was becoming with its website management policies and considered the present situation an embarrassment to the USCF.
Right?
No, that site has nothing to do with the USCF. Sam Sloan is just an irresponsible and sick individual.
How can I see the Sam Sloan posting forum? All thi talk is driving me crazy with not being able to see the evidence.
SOMEONE PLEASE HELP!!
Post the link or something !
http://groups.google.com/group/rec.games.chess.politics/browse_thread/thread/b10651c9c0162e51/b61a76bba194469c?hl=en#b61a76bba194469c
This is a link to the “samsloan” post that is on Google Groups. This GG forums is a mirror of the rec.games.chess.politics newsgroup. On that newsgroup there is, famously, a “fake” samsloan and a “real” samsloan. It is possible that this was posted by the fake one. However, Susan says that it was also posted on the USCF Issues forum.
http://groups.google.com/group/rec.games.chess.politics/browse_thread/thread/b10651c9c0162e51/b61a76bba194469c?hl=en#b61a76bba194469c
Try again
I’m having trouble posting this link. It is too long. Do a search on Google Groups.
I’m very disturbed by the posting of Mr. Sloan. I’m even more disturbed by the lack of action by the board. They’re protecting him and allow him to harm many people. The board must go.
Obviously the board should dump Sam. That would be a strong and sensible way to take control of the USCF’s future.
But some of you (mostly Americans) should take control of your lives and freedoms. You can be fired or go to jail for 40 years for porn appearing on your computer? When you can prove that you had no intent or knowledge, no reasonable way to predict that outcome?
Why don’t you liberate yourselves from tyranny? Throw off the yoke of oppression, set yourselves free at last, etc.
Regarding how to handle inappropriate posts, I think the best policy is to have posts reviewed by a moderator before they are posted at the website. That prevents any foul play. It does take a moderator’s time but I think it is worth it.
Regarding Sam Sloan’s behavior it is clear that he is pushing the limits as a way to get attention and dare anyone to do anything about it. I would blame him more but it is so easy to stop this kind of thing as suggested above.
Now if Sam Sloan or anyone else employed by the USCF reflects poorly on the USCF and/or commits a crime then it seems simple enough to just release them from their USCF duties.
Is Sloan evil?
why post link to porn site??
Arvin Sloan is evil!!!
I watched the movie.
Don’t know about Sam.
>>there are a huge number of posts on the usenet group rec.games.chess.computer (for example) that are supposedly from Sam Sloan but are too disgusting even for him (assuming that is possible!?)>>
A lot of people suspect that the fake Sam Sloan is actually the real one, just since it’s been going on so long without his doing anything about it. It’s not that hard to get an ISP to shut down an impersonator.
He should be referred to the police and dismissed from his job.
anonymous said “It’s not that hard to get an ISP to shut down an impersonator.”
Have you actually managed to achieve that result, or are you speculating that it is possible?? I think the latter.
Anyway, my point was that Usenet forums that are not moderated can be easily spoofed. Posts in rec.games.chess.? from “Sam Sloan” are extremely suspect.
Apparently the USCF forum has logs and logins etc. Unless the real Sam Sloan somehow can prove someone used his login on the USCF forum, it would seem that he did post the provocative links.
It seems that the links were to a domain that was formerly registered to an association that was working with the USCF. I suppose Sam Sloan could claim he was merely pointing out that the domain name had lapsed or otherwise taken over by “someone else”…
At the very least, Sam Sloan demonstrated the incredible lack of judgement for which he is now famous. No one ever said he was *stupid*.
My only advice to the USCF and USCF members: clean house and quickly!
I propose that somebody who can spare the $15? deposit (which might in this case not be returned) make a formal complaint to the USCF Ethics Committee. At least force them to take a formalized position.
throw his petifile ass in jail
Because of his Chess Obsession, Sam Sloan has achieved a powerful position to serve the public interest. He has also obtained numerous enemies because of his obsession with womanizing.
Therefore, it is more probable that an enemy posted the website under his name, or else gave him false information about the website, or hacked the website etc.
An investigation is needed to trace the source of that communication before anyone can call for Sam Sloan’s resignation.