Stephen Mick
Totally Usable
As many of you may know, there was an incident recently here on the forums that resulted in the banning of one of our members, John Brawley. After talking to everyone involved, and looking at the events leading up to the ban, we believe this was the wrong decision.
We, as moderators, fell short of what our membership expects and deserves from us. Many of us, myself included, haven’t given the forums the attention we should. We haven’t helped guide the discussions in the way we’ve needed to. That is on us, and it is something we will be working hard to address moving forward.
In the meantime, we are opening the door for John to return. We are accepting responsibility for how we handled (or didn’t) this situation, and we hope this public statement demonstrates just how seriously we all take this matter.
At the end of the day, we are not the ones who make this forum what it is, you do. Our role is, and should be, to foster discussion, to create opportunities for filmmakers to share their work, and to encourage each of you to go out and make films.
In closing, let me just say this… Moving forward, we will do better. I will do better. Collectively, I believe our mission is to foster a forum where new filmmakers can come to grow and develop, while established artists and professionals feel comfortable sharing their expertise. My hope is that over the next several months, you will see a group of moderators, old and new, dedicating and re-dedicating themselves to this mission.
And we hope that you all will continue to be a part of it.
We, as moderators, fell short of what our membership expects and deserves from us. Many of us, myself included, haven’t given the forums the attention we should. We haven’t helped guide the discussions in the way we’ve needed to. That is on us, and it is something we will be working hard to address moving forward.
In the meantime, we are opening the door for John to return. We are accepting responsibility for how we handled (or didn’t) this situation, and we hope this public statement demonstrates just how seriously we all take this matter.
At the end of the day, we are not the ones who make this forum what it is, you do. Our role is, and should be, to foster discussion, to create opportunities for filmmakers to share their work, and to encourage each of you to go out and make films.
In closing, let me just say this… Moving forward, we will do better. I will do better. Collectively, I believe our mission is to foster a forum where new filmmakers can come to grow and develop, while established artists and professionals feel comfortable sharing their expertise. My hope is that over the next several months, you will see a group of moderators, old and new, dedicating and re-dedicating themselves to this mission.
And we hope that you all will continue to be a part of it.