Aral Balkan

If you want to raise awareness of what Sys-Con are doing, please Digg this!, also Reddit.

I'm in utter disbelief over Sys-Con's latest attack on me, following the defamatory article they published, then removed, earlier after I called them out on Ulitzer. They've now published an article titled "Turkish Web Designer Declares Death on Twitter" (http://twitter.ulitzer.com/node/896664 - Update April 1, 2009: the page now appears to be showing a 404 (no joke!)), following their post about Ted Patrick titled "Adobe's Ted Patrick (Adobe Ted) Declares Death to SYS-CON Media" - http://web2.sys-con.com/node/896478).

In the article has my bio from the site, followed by the following text:

Company representatives contacted the Interpol and Scotland Yard to locate the Turkish Web Designer who is suspected to live in London. Aral Balkan is said to be organizing an underground group to kill or bodily harm the company representatives according to his Twitter logs.

In 1980, a Turkish assassin declared death to the Pope and in less than a year he escaped from his jail cell, traveled to Rome, and shot and wounded Pope John Paul II on May 13, 1981.

Others who acted after Aral Balkan's Twitter instructions left harrassing comments on the Company's website over the weekend, which were all turned over to the authorities, including FBI's cyber crimes unit based in Washington D.C.

For the record, I am not organizing any group underground or otherwise to do anything to anyone and I haven't given anyone instructions over Twitter to do anything either. Where do these people get off spouting such lies?

This is a malicious campaign of defamation aimed towards me, if not something worse, and I'm not going to take it lying down.

If you want to raise awareness of what Sys-Con are doing, please Digg this!

Here are screenshots of the site, in case they take it down again:

Update: They seem to have modified the text, at least on one of their sites so that it now reads:

Aral Balkan seemed to be organizing a Twitter group who may harm the company representatives according to his Twitter logs.

If you want to raise awareness of what Sys-Con are doing, please Digg this!, also Reddit.

Comments

• Wow! I can't believe it's going this way!!!

  by David Jumeau on 2009-03-30 20:09:16

• Definitely something has to be done. They are going way too far. I am quite amazed with the companies sponsoring them. Apart from boycott we need to contact those companies and let them become aware of what the heck is happening. This is getting surreal now. I am too busy today but if someone can do a simple timeline/summary of events of what's happening and a badge to link to that page I am sure lots will "supporters of the cause".

  by Fernando Colaco on 2009-03-30 12:38:23

• Two words (for them) Brand Risk. This sort of behavior only undermines any credibility (if they had any to start with) and future reputation. Wouldn't touch them in a million years, total lack of commercial foresight and understanding of the market they are supposed to operate in. Regardless, even if a PR stunt on their side - they just made one of the worse PR errors I have seen in a very long time. Disgraceful.

  by Lottie Messner on 2009-03-30 13:54:35

• here's a thought: is sys-con run by scientology? this smells a lot like their "fair game" tactics.

  by Patrick H. Lauke on 2009-03-30 14:25:11

• What?.. Why?... That story is the most ridiculous piece of crap I've ever read. As Keith Peters already commented: "Not sure if this is getting funny or scary."

  by Timo Virtanen on 2009-03-30 12:40:21

• lol Sorry Aral, but this is just simply hilarious. Please, do sue the pants off those people. :)

  by Daryl Teo on 2009-03-30 12:47:48

• [...] titled "Turkish Fags Living in London" in which they call me a "homosexual son of a bitch", and the second one, titled "Turkish Web Designer Declares Death on Twitter" wherein they state that I am "said to be [...]

  by Aral Balkan - Sys-Con goes from bad to worse, launches Ulitzer, attacks community and content creators on 2009-03-30 15:06:59

• Maybe it's time to update that bio: International Criminal? Twitter Assassin?

  by Nick on 2009-03-30 11:18:46

• If there's any way for us to support you, don't hesitate to ask. This story is simply unbelievable !!!

  by Cédric on 2009-03-30 11:21:50

• What the fuckety fuck fuck? They are comparing you with the guy who shot the Pope?! How reality-deprived are these idiots? Let me get this straight: you are organizing a secret militia to kill the owners of SYS-CON, but you are announcing it on an open Twitter feed with over 2,000 followers? These guys are paranoid and completely unreasoned, as well as shady.

  by Tom Morris on 2009-03-30 11:23:17

• what is wrong with that company? this is to much!! good luck with all this issue and hope that company make a rectification soon about such a big defamation and lies they just published

  by laura on 2009-03-30 11:24:52

• Not sure if this is getting funny or scary.

  by Keith Peters on 2009-03-30 11:24:56

• I'm confused as to what they think they are going to accomplish by creating lies about Aral... the more they make up these absolutely ridiculous accusations the more bad press they are getting for themselves. In my opinion they are already going to have to do quite a bit to begin to rectify all of the issues they've brought against themselves, although imo I already think that everyone who is aware of what has been happening isn't going to give them a second chance. They shouldn't keep digging if they plan on being around in the future. And just to clarify in case this seems to get mis-read by people who seem to create their own little make-believe stories... I'm also not threatening to kill anyone :)

  by Andrea Black on 2009-03-30 11:25:42

• Could this be any more nonsensical?! They're linking your nationality with a guy who tried to kill the Pope. Why are they even bothering putting your nationality up? Has anyone Digged/Reddited this at all?

  by Annika Clarke on 2009-03-30 11:27:50

• This stuff is spinning out of control. It really does amaze me how stupid some people can be. And it looks to me they are trying to rectify their mistakes with even bigger mistakes. Sad.

  by Shadowfox on 2009-03-30 12:28:41

• [...] Update: They have now published a second article, at the same URL, titled "Turkish Web Designer Declares Death on Twitter" wherein they state that I am "said to be organizing an underground group to kill or bodily harm the company representatives" and compare me to the gunman who shot Pope John Paul II. Read more about the second article here. [...]

  by Aral Balkan - And Sys-Con defames me on 2009-03-30 12:55:41

• WOW! I quit writing for Sys-Con sometime ago because of problems I had both as a customer and as an author. Not long after I came to this decision for myself several other authoring friends started opening up about problems they were having with Sys-Con. Many with difficulty interactions with Sys-Con that made my own look trivial. Even considering all that, I would not have imagined that things would have fallen this far down the rabbit-hole. Definitely time to call in the lawyers. Lottie is quite right, disgraceful.

  by rish on 2009-03-30 14:47:27

• why don't you send them a DMCA for using your picture without licensing on their website :)

  by Harun on 2009-03-30 14:47:48

• I wish I knew a way to support you. Sys-con should lose their sponsors.

  by Ozgur Brooklyn on 2009-03-30 18:51:20

• Have you read the headline article titled "Open Content Publication Is A Two-Edged Sword" at sys-con by Joe Rinehart (I'm doubtful about JR). Whole story with different point of view. I don't understand what sys-con intends to do... It's very ridiculous.

  by Volkan TUNALI on 2009-03-31 13:02:50

• del.icio.us-ed it best thoughts & encouragements.

  by nicoptere on 2009-03-31 13:09:50

• @Tom Morris: well put! Can't wait for the next exciting installment. Looks like they will be defenging libel, defamation, etc by saying "it was obviously a joke - look at the ridiculous things we said"

  by Antony on 2009-03-30 12:36:08

• Maybe its all this talk of death and dying... err.. technologies!

  by Mark Drew on 2009-03-30 11:29:22

• Isn't April 1st 2 days ahead of us???

  by Dimitri Van Heucke on 2009-03-30 11:12:54

• Jesus...what the hell is wrong with that company?

  by Patrick H. Lauke on 2009-03-30 11:13:30

• Aral, what ever you need, let us know if you need any help on this. Might sound harsh but I think that the word boycott is the most appropriate now.

  by Tiago Dias on 2009-03-30 11:38:33

• Somebody needs to ask these people "excuse me wtf r u doin". And also sue them into a smoking crater.

  by Dan Glegg on 2009-03-30 11:46:45

• Thank you guys, I'm in as much disbelief as you are. Your support means a lot!

  by Aral on 2009-03-30 12:18:32

• I just hope this is not your biggest 1st April Fool's day ever...

  by Zarate on 2009-03-30 12:25:12

• Wow, that's quite an incredible series of events. I have to wonder why they're bothering with the personal attacks.

  by yezzer on 2009-03-30 12:15:42

• Well, the good news is that with all this going on your ulitzer profile should be viewed a lot of times. And with sys-con paying 200% of the AdSense money you'll be loaded soon. You can then afford a kick-arse lawyer.

  by Chris Heilmann on 2009-03-30 13:25:30

• popurls.com // popular today... story has entered the popular today section on popurls.com...

  by popurls.com // popular today on 2009-03-30 14:00:17

• By bringing your racial heritage into this sys-con has given you the ability, (beyond what they gave you with the obvious libel), to effectively shut down their business. Simply contact their advertisers & hosting providers and say they're promoting hatred, (which they are, if they weren't your racial heritage would not be in the story and it would say "London-Based web designer ..."). Also, I hope you make some cash on a libel lawsuit. They appear to be based in the US, a country with a long, lucrative, litigious history.

  by John B on 2009-03-30 15:38:14

• In situations such as these, much more than a single author's content and reputation is at stake; a reasonable thing would be to set up a domain to host a campaign denouncing sys-con's shady practices, provide it with a reasonable page-rank through community support, and leave it up to the internet democracy do the rest.

  by Ivan D on 2009-03-30 15:50:59

• What kind of f.ed up crap is this??!!! And also Aral has class enough not to translate the actual derogatory term used here. it actually means "turkish f*gg*ts living in london". Extremely disgusting!!!

  by Simon on 2009-03-30 16:29:58

• The good news is that no one in the IT industry cares what Sys-Con has to say about anything. People pay about as much attention to them as a "please hold for an important message" spam phone call during dinner time.

  by TravisV on 2009-03-30 18:20:41

• This is beyond belief.

  by Mete on 2009-04-01 00:48:03

• @Tony - nice comment, the reason a 'nobody' like Aral gets attention is because sys-con are bullies, trying to crush any hint of community backlash with threats and insults. Comments like yours and your suggestion he paid them indicate you have no idea what you're talking about.

  by Jeff on 2009-04-01 01:26:17

• [...] to worse, launches Ulitzer, attacks community and content creators, And Sys-Con defames me & And Sys-Con libels me *again*) constitutes a lapse in judgement or freak occurrence or whether it is endemic to Sys-Con's regular [...]

  by Aral Balkan - More lies: Sys-Con editor is really actress from LA, Sys-Con writer is British male supermodel on 2009-04-01 21:22:16

• [...] It all started here: http://www.darrelplant.com/blog_item.php?ItemRef=1263 And continue on Aral website http://aralbalkan.com/2022 http://aralbalkan.com/2056 http://aralbalkan.com/2067 [...]

  by Dev by MX» sys-con craziness on 2009-04-09 04:19:26

• Hey Aral, Could this be some kind of perverted way of drumming up PR? I mean I had never even heard of sys-con before your tweets on the weekend. Could they be stirring up this pot to drive more traffic to their site? Where are they based? M

  by Mark on 2009-03-30 13:29:26

• http://www.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/88keq/hey_reddit_help_spread_the_word/ You'll be glad to know people aren't just ignoring this. I didn't personally submit it, but it was a frontpage reddit for me, so a lot of people will see.

  by Frank on 2009-03-30 16:41:58

• for a company thats in the new media business, they really don't understand the power of the web. they are digging a deep hole and looking for bigger shovels at the same time. you have our support Aral.

  by vijay shan on 2009-03-30 16:42:31

• I guess this is your karma payback for the coldfusion bs you wrote.

  by dave on 2009-03-30 21:03:55

• The only problem about making big noise is, that now there will be more and more links pointing to the sys-con sites. Giving them a Page-Rank boost. Especially if the bigger sites pick up on the story. I guess the SEO guys at Sys-con are more than happy about it. ;-(

  by sim on 2009-03-30 22:46:38

• - Write (formal) letters to their sponsors. Hurt them in the wallet. - Submit to techcrunch for hilarity

  by X. on 2009-03-31 04:31:24

• @Tony - some evidence would make your claim more credible.

  by X. on 2009-04-01 03:04:01

• Why are they bothering, seems someone there is spooked about nothing.

  by Tristan Bailey on 2009-03-30 11:31:58

• Amazing how a nobody like you gets so much attention. I wouldn't be surprised you paid those guys for some publicity, knowing that you are a big time web 2.0 wannabe.

  by Tony on 2009-03-31 22:31:39

• [...] Media has again and again tried to spread libel about Aral Balkan because he originally bad-mouthed them on Twitter and in [...]

  by Sys-Con once again attacks Aral Balkan with stupidity and ignorance | Barklund.org on 2009-07-15 14:51:10

• [...] Following that first article, they published another article, titled "Turkish Web Designer Declares Death on Twitter" in which they stated that I was "said to be organizing an underground group to kill or bodily harm the company representatives according to his Twitter logs" and continued to compare me to the Turkish assassin who "shot and wounded Pope John Paul II on May 13, 1981". The details of that article are documented here. [...]

  by Aral Balkan - My Sys-Con Nightmare on 2009-07-27 15:08:53