Concern

Admin's and Mod's Admin's and Mod's - War Room
#1

Hello mods!

Can somebody explain the following to me? I don’t understand the reason for the ban. This is not the first time I receive a complaint via email regarding a ban.

Thanks.

I am a brand new registrant to your forum, looking for information about the Dai Ichi Hotel in 1946 Tokyo (used as Field Grade Officer billeting by occupation troops) from anyone who may have such info. As I completed my very first post for submission, I got the following message –

You have been banned for the following reason:
spammer

Date the ban will be lifted: Never

I am not a spammer. I’m just a regular person looking for info to add to my family history. What did I do wrong? I’d love to have the opportunity to ask your forum readers for help.

This was what I was trying to post:

Subject — Dai Ichi Hotel – Tokyo-1946 – can you help me? (here’s my Mom’s incredible story…)

Hello Forum Members –

I’m hoping someone on this forum can assist me. I’m looking for any information about the Tokyo Dai Ichi Hotel when it was used for GHQ/SCAP Field Grade Officer housing for the US occupation forces in Tokyo. My family history has it that my mother was hired by a US Army Col. Joseph Muldoon to manage the basement snack bar in that hotel sometime during 1946. (and to distribute the rationed liquor!) She was 21 years old at the time, and spoke German, English and Japanese (that’s why she was hired, I suppose).

Our oral family history suggests an extraordinary life for my mother, Helga Hofmeier Kiderlen. Born in 1925 in Germany, her father was a published pediatrician (the family story is that he was a doctor to the Goebbels children in Berlin at one time). Her parents divorced when she was 3. Her new stepfather and mother sailed for Japan in late 1931, leaving her for several years with relatives in Munich when she was only 6. Her stepfather was eventually asked to work in the German Embassy’s Naval Attache office as Paymaster/Purchasing Agent by Admiral Paul Wenneker and he started work there in the mid-30s.

Mom followed, at age 10, on a steamship from Hamburg to Tokyo in 1935 - strangers hired to accompany her. She lived. a German in Japan, from 1935 to 1948. Little food, terrible times and, as a “gaijin”, always on the wrong side. She was on the train to her best friend Ulla Ott’s (daughter of the German Ambassador to Japan) birthday party when the train was stopped for Doolittle’s Raid, and everyone was told to take shelter. As she was only a very naive 17 years old, she tells me that she and her friends went to a nearby ice cream shop for a snack until the bombing was over (!!!). Geez!!

She survived her family home being burned to the ground during the March 10, 1945 fire-bombing of Tokyo, and was again on the train when the Emperor spoke to his public after Hiroshima. Her family had their summer house in Hakone, near where she met her first American GIs staying at the Myanoshita Hotel. She met my Dad, a Cajun from Louisiana, on a blind date in Tokyo very soon after his arrival in Japan as part of the USAF occupation troops.

Mom’s parents were repatriated to Germany in 1947, and Mom accepted sponsorship by an American Army officer, Lt Col John Watson, and family to come to the US on their dime, but work out that payment as their nanny. I still have the original “contract” they all signed in January 1948. She sailed alone into San Francisco in February 1948, surprised to find nothing bombed. She spent 1948 as a nanny for the Army family. In December of that year, Dad finished his tour of duty in Japan, arrived in San Diego, paid off her indenture and married Mom three days later…and then took her to his home in the bayous of Louisiana to “meet the parents”, then to Omaha, to his next PCS assignment. After one year at Offutt AFB, she then returned to the bayous for one year, alone with me, an infant, while Dad went on an unaccompanied tour for one year to the nuclear testing site of Eniwetok Island. She became a naturalized US citizen while in LA. I still have the original newspaper articles from the local paper.

I continue to be amazed at her life - first as the child of an affluent and intellectual family, then as a German in Japan during the war, then working as a nanny, then living as “one of those bad Germans” in very conservative small bayou town in Louisiana on her own with an infant. Although I’ve heard many, many of her stories, I still am surprised at the resilience, poise, and lady-like class she retained throughout her life.

Because of all the above, I’d like to compose a bit of written family history, but need to verify the Dai Ichi story. Can you point me in a direction that might help me with some specifics/photos/info re US military history/Dai Ichi Hotel/officer housing/basement snack bar during 1946 Tokyo?

The Holy Grail would be to find someone who actually remembers the young blonde German girl who worked at the Dai Ichi Hotel basement snack bar.

I know it’s a very long shot, but I’m trying anyway!

Sincere thanks for any help or direction you might be able to offer me —

Jane Lang

Thank you for your reconsideration –

Jane Lang

Atlanta, GA

Janel90

#2

I didn’t ban her but a ban can be lifted in the MCP with a couple of mouse clicks - which I just did.

#3

I just looked this up again, and I was the one banning her. I did this only because her IP (76.97.61.1) is among those of known spammers on stop forum spam. Her user name is of the sort used by many spammers as well. Of course I apologize for banning her if she is in fact legitimate. Here is a screen shot of the Stop Forum Spam page showing her IP record.

sfs janel90.jpg

#4

I did a search on stop forum spam and it does not find the IP. It returns a similar IP though, which probably caused the confusion.

Do we still get a lot of spam? Akismet is installed and believe it has done a terrific job.

#5

Yes we get a fair amount of spam. I usually delete at least one obvious “modded” spam thread a day…

#6

It’s probably one or two a day that get through the filters. That’s an immense improvement on the peak (nearly 100 a day).

#7

That is odd, I did look it up again and found the report for the different IP. I’ve never had that come up before, its always for the IP I was searching. I look up a fair number of new sign-ups everyday, and so if anything pops up in a search of SFS, or Proj. honeypot, Spam busted etc. I usually just go ahead and outplace them. (a little HR lingo there,) While there are still numerous attempts by bots, and spammers to sign up, there are not so many that actually land a spam post. though recently, I have found what I come to call a “kamikaze” spammer, who comes on drops 5-10 spam posts in different threads all at once, and then is gone. This doesn’t happen often so your anti spam efforts are doing a lot of good work. If an IP search does not show any results, I look up their user name, and see if they are signing up on bunches of non related sites, and if they have done any spamming etc. on them.
This is how I determine my course of action when moderating.

#8

Much keener than me! I normally just ignore them unless there’s some visible spam in the forum…

#9

Most spam won’t get through, as even if the spammer manages to register, any posts are first filtered through akismet.

Also if you do decide to go ahead and ban somebody, please don’t ban somebody on a prominent ISP such as aol, comcast or verizon (free in france, telekom in germany…you get the idea). The reason being that most people don’t have static IPs, meaning that today spam was sent from a certain IP, but then the same IP is released (by disconnecting/rebooting your modem) and reassigned to a different person who is not a spammer. In the end it does not help, as spammers are smart enough to move to a different IP as soon as their IP is blacklisted.

#10

In this case the IP belongs to comcast: http://www.who.is/whois-ip/ip-address/76.97.61.1/

#11

Another person. What was the reason this time?

The following message was sent to you via the WW2 in Color History Forum Contact Us form by mossini ( mailto:adri.mossini@gmail.com ).

I kindly ask you to restore my account, since I’ve been banned, for “spam” reason; I did not make any spam in this forum, I just replied to some topics and sent private message; I’ve also received by e-mail a notification of a private message that I would like to read.

Hope in your prompt response.

Best regards and thanks
A.Mossini

#12

Wasn’t me this time, I did look at his info, but it was all boringly normal.

#13

No idea why on the ban - can’t find any posts and no sign of spam in the signature. I’ve lifted it anyway.

Oh, and TG, looking back you had deleted his posts. I think it’s because they were simple statements like “thank you” or “great ones” and you assumed they were a spammer (we do get a few like that). Probably worth easing off a bit on the checking for spammers - we do get a few, but I’d rather kill spam after it gets posted than pre-emptively ban a handful of people who turn out to have been OK.

#14

There were two I remember that had questionable posts, one had posted 5, or,6 six, and I looked at his activities on other sites, and there was signature spam having to do with colon cleansing. I returned to his activity here, and found he was placing the same signature in his posts on this site, so I deleted his posts, and bagged him. I do not recall the user name of that person. The other was member Schweinehund, who was padding in order to post some images, I told him to post appropriate information like everyone else does, I deleted some of those posts, the gee thats nice, thank you so much sort of stuff. but I did not ban him. (his posts, and pics are on the boards now. ) If the man complaining was the one with colon cleansing in his signature, his posts conformed to recognized patterns of spamming, and I dealt with it as such.
That being said, I do not ban lightly, and check things out the best I am able to before I do, or do not. When I began this, the advice was be more proactive, and get them before they land their trash on the boards. I will do as you ask, I don’t want to turn away any honest person.

#15

I’d say don’t ban until the signature is being posted. Remember that some will make a few quick posts to get to the minimum link posting requirements.

#16

I think I might have banned him, we’ll be more discerning…

#17

No worries! Please be a bit more careful…don’t want to lose out on new valuable members.