Avcanada censorship
 

There seems to be a serious censorship problem on the Avcanada forums. Truthful threads that are unfavourable to certain individuals and organisations vanish without explanation. Efforts to expose safety issues and abusive practices towards employees are obstructed by Avcanada mods. To make it worse, this censorship is unevenly applied, as some very critical posts are allowed to remain. It takes time and effort to compose suitable posts, particularly where there are problems being exposed and one wants to be fair as well as being exact to avoid any defamation. It is frustrating to see this thrown away by uncaring or obstructive mods on Avcanada. Until this problem is resolved Avcanada should be avoided as it is a waste of time and effort to post anything the slightest bit controversial or unfavourable to certain parties on there. Issues affecting Canadian aviation should be posted on this forum, where they will receive a fair exposure.


Below are the first two posts from a thread “Mods!!.. QUIT deleting GOOD threads!!”that was started on Avcanada today to address this issue. It has already been deleted without explanation by Avcanada’s mods.

flyinthebug:
Who else is getting completely fed up with the moderation of this site??.. Im ranting but would you please explain to me where the "crash in YXL" thread now went? We had a GOOD discussion ongoing on that thread, no names were used (other then the company name was mentioned).. Please tell me why you couldnt just omit the name of the air service and let a good thread carry on?.. I see MY accident from last year is still on here. It also has the companies name in that thread.. so WHY did this latest accident in YXL get taken down?.. Maybe i should threaten to sue you for keeping MY thread up about MY accident for the past year?.. This is unacceptable and your gonna lose some valuable posters if you keep this kind of dictatorship up on this site!
My .02 cents for the day
Gets off soapbox
Rant over.
Fly safe all!

Carrier:
I agree that there is a problem on here with good posts or whole threads being eliminated. It is particularly unhelpful to honest operators and employees in Canadian aviation when posts and threads exposing unsafe practices, companies and individuals or acts of dishonesty vanish. Avcanada should be endorsing and encouraging such posts. It should be part of the solution to improve aviation safety and weed out shysters by exposing them, rather than being part of the problem by working with the shysters to hide their wrong doings and let them continue to exploit and threaten the safety of both those who work in the industry and those who are its customers.
A perfect example of Avcanada’s wimping out is its removal earlier this year of the whole thread on the Canadian ATPL obtained by forgery while the newspaper report on the court case, in which the individual admitted his guilt, remained in the public forum on the Calgary Herald’s website and is still available on other forums: http://www.pprune.org/canada/367387-...aked-atpl.html Those considering employing the guilty individual in future or working for or being a passenger on one of the air operators that employed him after the problem with his ATPL became known should have this information available to them so that it can be part of their decision making. The same applies to certain unscrupulous companies where threads and posts naming them and identifying their deficiencies have mysteriously vanished. This also applies to Transport Canada and its deficiencies, including its ineffective SMS.
What is so mystifying and unpleasant is the uneven application of the censorship by Avcanada. Some companies and individuals get immediate protection and anything the slightest bit unfavourable is immediately removed. Indeed, it seems that the names of some cannot be mentioned on here in any context. On the other hand the unfavourable posts on others are ignored and left on here. Why the difference?
I appreciate that Avcanada does not want defamatory statements on here but the truth is not defamatory and there is no excuse for Avcanada eliminating truthful but unfavourable posts and threads on certain companies, government departments and individuals.
If Avcanada will not get its act together and make a stand on improving safety and eliminating abuse in Canadian aviation then there are alternatives. Copy threads you are interested in on to your computer. If they vanish from this board then repost them on another forum such as http://www.pprune.org/canada-42/

Which individuals and companies are getting special protection? I didn't know that this was happening.

It doesnt take much to see which companies seem to get preferential treatment over on AvCanada...

Borek, Summit, WJ seem to me to be the main benefactors lately of the moderators while other companies seem to get the raw end of the stick (or their CP's, Ops Managers, etc).

It used to be funny, but its always the same old people complaining or making comments about how everyone else has problems, and yet when a particular companies Twin Otter runs off a 4,000 ft strip it is left up for a day or two, then like Houdini it disappears. :}

Lets just hope "we" dont screw PPRune up as bad as AvCanada is...

I am sure i can accommodate you all on our aviation site :) if need be.
All it takes is a little tweaking of the program and it's up! and we have good mods, un biased.
I recently looked at AVCanada and i don't think i will sign up, i have read as a guest but never posted on there.

Additional companies mentioned in Avcanada threads that have vanished are Bar XH AIr, Courtesy Air, National Aviation Inc, Sunwest Aviation and the company referred to in the “crash in YXL” (Sioux Lookout) thread. An individual who seems to have benefited is Ryan Atkins of ATPL forgery infamy. It seems none of these can be mentioned on Avcanada in an unfavourable light.

So fellaz.....why do I love the good old US of A.....:ok: Gear up ..fire up and git u gunz...!!!

My guess is that it has something to do with some recent court rulings, and the possibility of lawsuits. An example:

Law Times - Controversy rages over Internet privacy rights

Well, you might know me as a mod over on that there forum being discussed. Only since March, mind you, but nevertheless ...

The most recent thread disappearance started like this ... I got a PM from the accident pilot asking that the thread be removed as he/she was still "recovering". I told that person that I would pull it for the time being, but no more than a week, and would have to discuss with the other mods. Other mods received some PMs suggesting that there was reason to leave the thread for discussion and so it was returned to service, so to speak. In the meantime, someone had posted a "what happened to the thread" thread. Then it disappeared with no trace in the logs. My guess is that admin received a PM, maybe even a lawyered up PM, demanding removal. The rest of the mods don't know what happened to that thread. Admin has no obligation to tell us, but may do so when he gets a chance.

Other threads referenced here which have disappeared have gone because someone did, in fact, lawyer up. AvCanada does not have the money to fight in court for the words of anonymous users who may not even have their stories straight.

AvCanada has a different moderation style, to be sure, than Pprune. Not better or worse, but different.

WARNING: Personal Opinion

I've read through many posts on various topics on Avcanada's website. Rarely is there a post of interest to me so I wouldn't waste my time regestering. :ugh:

Let's be honest. PPRuNe has it's similar postings because Pilots are Pilots but it's at least global in content.

Western forum, West Jet bias? There's a surprise!! :rolleyes:

For my money, I wouldn't waste my time with AvCanada's forum. But, that's me. I can assure you, I've had one or two of my own postings on PPRuNe 'disappear' for whatever reason. It happens.

It all boils down to freedom of choice and don't bet on not being censored.

Willie :ok:

I’m not surprised as I had a similar experience on Pprune concerning WJ. It turned out that one of the Mods was either trying to get hired by WJ or was already an employee of WJ. The same Mod using the same handle is also a Mod on AvCanada and is a WJ pilot.

It’s called selective censorship whatever...

I read avcanada regularly. There is a general lower maturity level than the AEforum or PPrune, but it is great for keeping somewhat up to date on the smaller companies and other aspects of Canadian Aviation besides the big companies.

I suggest that censored Avcanada stuff be posted here on this thread.

But not the immaturity.

Quote by Doc, mod on Avcanada: “I've never understood how these companies even answer their phones when this CONTRAIL dude calls.
These companies are puppets on a string. Nothing more.”

It’s just like Avcanada’s response when someone representing the ATPL forger or Sleazebag Air phones! Doc, please set the example then. You, Widow, Admin and the other mods need to practise what you preach.

It is not defamation to state the truth. Except in certain situations, such as those involving juvenile delinquents or state security, every Canadian has the right to know what is said and admitted and by whom in a Canadian law court. It is not defamation to report on or pass that on to others. That includes the case of the pilot who pleaded guilty to forgery regarding his ATPL. The present Avcanada knee-jerk reaction to every complaint from or on behalf of wrongdoers is destroying Avcanada’s credibility. Readers cannot know if what is left on Avcanada is the truth or is some distortion at the behest of a slimy operator, individual or some low-life lawyer. It undermines those of us who are making efforts to have Canadian aviation cleaned up and the unsafe and abusive operators and individuals weeded out.

As stated, Avcanada has destroyed its own credibility. By now the word is out to every aviation spiv and his lawyer that a simple lawyer’s letter or phone call will cause Avcanada to remove or distort any exposure on its site of wrong doings involving them! They can carry on with their dirty tricks and unsafe practices, secure in the knowledge that victims and other interested parties will not be able to expose them on Avcanada.


Quote by Doc: “...it's a subject that's long over due to be discussed”

So selective! Why Contrails and not others who are actually worse or openly unsafe, dishonest or unethical? There are many other subjects in vanished threads that are long overdue to be discussed - and exposed.

Exactly... the mods at AVCanada, and YES Widow I put you into this group too, do not practice what they preach.

Too many times are posts and topics removed which have no basis for legal action, they are simply :mad: sessions, yet you make a comment and then suddenly a day later the post (or thread) is missing.

Sure there will be some cases where a thread or post must be removed because of possible legal ramifications, I dont think anyone here or on AvCanada would doubt that, however the level of deletion over there is such that the courts in Canada must be FILLED with lawyers, companies and pilots bending each other over.

And before you respond with some sort of "...but we dont have the money to respond to every lawyer and lawsuit...", explain to me how a previous CP of mine was allowed to be raked over the coals in numerous different threads - not that I specifically disagree with the comments made, but alas, when someone mentioned something about a Borek CP that post was on the board for a shorter period of time than it takes my wife to go from 0 to :mad:.

Rant over.

Carrier,

you are nothing but a gossip looking for gossip. Not trying to SAVE the community. You read about RA in the paper isn't that good enough? People have lives and deal with stress differently. Can't you respect that. Glass houses my friend. btw don't know RA or anything about him, but you sure have a thirst.

The problem is that why don't you research things yourself instead of relying on third hand information on a slag-fest forum. It always amazes me that the real **** show stuff doesn't get deleted. It's their site. they can do what they want. If you don't like it leave. Go cry on another forum.:{

get a life.

The more I think about it the more it offends me to hear some random guy bleating about some random conspiracy theory - I put at least a couple of hours a day into AvCanada, checking posts, approving posts, filtering out spam posts and dealing with the thousand daily micro-dramas that occur on the site.

Hey there, whomever started this thread, I'm Sulako.

I'm a mod on AvCanada so feel free to vent at me if it makes you feel better about life. While I'm listening to you whine like a mule, I would like to take the time to let you know a few things about AvCan so maybe this can die down for a little while - it'll inevitably come up again, and it's usually a year or so between "AvCanada mods are fascist/communist/terrorist whatevers".

AvCanada is a privately run site. It's run as a non-profit, and there's no money for lawyers, so we remove threads that people complain about. If any one of you decided to be a complete doorknob and randomly write an Avcanada mod an email asking for a post to be removed, it likely would be, because we don't have the money to hire lawyers to tell you to get stuffed.

It's really that simple. And if you don't like it, don't visit the site. That seemed intuitive to me, but clearly I'm mistaken.

If I come across as hostile, it's nothing actually personal toward submitter - I don't even remember the name of whomever started this thread, but it's because we go through this on a regular basis in our forums and I just get tired of it. Being a mod is a pretty damn thankless job, but we really do try our best, because we are proud of the site and because we want to bring value to Canadian aviation. Now as mods we aren't robots, we are human beings, each with our own experiences and biases. Every single day there are about 100 things for us to do on the site, and lots of those are grey-area things, like moderating a thread that is about to go nuclear but hasn't yet, or moderating between two people having a fight in the forums, etc. Now let's mix a tonne of work with nearly a dozen mods on the site, and it's inevitable that some judgement calls would be made differently by different people. The thing that unites all the mods is that we are all a) unpaid, and b) we are all very proud of the site and of our contributions toward it. If you enjoy the site, great. If you don't, then that's okay too - life will go on for all of us.

Good post..

What I think is the worst is when the likes of Widow and such Edit a post, Deleting or removing a post is one thing but when they edit your post and literally put word in your mouth that is bush league.

You don't like profanity replacement? You'd rather see the whole thing gone than see it cleaned up? Not everyone wants to read the potty mouth along with the relevant comments.

SR08;

I've seen some AvCanada posts before they were edited, and I think you and the others should be thanking the mods for taking the trouble to leave the relevant parts in while taking out the nonsense. If I'd have been doing the moderating, the whole thing would have been gone.

Widow go back and Read what I stated, here ill save you a mouse click.

Profanity Replacement with a @#$@#% :mad: etc is a fine example of profanity replacement, but when someone for instance says

Exhibit A

AVCANADA • View topic - Life in Paulatuk

When the Original post statedThis is an example of Putting word in people's mouths.

Off colour remark Yes
Profanity (potty mouth) No.

Given the topic of the thread and previous post on the topic it's a completely valid statement hardly worthy of Censorship, I think when censorship is dished out unevenly or inconsistently it lesson's the credibility of any site. I know mods have differing opinions on a topic but I would suggest at the very least a note should be sent to the poster stating "I have deleted your post for the following reason" (two seconds to type) and would save a lot of confusion. Agree or disagree with the mods decision you have at least been given a reason and a chance to modify your post in your own words.

I realize and agree that AvCanada cannot afford a lawyer to tell most of these companies to take a hike and that truth is not libel. So if XYZ Airline has an accident and its being discussed in a thread and it remains a factual discussion ask them if they have called or written the local papers and have ask them to censor their reports and get Transport Canada to pull the CADORS reports offline.

Either way AvCanada owes its popularity and thus its advertising revenues that maintain the site to the wide range of topics and opinions expressed on it. If AvCanada is censored beyond a reasonable amount it will loose credibility. I love magazines that favorably review a product such as a car or video game and the following page is a full spread advertising that product. :suspect:

AvCanada as one put it is like a Bar allot of BS some fighting a lot of opinions with some Truths not always entertaining but worth a stop by for a drink.

Looks like someone (not me, hence my having no idea what you were talking about - I verified that by checking the mod logs too, btw) thought the thread was verging on racist and was trying to pre-empt a regression. I note to that effect by the mod in question would have been appropriate though, agreed.

I think you're making mountains out of molehills.

This sounds all too very familiar. Didn't a small island country in the caribbean in 1964 open its prison gates and released 15000 prisoners to a bigger country not too far off just to rid themselves of the parasites in their society?

It was a genius move then as well...:D

Another case of a pilot’s licence “irregularity” has arisen: Readers will note no problem with the culprit being named, just as PPRuNe accepted naming the former Westjet ATPL forger.

Both of these well respected forums do not impose any censorship when guilty parties are named. This really shows up Avcanada’s selective censorship and refusal to allow the identification of certain wrongdoers, including those who have pleaded guilty and been sentenced! Note that there is no possibility of defamation where the party has pleaded guilty in court and such a plea is part of the court records and is common knowledge in the media. In such circumstances the threat of defamation and lawyers’ letters mentioned by an Avcanada moderator is a red herring or simple bluff that Avcanada’s mods have been taken in by.

As mentioned previously, Avcanada has destroyed its own credibility. It has some good topics and some wise and experienced posters. People post questions on Avcanada and receive useful answers. There is no doubt it adds some knowledge and enjoyment to Canadian aviation but Avcanada could be of far more value if it would correct its failings. It is to be hoped that the operators of Avcanada will review their moderation policy to introduce some consistency in what is allowed and to permit the identification of all wrongdoers.

All a bit prissy isn't this girls?

We've been running for 13 years 24/7 and there's not a single day of that we haven't censored/deleted/altered or bowdlerised posts on this site.

Let's make it absolutely clear guys - not one single day.

Regards
Rob

:ok:

exactly.

+1

Gotta add my name to the list. I've had a PM from the Admin at AVCanada telling me not to post names in threads. I simply asked a question about 'what ever happened to.....?' (Once).
I've seen many posts by people on said forum, including the board mods, that have names in them... some even could be considered 'negative'.
Seems to be a double standard over there.
I also agree with a huge lack of maturity there. I'm thinking of removing AVCanada from my 'bookmarks toolbar'.

Already done for me.

I won' t go into details, but I don' t trust the avcanada mods.

I look at AvCanada most days, but never have posted, nor wanted to, as their rep for removal of innocent posts is becoming legendary - even when it is a valid, serious point being made.

Some censorship and removal of lunatic posts is to be expected, but not to the extent of AvCanada - which I believe goes as far as modifying posts to create a specific editorial slant. Wonder if any of them work at Navigator PR ??:ooh:

PPRUNE doesn't do that it seems, and therefore, the discussion is not prissy as we establish precisely what they're up to over there in potentially slanting opinion...

You wouldn't be using "girls" like its a bad thing to be a girl, now would you PT?????? :rolleyes:

Apparently so...

The Sexual Politics Of The Mushroom Kingdom | GamesRadar

+1

Some with an agenda. Some with a double standard.

AvCanada is a waste of time.

avcanada is an excellent place to learn of "the currupt officals @ tcca"! not too many threads where that is involved go missing, why is that? seems the"top poster" himself has quit posting and is just learking. too bad. he brought alot of useful info to avcanada.(sarcasim)

Funny, they had a thread about the forum and moderation, and I put in my 2 cents on why that foum gets little traffic (mods with agendas, no one is interested in reading thread after thread title "To the crew of AC 8777" with a body of how great the flight/service/etc was, etc) and it was promptly deleted.

There is nothing to be learned there. The atmosphere doesn't foster interesting debate or exchange. Much more interesting information and discussion is available through private messaging.

The thing is, without a lot of active users, forums like that serve little purpose. If I want breaking stories, I'll come here, because not only do you find out what, you get informed thoughts on why.

Avcanada has alienated everyone there who could even remotely offer the same.

I'd rather mods deleting stupid questions than asking them.

I haven't logged in to this site for quite some time...

Anyways, I have some mixed feelings for AvCanada. I'm happy with the job that the mods have been doing in regulating profanity, questionable avatars (although I see one or two still there), idiotic/drunken posts and the like. That's moderation. What I DON'T like is removal of threads or modification of names when the information is readily available though other print media (newspapers, etc). The info is out there. I also have to admit that the continual TCCA rant has me glazed over... I love you to death Chuck, really.. but enough is enough. As soon as that pops up, the thread is done for me.

I realize that AvCanada is a private site. I think, for the most part, that Joe and the mods do alright.

You can read Avcanada all you want now flybabe because I have finally decided that enough is enough so I decided the best way to solve the problem is don't post there anymore.

When I first started to share my experience with TCCA on Avcanada it was in the hope it would prevent someone else from making the same mistake I made when I followed their rules, it just went from there to the point that I was unable to shake the habit. :)

LOL, Chuck - certainly no worries :) I understand the deal, totally.

Hell, I'm hardly on AvCanada anymore anyways... maybe I'll hang here now :ok:

This site is quite different flybabe as it is world wide in scope and thus there is less discussion of local problems.

Not to mention the fact that I spent the last decade of my career in Europe, Africa and South America so I am more comfortable in this culture. :)

You going to go back to air attack flying next year?

Likely, yes. I'm up for a type rating on the P2 but not really comfortable with the fact that I'm going to get one before a few of the other copilots I work with.

Conversely you should let the company decide who gets upgraded.

It is far better to have a rating you may not need than need a rating you can't afford. :ok:

When it comes to quality of content on an aviation forum one need look no further than the value of the posts by " Zipper Magnus " on Avcanada.

No wonder many of the people with something worth offering have left the site.