The site that is hosting the Tara Protection Pledge  http://www.petitiononline.com is down and so we are asking interested parties to mail us their details directly at  info@tarawatch.org

Note for UK Indymedia subscribers and staff: This exact post was made to Indymedia Ireland and was removed for 'possible breach of editorial guidelines'. Doesn't something stink about that?  http://www.indymedia.ie/article/82560

Petitions are akin to spam thats why it was hidden you know that.

Posting up the same info and pictures again and again does not do you any favours.

Hello X, and thanks for the snotty remarks.

First of all I posted similar articles in 2 places. One in Ireland and one here. The one in Ireland had an intro, which read:

"TaraWatch is launching the Tara Protection Pledge drive. We need to build a rapid reaction force, in the event of works beginning on the national monument. Please fill in the form with your mobile number and email address. They will not be published on the petition page. This petition just displays the number of signatories to the public."

The entire message was removed, without any explanation whatsoever. So, when I made the above comment, I had not been alerted to the accusation that I was in violation of any rule to do with petitions.

As you can see, the gist of the story is not that we are starting a petition, but that we are asking people to make a promise to take action, and to supply us with their contact information, confidentially. We are recruiting. The petition aspect is coincidental to the issue and the article. It is merely a mechanism that we used, because we are not good at cgi coding and forms. If we were we would have put it on our site and simply said sign the Tara Protection Pledge 'here'. Would that have breached the petition rule? No. Because it is not a petition.

A petition is signed and that's the end of the persons involvement, In this case, the form is signed and that marks the beginning of a relationship, which is designed to lead to action. So the news story is that TaraWatch is going on a recruitment drive....not TaraWatch is starting a petition. Does that news story violate any Indymedia rule? I would hope not. And it is not like Spam at all. It has nothing to do with spam.

I assume you're an Indymedia (Ireland) editor, from the tone of your remarks. Maybe not. But if you are you aren't doing Indymedia any favours either... To be honest, my continued experice is that Indymedia is becoming more and more user-unfriendly. There is no courtesy, no positive attitude, no kindness, no humour, just snottiness. May I suggest that when you delete somebody's contributions that you contact them and give them a reason for doing so, and a means of responding.