LENR-forum has apparently removed the .htaccess setting that disallowed all incoming links from CFC. So, in turn, I now allow referer information to be sent. If anyone sees a 403 error from them, by following a link from here, let me know!
Previous comments and information:
I have found and have implemented a fix, which is to configure coldfusioncommunity not to send referer information. I don’t like this, because web site operators like to know where traffic is coming from, it can be very useful, and I’d think that most site owners would want this information. However, because lenr-forum is blocking access to anyone following links to them from here, in an apparent attempt to discourage analysis of site content and activity, I found it necessary to put a warning on every page with such links. I have now changed site configuration here, in two ways: links should now open in a new window or tab, which is useful when following links to a source to check content here, and no referer information is sent. So I will be removing all those notices about “403 error,” pending.
Since about December 15, see a comment by “zeus45,” links from coldfusioncommunity.net to lenr-forum.com display a 403 error. This is only from ordinary text links from this site, clicked on by a reader. If the link is instead opened in a new tab or window, the target page displays.
To see this, look at this this Wikiversity page and follow the link to lenr-forum.com, readers should see the lenr-forum Forum home page., but follow the link here to lenr-forum.com, to the same page, and “403 Forbidden.”
The easiest fix I have found is to copy the URL from the browser address bar and past it back in and Go. It also works to open the link in an “incognito Window.”
Now, DYK that site administrators can tell when you have followed a link, naively, from a specific page? So, for example, they could ban anyone who reads a particular blog which links to lenr-forum.com. If this matters to you, you can open a link using incognito browsing, I’m using Chrome and it’s a right-click option for any link. However, I would not personally bother to do this defensively. Site admin on lenr-forum is becoming a bit draconian, but I doubt they will go that far! But, hey, if they did, we’d love to know! Share the wealth! (That is, if someone is banned without clear cause, it’s useful to know it — or even if they are banned for cause, what causes lead to bans and what causes don’t? Inquiring minds want to know.)
What is going on here?
I have received no complaints from lenr-forum administration. They have not asked me to remove any posts, they have not alleged harm to anyone from what I’m writing here. My understanding is that lenr-forum administration is divided, not in consensus, and that some administrators may be acting without the knowledge and consent of others, it is not clear. The information that I have indicates that someone is “furious” about my behavior. About what behavior, specifically, I can only speculate. “Doxxing” was mentioned, with no specifics. But I’ve received no complaints. Whatever I have done here has, to my knowledge, long been done on lenr-forum.com, much worse and routinely and without users being banned, not to mention sites effectively being blacklisted for incoming links. (Blacklisting for outgoing links is common and it’s an anti-spam measure. But incoming?)
The main thing I have done is to document what I consider abusive administration (which I define as site administration doing what the community would not approve of if it knew. Good administrators — otherwise — can be abusive.
It got bad enough, with unnecessary and arbitrary deletion of posts, that I declared I would boycott the site — since I could not trust it to at least warn me if it was going to delete something, nor provide me with a means to recover what I wrote.
“You can’t boycott, you are banned for two days.” (With no warning or notice — apparently they leave a “conversation” which, being banned, the banned user cannot read. They have not been sending email. And then that ban, with no announcement or open discussion (and probably not even discussed among the site staff), turned into permanent. And then, when I kept on writing here, they have to do *something” or they might look like wimps, right? That is, in fact, how some males think….
But they are punishing their readers for my alleged offenses, at least a few of them who dare to read me, and readers are going to link to this site as well. For example, here is a reader link to the document hosted here that is a merge of the Rossi Answer and the IH countercomplaint, so that they can be compared, claim by claim. This is all what Dewey called “amateur.” it is an attempt to impose personal power without obtaining the consent of a community, and without respect for the individuals they are attempting to control, but to them, it is a power struggle, and they must win or else!
Because the measure taken here, using a tool that might not even be standard for the software, but with access not being given to ordinary moderators, this has to be a site administrator, probably with root access. That limits the number of possible responsible admins to the owner, David Nygren, and Barty, I’m sure Alain would not do this. This kind of abusive behavior from owners will commonly be due to a mostly-non-participatory owner, who doesn’t understand what is going on, all he knows is that his volunteers (“staff”) are unhappy. If he does not take the time to investigate — and this is common — he may just removed the squeaky wheel, thinking it’s the user, when the real cause is somewhere else.