Jahanshah Javid

Don't you wish JJ was this stubborn about deleting comments?

He and his moderators delete comments here all the time without a thought. But if someone feels their personal safety is at risk, JJ doesn't feel it's important. Now since his policy page states that stuff is permanent, this new stuff - youtube (3rd party sites) and comments - needs a specific policy. Everything is so vague here.

Dear Party Girl Away,

I disagree with you on several levels. I don't know where to start; I think first I'll answer your direct questions. The first one you have answered already and probably meant it as a rhetorical question; "Am I somehow snooping or eavesdropping on people's personal lives?" My sentiment is with you; no you are not snooping or eavesdropping on people's personal lives. The minute they decided to post their video clip in a public forum they stopped being private and entered into the realm of public domain. In public domain there are all kinds of people, from the most decent to the most heinous, and if some people think by posting a decent video clip of their lavish wedding they are immune to negative comments, they can't be more wrong.

According to one statistic more than 50% of marriages end up in divorce, and I think the more lavish a wedding the harder it is going to crash for at least 50% of them, so I think if someone makes a comment that "I will give them two years at most.”, I think it is absolutely appropriate. Now don't get mad at me now, I was not invited to their wedding, I didn't shake hands with them, I did not eat their dinner or their wedding cake, and didn't dance with them. All I got from them was a video clip of a lavish wedding in my face while I struggle in this economy to survive, and so if I'm pissed off because I don’t have a job and they are living lavishly and I want to make a rude comment about it, under the existing rules it is my ABSOLUTE RIGHT to do so (under the current rules, once again) as long as it gets through the Editor‘s filter. No where it says a comment has to be comprehensive, no where it says comments are supposed to be nice, no where it says comments are supposed to be optimistic. Frankly, I think lavish weddings are show offs and they have deliberately posted it to rub our faces in it, how much they are better than the rest of us type of a thing. Now, don’t call me name, I’m playing devils advocate here. If two people truly love each other they don't need a lavish wedding, and if some people feel like they do, fine have a lavish wedding but keep it to yourself, but if you expect a poor Indian in Mumbai to leave a nice comment for you, you have something else coming to you.

“What's up with all that hate and venom people throw at other Iranians in those clips?”
There all kinds of Iranians out there, some of them are venomous and hateful, it has something to do with the way they have been screwed out of their lives, some has to do with their religion, culture, upbringing, you name it, but don't go on blaming the Iranians; I think it goes on in all cultures. Instead of blaming the audience we should blame the supplier, they are not victims here, they full well know what they are doing when they post their stuff and they are looking for approval, and when they don't get it they get pissed off, which is O.K. next time just don't do it.

I think a comment like "She only married him for his money" is very appropriate, why else would she marry lavishly. Lavish requires money; if the guy was poor there wouldn't be lavish wedding, money. I think a comment like "Who's the gramps?" is very appropriate in a public forum. Among Iranians many men marry women several years younger than them, if they want to post a video clip of their trophy wife, they better be ready for someone to tell them how they feel about it.

"How would you feel reading that?" Most of the time I laugh, because what we have here is great entertainment. I used to watch TV all the time, but I have never ever seen anything as great as this website in my life. The thing is the entertainment is provided to me free, well I pay to AT&T for an Internet connection but to be on this website I don't pay nothing, I doubt if I ever watched or pay any attention to the advertisings, unlike TV that I'm forced to watch Pepsi Cola and car advertisings all the time to get 20 minutes of a comedy show, I can entertain myself all day without watching a single commercial. So, that's why I'm here to be entertained. I believe a lot of other people are here to find a mate.

Can’t we be a little nicer? There are billions of people living on this planet, of them I don't know how many have access to Internet, but to expect all of them to be nice is delusional.

Can’t we be a little more responsible? In the absence of a website rules of conduct and an Editor who monitors all of the comments I believe we are very responsible

Does the site have to be responsible for all of us and our conduct? Yes, that's the way it is at the moment. In the absence of rules the Editor has taken that responsibility away from us and bestowed it upon himself. I like it! I gladly abdicate all my responsibility and leave it up to him. Didn't you guys learn any thing from our constitutional movement when people demanded a Majles and when they got they didn't know what to do for the country till the kings blow it up.

Have you guys seen Amir Kabir anywhere lately? No.

You have other questions about how would you feel about this and that if you were in a video, I tell you what, I sum up all of them, you'll never find me in one of these videos because long time ago I learned there is no privacy in cyberspace. Many years ago I posted some pictures of mine under my real full name and immediately learned that fact of life that nothing is private anymore. So, you'll never again find my real name or face anywhere in Internet. It's a cynical world, welcome to it.

همدردی و همراهی

آقا JJ شما این موضوع رو خیلی بزرگش کردید. یک کمی همدردی و همراهی هم برادرجان اشکالی نداره. ایشون که TheMrs نیست که بگید blog نوشتی و این site و همه نوشته هاش مال خودَم هست.
بنده خدا داره به شما میگه از ابتدا این ویدئیو
نمی بایست در اختیار عموم قرار میگرفته. حالا شما احساسِ Judge judy شدن بهتون دست داده و نه تنها همراهی باهاش نمی کنید ٫ بلکه داستانش رو در اختیارِ همه هم میگذارید. دست شما واقعأ درد نکنه. آفرین و صدها آفرین!

Dear JJ and all

I take this matter very seriously, so I feel I must share my thoughts on the matter.

People post videoclips of themselves and others on YouTube all the time. I look for Iranians among those videoclips. When I find them, I recommend them to JJ. Am I somehow snooping or eavesdropping on people’s personal lives? The loving optimist in me thinks not. When people post something on YouTube, they want it to be seen by others--that's the whole point of YouTube, sharing your videoclips! YouTube has a whole system of counting views, comments, and referring websites (I’ll get back to this one a little later). YouTube rewards popularity of videos posted on it by keeping tabs on how many times a videoclip is accessed and "read" and how many "subscribers" a channel has. A videoclip on YouTube is meant to be shared and viewed many many times and by many.

Even so, I am aware that some of what we see may be private. The loving optimist in me takes joy in going to an Iranian’s wedding through his or her videoclip. If I enjoy the trip, I want everybody else to go on that trip, too, which is why I recommend the clip.

Some people might disagree, but I do use some level of personal discretion about what I recommend. By now, I more or less know the kinds of things people might say about a clip. This makes me omit certain clips from my recommendation list sometimes. For example, I once found the videoclip of the wedding of a clinically obese Iranian woman who got married to the love of her life, an average-shaped American man. Though their wedding was very lavish and the clip was very well prepared, I felt it might invite rude and unkind anonymous comments, so I didn’t recommend it. I will talk about this subject a little later, too.

My standards and discretions, however, are mine alone. I have found clips which I have thought to be cheap or inappropriate, so I have passed on them. I have then seen the same clips recommended by other users and posted on the site either by JJ or in blogs.

I would like to address the part of JJ's blog which seems to have become lost on everybody on this thread. I believe the root of the problem may lie there. Just because someone puts their videoclip in the public domain, and just because it is legal for Iranian.com to post it does not mean that as an audience we can lose all sensibilities about what to say to REAL PEOPLE three minutes of whose lives we are watching! What's up with all that hate and venom people throw at other Iranians in those clips?

I continue to ask JJ to exercise better moderation on anonymous comments on ordinary people’s YouTube links. People who post videos on YouTube are able to see where people who view their clips are coming from. In almost every single case, people eventually find out that their clips were posted on Iranian.com and they do come to see what was going on here. That’s when they see the comments posted on their clips.

Remember the loving optimist in me who found those people in the first place? That loving optimist dies everytime the video owner comes to find the carnage that hate comments have left of his memory, of his wedding, of his 3-minutes of life.

Imagine it’s your wedding clip which was put up there, where anonymous, nameless and faceless people have said: “She only married him for his money,” or “Who’s the gramps?,” or “I will give them two years at most.” How would you feel reading that? How would you like it if you were dancing in a video and that video was posted on Iranian.com, and you saw 15 anonymous comments posted on it, saying "She is Haji Pasand," or “He is gay?” Is it any surprise that the video owner in this case came back and left indignant comments, saying: "I AM NOT GAY. I JUST LIKE TO DANCE?" What would you guys do?

People have come back and have left really sad comments for those anonymous users weeks and months after they were posted. Most people will never see those comments because the tracks become cold on a clip after 24 hours, but not to the clip owners whose lives were before our eyes for a day on this site.

Can’t we be a little nicer? Can’t we be a little more responsible? Does the site have to be responsible for all of us and our conduct?

This is all I can say right now, as I have to run to catch an important lead. I'll be back later this evening and I might say something smarter, if I can find out what!

P.S. Have you guys seen Amir Kabir anywhere lately?

I Guessed Wrong!

First I thought JJ was teasing our(the site's) Good Old Hajagha, but reading the gentleman's comment I'm confident he isn't Hajaha.

As far as I know Hajagha isn't married, yet. He's still looking for a bride.

Hajagha isn't an executive at iranian.com.

This guy's English is intelligible.

Hajagha's web site address doesn't appear at the bottom of the comment.

If it were Hajagha, he would beg JJ for the deletion of his cartoons, so he could go back to Iran.

PS.
Here's a pettition on behalf of Hajagha! Concerned visitors of the site please support him!

JJ please help Hajagha go back to Iran!!! We want him back, too.

Shame on shame!

Yes, every time someone pulls out a digital or video camera we need to make sure we look presentable and be on our best behavior. If you don’t like it, there are at least two options: leave or ask not to be recorded, and that only helps with the cameras that you know about, not the hidden ones.

There is no more such a thing as being amongst friends, always assume that you are among your worst enemies, always assume there is some secret recording of events is going on. If a married woman is going to have sexual encounters with a married man she better believe someone is video taping it and later is going to post it on youtube. If a policeman is beating the crap out of a ‘ bad hejab’ woman he better believe that his action is going to be seen by the entire world that has access to Internet, and he better be prepared for the embarrassment that he is causing for a whole nation. Recently some schools have installed video cameras in school busses and violent behavior and rowdiness in busses have decreased dramatically, so if you like violence ask the cameras to be removed.

If you have a boyfriend, you better defer from having a sexual relationship till you are married, and even then only have sex in total darkness under a sheet. There is no more privacy the way things are right now. It takes some major lawsuits to establish some rules about these matters. If a videotape shows that an action has happened there is no denying it. So if you don’t like it, stop the act before it happens, or don’t cry about it later. And, innocence has nothing to do with it, innocent people get crushed all the time and nobody gives a hoot. It you want fair game go to Africa. We live in completely different world that our parents did.

By the way I afraid my employer might be recording me right now.

Technical v. moral....... it's about judgment

Do you remember what JJ said when he posted the site with Iranian porn last year? He laughed when Nazy told him that this puts some people at risk. JJ brushed her off then too, and said "Be man che they did the porn, not me". This site has never been about moral responsibility. But I will say, what goes around comes around. If this person is so upset, why not use a kind card once in a while? There are billions of youtube videos with Iranians you can use for your site.

what difference does it make

who it starts with?  If an individual feels threatened, whether real or imagined, why keep the blog?  I disagree that JJ would be the object of interest.  He's simply exposing material or opinions provided by someone else.  It's the difference between the "big fish" and the "little fish".  It's not the drug dealer... it's the drug supplier who's the big fish. 

Sasan... I absolutely, positively agree with you on this one.

Iran4Ever wrote: "So when

Iran4Ever wrote:
"So when does someone's personal safety and someone's plea comes first to your definition of freedom of speech."
This is bull crap, if IRI and supporters would want to cause trouble they start with JJ not the petty contributers. Get a life, will ya!

What a shame..!

So every time someone pulls out a digital or video camera, we need to make sure we look presentable, and be on our best behavior?
What if I THINK I am amongst friends, and let loose a little, but unbeknownst to me, someone has been secretly filming?
What if a former flame decides to put some of our "private" pictures on line, 6 years after I am married to you?

Legal? Yes!
Ethical? No!

What about that video of that poor Iranian girl having sex, published by the SOB boyfriend? We just HAD TO rush and see THAT, didn't we?
After all, "anything that is available to the public on YouTube or anywhere else is "fair game".

Everything is funny, and 'fair game', as long as it is happening to someone else.

Shame people, shame!

Why don't they write to YouTube?

That's who actually holds the video.

The person may have a point for material that belongs to Iranian.com, but YouTube videos aren't even that!

well, do we know for sure

that these two issues are related?  One seems to be related to a video and the other to a blog.  If two different circumstances, then I would suggest that Iran4ever has a point.  I totally understand that a blog becomes the public domain of the website.  I disagree with that but that's not the point here.  If this guy posted a blog under his registered name and he became the target of abuse (at minimum) or feels like he's in danger (at worst), why would JJ want to keep the blog?  If the blog had run it's course, as all eventually do, why keep it?  I'm seriously left of center and I'm firmly against registration being required but I have a big problem with the "intent" behind some of the decisions made.  Is JJ keeping the blog for spite?  Obviously more information is needed about this.

To any of the registered users,

Please, please if you know which blog it is, post the name of it here, so we can all get on the stage and enjoy the beat.

So now the story gets juicier

So this is not about a youtube clip but about a blog, or maybe a blog that has a youtube clip in it? There seems to be more to it than meets the eyes. Never the less the author of the blog should have paid closer attention, that there is no concrete rule about who is allowed to delete, and who is not. As the way it is the Editor has the ultimate power over the “Delete Button”. You are the latest “victim” of this lawlessness.

I suggest changing your name, your phone number, your email address, your physical address, your job, and your spouse and family if you have too, if you are so afraid of IRI and its supporters. JJ will not give you the “Delete Button” back.

LOL

If you're determined to give all these clues as to who you are, why are you writing under a new anonymous name? LOL

too funny!

IRANdokht

JJ you are arrogant -- no more respect 4 you

JJ

I am sorry to say this and I am usually not this blunt.

You are truly showing your 3rd world side, which is bully, arrogant and greed.

I hope the readers right a way don't judge me based on this comment, since the story behind it.

JJ knows.

There is blog out there I had asked you several times in my e-mails please delete it since I am also getting ferocious emails from IRI supporters. You have done nothing.

As a matter of fact you have removed the delete button so I can not delete the blog.

So, you rather get more hit on that page and put my families life on danger than deleting or allowing me to delet that blog.

Since I have asked you several times and that is documented you and your LLC is responsible for their action.

So when does someone's personal safety and someone's plea comes first to your definition of freedom of speech.

Have a great day Chief Editor JJ

Iranian.com Executive

This is so hilarious!

Don’t they know once a video clip is posted publicly on youtube it can be copy and pasted on many other websites that is set up for it? I can’t stop laughing! Even his/her email in not private. What goes on cyberspace stays in cyberspace forever. It’s like Voyager spacecrafts and their phonograph record of the earthlings, it keeps going, and going, and going...

Now, please please let us know which one it is.

I am with Dokhtar e Iran

It's better to ask youtube to remove the video. Iranian.com has a huge audience but not as much as youtube

sticky wicket

What about those people who didn't know or didn't approve of a particular video being shown?  What about the girl who was taped and didn't know it and her private life was put on display to the world?  Would you say the same thing?  It might "belong" to the world but at whos expense?  I know this isn't the case here but still...

And now, of course, I want to know WHAT video...:-0

weird!

Why couldn't he ask the photographer to remove his private video from youtube? 

wouldn't that be the easiest approach?

IRANdokht

I am curious

JJ, you got attention. Can you tell us which video.

LOL ;0)

Good Response JJ.

THAT WAS PROFESSIONAL !