Website theft

[amphiguru]

Hi Everyone,

Last Saturday afternoon, a new Amphicar owner called complaining
about why our $16.95 clutch release bearing kit was on special on
our picture website for $35.00. Adding insult to injury, he asked
why the "special price" had a $5.00 shipping charge, while in our
catalog it's only $1.18.

At first, I told him we didn't have a picture special website.
Occasionally, the $16.95 release bearing was on sale for a lower
price of about $14.50, but not anywhere near $35.00. However, I
told him I would investigate.

Amphicar owners, I am sorry to report to you that someone deleted
our website from Amphicar.net and inserted Allan Woodcock's in its
place. So anytime a customer hit on Gordon Imports, Allan's popped
up instead. Who did this? We cannot believe an Amphicar owner
would do a pirate takeover of our site, especially since our prices
are lower. What would be the benefit to Amphicar owners to pay
higher prices? We also do not believe that school children
were "playing around" with the Amphicar.com and Amphicar.net sites
to give us fits. The takeovers are too specific and require a lot
of knowledge about Amphicar.

As of Saturday evening, John Bevins successfully deleted the
Woodcock site from Gordon Imports and put our information where it
should be under our name.

Now I believe a serious, detailed investigation of this takeover
should be started immediately. First, Bilgey at Amphicar.net, you
are the primary site which has been attacked. You have done a
superlative job organizing all the URL's, the sites, etc. into an
easily read action and information packed site loaded with help for
all new and old Amphicar owners. At your location, John Bevins, I
call upon you to work with Mike Israel and John Edelstein to find
out who crashed into Bilgey's and my website. Once we know who did
this (if it's an Amphicar owner), we must ban him forever from the
Amphicar Club, Amphicar.net, and Amphicar Lover's Digest.

None of us can tolerate and cannot afford to doubt the source and
truthfulness of e-mail and site information attributed to all of
us. Remember owners, this is our business not an after hour hobby.

Hugh

 

[gtpeterp]

--- In amphicar-lovers@yahoogroups.com, "amphiguru" <hughg@...> wrote:
>
> Hi Everyone,
>
> Last Saturday afternoon, a new Amphicar owner called complaining
> about why our $16.95 clutch release bearing kit was on special on
> our picture website for $35.00. Adding insult to injury, he asked
> why the "special price" had a $5.00 shipping charge, while in our
> catalog it's only $1.18.
>
> At first, I told him we didn't have a picture special website.
> Occasionally, the $16.95 release bearing was on sale for a lower
> price of about $14.50, but not anywhere near $35.00. However, I
> told him I would investigate.
>
> Amphicar owners, I am sorry to report to you that someone deleted
> our website from Amphicar.net and inserted Allan Woodcock's in its
> place. So anytime a customer hit on Gordon Imports, Allan's popped
> up instead. Who did this? We cannot believe an Amphicar owner
> would do a pirate takeover of our site, especially since our prices
> are lower. What would be the benefit to Amphicar owners to pay
> higher prices? We also do not believe that school children
> were "playing around" with the Amphicar.com and Amphicar.net sites
> to give us fits. The takeovers are too specific and require a lot
> of knowledge about Amphicar.
>
> As of Saturday evening, John Bevins successfully deleted the
> Woodcock site from Gordon Imports and put our information where it
> should be under our name.
>
> Now I believe a serious, detailed investigation of this takeover
> should be started immediately. First, Bilgey at Amphicar.net, you
> are the primary site which has been attacked. You have done a
> superlative job organizing all the URL's, the sites, etc. into an
> easily read action and information packed site loaded with help for
> all new and old Amphicar owners. At your location, John Bevins, I
> call upon you to work with Mike Israel and John Edelstein to find
> out who crashed into Bilgey's and my website. Once we know who did
> this (if it's an Amphicar owner), we must ban him forever from the
> Amphicar Club, Amphicar.net, and Amphicar Lover's Digest.
>
> None of us can tolerate and cannot afford to doubt the source and
> truthfulness of e-mail and site information attributed to all of
> us. Remember owners, this is our business not an after hour hobby.
>
> Hugh
>

I am a bit confused here. What specifically was changed:

1. The link to www.gordonimports.com on www.amphicar.net?
2. The DNS entry for www.gordonimports.com?
3. The source code for www.gordonimports.com?

If it was simply the link being changed, I would hesitate to suspect
malicious intent. If I read the code right, amphicar.net is written in
Frontpage (4.0!!), which has a history of changing things for you
because it feels they are a good idea. It would be trivial to get the
links mixed up during a routine edit.

It sounds like Mr. Bevins was primarily responsible for fixing the
site error. Feel free to give me a call if you would like some help
with this matter. I have been working on web sites professionally for
many years and would be glad to help out a fellow amphi.

Peter Pociask

 

[Bill Connelly]

I'm not really sure what the issue is here, but before everyone gets all
"flamey" here's what I do know:

Gordon Imports has never had its own Amphicar.net website. Ever. Apart from
a prominent free advertisement in the old Amphicar.net "Parts Bazaar" that
was carried over to the Club website six years ago (when the "Bazaar" was
shuttered in deference to the newly member-run Club), I cannot recall any
other Gordon-related items in Amphicar.net, except maybe for Cap'n John
Bevin's and Scott Moses' online unofficial parts catalog that included
Gordon's prices back in the Clinton Administration. If memory serves, that
Catalog had originally been hosted on the freebie but pop-up-happy Tripod
service, and I believe that revisions of this original excellent and helpful
collaborative work may form the basis of the Cap'n's subsequent online and
CD-version Amphicar Parts Catalogs, and these may or may not be squirreled
away in the Cap'n's private area of the Amphicar.net server at
http://www.amphicar.net/minnow/ . Frankly, aside from telnetting in from
time to time just to check if the allotted diskspace is sufficient, I really
haven't done a whole lot with or on Amphicar.net since I partied like it was
1999, and so far as I've always been concerned it's really just a big
sandbox for web-savvy Amphi owners to do their own thing in in a pop-up
free, banner-free environment with no strings attached. All I ask is that
the folks using it stay in their own directories, try not use up too much of
the allotted diskspace unnecessarily, and that anyone who enjoys what folks
are doing in there to PLEASE buy their waterproof AMSOIL grease at
http://www.amphicar.net/amsoil/ , which helps pay the webserver rent. I am
happy to say that functionally-speaking so much great stuff has been brewed
up on Amphicar.net that its content often functions seamlessly with the Club
website. You don't feel a thing...You just click, and what you want is
there. I expect that most folks don't spot that ".net" bit in the URL as it
flickers by and a new page loads...

That "amphicarparts.com" Internet domain was formerly the property of our
Amphicar-Lovers List Moderator Mike Israel, who had registered it and used
it to develop a trial storefront website for Gordon Imports some years ago.
To make a long story short, Gordon Imports decided not to pursue it, so the
domain name registration was simply allowed to lapse. It was subsequently
purchased and developed by Allan Woodcock to showcase his wonderful Amphicar
offerings at http://www.amphicarparts.com . As for that website that Mike
Israel had developed for Gordon Imports, one can still see the remains of
this "ghostsite" at http://www.carstrucksvans.com/gordon/ . I thought it
was a superb little storefront website, and I even ordered a T-shirt our of
sheer support the day it went "live", but...

So there you have it. Sounds like a simple misstep is floating around "out
there" in a link located somewhere...somewhere...somewhere...just like the
'Dan Quayle for President' website. What it almost certainly ISN'T is some
form of industrial sabotage or attack.

See you in Celina...WITH HAPPY FACES PEOPLE...HAPPY FACES...

~Bilgey~

----- Original Message -----
From: "amphiguru" <hughg@gordonimports.com>
To: <amphicar-lovers@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Monday, March 20, 2006 5:03 PM
Subject: [amphicar-lovers] Website theft


> Hi Everyone,
>
> Last Saturday afternoon, a new Amphicar owner called complaining
> about why our $16.95 clutch release bearing kit was on special on
> our picture website for $35.00. Adding insult to injury, he asked
> why the "special price" had a $5.00 shipping charge, while in our
> catalog it's only $1.18.
>
> At first, I told him we didn't have a picture special website.
> Occasionally, the $16.95 release bearing was on sale for a lower
> price of about $14.50, but not anywhere near $35.00. However, I
> told him I would investigate.
>
> Amphicar owners, I am sorry to report to you that someone deleted
> our website from Amphicar.net and inserted Allan Woodcock's in its
> place. So anytime a customer hit on Gordon Imports, Allan's popped
> up instead. Who did this? We cannot believe an Amphicar owner
> would do a pirate takeover of our site, especially since our prices
> are lower. What would be the benefit to Amphicar owners to pay
> higher prices? We also do not believe that school children
> were "playing around" with the Amphicar.com and Amphicar.net sites
> to give us fits. The takeovers are too specific and require a lot
> of knowledge about Amphicar.
>
> As of Saturday evening, John Bevins successfully deleted the
> Woodcock site from Gordon Imports and put our information where it
> should be under our name.
>
> Now I believe a serious, detailed investigation of this takeover
> should be started immediately. First, Bilgey at Amphicar.net, you
> are the primary site which has been attacked. You have done a
> superlative job organizing all the URL's, the sites, etc. into an
> easily read action and information packed site loaded with help for
> all new and old Amphicar owners. At your location, John Bevins, I
> call upon you to work with Mike Israel and John Edelstein to find
> out who crashed into Bilgey's and my website. Once we know who did
> this (if it's an Amphicar owner), we must ban him forever from the
> Amphicar Club, Amphicar.net, and Amphicar Lover's Digest.
>
> None of us can tolerate and cannot afford to doubt the source and
> truthfulness of e-mail and site information attributed to all of
> us. Remember owners, this is our business not an after hour hobby.
>
> Hugh
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
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