I haven't posted for a week, and it has been interesting to watch the blog. The blog postings about Berneray have received many views, while the one about Barra and Vatersay - which has a much larger population - has received only a small fraction in comparison.
Similarly, I've had several comments about Berneray that I've been unable to publish, as they are clearly in slander or libel territory. About Barra? Nothing.
I wonder why this is? I gather that most people on Berneray have Internet access, and many use it daily. Is, perhaps, the difference due to the low take-up of broadband and the Internet on Barra and Vatersay? Are Berneray people more attuned to finding information, or "debating" online? Though many of the comments that have hit this blog that I've rejected couldn't really be called "debate", to be honest.
I can't speak for Barra. But on Berneray, yes most people have access to the net, and have had it (in dialup, more recently broadband) for quite a few years.
ReplyDeleteYeah, there's a surprisingly long history of net use on Berneray. We got there in 2004 and perhaps naively thought we'd be two of the first. Very wrong. Some residents had been using it, through dial-up, since the mid 1990s.
And not always in positive ways. The campervan wars, feuds between residents, the cannabis grower who thinks he "owns" one of the beaches, and people slagging off the somewhat dodgy goings-on with one community group. Someone who lived very close to us was often in the thick of it, disguising his IP address and using various made up identities. Though in real life, he was a top man and one of the best neighbours I've had. A total shit online, though.
But he wasn't the only one. There were several other residents - both incomers, and people born there - up to the dubious arts online. Nearly everyone used false IDs. Others would claim not to be online, or not to look or contribute to various thing, which sometimes turned out to be straight-out lies when something slipped out. I'm thinking specifically of MM, SM, RS and ST. We also quietly outed some of the net users in I think 2005 or 2006 when getting the petition together to try and get broadband to the island, as more than one person who said they didn't have net access said they'd like broadband so they could get stuff online quicker.
Every kid on the island also has had net access for several years. Even Anamia had it, despite her mom Ursina being tediously loudly anti-net and anti-technology (though not anti-enough to turn down several thousand pounds of locally-funded computer arty farty stuff, which she didn't do but took the money for anyway; funny that).
One thing of interest was the root cause of nearly all the disputes that moved into the online arena was money. Misappropriation of funding, residents not declaring all their income to the tax man, people making money through damaging tourism, or an easy buck grant allocations from friends. There were a few other things, such as a Berneray paedophile court case of a few years back that caused some online bitterness between relatives of the accused and the accuser, but it was mostly money at the root of anonymous posts.
And it still goes on now, online. Speaking over the years to other people in other communities in the Outer Hebrides, there's a consensus that Berneray, possibly along with Ness in Lewis, has a specific "problem" with this. In fairness, this isn't just unique to Berneray, historically. Many years ago, an anonymous forum called I think "Hebridean Graffiti" allowed anyone to anonymously slag off specific council employees. For libel reasons, it didn't last long. The Stornoway Chat forum lasted longer, and Angus Nicolsons's blog serves a similar roll (note that the bulk of comments are anonymous), though some stuff is moderated out.
Also - how do Berneray people find your blog posts about the island so quickly? Simple. Several of them run Google Alerts or similar. Whenever something containing Berneray is indexed by Google, they get an automatic email. It was a retired local, online, who taught me that one. From correspondence with Berneray folk I'm still in touch with, that's what happened with your blog.
I am a little tired of the comments from obviously Berneray people that are about other Berneray people. There are invariably negative, unpleasant or slanderous. It is obvious that there are several feuds going on, and being played out online, between various angry people with too much time on their hands.
ReplyDeleteI have also spoken recently with the tourist office, and they described the absurdly ridiculous online anti camper van campaign. As they say, "You couldn't make it up".
I have previously not accepted some comments. Now, I've deleted a few of the previously accepted borderline comments. Also, I'm now deleting any comments that contain negative material about other people, even if the rest of the comment is relevant to the topic at hand.
That is probably a wise move. I gather there have been more complaints recently about the online activities of people on the island. A few more people having their internet taken away from them may not be a bad thing for the rest of us.
ReplyDelete