MP: Would you say Brennan's been responsive or not? S: He has been responsive in an appropriate manner. He evidently communicates with me and we banter on and off here on Twitter. What had originally happened in regards to the backup was that the SQL backup script malfunctioned around Feb 19, so the board could only unfortunately be backed up to February 19th.

MP: I noted threads about spammer attacks and baphomet attacks against fem and a source said you had to have the thing rebooted by HW S: The board was briefly spammed for ~15 pages worth of threads [15 threads *15] But Hotwheels reverted it back to the latest snapshot. eg "rolling back"

S: I haven't been forced off at all. I have all of the power along with volunteers, who can ban or delete posts by users.

Margaret Pless: I saw the threads in fem and baphomet and meta And I guess first question is, have you been forced off of fem or not?

MP: It seems like you were threatened on your own board. Is that usual? S: People do come and threaten me, but I take it with a grain of salt. A lot of it is warranted in some regards, as I 'shitpost' a lot on other boards, and say things that baphomet and other extreme boards dislike. But overall the threats do not remotely faze me on bit. I've been on the Internet for a long, long time [since I've been a little girl] And I know by now that a lot of these threats are not credible. So it's like, whatever, to me.

MP:what's the intent with fem? Is it supposed to be like [Reddit's] 2Xchromosomes on 8ch.net?

S: What's the intent of fem? It's exactly like what you've said. It's supposed to be the female space of the sorts for 8chan.

I did base it a little off of r.twoXchromosomes and r.trollXchromosomes.

MP: Is the community working out the way you hoped it would?

S: It was working out as I hoped in the beginning, but evidently it's been flooded with men who want female attention or are just seeking to be annoying.

These people aren't misogynist or anything like that, they're just bored and feel like getting reactions by trolling. Be reminded also that *chan's have always had a history of having populations of about ~33% female, 66% male, and that people of both genders on these *chan websites tend to be lonely, shy, or simply trying to escape from real life.

I personally myself had been using 4chan from the spring of 2006, all the way up until August of 2015, where I left in favor of 8chan.

Overall, the amount of spam / trolling has really driven women who used the community away, as they just want to discuss stuff in peace.

Be reminded however, that a lot of this isn't indicative of 8chan, the community, or the administration- but a small, irrelevant minority of people that would be best described as 'edgy', and 'annoying'.

MP: Doesn't that break the one global rule, though? The trolling prevents the free speech of people who want to use fem for its stated purpose.

And it seems like you demonstrated demand, you were in the Top 25 for awhile.

S: The only global rule is to not post illegal content.

While 8chan does have a free speech motive, the trolling doesn't particularly limit their free speech, as they can create other boards and migrate there. A similar argument could be presented that moderation limits the free speech of people, as volunteers can delete essentially whatever they want on a board. That is, however, to the risk of people migrating.

MP:My mistake. What's your stance on the impersonations of you on http://8ch.net ?

S: To what regards? Do you mean the libel against me by users?

Or people using my name and claiming they are me?

MP: The latter, but tell me about both. I understand you were using a PGP key, like a verified signature and that some people aped the way it looked to impersonate.

S: The libel against me hasn't really mattered much. Baphomet isn't particularly filled with smart people, and people easily see through the lies that they spout, as with the archive of that thread you had shown me that showed baphomet discussing me.

As you could have seen on that thread- they had created a infographic calling me a pedophile or claiming that I was another user on 4chan. A lot of people knew it was from baphomet and did not take it as a credible thing.

S:The PGP key was a joke on my part to annoy users on boards with 'forced anon'- which removes the ability to use a tripcode. HW uses a PGP key as a way of identification, as to prevent impersonation / doctoring of posts, and I was simply copypasting a modified text version of his key, and making the counter for the key go up with every post I had made.

S: Overall people libeling me / impersonating me does not matter, as a lot of the lies are easily disproven and I have specific tones / forms of writing on 8chan, and other websites, which distinguish me from others. I also have my tripcode / capcode here on 8chan, which is secure.

MP:I see. Do you think things will get better on fem?

S: Do I think things will get better?

Possibly. Time will tell, to be honest. 8chan is continuing and continuing to get more and more popular, and evidently with that popularity is an increase of population, in regards to both males and females.

Evidently these girls will find the board, and men will find the board, and post on it / contribute to it as normal.

MP:Is this the first time fem's been targeted?

S: No. It's been targeted many times before, but this is only really the only circumstance where it's been substantial enough to warrant a rollback.

Usually I'm responsive and online to deal with shitposting / raiding- but in this particular circumstance I had been sleeping for ~10+ hours and this gave them free reign, as I had also taken the anti spam settings off / forgot to have them on the board, after a previous raid weeks ago had ended.

The only other places I would say raiding / spamming / shitposting comes from would be b, i, and sp.

S:B is the random board, obviously, and is the 8chan variant of b on 4chan. I is the board meant to raid other websites / intraboard drama

and sp raids based on 'GETs', which are consecutive numbers in post IDs which are apart of *chan culture.

MP:Would you have anything say about being a woman on 8chan? It looks tough.

S: Would I have anything else to say about being a woman on 8chan? Not really. At the end of the day, my gender, and the gender of other girls is irrelevant to how our opinions are perceived.

We're all anonymous until we choose to be otherwise, so our opinions are all counted the same until the moment we bring identity into an argument.

MP:OK. Thanks for answering all my questions. What, if any of what we've discussed can I write on the record?

S:You can write and disclose all and anything I have said.

MP: OK. Anything else you want me to know about fem?

S: There's not much to say about fem beyond the fact that I am proud of the female [femanon / femanonymous] community here on 8chan and that

I hope the board recovers and goes back to normal routine of girl talk / discussion. That's all I have to say really.

S: Thank you for writing about fem and I look forward to reading the article. Feel free to tweet at me the link of what you've written when you release the piece tomorrow.

Feel free to contact HW himself, too, if you have any questions about 8chan that you feel like asking him, or how he feels about fem, as he's very open to discussion and a very friendly guy / passionate about 8chan / the Internet.

MP: I will. Thanks for talking to me.

S: Yup, have a great evening.