"...feel that they are immune from accountability."

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Daniel Brandt's battles with Wikipedia are well known. The end of his tenure as an editor seems to have been entirely occupied with attempting to have his Wikipedia bio page removed. The following is an excerpt from his recent letter to Wikimedia's legal counsel, Bradford A. Patrick. The letter appears on Brandt's Wikipedia Watch site:

April 23, 2006

Bradford A. Patrick, Esq.
Fowler White Boggs Banker
501 E. Kennedy
Blvd., Suite 1700
Tampa, FL 33602-5239
bpatrick@fowlerwhite.com
Tel: 813-228-7411
Fax: 813-229-8313


Dear Mr. Patrick:

I am writing to you because you are the attorney for Wikimedia Foundation. This letter should be interpreted as a formal notice made to the Foundation.

For six months I have been defamed and / or had my privacy invaded by agents of the Foundation. This has occurred primarily, but not exclusively, on these pages:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_Brandt
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Daniel_Brandt
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_Talk:Daniel_Brandt

* * *

I am prepared to show that certain administrators, some of whom remain anonymous despite efforts to identify them, have contributed to a situation where much of the material related to me amounts to defamation and/or invasion of privacy. I further contend that there is evidence of unchecked hostility and maliciousness on the part of some editors and administrators. An overview of this pattern of behavior is available at www.wikipedia-watch.org/hivemind.html.

* * *

I cannot answer my detractors as a Wikipedia user, because administrators have blocked me indefinitely. This was primarily due to their perception of a legal threat from me. This "no legal threats" policy is inappropriate in a civil society, one purpose of which is to provide civil remedies under the rule of law. It causes the Foundation's editors and administrators to feel that they are immune from accountability. [Go to the complete letter >>>]

Brandt has also been branded a spammer for redirecting links from Wikipedia (originally to his Wikipedia Watch page cited above: www.wikipedia-watch.org/hivemind.html) to the Wikipedia Review homepage. Again, this does not meet any known definition of spam (see: Wikipedia and the Question of LinkSpam) but an angry Wikipedia hive does not scrupple at mere facts. He pulled a fast one and that's spam enough!

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