2003-06-27 SvsG Emails

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17:36 Nick to Bubba

Nick Notes

This email was started on 6/25 in response to my phone conversation with Bubba on 6/24. I think the P.S. is referring to another call, probably Thursday, in which B said things like "what is this, suddenly we have to have mediation? this is bullshit. we've never had trouble before. c'mon, nick, this is me..." and stuff like that.

Email

Date: Fri, 27 Jun 2003 17:36:19 -0400

From: "N. Staddon" <natredhousedotcom>

To: batvbzdotnet

CC: lynneatredhousedotcom

Subject: our discussion

(Typed this Wednesday, but decided to think about it for a few days before sending.)

Bubba,

To reiterate what I was trying to say last night: we need to go into mediation if there is going to be any hope of working this stuff out. If we can't work it out, we can't work together. What I see from you is behavior that attempts to keep total control of the situation; that is not acceptable to me in any kind of business dealing.

By refusing to let go of the reins, you are going to end up losing something you have worked at very hard for a long time. This seems very self-destructive to me, and I can only hope that putting my foot down will serve as a wake-up call to you that you need to be aware of these patterns and find a way to break out of them. You have often mentioned your long history of partnerships that dissolved abruptly; is it not possible that other people are being put off by the same issues I'm seeing?

I'm being straightforward with you by telling you what I see, and as humane as I can by alerting you to it and offering to go into mediation rather than just pulling out completely as many of your previous partners have apparently done. I cannot, however, continue to operate the way you seem to want me to operate.

I have a list of professional mediators in the Athens area. If you have any specific names you'd like to suggest, please let me know. Red House can pay for the immediate expense, with half of the cost being added to the RDA's debt account (unless we work out something else in mediation) and the other half being deducted from what RH owes me.

If you need time to think about this, that's fine; I'll be in Athens briefly the weekend after this, so there's not much that could happen before then.

Remember, mediation is an opportunity for YOUR side of the story to be heard by an impartial third party; this is not my opportunity to railroad and/or override you. I could do that if I wanted to just break away completely, but I still have some faint hope of resolving this amicably.

It would not, therefore, be helpful for you to call me and try to wear me down until I concede something just to get away from the conflict. It would also not be helpful for you to respond by saying this whole thing is bullshit, nonsense, or any other dismissive phrasing. This is a deal-breaker; we mediate, or we stop altogether.

Please let me know if you are willing to mediate. If so, we can then start discussing logistics.

Thank you,

Nick

P.S. You started calling when I was out, if it makes a difference. I really cannot talk to you without a mediator present. Please stop calling; I will not be picking up.

19:44 Bubba to Nick

Date: Fri, 27 Jun 2003 19:44:30 -0400

To: "N. Staddon" <natredhousedotcom>

From: Bubba <batvbzdotnet>

Subject: Re: our discussion

Nick, In regards to your email stating that you feel that mediation is the next step in the process. It seems clear that you are not willing to go through with your initial agreement to meet after Lynne and I had been given a chance to look over the spreadsheet you sent. This would be in keeping with the "Review and Revision" (your terms) process in which you so often operate. Seems it's just another agreement up to which you will not live.

My understanding was that we would meet and:

A) Set up an agreed upon schedule and process for addressing the issues we cannot agree upon

B) Make a list of issues that need to be discussed and arrange them according to priority

C) Make a list of agreements and boundaries for the upcoming discussions along with how we would enforce them in a conversation when things became heated

D) Outline what we see as an "acceptable" process for dealing with these issues as well as what we see as "unacceptable" processing.

E) Determine what would deem our discussions (without a mediator) to be a failure and accept that it would be necessary to hire a professional mediator.

From my standpoint, you have created an imaginary debt (that we have not agreed exists) based on financial records that you have not been willing or able to produce in order to justify withholding all of the money that has come into VBZ.NET since it's beginning. It seems unreasonable to ask us to agree to incur a "real" debt for something that we don't need to be added to an "imaginary" debt that we agreed to discuss as far as we could without adding the expense of mediation. We will take some time to think about this and ask that you do the same. If you are willing to pay for the mediation without expecting us to shoulder any of the costs, we would be more apt to agree to something we don't feel we need at this time.

I agree that there may come a time where we would agree go half's on the mediation. After we have worked through the list above, that we agreed would make sense, then it might make sense to bring someone in to assist us. The process that it will take to get that list together and hash out what we can, will take quite a bit of time. Maybe you would like to pay for that portion we agreed to do without a mediator and go from there. Let me know what you think. It may be best to avoid talking until we can reach some agreement on how to proceed. Take all the time you need and we will be giving all of this some thought, as well.

B.

Nick Notes

Soon after I received this email, several domain transfer requests arrived from godaddy.com for two domains (whose registration B had paid me back for, after using Red House's check card to pay for them initially): n2ug.com and qualtro.com. The hosting for the time they were on Red House's server had not been paid, but I allowed the transfers to go through.

21:52 Bubba to Nick

Date: Fri, 27 Jun 2003 21:52:46 -0400

To: "N. Staddon" <natredhousedotcom>

From: Bubba <batvbzdotnet>

Subject: images

N., does this mean that you know about the images or not?

B.

Nick Notes

I think this refers to some images I finally got him to upload a couple of weeks earlier... I'll get the specifics when I put up those emails.

22:14 Bubba to Nick

Date: Fri, 27 Jun 2003 22:14:30 -0400

To: "N. Staddon" <natredhousedotcom>

From: Bubba <batvbzdotnet>

Subject: images

N., not responding is just another control issue on YOUR part not mine.

I've started what I said I would and you have gotten most hostile, defensive and confrontational to the point of threatening me with "losing 5 years of work" if I don't capitulate to your unreasonable demands. How is this positive and in the best interest of the store or our partnership? Why do you seek to dictate to me as to how I perform my duties. When did you become the boss to make the call? My call to you the other night was just to let you know that I'll ask who I want, when I want, for what I want and if you have issue with that then you can have issue with it and it'll not change how I do what I do for the store.

All I asked was for you to let me know if you knew the freekin' images are there. Why is this a stumbling block for you? What part of "Do you know the images are there?" is causing you grief? As your partner don't I deserve an answer to this legitimate reasonable request? If not tell me why.

B.

Nick Notes

I think the "hostile"/"threatening" bit refers to our phone conversation which, sadly, was not recorded for posterity. To the best of my recollection, the only "threatening" I might have done in that conversation was to warn Bubba that he was exceeding the limits of my ability to work with him.