Anti-social Media with Judd Bagley Exposing User-Generated Discontent

18Dec/060

Gary Weiss, the Root of the Problem: Part One

When attempting to understand the nature of a specific pathology, it’s wise to seek information about its origins in the context of the subject’s history.

This is the first of a four part series on the origins of the pathology apparently afflicting our subject, Gary Weiss. This pathology is manifest as a compulsion to invent false identities online for personal gain, and, when discovered, to lie, deny, and attack his accusers.

Gary himself provides a beautiful launching point in the form of a story written for Business Week in June of 1995, entitled Online Investing. Around halfway, Gary offers this lynchpin piece of information:

My AOL address is Garywbw@aol.com. I also have a Prodigy address (NNEL28A@prodigy.com) and an address at an Internet provider known as NETCOM On-Line Communication Services Inc.: garyrw@ix.netcom.com. But initially, I was only at AOL.

It seems safe to assume that garywbw stands for “Gary Weiss Business Week.”

It also seems safe to assume that in 1995, Gary Weiss was among the many oblivious to the future implications of printing one’s personal email address in Business Week.

That future is here.

Exactly six months prior to Gary’s publication of his email address in Business Week, he made what appears to be his first newsgroup posting, to the misc.writing group.

The next post made as garywbw wouldn’t come until September of 1996, simply reading:

Looking for people who have had any dealings with [Monitor Investments, Global Equities Grp., State Street, Norfolk, Biltmore], as well as Sovereign Equity Management and First Hanover. Kindly email me at garywbw@aol.com.

Three months later, part one of Gary Weiss’s BusinessWeek story The Mob on Wall Street would make extensive reference to four of the firms inquired about in the above post.

Point being, garywbw@aol.com is our Gary Weiss.

Garywbw spends the first part of 1997 as a surprisingly constructive participant in a few support-related groups. Then, in March of that year, we see Gary’s first, fateful post to the newsgroup soc.culture.jewish:

This newsgroup sucks
Is there a better one somewhere -- a moderated one, preferably to keep out the kooks, flames and so on? One where "Jewish culture" is actually discussed? Pls advise.

We consider that post “fateful,” because it represents Gary’s first apparent contribution to the newsgroup where the seeds of his habitual deception were sown.

Part two of this series (to be published on Wednesday, December 20, 2006) examines a few of those seeds; and, if we may be so bold, will likely freak you out.

18Dec/06Off

The root of the problem: Part One

When attempting to understand the nature of a specific pathology, it’s wise to seek information about its origins in the context of the subject’s history.

This is the first of a four part series on the origins of the pathology apparently afflicting our subject, Gary Weiss. This pathology is manifest as a compulsion to invent false identities online for personal gain, and, when discovered, to lie, deny, and attack his accusers.

Gary himself provides a beautiful launching point in the form of a story written for Business Week in June of 1995, entitled Online Investing. Around halfway, Gary offers this lynchpin piece of information:

My AOL address is Garywbw@aol.com. I also have a Prodigy address (NNEL28A@prodigy.com) and an address at an Internet provider known as NETCOM On-Line Communication Services Inc.: garyrw@ix.netcom.com. But initially, I was only at AOL.

It seems safe to assume that garywbw stands for “Gary Weiss Business Week.”

It also seems safe to assume that in 1995, Gary Weiss was among the many oblivious to the future implications of printing one’s personal email address in Business Week.

That future is here.

Exactly six months prior to Gary’s publication of his email address in Business Week, he made what appears to be his first newsgroup posting, to the misc.writing group.

The next post made as garywbw wouldn’t come until September of 1996, simply reading:

Looking for people who have had any dealings with [Monitor Investments, Global Equities Grp., State Street, Norfolk, Biltmore], as well as Sovereign Equity Management and First Hanover. Kindly email me at garywbw@aol.com.

Three months later, part one of Gary Weiss’s BusinessWeek story The Mob on Wall Street would make extensive reference to four of the firms inquired about in the above post.

Point being, garywbw@aol.com is our Gary Weiss.

Garywbw spends the first part of 1997 as a surprisingly constructive participant in a few support-related groups. Then, in March of that year, we see Gary’s first, fateful post to the newsgroup soc.culture.jewish:

This newsgroup sucks
Is there a better one somewhere -- a moderated one, preferably to keep out the kooks, flames and so on? One where "Jewish culture" is actually discussed? Pls advise.

We consider that post “fateful,” because it represents Gary’s first apparent contribution to the newsgroup where the seeds of his habitual deception were sown.

Part two of this series (to be published on Wednesday, December 20, 2006) examines a few of those seeds; and, if we may be so bold, will likely freak you out.

5Dec/06Off

A renewed view of Gary Weiss, viewed and re-viewed

At some point on December 4, 2006, the number of reviews of Gary Weiss's book Wall Street Versus America dropped from 17 to 10, as all of the following reviewers' contributions were deleted:

Burton (Baltimore, MD)
Dave Watson (Banning, CA)
Luminiere (Miami)
George (Needham, MA)
Marty Ross (Houston, Texas)
Rich Golden (New York, NY USA)
Ted Dichtler (Monroe, NY)

Jim O'Reilly (New York, NY USA), who did not review Weiss's book, also saw his 16 reviews deleted.

You'll note that five of the above eight names (in bold) are the same five we concluded were being deceptively used by Gary Weiss to artificially boost his book's sales while artificially depressing others.

Of course the reviews in situ are gone and the links to them broken, but we will soon post the full text, which we saved pre-delete, here.

We had concluded that the additional three users were also Gary Weiss, but limited our initial report to five, given the need to conserve space and the ease of proving as much.

Our complete list, for those of you playing at home, also includes the following:

Chuck T. (Chicago, IL)
Elliot Baker (Red Bank, NJ)
Johannsen (Atlanta)
Raymond Stella (New York, NY)

At this point, it's unclear who deleted these reviews, whether it was Amazon administrators or Gary Weiss himself (as users may delete or edit their own reviews) but the following incident suggests it was Gary.

Soon after the reviews were discovered to be missing, a poster on an investorvillage.com message board noted that the user page of Jim O'Reilly, while devoid of reviews, retained a link to Jim O'Reilly's "Wish List." Upon clicking the link, he found "Gary Weiss's Wish List." A cut and paste version of it can be seen here.

Within minutes of posting this odd Weiss/O'Reilly connection, the wish list was also deleted. We hypothesize that the account was originally called Gary Weiss and the name was changed to Jim O'Reilly at some point, though the name on the wish list was not.

We applaud Gary Weiss for deleting eight of his deceptive reviewer accounts and call on him to now remove the additional four noted above.

25Nov/060

Gary Weiss, viewed and re-viewed

UPDATE: as explained here, shortly after the following post was published, all of the reviews of each of the five "reviewers" examined were deleted by the reviewer himself, whom we posit to be Gary Weiss. Consequently, the links to the original reviews included in this post lead to blank pages. Still, we leave the post in its original state for your consideration.

You were probably expecting this installment of Antisocialmedia.net to be entirely about Gary Weiss. Sorry, it's not. At least not exclusively.

Instead, this is a story about ten authors and five Amazon.com reviewers, and how Gary Weiss unites them all.

We'll start with writer Daniel Strachman.

Daniel Strachman
Strachman is a business writer, whose list of published books includes Getting Started in Hedge Funds and the biography of former hedge fund owner Julian Robertson, A Tiger in the Land of Bulls and Bears. Strachman's books are sold in many online venues, including Amazon.com, which is notable for its reader-contributed book reviews. An examination of the reviews of Strachman's Getting Started in Hedge Funds reveals an unusual degree of polarization and negativity, especially for a title of the non-fiction, "high level overview" genre.

The most recent (11/2006) review of the book was submitted in April, 2005 by someone who merely self-identifies as George (Needham, MA).

Here's what George wrote about Getting Started in Hedge Funds:

Additional Information

In 1996, Julian Robertson filed a $1-billion libel lawsuit against Gary Weiss and his then-employer Business Week Magazine. Robertson insisted, and Business Week later admitted, a story about Robertson, penned by Weiss, contained some overt inaccuracies.

In A Tiger in the Land of Bulls and Bears, Strachman offers Robertson's view of his clash with Weiss, and BusinessWeek, and quotes Weiss as saying:

"I understand how he could be upset because the article was negative. Although [Robertson] did have a few good years after the article came out, it did prove correct because he did have to close."

In the interim, Gary Weiss has used the web to take shots at Robertson more than once. The successful efforts to delete the Wikipedia articles on a Robertson-funded scholarship and another on Robertson's wife Josie were both instigated by Lastexit, one of Gary's confirmed Wikipedia sockpuppet accounts, and (in direct violation of Wikipedia rules) supported by Mantanmoreland, another Weiss sockpuppet.

A worthy companion to Strachman's horrid biography of Julian Robertson, which it resembles. Tepid, tedious and superficial, utterly devoid of any redeeming value, this is the kind of book that makes you wonder if Wiley is actually a publisher. The correct term appears to be "printer," with no consideration given to the merits of the book. (George)

It's not immediately clear why someone would give the author of a "horrid biography" a second chance, but we'll assume George has his reasons. To better understand what those reasons are, we could read George's review of the Robertson book.

Unfortunately, despite having read it, George opted not to review the Robertson biography, although we do find another review, submitted by Rich Golden (New York, NY), that comes unusually close to what we imagine George might write.

A horrid little book that reads like the kind of "vanity" tome that CEOs privately print for their friends and relatives. You know, books with titles like, "Forty Years at the Helm of Acme Industries." It's that bad.

Strachman glosses over Robertson's mistakes -- little things like his fund going OUT OF BUSINESS -- and is filled with errors and inconsistencies. Shame on Wiley for publishing such pap. (Rich Golden)

Note how both George and Rich Golden employ the term "horrid," and both single out the publisher Wiley & Sons for criticism -- keeping in mind that most readers are rarely even aware of a book's publisher, much less prone to assign blame or credit for a book they've read.

Another notable exception to that rule is reviewer Jim O'Reilly (New York, NY), who hated the Robertson bio and also blames the book's publisher.

This book reads as if you had programmed a computer to produce the worst possible book about Julian Robertson. It is awkwardly written, hagiographic in the most egregious way possible, and omits so much that you really have to question the motives of the author in writing this book...

Really dreadful, and I am surprised that a major publisher would produce swill such as this. (Jim O'Reilly)

Apart from their shared dislike for the work of Daniel Strachman and disappointment in the editorial judgment of Wiley & Sons, what else do George, Rich Golden and Jim O'Reilly have in common?

To learn, let's look at their reviews of other authors.

Frankie Saggio
On April 9, 2005, one day before his thrashing of Strachman, George reviewed Frankie Saggio's autobiographical Born to the Mob.

Pathetic. You got to hand it to this Saggio guy--the scams never end. Now comes his latest scam, which is this book, which he obviously just made up completely. Anyone could have written this book using stuff that appeared in the media...Pretty miserable and pathetic stuff. (George)

Interestingly, we find that Jim O'Reilly also read and reviewed Born to the Mob.

Total garbage--don't be conned by shills.

I have only myself to blame for buying this piece of crap, on the basis of eighteen reviews -- most from "A reader" and all sounding alike.

Additional information

A psychologist might classify this review as a good example of Freudian Projection.

And I didn't bother to check that practically all the "reviewers" who could be checked had reviewed only this book. Gee, what a coinkidink that a book that is barely selling and is put out by a doggie-do publisher should get so many "raves." See if you can guess who probably wrote all those reviews...A total crib job, a real fraud from a read fraudster. (Jim O'Reilly)

Two weeks after Jim O'Reilly weighs in, reviewer Marty Ross (Houston, TX) expresses his disappointment with Saggio's effort.

I've read pretty much all the books on [organized crime] that have come out in recent years, and this one is one of the absolute worst...When you think about how many great books there are on the Mob, particularly Wise Guys by Nick Pileggi and the Jerry Capeci books, or more recently the great book by George Anastasia, you have got to have your head examined to read a book like this. (Marty Ross)

To learn more about Marty Ross, let's read his reviews of other authors.

Salvatore Lauria
In November, 2003, Marty Ross reviewed The Scorpion and the Frog by Salvatore Lauria, and offers a very telling bit of insight when he strikes a comparison between that book and another true crime tale released that same year.

A tedious book, poorly written, boring, superficial, and lacks credibility.

Additional information

Weiss (as Mantanmoreland) also complained about Lauria's having changed some names in an edit to the Wikipedia article Pump and Dump:

Pump and dump fraud was explored in the anonymously written books License to Steal and in The Scorpion and the Frog. Both books explore pump and dump schemes in some detail but, unlike Born to Steal, do not provide the real names of the specific firms and people described. (Mantanmoreland)

The author has changed some names and left others alone, which makes me wonder which names are true and which are phony. Or I would wonder, if I cared--which I don't.

It covers much the same ground as a much better book called Born to Steal, as I only discovered after buying the book and reading a short way into it. Even writes about some of the same gangsters and stock promoters, such as Roy Ageloff and Frank Coppa, but what was vivid and fascinating in Born to Steal is limp and uninteresting here. A shame, as this is a subject that definitely warrants another book. (Marty Ross)

Mr. Ross's criticism of Lauria is echoed by reviewer Ted Dichtler (Monroe, NY).

Self-serving, poorly written, uninformative.

The "readers" who gave favorable reviews to this book are obviously pals of the author, if he has any left, as no one else would find anything even the slightest bit worthwhile about this book. This patently dishonest tripe is simply not worth buying. Take it out of the library if you want to read some boring garbage some evening you have insomnia and need to sleep. (Ted Dichtler)

To learn more about Ted Dichtler, let's read his reviews of other authors.

Selwyn Raab
Ted Dichtler was disappointed by Selwyn Raab's Five Families: The Rise, Decline, And Resurgence of America's Most Powerful Mafia Empires.

Additional Information

Selwyn Raab covered the organized crime beat for the New York Times and wrote a high profile expose on the Mob's infiltration of Wall Street which ran in the middle of BusinessWeek's three-month long series on the same topic, written by Gary Weiss.

I bought this book in the hope that this would be a kind of mob version of the Encyclopedia of New York City -- a kind of comprehensive treasure trove of lore, as promised.

Unfortunately, the book fell short of my expectations. It is far too unfocussed and poorly written, as even the obligatory Times review noted today, and also it provides only very slim information on recent developments in the Mob.

Mob books are a glut on the market, so every new one must pass a higher and higher bar. This one might have been a real winner ten years ago but today it is not. (Ted Dichtler)

Mr. Dichtler's review, posted September 11, 2005, came just one day after a review of the same book by Rich Golden.

...I read it through quickly, skimming through all the old stuff, all the rehash that I had read before, which was pretty much everything.

...It is boring, pedantic, and not at all well-written...One problem with this book is that it is based on public records, and thus has a kind of second-hand feel. Also it has very little on the latest doings in the mob -- just a few paragraphs on stock fraud schemes for example, even though they are the mainstay of the mob lately.

The title of the book says that there has been a "resurgence" of the Five Families. But there is nothing in the book that talks about that, except for a few pages toward the very end, so he simply does not support his thesis...This book fails in contrast with the superb reporting of Robert Lacey in his book on Meyer Lansky-- Little Man -- or the fascinating recent book on Mafia pump and dump schemes, Born to Steal. (Rich Golden)

Two weeks later, on September 28, 2005, Jim O'Reilly reviews the same book.

Also it does a limp job of describing the most recent Mafia scams, and lays an egg by promising a "resurgence" in the title but failing to deliver. No new analysis, no new facts. Bah

This book falls flat on its keister -- as fresh as last year's newspaper and as riveting as the Brooklyn telephone directory. What Raab has done is to take a lot of Mafia lore from the public record and pour it like molasses into these pages. (Jim O'Reilly)

George, Rich Golden, Jim O'Reilly, and Ted Dichtler all seem to have a lot in common. At the very least, we see that they hate the work of the same writers. Can the trend continue? Let's find out by looking at another author.

Michael Mandel
Ted Dichtler read Michael Mandel's Rational Exuberance, but couldn't find anything positive to say in his original review posted August 24, 2004.

Additional Information

Strangely, this review was substantially edited on or about November 15, shortly after it was revealed that the origins of Gary Weiss's Amazon.com reviews would be a forthcoming topic on this blog.

The edited version gives five enthusiastic stars, where Ted Dichtler's original (cached version available here) gave one.

The problem with this book is that it posits one strawman after another--particularly liberal economists like Krugman. But the basic flaw in his argument is that there really aren't a lot of people out there who are "against progress and innovation," no matter how many rationalizations he may use to present that thesis.

So what we have here is an author trying to drum up a "controversy" that doesn't exist, which doesn't work on an intellectual level and apparently isn't selling many books either, judging from the Amazon sales rank. (Ted Dichtler)

Coincidentally, Ted Dichtler's review was posted just a few weeks after our friend George thrashed the same book.

Additional Information

Michael Mandel and Gary Weiss were colleagues at Business Week until Weiss left the magazine in mid-2004. Mandel remains at BW as Head Economist.

No wonder this book is a dud.

Michael Mandel's book has laid an egg, but you can only understand why if you make the mistake of picking up this book and reading it. This same gent, who "predicted" the Internet depression (after it already happened) now seeks to burden us with the believe that all these hobgoblins out there are the "enemies of growth." But his arguments are unconvincing and poorly presented, in prose that is hackneyed and academic-dull. (George)

Despite his almost visceral aversion to Mandel's Rational Exuberance, ten months later George opted to read yet another book by the author, The Coming Internet Depression.

Nice going, Mandel. He predicts a decline in Internet stocks in a book that comes out in October 2000-- AFTER the market falls. He predicts a "depression" when what we got was a mild recession. Mandel's next book is about the dangers that iceburgs pose to ships like the Titanic, and how we have to watch out for Al Qaeda. (George)

So far, among reviewers Rich Golden, George, Ted Dichtler, Jim O'Reilly, and Marty Ross, we've seen instances of cross-over among everybody but Marty and Rich. Until now...

Rebecca Smith
Among the first to review Rebecca Smith's 24 Days: How Two Wall Street Journal Reporters Uncovered the Lies that Destroyed Faith in Corporate America were Marty Ross and Ted Dichtler. In fact, they wrote their reviews within four days of each other, starting with Ted.

Readers who believed the publisher's hype and expected another fast-paced sophisticated thriller along the lines of All the President's Men or Indecent Exposure are going to be disappointed...Power Failure is a much better and more interesting book. This one simply fails to generate enough, pardon the expression, wattage. The writing is lackluster and book is simply not a very good read. (Marty Ross)

Like Ted Dichtler, reviewer Marty Ross also warns readers against falling for the publisher's "hype," in addition to offering the book Power Failure as an alternative, and concludes by attacking the quality of the book's writing.

Additional Information

Gary Weiss is an active consumer of Enron-related material, and wrote a column on the topic for Salon.com.

Forget the hype--this book is a bomb. The authors could not get access to the real players in the Enron drama, so they did what they thought was the next best thing and wrote about themselves...Power Failure told the story from the inside. This book tells the story from the outside and not as well. The writing is pedestrian, the insights marginal. Avoid. (Ted Dichtler)

Arthur Levitt
After leaving the Chairmanship of the SEC, Arthur Levitt started writing books, including Take On the Street: What Wall Street and Corporate America Don't Want You to Know.

Additional Information

Upon conclusion of his month long Wikipedia absence, one of Gary Weiss's first edits was the following, made to the Wikipedia article on former SEC Chair Arthur Levitt, where he noted:

During Levitt's tenure at the SEC, he was widely viewed as a pro-investor advocate and received favorable press coverage. However, more recently has come under criticism for failing to act against 1990s bull market abuses. Critics include former Wall Street Journal reporter Charles Gasparino, author of Blood on the Street, and Gary Weiss, who harshly criticizes Levitt in his 2006 book Wall Street Versus America. (Mantanmoreland)

Marty Ross spent part of his Christmas Eve, 2003 offering up this review of Levitt's book:

This book needs to be read over again, in conjunction with Gary Weiss's scorching expose of Wall Street, "Wall Street Versus America." He excoriates Levitt's record as SEC chairman, and points up the yawning gaps and omissions in this book. *

I read this book when it came out and I thought that it was self-serving and generally of no value whatsoever. Now I went back to it after reading the Weiss book and I found it was actually a pretty contemptible piece of work after all. (Marty Ross)

*Though dated 12/24/2003, this review makes reference to Gary Weiss's second book, which was not published until 4/6/2006. Just though it was worth mentioning.

Charles Gasparino
Additional Information

Charles Gasparino has been the subject of attacks by Gary Weiss for Gasparino's defense of SEC subpoenas issued to financial journalists and commentators, including CNBC's Jim Cramer.

Rich Golden reviewed CNBC Wall Street reporter Charles Gasparino's Blood on the Street: The Sensational Inside Story of How Wall Street Analysts Duped a Generation of Investors but here again, had nothing positive to say about it.

Haven't I read this before? Henry Blodgett is a liar! Oh my. Stop the presses! That's the kind of breathless, naive tone of much of this book. Puh-lease. I've read this all before. (Rich Golden)

James J. Cramer
CNBC's Mad Money host Jim Cramer also writes books. Ted Dichtler read Jim Cramer's Real Money and it appears to have changed his life.

Additional Information

Gary Weiss seems to adore Jim Cramer and frequently defends him on his blog.

Totally loved it. Am a great fan of Cramer's from watching his TV show and this book packed the same wallop as his show. I've read many books on investing and this one is right up there with One Up on Wall Street in the classics of investing. A big booya! (Ted Dichtler)

George read Cramer's Confessions of a Street Addict and was touched.

You may not like Jim Cramer--I find him a little abrasive--but you can't deny that he is a riveting and excellent writer. This book is one of the best inside accounts that has come out on Wall Street, and by far the best book ever to come out on the hedge fund biz...Instead of portraying himself as "philanthropist" or other self-indulgent crap that we get in other books of this kind, we have an honest, warts and all portrayal.

The shame is that a lot of the negative reviews on this book are a result of its chief asset, which is its honesty. (George)

Gary Weiss
The combined passions of George, Ted Dichtler, Marty Ross and Rich Golden converge around Gary Weiss and his books Born to Steal and Wall Street Versus America.Ted Dichtler on Born to Steal:

Additional Information

This review is dated 5/4/2003, which is between 0 and 38 hours after the first possible opportunity to buy the book in stores (Warner Books only lists the publication date as "5/03")..

Good gawd, this is the best book I have read in a long time--and definitely the best book I've ever read about the Mafia or Wall Street. It is funnier and more knowing than Liar's Poker, and much more disturbing than any of the James Stewart books I have ever read. And it is a cut above any book I have ever read about the Mob--thrilling and funny at the same time...It is reminiscent of the story that Nick Pileggi told in Wise Guy or the movie Goodfellas, but with considerably more humor and with a more entrancing style. At times I laughed out loud!...Born to Steal is a winner! (Ted Dichtler)

Ted Dichtler on Wall Street Versus America:

A solid, well-researched appraisal of the various ways Wall Street in its various guises can and does rip off the public.

This book is a considerably broader look at securities industry practices that Weiss's previous book Born to Steal, and in this broader canvas he paints a picture that is more disturbing. In Born to Steal the protagonist was a young punk from the fringes of society. In this book society itself is to blame.

The book is tough on pretty much everyone involved, but is toughest on Arthur Levitt, who presided over the SEC in the 1990s. Highly recommended. (Ted Dichtler)

Rich Golden on Born to Steal:

It's interesting to contrast this detailed, fascinating account of Mob pump and dump schemes with the much-hyped "five families" compendium that just came out the other day, and which I found to be pretty lame.

What sets this book apart is its rich detail. Instead of relying on secondary sources like some Mafia writers, Born to Steal takes it all from the horses mouth, a kid from the streets of Staten Island who was lured into a Mob brokerage house...

What is particularly compelling about this book is that it shows the Mafia in decline. There is no "resurgence," as one recent author argued. On the contrary, the mob seems to have regenerated to becoming a shadow of its former self. It is now little more than a street gang.

This book is compact, engrossing and a great read that is informative. Well-written and witty too, it brings out the irony in every situation. (Rich Golden )

Rich Golden on Wall Street Versus America:

A solid, tough-minded yet breezy examination of nefarious Wall Street practices by a master investigative reporter...This book is a good supplement to Born to Steal but covers a much broader canvass.

Weiss does not hide his contempt for Wall Street hypocrisy, and his treatment of the financial media is refreshing.
I would recommend this book to anyone reading Joel Greenblatt's Little Book That Beats the Market. I happened to like that book very much, but here we get a differing point of view, which is that stock-picking systems don't work. I think both points of view have validity, and likewise I would recommend that readers of this book should read Greenblatt's.
I just read Cramer's new book and it definitely conflicts with that too. Again, it is the philosophical difference between value investing and efficient markets. Both need to be understood by investors.

Overall I came away from this book a little shell-shocked, but it definitely makes convincing arguments and does so with zest and wit. (Rich Golden)

Marty Ross on Born to Steal:

I laughed out loud reading this book, which is a really exciting read as well. This book reminds me a lot of the Scott Turow books, but it doesn't take itself, or its cast of characters, quite as seriously.

Even so, this book gets into the mind of the criminal better any I have ever read, as is as good a tour of Wall Street--and the Mob--as I am sure I will ever find. (Marty Ross)

Marty Ross on Wall Street Versus America:

I'm surprised that more attention hasn't focused on how this book takes aim at the financial press. It is definitely a case of ready, aim and fire, and Weiss scores a bullseye.

The book is a sometimes raunchy, always very funny examination of all things related to Wall Street. But I liked most how he totally rips to shreds the financial press from stem to stern. Nobody escapes his slingshot, not even his own colleagues at Business Week...

Additional Information

Tim Picks actually first used the "Eddie Haskell" line to refer to Goldman Sachs back in 2002.

This book is filled with many funny lines, with Bear Stearns is the "Eddie Haskell of Wall Street" and the New York Stock Exchange as acting in a "vampiristic" fashion. The crazy thing is that when you think about it, you realize it is all true! (Marty Ross)

George on Wall Street Versus America:

Wow! This book blasts its way across Wall Street and doesn't pull any punches. Weiss is acerbic, insightful and very very funny...A solid, fast read that should be on the shelf of every investor in America. (George)

George on Born to Steal :

Start reading this early in the day. Why? BECAUSE YOU CAN'T PUT IT DOWN!!!!!

I took this book to the beach during the July 4th weekend and made the mistake of starting to read it in the afternoon. There I was as the sun was setting at 8, and I was still reading it. Everyone was gone and I was squinting as the sun went down. That's how electrifying this book is.

Louis Pasciuto is a parochial school kid from Staten Island who has a slight character-development issue: He steals. He stole when he was a small child and as a teenager he found just the place to practice his craft. Wall Street beckoned, in the form of a well-groomed stock scammer named Roy Ageloff.

Such is the setup for one of the most readable stories that have come down the pike in a long time. Weiss's portrayal of the world of Wall Street and the Mafia is extraordinarily revealing. I heard this is going to be a movie and I can see why.

I don't want to give away any of the plot, as this is one of those books that you read with your hand on the page to keep from letting your eyes wandering down to see what is happening in the future. It was an education on the subject of Wall Street, and I came away from reading this book with a wealth of education that I hope will make me into a smarter investor.

One thing about this book that is surprising is how entertaining and funny it is. You wouldn't expect that from a book about Wall Street or the Mafia. But Weiss has extraordinary comic sense and he brings out the irony in some characters who are at once loathsome and fascinating. He also makes some sharp observations on the abysmal failure of Wall Street regulation and the moronic character of so much that has been written about the Mob.

Born to Steal is a winner in every respect. (George)

But what about Jim O'Reilly?

Interestingly, Jim O'Reilly was the only one of the five who never reviewed Gary Weiss's books.

However he did the next best thing: he reviewed The Sanity Check Blog, run by Weiss's avowed mortal enemy Bob O'Brien.

Check Your Sanity At the Door.

This is arguably the worst website on the Internet purportedly devoted to the stock market and investing.

This website promotes the lastest variation on a very old, long-discredited conspiracy theory that occasionally makes the rounds. It is now being promoted by a consortium of stock promoters and is led by Patrick Byrne, the famously flaky CEO of Overstock.com, whose demagoguery is prominently featured on the site.

Let's start with the name: "Sanity check." In a sense that is correct, because you have to "check your sanity" at the door. The purpose of this website is to confuse, frighten, misinform and mislead investors.

Enter the site and you are told that the purpose is to promote a "market reform movement." But as you penetrate the layers of this site, you see that what the site operator has in mind is one issue and one issue only: something he describes as "stock counterfeiting" or "naked short selling."

As you go through the site, you see that every problem the market faces, from microcap fraud to Enron, supposedly boils down to a mammoth "conspiracy of miscreants," and that yet another conspiracy has been whipped up to cover up the central conspiracy.

Therefore Enron was not the fault of its management. Various microcap frauds were not the fault of stock promoters or company officials. Companies don't decline because they are bad companies. Their stocks decline because of a "conspiracy of miscreants" and "bad guys."

It's all laid out in this slick, well-financed website, written for the express purpose of deceiving the public by experts -- the boiler room con men made famous by the movie Boiler Room.

These same con men and their allies are the principal advocates of the "stock counterfeiting conspiracy" theory advocated on this website.

To further this lurid tale, which is advanced by several "blogs" on the site, the website takes highly technical securities processing esoterica and weaves grotesque conspiracies around them.

Central to its premise is the idea that "fails to deliver," a commonplace occurrence in the market that does not disadvantage investors, is somehow a cover for mammoth "stock counterfeiting."

The "experts" spouting nonsense on this site are microcap stock promoters and a "Dr. Jim," who is promoted as an "expert on securities processing" but was recently outed as a dentist in Oregon.

Why devote a website to a non-existent problem? Because the principal proponents of the "stock counterfeiting" conspiracy theory are microcap stock promoters seeking to create a smokescreen for their own activities. Some of their wares, such as a crummy delisted mining company called CMKH and a mob stock manipulation called Eagletech, are promoted on this website.

In this website you see a lot of references to "bad guys" and "miscreants." They are never stock promoters or actual criminals, but rather people seeking to bring actual fraudsters to justice. The "enemies" of this "market reform movement" are viciously attacked and villified in a manner more suited to a cult than a "stock market reform movement."

Additional Information

This review was posted on 3/11/06. Two days later, Gary Weiss blogged about TheSanityCheck.com and Bob O'Brien's then-recent attack on Jim Cramer's character.

Among the central villains of this tale are regulators, Eliot Spitzer, and investigative journalists who have targeted the "stock counterfeiting" myth, and these are villified and libeled routinely, along with other "miscreants" such as CNBC host Jim Cramer and the Depository Trust and Clearing Corp.

The webmaster of the site, not surprisingly, carefully guards his identity in order to avoid being sued or subjected to prosecution for the lies and stock promotions contained on this website.

So if you own a stock that has declined and want to blame somebody OTHER THAN THE COMPANY --- this site is for you. You'll be deceiving yourself, but that's understandable because the people who run this site are experts at deception.

And with that, gentle reader, we rest our case.

Antisocialmedia.net again calls on Gary Weiss to end his seemingly limitless online charades.

(Ready to run up the score a little again? OK, how about this...)

Additional Information

Blogger is the blogging platform Gary Weiss uses (exclusively).

Jim O'Reilly also reviewed Blogger.com:

...my blog utilizes the blogger.com platform exclusively. (Jim O'Reilly)

Jim O'Reilly also reviewed two DVD compilations of the Naked City television series.

Additional Information

Confirmed Weiss sockpuppet Tomstoner is the single largest contributor to the Wikipedia article on the Naked City tv series.

Image Entertainment has really outdone itself with this outstanding collection from one of the best television shows ever to be shown. Am waiting impatiently for the remaining shows to be released on DVD. (Jim O'Reilly)

Marty Ross thrashed Arthur Waskow's A Time for Every Purpose Under Heaven: The Jewish Life-Spiral as a Spiritual Path with particular zest:

Additional Information

Gary Weiss (Mantanmoreland), apparently felt no conflict of conscience when he brought an administrative complaint against an editor named Awaskow (presumably Arthur Waskow) for editing the Wikipedia article about him.

...Awaskow is obviously Arthur Waskow or, far less likely, impersonating him... Both this user and sockpuppet should be blocked from editing indefinitely, since he is clearly here solely for self-promotional purposes. (Mantanmoreland)

The World According to Waskow should be the title of the totally nonsensical, wretched collection of claptrap. Arthur "East River" Waskow should hold the title of "rabbit" and not "rabbi" because all he has done here is taken his personal political and pseudo-social agenda and coated it with a think shellac of Judaism. I took this book out of the library.

I returned it. You should do the same. (Marty Ross)

25Nov/060

Gary Weiss gave his own books many positive reviews on Amazon

UPDATE: as explained here, shortly after the following post was published, all of the reviews of each of the five "reviewers" examined were deleted by the reviewer himself, whom we posit to be Gary Weiss. Consequently, the links to the original reviews included in this post lead to blank pages. Still, we leave the post in its original state for your consideration.

You were probably expecting this installment of Antisocialmedia.net to be entirely about Gary Weiss. Sorry, it's not. At least not exclusively.Instead, this is a story about ten authors and five Amazon.com reviewers, and how Gary Weiss unites them all.We'll start with writer Daniel Strachman.
Daniel Strachman
Strachman is a business writer, whose list of published books includes Getting Started in Hedge Funds and the biography of former hedge fund owner Julian Robertson, A Tiger in the Land of Bulls and Bears. Strachman's books are sold in many online venues, including Amazon.com, which is notable for its reader-contributed book reviews. An examination of the reviews of Strachman's Getting Started in Hedge Fundsreveals an unusual degree of polarization and negativity, especially for a title of the non-fiction, "high level overview" genre.The most recent (11/2006) review of the book was submitted in April, 2005 by someone who merely self-identifies as George (Needham, MA).Here's what George wrote about Getting Started in Hedge Funds:

Additional Information

In 1996, Julian Robertson filed a $1-billion libel lawsuit against Gary Weiss and his then-employer Business Week Magazine. Robertson insisted, and Business Week later admitted, a story about Robertson, penned by Weiss, contained some overt inaccuracies.

In A Tiger in the Land of Bulls and Bears, Strachman offers Robertson's view of his clash with Weiss, and BusinessWeek, and quotes Weiss as saying:

"I understand how he could be upset because the article was negative. Although [Robertson] did have a few good years after the article came out, it did prove correct because he did have to close."

In the interim, Gary Weiss has used the web to take shots at Robertson more than once. The successful efforts to delete the Wikipedia articles on a Robertson-funded scholarship and another on Robertson's wife Josie were both instigated by Lastexit, one of Gary's confirmed Wikipedia sockpuppet accounts, and (in direct violation of Wikipedia rules) supported by Mantanmoreland, another Weiss sockpuppet.

A worthy companion to Strachman's horrid biography of Julian Robertson, which it resembles. Tepid, tedious and superficial, utterly devoid of any redeeming value, this is the kind of book that makes you wonder if Wiley is actually a publisher. The correct term appears to be "printer," with no consideration given to the merits of the book. (George)

It's not immediately clear why someone would give the author of a "horrid biography" a second chance, but we'll assume George has his reasons. To better understand what those reasons are, we could read George's review of the Robertson book.

Unfortunately, despite having read it, George opted not to review the Robertson biography, although we do find another review, submitted by Rich Golden (New York, NY), that comes unusually close to what we imagine George might write.

A horrid little book that reads like the kind of "vanity" tome that CEOs privately print for their friends and relatives. You know, books with titles like, "Forty Years at the Helm of Acme Industries." It's that bad.

Strachman glosses over Robertson's mistakes -- little things like his fund going OUT OF BUSINESS -- and is filled with errors and inconsistencies. Shame on Wiley for publishing such pap. (Rich Golden)

Note how both George and Rich Golden employ the term "horrid," and both single out the publisher Wiley & Sons for criticism -- keeping in mind that most readers are rarely even aware of a book's publisher, much less prone to assign blame or credit for a book they've read.

Another notable exception to that rule is reviewer Jim O'Reilly (New York, NY), who hated the Robertson bio and also blames the book's publisher.

This book reads as if you had programmed a computer to produce the worst possible book about Julian Robertson. It is awkwardly written, hagiographic in the most egregious way possible, and omits so much that you really have to question the motives of the author in writing this book...

Really dreadful, and I am surprised that a major publisher would produce swill such as this. (Jim O'Reilly)

Apart from their shared dislike for the work of Daniel Strachman and disappointment in the editorial judgment of Wiley & Sons, what else do George, Rich Golden and Jim O'Reilly have in common?

To learn, let's look at their reviews of other authors.

Frankie Saggio
On April 9, 2005, one day before his thrashing of Strachman, George reviewed Frankie Saggio's autobiographical Born to the Mob.

Pathetic. You got to hand it to this Saggio guy--the scams never end. Now comes his latest scam, which is this book, which he obviously just made up completely. Anyone could have written this book using stuff that appeared in the media...Pretty miserable and pathetic stuff. (George)

Interestingly, we find that Jim O'Reilly also read and reviewed Born to the Mob.

Total garbage--don't be conned by shills.

I have only myself to blame for buying this piece of crap, on the basis of eighteen reviews -- most from "A reader" and all sounding alike.

Additional information

A psychologist might classify this review as a good example of Freudian Projection.

And I didn't bother to check that practically all the "reviewers" who could be checked had reviewed only this book. Gee, what a coinkidink that a book that is barely selling and is put out by a doggie-do publisher should get so many "raves." See if you can guess who probably wrote all those reviews...A total crib job, a real fraud from a read fraudster. (Jim O'Reilly)

Two weeks after Jim O'Reilly weighs in, reviewer Marty Ross (Houston, TX) expresses his disappointment with Saggio's effort.

I've read pretty much all the books on [organized crime] that have come out in recent years, and this one is one of the absolute worst...When you think about how many great books there are on the Mob, particularly Wise Guys by Nick Pileggi and the Jerry Capeci books, or more recently the great book by George Anastasia, you have got to have your head examined to read a book like this. (Marty Ross)

To learn more about Marty Ross, let's read his reviews of other authors.

Salvatore Lauria
In November, 2003, Marty Ross reviewed The Scorpion and the Frogby Salvatore Lauria, and offers a very telling bit of insight when he strikes a comparison between that book and another true crime tale released that same year.

A tedious book, poorly written, boring, superficial, and lacks credibility.

Additional information

Weiss (as Mantanmoreland) also complained about Lauria's having changed some names in an edit to the Wikipedia article Pump and Dump:

Pump and dump fraud was explored in the anonymously written books License to Steal and in The Scorpion and the Frog. Both books explore pump and dump schemes in some detail but, unlike Born to Steal, do not provide the real names of the specific firms and people described. (Mantanmoreland)

The author has changed some names and left others alone, which makes me wonder which names are true and which are phony. Or I would wonder, if I cared--which I don't.

It covers much the same ground as a much better book called Born to Steal, as I only discovered after buying the book and reading a short way into it. Even writes about some of the same gangsters and stock promoters, such as Roy Ageloff and Frank Coppa, but what was vivid and fascinating in Born to Steal is limp and uninteresting here. A shame, as this is a subject that definitely warrants another book. (Marty Ross)

Mr. Ross's criticism of Lauria is echoed by reviewer Ted Dichtler (Monroe, NY).

Self-serving, poorly written, uninformative.

The "readers" who gave favorable reviews to this book are obviously pals of the author, if he has any left, as no one else would find anything even the slightest bit worthwhile about this book. This patently dishonest tripe is simply not worth buying. Take it out of the library if you want to read some boring garbage some evening you have insomnia and need to sleep. (Ted Dichtler)

To learn more about Ted Dichtler, let's read his reviews of other authors.

Selwyn Raab
Ted Dichtler was disappointed by Selwyn Raab's Five Families: The Rise, Decline, And Resurgence of America's Most Powerful Mafia Empires.

Additional Information

Selwyn Raab covered the organized crime beat for the New York Times and wrote a high profile expose on the Mob's infiltration of Wall Street which ran in the middle of BusinessWeek's three-month long series on the same topic, written by Gary Weiss.

I bought this book in the hope that this would be a kind of mob version of the Encyclopedia of New York City -- a kind of comprehensive treasure trove of lore, as promised.

Unfortunately, the book fell short of my expectations. It is far too unfocussed and poorly written, as even the obligatory Times review noted today, and also it provides only very slim information on recent developments in the Mob.

Mob books are a glut on the market, so every new one must pass a higher and higher bar. This one might have been a real winner ten years ago but today it is not. (Ted Dichtler)

Mr. Dichtler's review, posted September 11, 2005, came just one day after a review of the same book by Rich Golden.

...I read it through quickly, skimming through all the old stuff, all the rehash that I had read before, which was pretty much everything.

...It is boring, pedantic, and not at all well-written...One problem with this book is that it is based on public records, and thus has a kind of second-hand feel. Also it has very little on the latest doings in the mob -- just a few paragraphs on stock fraud schemes for example, even though they are the mainstay of the mob lately.

The title of the book says that there has been a "resurgence" of the Five Families. But there is nothing in the book that talks about that, except for a few pages toward the very end, so he simply does not support his thesis...This book fails in contrast with the superb reporting of Robert Lacey in his book on Meyer Lansky-- Little Man -- or the fascinating recent book on Mafia pump and dump schemes, Born to Steal. (Rich Golden)

Two weeks later, on September 28, 2005, Jim O'Reilly reviews the same book.

Also it does a limp job of describing the most recent Mafia scams, and lays an egg by promising a "resurgence" in the title but failing to deliver. No new analysis, no new facts. Bah

This book falls flat on its keister -- as fresh as last year's newspaper and as riveting as the Brooklyn telephone directory. What Raab has done is to take a lot of Mafia lore from the public record and pour it like molasses into these pages. (Jim O'Reilly)

George, Rich Golden, Jim O'Reilly, and Ted Dichtler all seem to have a lot in common. At the very least, we see that they hate the work of the same writers. Can the trend continue? Let's find out by looking at another author.

Michael Mandel
Ted Dichtler read Michael Mandel's Rational Exuberance, but couldn't find anything positive to say in his original review posted August 24, 2004.

Additional Information

Strangely, this review was substantially edited on or about November 15, shortly after it was revealed that the origins of Gary Weiss's Amazon.com reviews would be a forthcoming topic on this blog.

The edited version gives five enthusiastic stars, where Ted Dichtler's original (cached version available here) gave one.

The problem with this book is that it posits one strawman after another--particularly liberal economists like Krugman. But the basic flaw in his argument is that there really aren't a lot of people out there who are "against progress and innovation," no matter how many rationalizations he may use to present that thesis.

So what we have here is an author trying to drum up a "controversy" that doesn't exist, which doesn't work on an intellectual level and apparently isn't selling many books either, judging from the Amazon sales rank. (Ted Dichtler)

Coincidentally, Ted Dichtler's review was posted just a few weeks after our friend George thrashed the same book.

Additional Information

Michael Mandel and Gary Weiss were colleagues at Business Week until Weiss left the magazine in mid-2004. Mandel remains at BW as Head Economist.

No wonder this book is a dud.

Michael Mandel's book has laid an egg, but you can only understand why if you make the mistake of picking up this book and reading it. This same gent, who "predicted" the Internet depression (after it already happened) now seeks to burden us with the believe that all these hobgoblins out there are the "enemies of growth." But his arguments are unconvincing and poorly presented, in prose that is hackneyed and academic-dull. (George)

Despite his almost visceral aversion to Mandel's Rational Exuberance, ten months later George opted to read yet another book by the author, The Coming Internet Depression.

Nice going, Mandel. He predicts a decline in Internet stocks in a book that comes out in October 2000-- AFTER the market falls. He predicts a "depression" when what we got was a mild recession. Mandel's next book is about the dangers that iceburgs pose to ships like the Titanic, and how we have to watch out for Al Qaeda. (George)

So far, among reviewers Rich Golden, George, Ted Dichtler, Jim O'Reilly, and Marty Ross, we've seen instances of cross-over among everybody but Marty and Rich. Until now...

Rebecca Smith
Among the first to review Rebecca Smith's 24 Days: How Two Wall Street Journal Reporters Uncovered the Lies that Destroyed Faith in Corporate Americawere Marty Ross and Ted Dichtler. In fact, they wrote their reviews within four days of each other, starting with Ted.

Readers who believed the publisher's hype and expected another fast-paced sophisticated thriller along the lines of All the President's Men or Indecent Exposure are going to be disappointed...Power Failure is a much better and more interesting book. This one simply fails to generate enough, pardon the expression, wattage. The writing is lackluster and book is simply not a very good read. (Marty Ross)

Like Ted Dichtler, reviewer Marty Ross also warns readers against falling for the publisher's "hype," in addition to offering the book Power Failure as an alternative, and concludes by attacking the quality of the book's writing.

Additional Information

Gary Weiss is an active consumer of Enron-related material, and wrote a column on the topic for Salon.com.

Forget the hype--this book is a bomb. The authors could not get access to the real players in the Enron drama, so they did what they thought was the next best thing and wrote about themselves...Power Failure told the story from the inside. This book tells the story from the outside and not as well. The writing is pedestrian, the insights marginal. Avoid. (Ted Dichtler)

Arthur Levitt
After leaving the Chairmanship of the SEC, Arthur Levitt started writing books, including Take On the Street: What Wall Street and Corporate America Don't Want You to Know.

Additional Information

Upon conclusion of his month long Wikipedia absence, one of Gary Weiss's first edits was the following, made to the Wikipedia article on former SEC Chair Arthur Levitt, where he noted:

During Levitt's tenure at the SEC, he was widely viewed as a pro-investor advocate and received favorable press coverage. However, more recently has come under criticism for failing to act against 1990s bull market abuses. Critics include former Wall Street Journal reporter Charles Gasparino, author of Blood on the Street, and Gary Weiss, who harshly criticizes Levitt in his 2006 book Wall Street Versus America. (Mantanmoreland)

Marty Ross spent part of his Christmas Eve, 2003 offering up this review of Levitt's book:

This book needs to be read over again, in conjunction with Gary Weiss's scorching expose of Wall Street, "Wall Street Versus America." He excoriates Levitt's record as SEC chairman, and points up the yawning gaps and omissions in this book. *

I read this book when it came out and I thought that it was self-serving and generally of no value whatsoever. Now I went back to it after reading the Weiss book and I found it was actually a pretty contemptible piece of work after all. (Marty Ross)

*Though dated 12/24/2003, this review makes reference to Gary Weiss's second book, which was not published until 4/6/2006. Just though it was worth mentioning.

Charles Gasparino
Additional Information

Charles Gasparino has been the subject of attacks by Gary Weiss for Gasparino's defense of SEC subpoenas issued to financial journalists and commentators, including CNBC's Jim Cramer.

Rich Golden reviewed CNBC Wall Street reporter Charles Gasparino's Blood on the Street: The Sensational Inside Story of How Wall Street Analysts Duped a Generation of Investors but here again, had nothing positive to say about it.

Haven't I read this before? Henry Blodgett is a liar! Oh my. Stop the presses! That's the kind of breathless, naive tone of much of this book. Puh-lease. I've read this all before. (Rich Golden)

James J. Cramer
CNBC's Mad Money host Jim Cramer also writes books. Ted Dichtler read Jim Cramer's Real Moneyand it appears to have changed his life.

Additional Information

Gary Weiss seems to adore Jim Cramer and frequently defends him on his blog.

Totally loved it. Am a great fan of Cramer's from watching his TV show and this book packed the same wallop as his show. I've read many books on investing and this one is right up there with One Up on Wall Street in the classics of investing. A big booya! (Ted Dichtler)

George read Cramer's Confessions of a Street Addict and was touched.

You may not like Jim Cramer--I find him a little abrasive--but you can't deny that he is a riveting and excellent writer. This book is one of the best inside accounts that has come out on Wall Street, and by far the best book ever to come out on the hedge fund biz...Instead of portraying himself as "philanthropist" or other self-indulgent crap that we get in other books of this kind, we have an honest, warts and all portrayal.

The shame is that a lot of the negative reviews on this book are a result of its chief asset, which is its honesty. (George)

Gary Weiss
The combined passions of George, Ted Dichtler, Marty Ross and Rich Golden converge around Gary Weiss and his books Born to Steal and Wall Street Versus America.Ted Dichtler on Born to Steal:

Additional Information

This review is dated 5/4/2003, which is between 0 and 38 hours after the first possible opportunity to buy the book in stores (Warner Books only lists the publication date as "5/03")..

Good gawd, this is the best book I have read in a long time--and definitely the best book I've ever read about the Mafia or Wall Street. It is funnier and more knowing than Liar's Poker, and much more disturbing than any of the James Stewart books I have ever read. And it is a cut above any book I have ever read about the Mob--thrilling and funny at the same time...It is reminiscent of the story that Nick Pileggi told in Wise Guy or the movie Goodfellas, but with considerably more humor and with a more entrancing style. At times I laughed out loud!...Born to Steal is a winner! (Ted Dichtler)

Ted Dichtler on Wall Street Versus America:

A solid, well-researched appraisal of the various ways Wall Street in its various guises can and does rip off the public.

This book is a considerably broader look at securities industry practices that Weiss's previous book Born to Steal, and in this broader canvas he paints a picture that is more disturbing. In Born to Steal the protagonist was a young punk from the fringes of society. In this book society itself is to blame.

The book is tough on pretty much everyone involved, but is toughest on Arthur Levitt, who presided over the SEC in the 1990s. Highly recommended. (Ted Dichtler)

Rich Golden on Born to Steal:

It's interesting to contrast this detailed, fascinating account of Mob pump and dump schemes with the much-hyped "five families" compendium that just came out the other day, and which I found to be pretty lame.

What sets this book apart is its rich detail. Instead of relying on secondary sources like some Mafia writers, Born to Steal takes it all from the horses mouth, a kid from the streets of Staten Island who was lured into a Mob brokerage house...

What is particularly compelling about this book is that it shows the Mafia in decline. There is no "resurgence," as one recent author argued. On the contrary, the mob seems to have regenerated to becoming a shadow of its former self. It is now little more than a street gang.

This book is compact, engrossing and a great read that is informative. Well-written and witty too, it brings out the irony in every situation. (Rich Golden )

Rich Golden on Wall Street Versus America:

A solid, tough-minded yet breezy examination of nefarious Wall Street practices by a master investigative reporter...This book is a good supplement to Born to Steal but covers a much broader canvass.

Weiss does not hide his contempt for Wall Street hypocrisy, and his treatment of the financial media is refreshing.

I would recommend this book to anyone reading Joel Greenblatt's Little Book That Beats the Market. I happened to like that book very much, but here we get a differing point of view, which is that stock-picking systems don't work. I think both points of view have validity, and likewise I would recommend that readers of this book should read Greenblatt's.

I just read Cramer's new book and it definitely conflicts with that too. Again, it is the philosophical difference between value investing and efficient markets. Both need to be understood by investors.

Overall I came away from this book a little shell-shocked, but it definitely makes convincing arguments and does so with zest and wit. (Rich Golden)

Marty Ross on Born to Steal:

I laughed out loud reading this book, which is a really exciting read as well. This book reminds me a lot of the Scott Turow books, but it doesn't take itself, or its cast of characters, quite as seriously.

Even so, this book gets into the mind of the criminal better any I have ever read, as is as good a tour of Wall Street--and the Mob--as I am sure I will ever find. (Marty Ross)

Marty Ross on Wall Street Versus America:

I'm surprised that more attention hasn't focused on how this book takes aim at the financial press. It is definitely a case of ready, aim and fire, and Weiss scores a bullseye.

The book is a sometimes raunchy, always very funny examination of all things related to Wall Street. But I liked most how he totally rips to shreds the financial press from stem to stern. Nobody escapes his slingshot, not even his own colleagues at Business Week...

Additional Information

Tim Picks actually first used the "Eddie Haskell" line to refer to Goldman Sachs back in 2002.

This book is filled with many funny lines, with Bear Stearns is the "Eddie Haskell of Wall Street" and the New York Stock Exchange as acting in a "vampiristic" fashion. The crazy thing is that when you think about it, you realize it is all true! (Marty Ross)

 

 

George on Wall Street Versus America:

 

 

Wow! This book blasts its way across Wall Street and doesn't pull any punches. Weiss is acerbic, insightful and very very funny...A solid, fast read that should be on the shelf of every investor in America. (George)

George on Born to Steal :

Start reading this early in the day. Why? BECAUSE YOU CAN'T PUT IT DOWN!!!!!

I took this book to the beach during the July 4th weekend and made the mistake of starting to read it in the afternoon. There I was as the sun was setting at 8, and I was still reading it. Everyone was gone and I was squinting as the sun went down. That's how electrifying this book is.

Louis Pasciuto is a parochial school kid from Staten Island who has a slight character-development issue: He steals. He stole when he was a small child and as a teenager he found just the place to practice his craft. Wall Street beckoned, in the form of a well-groomed stock scammer named Roy Ageloff.

Such is the setup for one of the most readable stories that have come down the pike in a long time. Weiss's portrayal of the world of Wall Street and the Mafia is extraordinarily revealing. I heard this is going to be a movie and I can see why.

I don't want to give away any of the plot, as this is one of those books that you read with your hand on the page to keep from letting your eyes wandering down to see what is happening in the future. It was an education on the subject of Wall Street, and I came away from reading this book with a wealth of education that I hope will make me into a smarter investor.

One thing about this book that is surprising is how entertaining and funny it is. You wouldn't expect that from a book about Wall Street or the Mafia. But Weiss has extraordinary comic sense and he brings out the irony in some characters who are at once loathsome and fascinating. He also makes some sharp observations on the abysmal failure of Wall Street regulation and the moronic character of so much that has been written about the Mob.

Born to Steal is a winner in every respect. (George)

But what about Jim O'Reilly?

Interestingly, Jim O'Reilly was the only one of the five who never reviewed Gary Weiss's books.

However he did the next best thing: he reviewed The Sanity Check Blog, run by Weiss's avowed mortal enemy Bob O'Brien.

Check Your Sanity At the Door.

This is arguably the worst website on the Internet purportedly devoted to the stock market and investing.

This website promotes the lastest variation on a very old, long-discredited conspiracy theory that occasionally makes the rounds. It is now being promoted by a consortium of stock promoters and is led by Patrick Byrne, the famously flaky CEO of Overstock.com, whose demagoguery is prominently featured on the site.

Let's start with the name: "Sanity check." In a sense that is correct, because you have to "check your sanity" at the door. The purpose of this website is to confuse, frighten, misinform and mislead investors.

Enter the site and you are told that the purpose is to promote a "market reform movement." But as you penetrate the layers of this site, you see that what the site operator has in mind is one issue and one issue only: something he describes as "stock counterfeiting" or "naked short selling."

As you go through the site, you see that every problem the market faces, from microcap fraud to Enron, supposedly boils down to a mammoth "conspiracy of miscreants," and that yet another conspiracy has been whipped up to cover up the central conspiracy.

Therefore Enron was not the fault of its management. Various microcap frauds were not the fault of stock promoters or company officials. Companies don't decline because they are bad companies. Their stocks decline because of a "conspiracy of miscreants" and "bad guys."

It's all laid out in this slick, well-financed website, written for the express purpose of deceiving the public by experts -- the boiler room con men made famous by the movie Boiler Room.

These same con men and their allies are the principal advocates of the "stock counterfeiting conspiracy" theory advocated on this website.

To further this lurid tale, which is advanced by several "blogs" on the site, the website takes highly technical securities processing esoterica and weaves grotesque conspiracies around them.

Central to its premise is the idea that "fails to deliver," a commonplace occurrence in the market that does not disadvantage investors, is somehow a cover for mammoth "stock counterfeiting."

The "experts" spouting nonsense on this site are microcap stock promoters and a "Dr. Jim," who is promoted as an "expert on securities processing" but was recently outed as a dentist in Oregon.

Why devote a website to a non-existent problem? Because the principal proponents of the "stock counterfeiting" conspiracy theory are microcap stock promoters seeking to create a smokescreen for their own activities. Some of their wares, such as a crummy delisted mining company called CMKH and a mob stock manipulation called Eagletech, are promoted on this website.

In this website you see a lot of references to "bad guys" and "miscreants." They are never stock promoters or actual criminals, but rather people seeking to bring actual fraudsters to justice. The "enemies" of this "market reform movement" are viciously attacked and villified in a manner more suited to a cult than a "stock market reform movement."

Additional Information

This review was posted on 3/11/06. Two days later, Gary Weiss blogged about TheSanityCheck.com and Bob O'Brien's then-recent attack on Jim Cramer's character.

Among the central villains of this tale are regulators, Eliot Spitzer, and investigative journalists who have targeted the "stock counterfeiting" myth, and these are villified and libeled routinely, along with other "miscreants" such as CNBC host Jim Cramer and the Depository Trust and Clearing Corp.

The webmaster of the site, not surprisingly, carefully guards his identity in order to avoid being sued or subjected to prosecution for the lies and stock promotions contained on this website.

So if you own a stock that has declined and want to blame somebody OTHER THAN THE COMPANY --- this site is for you. You'll be deceiving yourself, but that's understandable because the people who run this site are experts at deception.

And with that, gentle reader, we rest our case.

Antisocialmedia.net again calls on Gary Weiss to end his seemingly limitless online charades.

(Ready to run up the score a little again? OK, how about this...)

Additional Information

Blogger is the blogging platform Gary Weiss uses (exclusively).

Jim O'Reilly also reviewed Blogger.com:

...my blog utilizes the blogger.com platform exclusively. (Jim O'Reilly)

 

Jim O'Reilly also reviewed two DVD compilations of the Naked City television series.

Additional Information

Confirmed Weiss sockpuppet Tomstoner is the single largest contributor to the Wikipedia article on the Naked City tv series.

Image Entertainment has really outdone itself with this outstanding collection from one of the best television shows ever to be shown. Am waiting impatiently for the remaining shows to be released on DVD. (Jim O'Reilly)

 

Marty Ross thrashed Arthur Waskow's A Time for Every Purpose Under Heaven: The Jewish Life-Spiral as a Spiritual Path with particular zest:

Additional Information

Gary Weiss (Mantanmoreland), apparently felt no conflict of conscience when he brought an administrative complaint against an editor named Awaskow (presumably Arthur Waskow) for editing the Wikipedia article about him.

...Awaskow is obviously Arthur Waskow or, far less likely, impersonating him... Both this user and sockpuppet should be blocked from editing indefinitely, since he is clearly here solely for self-promotional purposes. (Mantanmoreland)

The World According to Waskow should be the title of the totally nonsensical, wretched collection of claptrap. Arthur "East River" Waskow should hold the title of "rabbit" and not "rabbi" because all he has done here is taken his personal political and pseudo-social agenda and coated it with a think shellac of Judaism. I took this book out of the library.

I returned it. You should do the same. (Marty Ross)

14Nov/06Off

Wikipedia: it pays to have friends in high places

We like to think that based on the strength of some of the research on this site, a move to delete the Wikipedia article autobiography of Gary Weiss was undertaken recently.

A longshot from the beginning, that effort failed despite the principled efforts of Cla68, an exemplary contributor and a truly bright light in what can seem an otherwise dark place.

A couple of interesting things happened through the proposed article for deletion (AfD) process. One is that Gary Weiss himself basically came unglued. The other is the subsequent deletion of record of the AfD debate (and with it record of Weiss's mental decomposition).

As it turns out, the deletion of that debate will be hard to undo, since it came from the top of the Wikipedia organization: Jimbo Wales himself. Wales claims the debate was filled with "discourteous commentary" and as such meriting elimination from the record.

Last week an anonynmous editor asked Jimbo about his decision. That conversation, at least for now, may be read here. Not surprisingly, that editor was soon banned as a WordBomb sockpuppet.

Thanks to an enterprising administrator with the requisite permissions, the deleted debate has been recovered and is reproduced here for your enlightenment. Please inspect it and then comment on what you see as commentary of so discourteous a nature as to require elimination.

21Oct/06Off

Gary Weiss, your number is up.

I thought the question of Gary Weiss's abusive Wikipedia sockpuppetry was settled long ago. And while I never expected what I've come to realize is an incomparably corrupt band of Wikipedia administrators to do anything about it, I assumed all objective observers would at least concede the obvious.

Then Goofus arrived, leaving a string of comments, each more irresponsible and intellectually dishonest than the last.

I finally decided that one more Gary Weiss-focused post was needed in order to make the case so clear that even Goofus would struggle to swallow the pride necessary to counter it.

My main challenge in assembling these points of evidence was not finding them, but deciding what to leave out. This dilema reminded me of an anecdotal story told about Milton Berle and advice he was given when participating in a very specific competition (details of which are omitted): "Hey Miltie, be kind and only take out enough to win."

What follows is calculated to be just "enough to win."

weiss career edits

Gary Weiss's sockdrawer. Click image to enlarge

One way to understand that Gary Weiss is indeed editing Wikipedia using various pseudonyms is to consider all his edits in the aggregate (from 11/1/05 to 10/20/06).

This image graphically represents the edits of Gary's most obvious sockpuppets (Mantanmoreland, Lastexit and Tomstoner) on a per day basis, stacking them to reach a cumulative daily number.

A few regions immediately stand out as unique. Crossreferencing those regions with what we know about Gary Weiss proves instructive.

#1: The book
On March 13, Mantanmoreland goes silent (while Doright and Tomstoner go very nearly silent) until April 13, when as his first act, Mantanmoreland creates the Wikipedia article for Gary Weiss.

Why take exactly one month away from Wikipedia?

April 13 turns out to be significant, as it's precisely one week after the publication of Gary Weiss's book.

It was necessary to wait one week because Mantanmoreland -- a supposed stranger to Weiss -- used as his rationale for creating Gary's page that he was a fan of his book (implying that he had actually read it), he had to wait a few days to make that claim plausible.

Why take exactly one month off?

It's understood that Wikipedia purges its server logs monthly, thus requests to tie two accounts together as sockpuppets via an administrative process known as "Checkuser" cannot be considered if more than one month has passed since one of the two has edited.

Gary likely wanted to put some distance between Mantanmoreland and the edit warring that defined Mantanmoreland's first two months of existence, not to mention the abuses of his sockmate Doright.

During the same period, a clear increase in "basher" posting on Yahoo's OSTK message board is observed, much of it hyping Weiss's book (more on that subject in a future post).

#2: WordBomb
Beginning April 13, Gary Weiss's Wikipedia editing began to increase dramatically, with all sockpuppets operating in tandem (often abusively).

The first serious effort at publicly unmasking Gary Weiss as sockpuppetmaster was carried out by WordBomb and took place on July 23.

Sadly, all evidence of it have been eliminated by SlimVirgin, FloNight and JayJG.

However, enough people did get the message that Weiss immediately discontinued editing with all outed sockpuppets except for Mantanmoreland and Lastexit, whom he briefly claimed were nephew and uncle living together and using the same computer without realizing each was actively involved in editing articles on naked shorting and Patrick Byrne.

Seriously.

He said that.

However, by July 29, Lastexit had also been put into storage.

And then, as Agatha Christie would have written, there was one.

#3: Cuban
On August 22, Mantanmoreland edited the article on Mark Cuban to reflect what Gary Weiss had been saying in his blog for several weeks. Cuban was alerted and he in turn blogged about Weiss's questionable ethics, sparking a firestorm of Weiss-bashing both on Wikipedia and off.

Weiss spent August 23rd failing to manage the debacle, and then wisely spent the following two days under his desk, as reflected by Mantanmoreland's absence of edits on the 24th and 25th.

#4:India
edits pre indiaMantanmoreland's edit trends before Weiss trip to India: running average of about 20 edits per day.
india Mantanmoreland's edit trends while Weiss is in India dropped to under two per day
Since April 13, Mantanmoreland's most significant reduction in Wikipedia editing activity started on September 25 and appears to have ended on October 18.

During that time, Mantanmoreland's average daily edits dropped from over 20 to under two.

Interestingly, Gary Weiss's most notable absence from his blog started on September 24 and ended on October 17.

#5:Bonus point At the risk of being accused of poor sportsmanship for running up the score, allow me to end with this final point, dedicated to the ever-doubting Goofus:You'll note that Gary Weiss's honeymoon missive from India is datelined VARKALA, INDIA and includes the phrase:

In the seacoast town in Kerala where I am writing this, with its fishermen's huts, coconut palms...

Interestingly, on May 17, 2006 Mantanmoreland made this edit to the Wikipedia article on Varkala, India:

Varkala is a coastal Town in Kerala state, India.

Given how few total edits to that article have been made, even Goofus will have a difficult time claiming that's a coincidence.

Clearly, Gary Weiss needs to apologize for treating us all like fools, and to his lone defender Goofus for making him play the part so well on his fool's errand.
14Sep/06Off

Full Circle, with the Irony-Meter Maxed Out

This post will take you on a little journey which promises to be very satisfying by the time it's done, but will require your full attention to get there. HINT: you're free to take notes if it will help.

Arriving at our destination, you can expect to have learned, as we have, that Gary Weiss is quite actively engaged in deception on other people's blogs, in addition to his own. Furthermore, by the time we're done, you'll have found new levels of ironic significance in these words:

"Bravely spoken, by the coward who hides behind a pseudonym."

And here we go...
The first thing you need to understand is that in late January of 2006, Gary Weiss' IP address was 70.23.85.112.

Here's how we know that.

The website Wikipedia endeavors to be an online encyclopedia that anybody can make changes to. Fortunately for mankind, a record is kept of each of those changes. Here's just such a record: a summary of edits made by a user at the IP address 70.23.85.112.

Note the date range: January 27-28, 2006, and the article edited: Naked short selling. Such rapid succession of edits, as seen here, is suggestive of what's called an "edit war."
Now, let's look at who else was editing that article during that period, to learn more about this edit war.

Starting at the bottom and working up, we see the editor identified by the IP address 70.23.85.112 editing heavily until 7:19pm when that user's edits abruptly cease.

79 minutes later, a brand new user calling himself Mantanmoreland arrives, picking up right where 70.23.85.112 left off. A few days later, Tomstoner arrives, forging an unusually strong "tag team" relationship with Mantanmoreland. Together, Mantanmoreland and Tomstoner become the primary antagonists of the novice and disorganized bloc of Wikipedian naked shorting opponents.

On February 20, 2006, as if to put a fork in their soundly defeated opposition, Tomstoner adds a link to Gary Weiss' blog to the naked short selling article.

Fast forward six weeks.

On April 6, Gary Weiss sees his second book published. Bravo, Gary.
On April 9, Tomstoner adds a reference to the three-day-old book on the article about Gary Weiss' alma mater, the City College of New York.
On April 13, Mantanmoreland creates the Gary Weiss article on Wikipedia, and goes on to take ownership of it, including going so far as to know when one Weiss quote is more suitable than another.
On April 14, Mantanmoreland adds a link to a nearly decade-old Business Week article originally written by Gary Weiss
On April 15, Mantanmoreland decides the article on Arthur Leavitt would be better with a link to the nine-day-old book by Gary Weiss.
On April 17, Mantanmoreland adds a link to the first book by Gary Weiss
On April 30, Mantanmoreland feels one more article could benefit from a reference to the three-week old book by Gary Weiss.
Make that two more articles
On May 13, Lastexit, one of Mantanmoreland’s admitted "sockpuppet" alter-egos, feels the article about Julian Robertson could benefit from a link to a six-year-old bit of journalism by Gary Weiss.
On May 19, Mantanmoreland decides the article on hedge funds is incomplete without a link to the Weiss Book.
On July 12, Lastexit concludes that a three year old Business Week piece on naked shorting penned by Gary Weiss would perfectly round out the Wikipedia article on the same topic.

Anybody not convinced that 70.23.85.112 = Mantanmoreland = Tomstoner = Lastexit = Gary Weiss raise your hand.

Ok good. So we can all agree that in late January, 2006, 70.23.85.112 = Gary Weiss (remember that...it's on the final exam!).

Now, let's go back to January 22, 2006.

On that day, two relevant things happened.

First, the New York Post published an effusive review of the Gary Weiss book, which would not go on to be available for purchase for another 3.5 months.

Second, Yahoo user ID lamborghini751 is created and soon makes his first message board post in the form of a question as to his “wife’s” career options.

Four minutes later, his second post, to Yahoo’s Overstock.com message board, announces to the world that Gary’s book, though a full financial quarter away, had been the subject of a glowing review by the New York Post.

On January 24, 2006, Yahoo user ID cupandsaucerwithsugar is created. As his first act, at 1:29 pm EST, he provides an answer to lamborghini751’s two day old question.

(A quick scan of the subsequent postings of both lamborghini751 and cupandsaucerwithsugar makes it obvious that the same person is behind both. But Yahoo’s delightful dissembler sorting algorithm bug confirms this, as those familiar with the DSA will easily see.)

As his second act, less than 60 seconds after the first, cupandsaucerwithsugar chooses to honor Gary Weiss, as follows:

“yeah and weiss just ripped boobo and co a new one on his blog”

How sweet.

For those keeping track at home, that post brings us to 1:30 EST on January 24, 2006.
Interestingly, according to the header info on the sample chapter posted on his website, Weiss’ publisher would complete the book's soft proof 82 minutes later, at 2:52pm.

So what had the NY Post reviewer been reading?

Hmmmm.

Nevermind such details!

Six hours later, at 8:35pm, Gary Weiss publishes a new blog post, which opens thusly:

"Bob O'Brien," the bravely anonymous leader of the Baloney Brigade…

Just 25 minutes later, on the above-mentioned Bob O’Brien’s blog, first time commenter cupsandsaucer has this to say to the same Bob O’Brien:

Bravely spoken, by the coward who hides behind a pseudonym.

A quick review of the corresponding server log entry (time zone set to GMT) confirms what we all already suspect, and poetically brings us full circle:

server log tells all
How much more ironic is the accusation,

...coward who hides behind a pseudonym...

when you consider it was posted by cupandsaucer Gary Weiss (aka 70.23.85.112, Mantanmoreland, Lastexit, Tomstoner, Lamborghini715, and cupandsaucerwithsugar), who's turned pseudonymity into a way of life?

14Sep/060

Gary Weiss: Full Circle, with the Irony-Meter Maxed Out

This post will take you on a little journey which promises to be very satisfying by the time it's done, but will require your full attention to get there. HINT: you're free to take notes if it will help.

Arriving at our destination, you can expect to have learned, as we have, that Gary Weiss is quite actively engaged in deception on other people's blogs, in addition to his own. Furthermore, by the time we're done, you'll have found new levels of ironic significance in these words:

"Bravely spoken, by the coward who hides behind a pseudonym."

And here we go...
The first thing you need to understand is that in late January of 2006, Gary Weiss' IP address was 70.23.85.112.

Here's how we know that.

The website Wikipedia endeavors to be an online encyclopedia that anybody can make changes to. Fortunately for mankind, a record is kept of each of those changes. Here's just such a record: a summary of edits made by a user at the IP address 70.23.85.112.

Note the date range: January 27-28, 2006, and the article edited: Naked short selling. Such rapid succession of edits, as seen here, is suggestive of what's called an "edit war."
Now, let's look at who else was editing that article during that period, to learn more about this edit war.

Starting at the bottom and working up, we see the editor identified by the IP address 70.23.85.112 editing heavily until 7:19pm when that user's edits abruptly cease.

79 minutes later, a brand new user calling himself Mantanmoreland arrives, picking up right where 70.23.85.112 left off. A few days later, Tomstoner arrives, forging an unusually strong "tag team" relationship with Mantanmoreland. Together, Mantanmoreland and Tomstoner become the primary antagonists of the novice and disorganized bloc of Wikipedian naked shorting opponents.

On February 20, 2006, as if to put a fork in their soundly defeated opposition, Tomstoner adds a link to Gary Weiss' blog to the naked short selling article.

Fast forward six weeks.

On April 6, Gary Weiss sees his second book published. Bravo, Gary.
On April 9, Tomstoner adds a reference to the three-day-old book on the article about Gary Weiss' alma mater, the City College of New York.
On April 13, Mantanmoreland creates the Gary Weiss article on Wikipedia, and goes on to take ownership of it, including going so far as to know when one Weiss quote is more suitable than another.
On April 14, Mantanmoreland adds a link to a nearly decade-old Business Week article originally written by Gary Weiss
On April 15, Mantanmoreland decides the article on Arthur Leavitt would be better with a link to the nine-day-old book by Gary Weiss.
On April 17, Mantanmoreland adds a link to the first book by Gary Weiss
On April 30, Mantanmoreland feels one more article could benefit from a reference to the three-week old book by Gary Weiss.
Make that two more articles
On May 13, Lastexit, one of Mantanmoreland’s admitted "sockpuppet" alter-egos, feels the article about Julian Robertson could benefit from a link to a six-year-old bit of journalism by Gary Weiss.
On May 19, Mantanmoreland decides the article on hedge funds is incomplete without a link to the Weiss Book.
On July 12, Lastexit concludes that a three year old Business Week piece on naked shorting penned by Gary Weiss would perfectly round out the Wikipedia article on the same topic.

Anybody not convinced that 70.23.85.112 = Mantanmoreland = Tomstoner = Lastexit = Gary Weiss raise your hand.

Ok good. So we can all agree that in late January, 2006, 70.23.85.112 = Gary Weiss (remember that...it's on the final exam!).

Now, let's go back to January 22, 2006.

On that day, two relevant things happened.

First, the New York Post published an effusive review of the Gary Weiss book, which would not go on to be available for purchase for another 3.5 months.

Second, Yahoo user ID lamborghini751 is created and soon makes his first message board post in the form of a question as to his “wife’s” career options.

Four minutes later, his second post, to Yahoo’s Overstock.com message board, announces to the world that Gary’s book, though a full financial quarter away, had been the subject of a glowing review by the New York Post.

On January 24, 2006, Yahoo user ID cupandsaucerwithsugar is created. As his first act, at 1:29 pm EST, he provides an answer to lamborghini751’s two day old question.

(A quick scan of the subsequent postings of both lamborghini751 and cupandsaucerwithsugar makes it obvious that the same person is behind both. But Yahoo’s delightful dissembler sorting algorithm bug confirms this, as those familiar with the DSA will easily see.)

As his second act, less than 60 seconds after the first, cupandsaucerwithsugar chooses to honor Gary Weiss, as follows:

“yeah and weiss just ripped boobo and co a new one on his blog”

How sweet.

For those keeping track at home, that post brings us to 1:30 EST on January 24, 2006.
Interestingly, according to the header info on the sample chapter posted on his website, Weiss’ publisher would complete the book's soft proof 82 minutes later, at 2:52pm.

So what had the NY Post reviewer been reading?

Hmmmm.

Nevermind such details!

Six hours later, at 8:35pm, Gary Weiss publishes a new blog post, which opens thusly:

"Bob O'Brien," the bravely anonymous leader of the Baloney Brigade…

Just 25 minutes later, on the above-mentioned Bob O’Brien’s blog, first time commenter cupsandsaucer has this to say to the same Bob O’Brien:

Bravely spoken, by the coward who hides behind a pseudonym.

A quick review of the corresponding server log entry (time zone set to GMT) confirms what we all already suspect, and poetically brings us full circle:

server log tells all
How much more ironic is the accusation,

...coward who hides behind a pseudonym...

when you consider it was posted by cupandsaucer Gary Weiss (aka 70.23.85.112, Mantanmoreland, Lastexit, Tomstoner, Lamborghini715, and cupandsaucerwithsugar), who's turned pseudonymity into a way of life?

9Sep/06Off

Gary Weiss: The Strawman Cometh

The mission of AntiSocialMedia.net is to reveal those who misuse the power of online collaboration and community-building tools for personal gain.

Gary Weiss is a former journalist, book author, outspoken advocate of securities regulation reform, and someone who should know better than to use his blog to deceive and attempt to intimidate his opponents.

First, some background
Haloscan is a third party weblog commenting system often used by users of the Blogger platform.

A funny thing about Haloscan: when you use it to post a comment, a "cookie" is placed on your computer, storing your user data (username, email and website) so you won't have to enter that information next time. This is generally convenient, since Haloscan requires you to enter a username and email address every time you comment. However the website field is not required.

But the Haloscan cookie can be a little buggy, in that having entered a website url once, sometimes it will insist that the same url appear in subsequent comments. If you erase the auto-completed website field it will likely get posted with your comment anyway. At times, the only solution is to specify another website, which may in turn appear on future comments whether you like it or not.

A little inconvenient, but nothing more.

Unless, that is, you are a commenter attempting to covertly use multiple identities on the same blog, as appears to have been the case with blogger Gary Weiss earlier this year. In that case, Haloscan becomes a rather conspicuous indicator of deceit.

Here's what happened (in each case, a link to the live website is provided, but considering the likelihood that inconvenient posts will be deleted or altered, screenshots are provided as well. Click on the thumbnail to see a full version, each or which was captured while a mouse pointer -- not visible in the screencapture -- hovered over the link thereby revealing its destination in a yellow tool-tip style box):

On January 25, 2006, Weiss' blogging rival Bob O'Brien posted an entry from an apparant ally named James Cummins who, notably, lauds Gary Weiss as an "American hero." A commenter to O'Brien's blog suggested Cummins copy the post to Gary Weiss' blog, which Cummins does on January 31, 2006, via Haloscan.

In the Haloscan website field, Cummins apparently attempted to enter the url corresponding to his original post on thesanitycheck.com.
Original comment

James Cummins early comments

Over the next two days, Cummins and Weiss engage in comment jousting. In each case, Gary includes a link to his website with his comments, while Cummins does not. That changes on February 3, 2006, when a link to Cummins' website suddenly appears. Strangely, the link points to the website claimed by Gary Weiss.
Original comment
Frank Guss ooops2

The following 14 hours saw more comment jousting in which Gary Weiss consistently includes a homepage link while James Cummins did not. Suddenly, that changes, with Cummins again linking to Gary Weiss.
Original comment
James Cummins oops2

Two hours later, a special treat: the previously unknown Mr. Frank Guss opts to join the discourse, with harsh words for Mr. Cummins. Oddly, the homepage of Mr. Guss is the same used by Gary Weiss.
Original comment
gussoops11.gif

Before Cummins can respond, Guss is back for more, attacking Cummins and again linking to the homepage of Gary Weiss.
Original comment
gussoops2.gif
In less than two minutes, Cummins is back up off the matt, calling Guss a "basher" yet following his lead by linking to the homepage of Gary Weiss.
Original comment
James Cummins oops3
Less than a minute passes before Gary Weiss sweeps in to defend the honor of his fair blog commenters. In keeping with what's fashionable, Gary links to the homepage of...Gary Weiss.
Original comment
Gary Weiss comment
Now, at this stage, it needs to be pointed out that Gary Weiss is known for moderating his blog comments; meaning, prior to publication, Haloscan holds comments pending Gary's approval, with requests for moderation arriving via email. So, depending on the speed of the network carrying that email and Gary's proximity to a computer, this can realistically delay the posting of comments anywhere from a minute to many hours or beyond. However in the case of the three comments documented immediately above, we see James Cummins respond to Frank Guss and be responded to by Gary Weiss...all within about two minutes. Of course, comments made by Gary himself get published immediately.

There are several possible explanations for these odd circumstances, and I commit to add Gary Weiss' version here alongside my own if he'll offer it. But the version I find most likely is as follows:

Gary Weiss is James Cummins and Frank Guss.

While there is evidence to suggest that a young writer named James Cummins does exist and may have collaborated on the referenced project, he had no part in this interaction. Instead, Gary gravely mislead his readers by propping up an overly-gracious strawman to publicly flay with the help of others, including at least one poster who was in fact also Gary Weiss.

The effect of the Haloscan auto-complete bug is limited to individual machines, such that the only reason it might affect either James Cummins or Frank Guss would be if they all posted from the computer used by Gary Weiss. Indeed, that appears to he what happened, though it was Gary acting as the other two at the time.

Gary Weiss has done his readers and patrons a tremendous disservice for which he should apologize, reveal what role the real James Cummins played in this ruse (if any), and commit to a more honest use of social media moving forward.

--ASM