Notes

The Strange Case Of Ferarro

We together with many of you, have been following the enigma surrounding one of the most well-known Paladin bloggers, Ferarro. On May 26, we did an 15 Minutes of Fame interview with Ferarro. The article was about her experiences as a blogger, a paladin, and a game tester for Blizzard.



A few things happened after the article was published.



Jagoex first published a story about Ferarro's use of photos from TechDarling. Ferarro was claiming she was the person in the picture, but in fact she wasn't. Sarah Townsend, the author of TechDarling has said she doesn't know who Ferarro is.



Second, Ferraro's blog Paladin Schmaladin abruptly switched to privacy mode, blocking anyone from reading it unless they received an invitation from Ferraro. Her Twitter account featured the message "Stalkers are cool," and was then closed until it was removed completely the next day. Her WoW character disappeared via a server transfer and her contributions to RetPaladin.com were also removed completely. Update: Ferarro has made her blog and statement private again after the publication of this article. However, you can look at the Google cache of the page.



This raised a lot of eyebrows and generated a lot of speculation. This all came to an end today when she posted claiming she was multiple people that, following an investigation, are now being investigated as well.



Ferarro initially stated that she was being targeted. But, it became so serious that Ferarro was forced to remove herself from the internet. It would be understandable, as someone's safety and life are more important than a World of Warcraft Blog.



However, some in the various forums thought that she felt the weight of Blizzard come down on her for potentially lying about her involvement with the company.



Some believed that it was just a way of clamping up and removing herself from the scene after embarrassing information were revealed that permanently tarnished her credibility.



The speculation was played out on the official WoW forums (most threads have been deleted) and also in the comments section over at Jagoex's site. The speculation continued until Ferarro replied to the question.



She basically states that Ferarro is the name we've come to be able to recognize as Ferarro has been used by seven different people. Only one of these people writes as Ferarro at a given time and only one uses Twitter. Everything is transferred to the new Ferarro owner each time. However, there is one exception one thing: the Ferarro WoW account has been passed around "early on" however it's currently being used by "Ferarro #3." This is in direct violation of the Terms of Service. You'll be subject to severe penalties and a ban immediately.



TechDarling images of Ferarro are not authentic Ferarro. They were taken without TechDarling's permission.



What is the truth?



We've looked into the matter, and have determined by looking at IP address records of comments left by Ferarro on WoW.com between July of 2008 and May 2009 that the comments came from the same small subnet of IPs and are all geographically very local to each other. This means that "Ferarro #1" through Ferarro #7 aren't within just a few blocks of one other.
EXTREMEMINING.ORG


An IP address is a specific address that your internet provider provides to you when you access the internet. It changed a lot back in the day but now, if have a cable modem , it'll only change once in a while. All internet service providers have an IP group they offer to their customers.



The same small ISP offered the same couple IP numbers to Ferraro at the time she claims to have been different people. Particularly Ferarro claims that her current personality was the one who took over the blog in January of 2009. However, our IP records directly contradict this statement. They clearly indicate that it's the same Ferarro commenting here prior to and following this time.



Although it's possible Ferarro #7 has been the only one who has commented here in the past two years, it is unlikely considering her comments on her blog today. According to the blog post, the email address associated with Ferarro is turned over completely to the new Ferarro owner each time, and the new Ferarro even goes to great lengths to forward emails to previous Ferarros when it's appropriate.



We have clear continuity in IP addresses and email addresses that debunk her claims, as all comments are linked to this email address.



What is the 15 minutes of Fame Article we posted?



It's unfortunate that this has occurred. Ferarro was denied multiple opportunities by Lisa Poisso clarify, refute, and extend the story. Ferarro was unable to answer questions about the photos, especially when they were directly asked about them.



We've since removed the TechDarling images and have added an apology at the start of the article.



What is the status of Paladin Schmaladin?



We'll need to wait and see.



It's unfortunate that things have turned out like this. Paladin Schmaladin is an excellent resource for Paladins and WoW players, and it's a shame to witness the authors' actions ruin this otherwise trustworthy source of information.


Homepage: https://extrememining.org/