Rumor Mongering: Is Jim Puckett Ousted at BAN?

For the past year, independent studies have piled up overwhelmingly demonstrating what this blog has maintained since 2007.  Basel Action Network does not know what it's talking about, and is making it up as they go along.  Whether they are told politely, or humorously, or angrily that their fiction is hurting the environment and developing nations, they ignore it.

E-Waste Watchdog "Basel Action" Re-Publishes Discredited Data

Or so far they have.   But rumors this month suggest that the Basel Action Network's Board of Directors may finally be listening.   Bad statistics are disappearing from the website.   And in their latest press release, Jim Puckett's name and phone number is missing (Mike Enberg and Sarah Westervelt are listed as the contacts).

Is Puckett just taking a leisurely break following the latest COP (Conference of Parties) at the annual Basel Convention get-together?  Or has the BAN.org board of directors finally started to listen to environmentalists and development professionals who told them their poster child campaign has gone too far?

Mark Twain's Anti-Defamation Recipe

Mark Twain:  

"It's not what you don't know; it's the things you know, that are not so, that really get you."

http://retroworks.blogspot.com/2010/03/mark-twain-weighs-in-on-crt-e-waste.html

BAN NGO Threats Lawsuit vs. Vermont #ewaste Blogger

BAN:  Worst NGO in the world?

"Robin— this conversation is about one thing: removing the false and misleading information from your website.   It is my hope that you will agree to remove this libel and not attempt to “trade” its removal for any other action.

This is our final request.  Should you fail to remove this libelous information about our fees from your website immediately, the next communication you will receive on the subject will be from our attorneys. 

Please advise."

Ok, here's my advice.

BAN objected to my calculation of their fees for licensing "E-Stewards" Recycling.  My number was within 1%, not a glaring error like "80% bad exports" when the fact is "85% good exports".  This time, happily, BAN provided the real numbers, so I was happy to remove what I'd been told second-hand.

It's good to see BAN become such a stickler for correct percentages.  Boycott E-Stewards?  As I said yesterday, I wouldn't go that far... they are all good companies, even if the alternatives are not anywhere as bad as they say.  But here is my case for why Basel Action Network needs people like me to do them favors like this... Tough love from a fellow environmentalist.

First, let's be clear.  You wouldn't be suing me for saying that overseas refurbishing factories were ruined without evidence, or that the African dumps were not filled with imported material, or that you have a monetary incentive to recommend one company over a company that has the exact same (R2) system and markets. You won't sue me for mis-representing Basel Annex IX.  Of course not, 90% (a statistic I just made up) of what I write is true, which is a pretty decent defense.

You are threatening to sue me based on a decimal point, a percentage, somewhere between 0% and 2%.  You, who said that dirty Africans primitively burn 80% of the computers they buy, that they are waste tourists and criminals... You want to sue me over, plus or minus, a decimal point.  Hmmm. FY SUE ME?  No.  You should hire me.