The plot thickens
An extremely lengthy thread about Mark Smith and Smith's School of English, Japan on the AACircle ESL Blacklist was closed by the administrator on the grounds that he had seen 'indisputable documentary evidence' that Mr Smith was innocent of all the accusations made against him.
An intriguing and, presumably, unrelated point that is not mentioned in his post is that on another page on the site there is a sponsored link from Mr Smith. I, for one, am utterly sure that there is no connection between the two.
[Update 27/08/07: Gfell has correctly stated elsewhere that the advert for Smith's franchises can be found in the Wayback Machine cache of his page. I, therefore, removed the word 'now' from before 'a sponsored link'.However, he has not yet revealed any details of what it was that changed his mind about Smith's School of English.]
[Screenshots of Gfell's statement about Mr Smith and the advert on the other page were taken and are available on request.]
Categories: Asian Blog
No thirty pieces of silver?
What about my school that you allowed to be trashed on your site? What about the lies written about Chocolate English? Have you corrected those postings?
I thought I was banned from your site for trying to defend myself; for trying to prove that I wasn't Mark Smith. Why are you now sending corrections about Smith's to me?
Why don't you set my record straight also?
I supported Mark Smith(though I have never meet him) thoughout my time on the forum because I was attacked by the same people with the same baseless accusations. They were so obviously lying about Mark Smith and myself. Now my business has suffered because of your incompetence!
And, what about all the crazy-sick telephone calls that frightened my family? Strangers ringing my doorbell? What about allowing my home address to be posted and publicised to an audience conditioned to beleived that I was scamming teachers.
I am a small business man and you are a large corporation. You helped damage my business and ruin my reputation.
Your administrator(gfell) actually told a poster to post information that "warns others about this person"(me)! In fact I have never meet or had any relationships with any of the posters, besides defending myself on your forum!
GI JOE
What about the lies involving Chocolate English?
Oh, you allow for holding comments because they may be malicious. It is censorship!!!
1 Posts are held to stop spam, etc. As you can see, we haven't censored anything.
2 You are confusing this site with another (aacircle). We haven't banned you, but then you have never been a member. The incompetence is not ours- we have had nothing to do with any discussions about Chocolate English. I cannot correct these postings because I didn't make them and they are not on my site.
3 Gfell is not our adminstrator- he is the administrator of aacircle, not this site. He has no connection whatsoever with this site.
4 Your home address is not posted on this site, nor ever has been- again you are talking about another site.
5 You have never defended yourself on our forum, but then you have never been mentioned on it. Here's the site-wide search for your school:
"Your search - "chocolate english" - did not match any documents."
We have no mentions of your business.
6 We have had no impact on your business whatsoever for the reasons given above.
7 I live a couple of thousand miles from Japan, so I have not been ringing your doorbell.
8 I haven't sent anything to you ever. You came here and posted this of your own accord.
Next time you launch into a diatribe like this, at least try reading the URL to check that you are talking about the correct site.
This is gfell's site: http://www.aacircle.com.au/forums/
This is our site:
https://www.usingenglish.com/
Can you see the difference?
And for those who would like to read what people said about GI Joe's 'cafe franchise business', try here:
http://www.aacircle.com.au/forums/f2/chocolate-english-take-three-8452/
GI Joe needs to come done. Think before you shoot off your mouth otherwise you are only going to make things worse for Chocolate English.
If you want things resolved, I would go about swearing and cursing people about it GI Joe.
"Chocolate English"?!
I just don't fuggin' believe it - really I don't!
What's next? Pork Pie English?? Cheese Sandwich English??? Ice Cream English????
Anybody who chooses to call his outfit 'Chocolate English' deserves all he gets, anyway.
Actually, I've just had an idea - "Whisky English"! Hopefully it won't end up on the rocks, either...
A note for the person in Kanagawa who left a comment pretending to be Bearcat
I am not publishing your comment because you were using a false identity. I emailed Bearcat to check and he confirmed that it was not his comment.
[Update]
Your second comment will not be appearing either. This time you were pretending to be Scotty Spargo and copying something he wrote on another site.
i am looking for a homestay tutor in delhi india
I too had a Smith's school of English franchise...for 4 years. I know the truth. I know the scam. I have since gone on to get a CELTA certificate and learn what real teaching is about. Mark Smith knows nothing about TEFL, and his success lies in his persuasive charisma. He will say anything, and say it with conviction, to get you to fork over $15k for a school. In this post, I would like to share the truth about the Smith's curriculum:
http://smithsschoolofenglishmethodology.blogspot.com/
Smithparody, I have cut your comment down, but left the link which will take people to your blog.