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« on: November 04, 2013, 09:34:49 am »
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EDIT: I, Dread Pirate Roberts, have signed the below message as an endorsement to the support V and all others have offered support to our cause. I would like to thank you all for your contributions for helping the new Silk Road launch successfully and I hope you enjoy the new market when it goes live!
[Signed 11/03/2013]
Hello Community
You were called, you responded – and now, you’re needed.
The time has come, and the marketplace is going live tomorrow. The link will be announced the moment it’s live, so now it’s time for us to prepare to put our plan into action.
Navigating This Post
1. Ideas for Distributing the Message
2. Approaches to Avoid
3. Reinforcing Why We Exist
:::::Part One:::::Ideas for Distributing the Message:::::
Alternative Forums
This will be the key to both pulling back the old members who are still astray, as well as pulling in new members who are already using other markets but who never used Silk Road.
Remember the importance of avoiding spam. Spamming message boards makes us look desperate. It makes us look like the many tried-and-failed attempts. It makes us look needy.
With that in mind, it is time for you to log into any other forums you are a member of, and to let the members know that Silk Road has once more risen. If you’re starting a thread about it, don’t start more than one. Try to drop it into conversation naturally – we’re not pyramid scheme salesmen, we’re Silk Roaders.
Do not start unnecessary new threads and do not purposefully tread on the toes of loyal followers of competitor sites. We are not here to take over. We are here to be what we are and open our arms to anybody who wants to be a part of that.
Your Contacts
Many of you will have contacts from before the arrest of Ross Ulbricht who are not yet here. Using whatever secure means of communication you have at your disposal, reach out to each and let them know that we’re ready to go. Remember that many members will still be hiding, and you might just be their only contact in terms of news – it’s better that they hear it twice than don’t hear it at all.
The Clearnet
If you don’t feel you can discuss Silk Road on the clearnet securely, then you shouldn’t. But that doesn’t mean you can’t use the clearnet to help spread the word.
Social Media[/i]
As many of you now know, Dread Pirate Roberts is on Twitter. There will also be a number of other social media campaigns launched in the coming weeks – so, although you don’t need to identify yourself or even leave comments, it will be of great help if you can at least offer a ‘like’ or a ‘follow’, to get Silk Road the exposure it needs to rise bigger and better than before.
OzFreelancer
I am also going to mention OzFreelancer’s news site (clearnet) allthingsvice.com. OzFreelancer is on the forums – find her, support her – but more importantly, bookmark her website and link to it wherever you can. She provides a balanced and fair opinion on what happens here, and is one of our few ways of telling the world what we really do and what we stand for. (Not sure why you’re bookmarking or linking to her site? It is a simple, fairly anonymous gesture that will help her website increase in page rank on Google, so that any interested party looking up Silk Road will be more likely to land there than the bigoted major media outlets. Don’t ask why bookmarking or linking works, I’m not a Search Engine Optimization expert - it just does).
Your Own Blogs & Websites
If you own a website or a blog, then where possible, mention Silk Road’s rise. If it is inappropriate, avoid it – but if you have the means, the more 'inside info' about Silk Road the public gets, the less like ‘demons’.
*Please Note: I am not suggesting you start posting adverts to your vendor profile on the clearnet - avoid anything other than non-incriminating reference at all costs.
The Old Silk Road Forums
Most people who use the old forums are already aware of this new venture, but that doesn’t matter – if you were involved in a sub-community; if you had a review thread; if you had on-going relationships in threads you controlled that other members were a part of - then make an announcement so that any stragglers turning up to the empty room will know where to go. This will also help you get your reviewers and favorite vendors back on board.
:::::Part Two:::::Approaches to Avoid:::::
I want to highlight 3 key points we will all need to keep in mind when spreading the news:
1. Nobody likes a spammer or a ‘network marketer’ (you know, the brain-washed idiots selling Ambit Energy and such), so let’s not sound like that. This process will need to be executed naturally.
2. Be respectful of other marketplaces. Black Market Reloaded in particular has been good to us as a community, and offered us shelter when they didn’t have to. No matter what your opinion on their forum, their community, their marketplace or their goals, do not criticize or lambast – be respectful.
3. How you tell others about the marketplace is essentially down to you, and the steps I have highlighted are purely guidelines that will help us work as one community and keep the message strong.
:::::Part Three:::::Reinforcing Why We Exist:::::
It’s VERY important that you remember why this marketplace exists, why it’s different to the others, and why we want to rebuild it. When spreading the word, take the following ideas into account as well as your own:
1. Silk Road is not all about the drugs. Drugs can be bought on countless marketplaces. Silk Road just happens to be the best.
2. Unlike other attempts, this new marketplace has been built by original members of staff from the original marketplace. There’s evidence everywhere, if you want pointing in the right direction please PM me (my hat is not made of tin foil, so please do not flood my inbox with conspiracy theories – I’m simply offering to help anyone who’s unsure on how to find their footing).
3. Silk Road has the closest community of any other marketplace. There are families, clubs and groups that know and love each other. I don’t say love lightly – there is love within these sub-communities that is stronger than many real world relationships.
4. Silk Road has a moral code, and the community works to protect each other – we can see this everywhere. From DoctorX's medical advice thread, to the fact that items such as weapons, credit card lists and child pornography are not permitted.
5. Insert your own. Only you know why you love Silk Road and why you help it to continue existing – and by being here right now, you’ve proven that whatever makes Silk Road special for you, it’s something NOT offered by Sheep Marketplace, BMR or any other alternative.
:::::In Conclusion:::::
Make your own judgements, your own decisions, and spread the word naturally. Take on-board whatever advice you wish to from this post, and above all else, remember why YOU are here on Silk Road. Because everybody is here for different reasons, united under the common goal of freedom. That freedom was briefly taken. We lost a few along the way. But it has been reclaimed, and if they shut us down we’ll rise again.
Ideas are bulletproof. Now go out there and tell that to the world.
V
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