So this is where the big guy hangs out? Seems too good to be true, but I'll bite.
Please don't turn this board into another /operate/ or /meta/.
That said, this is a big issue and it would be nice to clarify this and maybe draw some conclusions. Jim seems like a cool guy, I hope he'll understand everyone's concerns here. I don't even use either of the boards in question and it's still worrying.
The main issue at hand is trust. By posting on 8ch, we're expected to trust a lot more people than we'd want to, especially in face of an expectation of anonymity that comes with these sites. Take that expectation away and this site turns into a less convenient version of every other forum on the internet.
I vaguely recall Fred saying once that he's the only guy you have to trust with your posts here, aside from the board owner. It was either a post of his or a part of the FAQ. For a while, that was the truth.
The first data security problem I can think of was global volunteers being able to cross reference users' posts. But I think it got fixed pretty fast. Again, don't take my word for it. It was long ago and I don't feel like digging things up.
But then we got
>an archive running off of a JSON API which turned out to leak some global ID data due to a coding study up by Fred himself
>support for board volunteers, who have the same access to post histories as the board owner with no option to limit that
>a new developer who seems really shady and makes absolutely no efforts to dispel people's doubts about him
>several board owners getting too close to each other over time
And now, one of those board owners admits to dealing with the cops and goes full retard about it. It is worrying.
Most people posting on 8ch aren't aware of a single of these things, they either think only the admin can see what they do or they don't think about it at all. (and they should) A quick glance at 2channel's history shows us how damning can any security leak be.
This whole deal makes 8ch even less secure than cuckchan, because on cuckchan you at least have a huge crowd to blend in with, and the data that may be compromised is in the hands of rather large entities who at least have incentives to avoid a scandal. 8ch is small, it's much easier to single out users and you can do so while staying relatively anonymous yourself. Shouldn't it be the other way?
Posting on 8ch isn't fun anymore outside of small, obscure boards. There's way too many people I'm expected to trust with my posts, and it's a possibility that it might be used against me. I try not to self-censor too much out of principle and a kind of a defiance to this absurd status quo, but it's always in the back of my mind.
If you want this site to thrive and contain more than just safe manureposts and boring, sanitized popular opinions, it needs a bulletproof data policy and software that enforces it.