I agree, Sunshine. One particular message purporting to be from "Charles
Ponds" is nothing like his writing before, and causes me to believe strongly
that the real writer of the message is a scammer or at the very least a person
who cannot handle any degree of doubt or questioning of his identity. I am
about to the point where I suggest that we on this list ignore and delete from
our computers future messages purporting to be from "Charles Ponds" unless
someone we trust can establish for certain whether he is alive. We don't have
any place for more messages such as that one that said it was from him.
-----Original Message-----
From: optacon-l-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx <optacon-l-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf
Of sunshine
Sent: Sunday, July 26, 2020 3:17 PM
To: optacon-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [optacon-l] Re: Fake Messages
To be honest I wouldn’t imagine that Charles would write that kind of message.
I can’t say either way whether he is or isn’t alive because I don’t know. I
have always known of him to be very polite.
Sunshine
Sent from my iPhone XR
On Jul 26, 2020, at 11:53 AM, David Plumlee (Redacted sender knobman forto view the list archives, go to:
DMARC) <dmarc-noreply@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Hi, Petra,
I hope the list owner takes that nasty message down; you are right
that there is no reason at all for such language on this list! As I
understand the guidelines for this list, that message is a blatant
violation of those guidelines!
-----Original Message-----
From: optacon-l-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx <optacon-l-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
On Behalf Of petra
Sent: Saturday, July 25, 2020 7:02 PM
To: optacon-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [optacon-l] Re: Fake Messages
Good evening Charles?
Excuse people for thinking you had passed on. You were the one always
telling us how ill you were and then no posts from you for quite a while.
I'm glad you are alive, if it's really you, and hope you fully recover
from whatever is plaguing you.
I think the language in your message is appalling. No reason for that.
Petra
----- Original Message -----
From: CHARLES POND <dmarc-noreply@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> (Redacted sender
wpg67 for
DMARC)
To: optacon-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Date: Saturday, July 25, 2020 2:42 pm
Subject: [optacon-l] Re: Fake Messages
straight.
List: This is Charles Pond in Ottawa. David Plumlee, Catherine
Thomas and the several others of like-mind: What the "Fake" is wrong
with you people? You are so full of brown-stuff and this is now so
far gone that you can't even be reasoned with at this point, let
alone see
I'll address this ridiculous gossipy virtually slandrous crap aboutexcept for one proverbial "fly in the ointment": The ubiquitous
me being deceased and a fake and scamming in a few days, but for now:
for "fake sake", this is Charles Pond very much alive in Ottawa. I
am nod dead! What the f*** is wrong with you people!? Do you want me
to send my rent receipt for July and my bank statements to prove this? Who
started this way-out Bull-S and perpetuates it? They should be exposed
and publicly humiliated and help accountable in most blatant terms!
I have been regularly and consistently on other lists and there are
people on the "optacon losers' (excuse me, users') list" who readily
know this and with whom I interact often en. What is seriously
wrong with you people?!
enough of this bull-shit from you - Catherine, David and a few others!
Charles Pond
On 2020-07-25 1:10 pddm., David Plumlee (Redacted sender knobman for
DMARC) wrote:
Hi, Pamela,
Notifying BBB or the local police would be an extremely great idea
practice of that damnable number spoofing. For one thing, I believe
that number spoofing makes the "DO NOT CALL" lists virtually WORTHLESS
because there is no way to capture the REAL PHONE NUMBER of these
callers. Occasionally, you might get a true phone number for the
caller; but when I have Googled several of these suspicious callers, I
have found that a whole branch of an exchange (i.ei, (701) 238-****,
covering 9,999 possible numbers) is listed as scam, suspicious, or the like.
the F-word when I wouldn't tell him my age, I googled his number andOne day when I received a call from a guy who became very nasty and
used
found it to belong to a woman in a small town not far from our home.
That call was to me a "wake-up call" against calling any number found
for one of these calls since I could very easily be blaming an
innocent person for calling me. As another "wake-up reminder" we had
a call one day while Debbie was on the phone with a friend, and our
Caller ID said the call was from our own number. That call was
obviously from a spoofed number, since you wouldn't call your own
number. Debbie and our friend both laughed at that Caller ID report.
spoofing so that a caller would have to either have his number shownI wish that phone companies would take action to eliminate all
number
on Caller ID or else come in as a "number unknown" so that a person
could easily choose to ignore all "number unknown" calls if desired.
I am already moving more firmly in the direction of ignoring all calls
that report "toll-free call" or "out of area" calls. Such calls are
almost always junk ads or scams. How often have you answered a call
and heard something like "This is your final call'''." THEY ARE LIARS
- ALL OF THEM! Since they can't tell the truth on that statement
(they keep calling), those callers can't be trusted for anything!!!
other agency, but that's the way I see the situation these days. We
Yes, I know I am pessimistic about reporting to BBB, the police,
FTC, or
simply have NO IDEA who is placing most of these calls. Sadly, I have
heard on our local news about persons in our area being scammed out of
much of their savings by these thieves. It's sad indeed that at least
one of them somehow found our Optacon list; but we can render them
ineffective by refusing to click on any of their messages or send them
any money or personal information.
moment to notify your local Better Business Bureau and even the police
-----Original Message-----
From: optacon-l-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<optacon-l-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of Pamela Drake
Sent: Saturday, July 25, 2020 2:31 PM
To: optacon-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [optacon-l] Re: Fake Messages
David and all,
I would also suggest that anyone receiving such phone calls take a
if you believe it would be helpful. Yes indeed, scams are out there
everywhere!
The BBB has a page on their site <beb.org> which they call scam Trackers.
You can report and find a lot of scamms, nationally and locally.
<dmarc-noreply@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On Jul 25, 2020, at 10:34 AM, David Plumlee
come twice to our house on two different phone calls. On one call, a
"I also want to warn all listers about a telephone-based scam which
has
fellow said that he was offering me a grant of $80,000 which I could
use for anything I want, tax free, coming from something he called a
reinvestment and recovery act. I knew that nobody, especially the
U.S. Government, is out there to give me EIGHTY THOUSAND DOLLARS with
no strings attached! I recorded the information he gave me on how to apply
for the grant.
"hook" somewhere by which the scammer would get money from us whileWhen I discussed the call with Debbie, she agreed that there has to
be a
providing us nothing; or maybe the scam was to get us involved with
some crooks stealing government money. We stayed out of it!
grant of $15,000. Having already discussed this kind of scam withA few days ago, I received a call from a woman supposedly offering
me a
Debbie, I told the woman on the phone that nobody is out there to give
us that amount of money and that we are not interested. I then
immediately hung up the phone. More than likely, the phone numbers
from both of the callers were spoofed and therefore untraceable. The
calls probably came from someone overseas. I haven't yet figured out
how the scamming group was going to get money while they were giving
money to me with no requirement that I pay any kind of fee to get it;
but I'm sure there is a "hook" somewhere in those deals, and our best
approach was to leave both of them alone!
any of us to think, if we got such a call, that we could apply for aI take time on this list to tell of these scams because I wouldn't
want
grant in order to provide funds for research and development of a new Optacon.
Most of us are in no position to get scammed out of our own limited
funds, and it is sad indeed that scammers have apparently discovered
this list and sent some fake messages, perhaps "feelers" to see if
anyone will offer to advance some money "down the rat hole." I also
share the opinion that we cannot expect a new Optacon anytime soon -
and maybe not at all. If I understand "the way the wind blows" these
days, education of young blind children has moved so far into
recordings and computerized speech that nobody will seriously look at the
device which has been so helpful to us.
but not to a foundation or the like, and not much money for R&D.
-----Original Message-----
From: optacon-l-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<optacon-l-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of Carolyn
Sent: Saturday, July 25, 2020 9:19 AM
To: optacon-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [optacon-l] Re: Fake Messages
That was why in my post, I said that $10,000 was a lot to an
individual,
a new Optacon 3 product anytime soon, and I encourage you to be
-----Original Message-----
From: optacon-l-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:optacon-l-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Noel Runyan
Sent: Friday, July 24, 2020 6:31 PM
To: optacon-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxx; optacon-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [optacon-l] Re: Fake Messages
Catherine and listers,
I will start by echoing a strong warning about getting your hopes up
for
extremely suspicious about anyone asking for money to fund new Optacon
research.
development.With that said, I hasten to point out that Charles Pond's recent
messages to this list were not asking for money, although he did
state that he needed
$10,000 to $13,000 in order to finish his new Optacon display
near the many hundreds of thousands of dollars needed to develop theClearly, that relatively small sum of funding would not come
anywhere
rest of an Optacon 3 device, assuming the tactile display development
portion was successful and working well.
assumptions or suspicions about the poor health or death of individuals.I also encourage us all to be extremely careful when making and
sharing
truly deceased, or do we only have unsupported assumptions andDoes anyone on this list have any actual proof that Charles Pond is
irresponsible gossip?
being his brother and writing for Charles.In two of his recent posts to this Optacon list, Charles Pond
mentioned
expect from someone who has been falsely proclaimed to be deceased.These appeared to me to be the kind of ill advised humor one might
Charles, and they both were very consistent with his former writingIn the last several months, I have had two direct Email exchanges
with
style and technical issues. He mentioned Halbach magnetic arrays, a
technical term for a special kind of magnet I told him about several years
ago.
technical reference in Optacon discussions with me.I am sure that a poser would not have known to use such a unique
heard from in the past, is still alive and has recovered enough fromCertainly, I am comfortably convinced that Charles Pond, the one
we've
his severe health problems to be able to continue some discussions
about Optacon tactile displays.
observation of and confirmation of any working prototypes of Charles'sHowever, I am also convinced that we have not had independent
Optacon 3 tactile array devices, something that causes most experts in
the field to have serious doubts about its performance and viability.
Charles Pond will need to be more open and willing to share details ofTo be taken seriously by researchers in the tactile display field,
his design concepts and any prototypes.
quotes) in the message subject.Sincerely,
Noel
-
Noel H. Runyan
Phone: 1-408-866-7564
Email: Noel@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
-
At 11:35 PM 7/23/2020, Catherine Thomas wrote:
I think someone is having a joke at the list's expense. Idoubt vey
seriously that the messages are authentically from Charles.The english
is wrong, the writing style does not match and the tone iswrong. If
anyone receives any private requests for funds claiming tobe from
Charles, just delete them. This is only my opinion based onyears of reading Charles'
messages.----------
Catherine
------------------------------------------------------
comCatherine Thomas
braille@xxxxxxxxx /
-----------------------------------------------------------
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