Attempted Sabotage of Wild DFW by Area Naturalist
A well-known naturalist thought it justifiable to divert Wild DFW outreach intended for North Texas nature nonprofits to his own personal enterprises.
The Situation
The first time Wild DFW was used in public is a July 7, 2020 GreenSourceDFW article in which my editor used the shorthand Wild DFW for the book, then titled Wild Dallas-Fort Worth.
About two months later, on September 14, 2020, Ben Sandifer obtained the domain WildDFW .com from CheapNames domain registry — Creation Date: 2020-09-14 T13:33 [1:33 pm] — just a few days before I attempted to obtain that URL. He filled his Wild DFW site with photos and vague copy about aiding nature, plugging himself by name several times.
On his WildDFW landing page, in an attempt to make my book look like an unethical usurper of his website name—when the opposite is true—Sandifer stated that his site began in 2009; see graphic.
The CheapNames domain registry proves that’s not true. Also, the first entries on his other websites, not maintained in years, are December 2010.
The Reason
I can only conjecture why he would do such a thing, but it seems apparent he was trying to divert people seeking the Wild DFW book to himself.
Here is an Honorary Texas Master Naturalist sabotaging a huge outreach opportunity for the North Texas chapter that bestowed on him Honorary TMN status with all its perks and privileges.
In the process, his plan would also divert outreach meant for three other TMN chapters (Blackland Prairie, Cross Timbers, and Elm Fork), as well as their sponsor Texas Parks & Wildlife. Each is heavily featured in the book.
His plan would’ve also robbed the outreach intended for multiple Native Plant Society of Texas and Native Prairies Association of Texas chapters, and over two dozen nature nonprofits.
All the above greatly looked forward to the publicity and new members the book promises to engender.
Impact to Myself
Imagine that you are a fairly well-known female artist. You work for over a year to create a large gallery show on an ecological theme. It features many female artists who greatly need the publicity the show would provide.
The artist publicizes the show extensively through print and other avenues. Then another artist, a male artist, sets up a website with the same title as the show. So anyone seeking to find info on the show online would go to his site, not to coverage of the women’s show.
He profits from all the publicity the female artist had done while doing no work to gain it. That’s what happened here. To me personally, it’s just another man trying to steal attention from a woman’s work, ie cheating.
Attempts to Fix the Situation
I was just going to let it slide. But then this spring Timber Press decided they’d like to use Wild DFW for the book title, rather than Wild Dallas-Fort Worth, mainly because it looks much better on the front cover.
After appealing unsuccessfully for intercession from two mutual colleagues, I emailed Sandifer, stressing the damage his actions would do to nature groups in North Texas. I offered to pay for the domain name which he reserved for five years. Sandifer wrote back, stating:
May 9, 2022, at 9:19 PM: I do not own the domain name wilddfw.com. I do not have any content on wilddfw.com. Your inquiries should be directed to ICANN or other registry entities as to ownership of said domain. I have no further information other than the above statement to provide to any inquiries.
Breathtaking lie! The Internet Archive has a copy that anyone can see showing it was his site. See below or click: https://web.archive.org/web/20220410220916/https://bsandifer.wixsite.com/website
Searching afterward for WildDFW.com, I saw that the site had been taken down. I inquired with CheapNames and was told that the domain was unavailable for sale. This means Sandifer took it down and indicated that it not be sold. Now cybersquatters use the domain for advertising various wares.
I’ve since obtained the domain Wild-DFW.com with a dash. I must hold on to hope that people seeking the book online and finding an bogus webpage will think to try the name with a dash.
Proving my Assertions
Here are screen grabs that prove a connection between Sandifer, or someone acting in Sandifer’s name, and wilddfw.com.
1. Look up wilddfw.com on Internet Archive site.
2. This page also links you to the site that the Internet Archives’ bot scanned and saved.
3. That search gets you this page: showing redirect from wilddfw.com to bsandifer.wixsite.com
4. This site also shows how many times their bot has scanned and saved the site. Here, one time for wilddfw.com in December of 2021.
5. Here, the other time for bsandifer.wixsite.com in April of 2022.
6. By comparison, scootersmith.com—the quiet creative artistry site of my husband—was scanned and saved dozens of times since 2009, thus proving Sandifer’s site did not go back to 2009.
