MicrostockGroup

Strange, they dont call at least one experienced, high-ranked independant. Reps from all quarters is the normal precidure in this action.

That aside, I dont doubt for a second that IS can show everything is above board, never doubted their honesty in this mess. Just, it could have been handled much better and in a much more diplomatic way, thats all.

Exactely! Been wondering about that too...
 maybe his legal team is on it and he can't comment? or his sweetheart deal is so sweet it soothes everything for him? or or..?

This shouldn't be a conference call with exclusive members. This needs to be a town hall meeting with lots of participants and a question queue. I know this is easy to facilitate because I used to work for a Fortune 500 company and we'd have global conference calls with our CEO quarterly. 

Thankfully there are some rational heads over there still:

I would urge anyone considering taking on this responsibility to consider it carefully.  Depending on the NDA and how much you learn, it is possible that you might not be able to post much if anything analytical about Istock in the forums again, ever.

Those are my thoughts exactly.

I totally agree. But it looks like people are falling for it. Boggles my mind.

It seems that the discussion with the five peer-selected contributors is only about the fraud, not about the gazillion other things which are wrong with iStock at the moment. Therefore:
It MAY be that iStock is going to explain to the group what the nature of the fraud was, what they did about the first wave, in December, why they apparently can't get insurance (RM says they can't, at any rate!), why the second wave happened, why it went on for so long, apparently undetected - or did they have to leave it for so long to gather enough evidence for the police or other relevant authorities.
It MAY be that that information is sub judice or similar, so can't at the moment be made public. I think that's what Kelly has been saying.
HOPEFULLY the NDA would only be that the group couldn't discuss the details of the fraud cases until it's all made public in the fullness of time.
There would be no need to muzzle the chosen sample from frank, free and full exchange of opinions on other matters on the forums, here or elsewhere, and I wouldn't expect them to agree to anything else.
Sean and JoAnn from here, I hope you're both up for it.

That was my take on it -- an NDA rouses suspicion for sure, but IF there was truly something that the authorities are involved in and IF it is still on-going (and it sounds like it is, if the last "fraudulent downloads" took place as recently as February 28) and they're still trying to catch them, I can see why perhaps there are parts they can't divulge publicly, and why they would need to have new people in the loop agree not to compromise it by divulging certain things.  However it also gives them a weasel-out if it was in fact due to their negligence or carelessness, or a gaping security hole in their F5 revamped site, or something else. 

People signing it don't have to say anything in order to make their opinions known.  I'm sure anyone working there has to sign an NDA agreement, including inspectors, and yet you see them give up their badges and/or leave because in their own words they don't like what is going on or the direction it's going in, and they vote with their feet without breaking agreement.  Likewise, I think if Sean agrees to do this and sees something dodgy, he's not going to sacrifice himself - he might not be able to tell all, but if he leaves or tosses the crown or takes other action like that, he'll have said something by his actions.   Sean doesn't back down from what he thinks is right, as evidenced by three tries to re-open the February stats thread even though TPTB kept locking his thread.  If he sees something on the NDA that doesn't look right, if isn't there for a legitimate reason, I expect that he'll call them on it -- and we'll hear about it. 

I do wish it was open to more than five -- but I think a totally open-for-all call would turn into a major shitstorm, and we'd end up with less answers than we are likely to with a carefully chosen fewer number.  Bottom line -- to me, it's better than KK just locking the thread and ignoring everything until the next issue comes up, which has become the norm lately. 

Just my two cents.   

I dont know how this will work other than to quiet 5 people in the forums.plus it will cause more speculation as the rest of us will remain in the dark.

It surely hasn't been at a communications or people-skills workshop.    They seriously need someone else to be their spokesperson. 

I couldn't agree more.  

I'm sure that Sean for one would be happier knowing that this was a genuine, unpreventable, major fraud assault (assuming for the moment that it is) and not just his agent's negligence or worse.

I like Paul Cowan's suggestion that the five have a list of questions they can answer in advance of the meeting.

Since this is a spinoff of the fraud thread, it's fair to assume that this conference relates only to that issue.  If it covered any other issues, then the five should refuse to sign the NDA.  Finally, if possible the group should include a lawyer and a programmer.