re: Snopes in trouble, looking for the internet to bail it out #SaveSnopes (UPDATE)

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this won't possibly end well

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Now an advertising and internet services company called Proper Media is making similar accusations against Mikkelson in a lawsuit filed in May in California which is scheduled for a court hearing next month.

Proper Media's owners last year purchased 50 percent of Bardav Inc., the company founded by both Mikkelsons that owns Snopes, taking Barbara's 50 per cent share.

Proper Media claims that over the past year Mikkelson 'engaged in a lengthy scheme of concealment and subterfuge to gain control of the company and to drain its profits.'

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But Proper Media insists that Mikkelson's personal spending and mismanagement is to blame for Snopes's money woes.

In legal papers filed in San Diego Superior Court, they say: 'But while Snopes is built entirely around the concepts of transparency and truth, its founder, Defendant David Mikkelson ('Mikkelson') has engaged in a lengthy scheme of concealment and subterfuge to gain control of the company and to drain its profits.'

The company says Mikkelson unilaterally broke the advertising contract earlier this year and has bristled at shareholder efforts to rein in his spending.

They note that even as Mikkelson claimed to be under financial duress in court filings in June, he signed the documents while on a trip to Orleans, France.

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