SOS has not proven kind to other fan sources in the past, especially if they think that tearing down another website will boost their credibility. Fortunatly, this tactic has continually backfired on them.

The most recent furor with SOS involves the Cloverway e-mails. As can be seen on the Current Legends page, several websites, including The Sailor Senshi Page, the inspiration for this site, received an e-mail claiming to be from Cloverway. According to Jackie Chiang, the owner of the SSP, the e-mail's IP tracked back to Cloverway's servers, so either they were hacked or the mails are genuine. The first reaction of the SOS was to accuse the sites receiving the e-mail, especially the SSP, of fabricating the e-mails. While they don't point fingers at the SSP on their main site, they do link to an e-mail off of their Yahoo mailing list which does link straight to the SSP and blames that site for "fabricating" the story(SOS debunks Cloverway hoax). They still claim that they know more about Cloverway than the rest of the fans...despite the fact that they didn't even know who Cloverway WAS until after the beginning of the S dub, when the rest of the fans were also confused as to the new dubbing company. Now they're suddenly buddy buddy with a company they hadn't heard of? High unlikely. Whether the e-mails are true or not, Cloverway contacting SOS above anyone else, especially the press, is ridiculous. SOS also manages to contradict itself in its FIRST PARAGRAPH with the following statement:

Cloverway, Inc., the overseas representative of Toei Animation, would like all Sailor Moon fans to know that it is not (and has not been) in contact with fans via the Internet.

Which would include the SOS, now wouldn't it? Unless they'd like us to believe that they got a phone or fax number. Again, highly unlikely considering the SOS track record with abusing phone numbers. For Jackie's full rebuttal, go to her site where she has linked to her response. She also posted an even longer statement in her forum.

They had already attacked another website before this, however, and gotten a similar backlash from angry fans. In early August 2002, when SOS reported on Sailor Moon being dropped from the schedule again, Toonzone.net posted some Cartoon Network press releases dealing with the ratings. Toonzone generally mentions the sources of their information, which already elevates them higher than SOS's "confidential" sources. Yet, SOS couldn't handle being left out of their loop, and posted this statement on their site, which I've gathered from the extensive log by Sailor Moon Uncensored:

...We've linked rating periods to the Toonzone site which has posted press releases with the published ratings from the Cartoon Network. We've selected Toonzone this time in the hope that they would start analyzing claims made by such companies or cease to post them. (But maybe they don't dare since AOL Time/Warner has paid them money to put advertising on their pages.)...

As SMU details, the owner of Toonzone was extremely upset at this claim about being paid off. While they do use purchase links to WB Store and Amazon.com (a common method of paying off large web bills), these companies have nothing to do with the content of the site, and nothing Toonzone says on their page is influenced by AOL/Time Warner. Simply reporting that Cartoon Network claims the show was getting X ratings is not a bias. Why would Cartoon Network lie about their ratings in the first place? A much more detailed explanation of the matter can be found in the SOS log by SMU, so go there for further details. But this example is here to show that SOS has, of late, become rather desperate to regain whatever crumbling influence they still have.