For many people, 2024 seemed to have been a relatively bad year.

For me, it was the worst year I've ever experienced - at least professionally, though that inevitably has an impact on one's personal life too.

I've been uncertain whether to put this site live - I'd written the previously blog posts I've shared here but hadn't yet decided to publish them until I received this message on New Year's Eve.

The message was sent from an online CV service I setup - I hadn't needed a CV before in my life as I'd been self-employed since my teenage years. However, as I'm now looking for consulting and full time opportunities following the closure of Venntro Media Group in 2024 I decided to setup an online CV at https://bold.pro/my/ross-williams-uk

I received the message early on the morning of Tuesday 31st December - not a great way to end the year but equally quite fitting given the year I'd had.

The sender had entered:

Name : You Fucking Failure
Company Name : You coffee stained tooth hamster looking cunt
Email : weknowwhereyoulive@death.com
Phone Number : 007


At first I was genuinely concerned - as I've written in this blog, I can absolutely understand why some people hold me personally and directly responsible for Venntro's closure - but the threats in this message were more concerning.

So who wrote this message?

Now let's try to work out who might have sent this message and I'll share my thought process:

  1. It was sent at 8.30am on the morning of New Year's Eve (UK time) - this made me initially think it was someone on the west coast USA or in the far east Australasia as I couldn't imagine anybody could be that angry so early in the day if they were in the UK.
  2. However, the language used is very "British" in nature specifically around the compounding adjectives to describe exactly what kind of c**t I am.
  3. BUT - here's the thing - most Brits don't recognise average dental hygiene (my teeth indeed do get coffee stained if I don't go to the hygienist but in the last few years I've been very good at that. So this person knows me in person from around 5+ years ago. Also - teeth and appearance matters to this person - likely then they take good care of their own appearance to spot this issue in others.
  4. That CV site is only linked to from my twitter and from my Linkedin - fortunately on both I can see where people are looking.
  5. On Linkedin, I had a few views including from a woman who is a business partner of an estranged, very angry previous affiliate of Venntro.
  6. On the stats of the CV site it showed me the location of people who had visited the page in the last 48 hours.
  7. There was one location shown - which matches the location where this estranged, angry affiliate lives.
  8. Based on this location, the link to their business partner viewing my Linkedin profile and the references to my teeth as a noteworthy point (this individual takes very good care of their appearance and enjoys working with online influencers and celebrities) I've got a good idea who was responsible and am not too concerned about the threat (which is why I'm sharing it here).

HOWEVER, this message gave me the confirmation that I need to share my side of the story of the last 12 months.

I sincerely believe that - based on some of the whispers that have got back to me - a lot of lies have been spread by a minority of people intent on harming my reputation and future businesses.

As I shared in Venntro - What Happened Next - Act IV:

“A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to get its pants on”

So receiving this message confirmed my decision to publish these posts and get my perspective out there.

So I'm now going to hit publish and go live - you can read about my perspective on the last 12 months at:

  1. The End of an Era: Reflections on Venntro Media Group
  2. Venntro - What Happened Next - Act I
  3. Venntro - What Happened Next - Act II
  4. Venntro - What Happened Next - Act III
  5. Venntro - What Happened Next - Act IV
  6. Venntro Epilogue: Rising from the Ashes

You can also read a theatrical interpretation of this at The Curtain Falls on 2024: A Retrospective Act by Act.