Well, since more than just a few people are starting to ask what's going on with Joe, I'll explain it for everyone.
We decided to deop Joe on irc because of his attitude over the past few weeks, we just felt it was not representative of what a good op should be. (No offense to you Joe, if you happen to be reading this). He's not a bad person, just we have been getting too many complaints and have seen too many conversations turned sour when Joe reacted the wrong way to a joke which wasn't intended to offend him at all. We just felt this sort of behavior was unfit for a person who people look up as an operator.
If you are unclear about any of this, ask any of us and we can clarify what we believe constituted a de-op.
Anyway, we reached a decision last night regarding this behavior, and we felt that it would be in the community's best interests to deop Joe. This was by no means any sort of personal vendetta against Joe, I've worked with Joe on several projects related to OP2.
However, we had no plans to drive him from the community at all. His decision to leave was purely his own choice. If he wants to come back at any time, he is completely welcome to come back and participate in the community.
Anyway, it's been great having Joe around and hopefully we'll see him come back at some point.
-- op2hacker and the rest of the OPU team