The Crisis Center Has Shut Down
Brian Dinnigan
Center" has shut down [has been, for at least a week now]. According to
Lynk [the site maintainer], it was only receiving a few thousand hits a
month, and did not justify the expense of maintaining that. The site itself
is down, and all the information included. Along with the site, the
associated forum is gone, too.
To be honest, I'd be ecstatic if I could get similar hit rates for my site
[over its entire [at least] 4-year lifespan that was counter-monitored,
I've received an averaged 220 hits per month, though with the majority
coming nearer the end than the start].
This is the reason that I'm really, really angry that usenet is so under-
utilized. Web forums just can't compete with the distribution and
survivability of a newsgroup. I tried to persuade some of the forum members
to come over here, but it seems that I have not succeeded.
--
dinnigan *at* nucleus *dot* com
Visit my page of anime(style) fan and original pics at:
http://www.nucleus.com/~dinnigan/fanart.htm
Chris Schumacher
news:Xns9641CB3AFC8E...@66.18.192.242:
> This is the reason that I'm really, really angry that usenet is so
> under- utilized. Web forums just can't compete with the distribution and
> survivability of a newsgroup. I tried to persuade some of the forum
> members to come over here, but it seems that I have not succeeded.
Also, unmoderated newsgroups are pure democracies. People tend to be genial
because they WANT to be genial, and fights don't last long because the other
denizens get sick of it and tell the fighters to take the pissing match
elsewhere.
You can never go wrong with giving someone "too much" freedom.
Not to mention the wonderful simplicity of unadorned text...
I know the numbers are small, but it could be worse. Imagine how lonely a KOR
group would be...
-==Kensu==-
Who went online in 1994, getting a good couple of years of KOR fandom before
it all went away.
Brian Dinnigan
news:Xns9641DC2D9137...@207.115.63.158:
> Also, unmoderated newsgroups are pure democracies. People tend to be
> genial because they WANT to be genial, and fights don't last long
> because the other denizens get sick of it and tell the fighters to
> take the pissing match elsewhere.
Hmm, you say that, then you say that you've been online since 1994...
WHAT IS HAPPENING HERE?
I have to disagree, however, with your premise. I think one of the
reasons people stay away from newsgroups [assuming they can even find
one, but it's getting easier with Google Groups, problems
notwithstanding] is that lack of control. People come onto a group, get
flamed roundly in one of two ways:
1. Justifiably [according to the group, though I am often inclined to
agree]- they post something irretrievably dumb and or annoying.
Alternatively, there's the dumb stuff like "froup", or getting mad at
people when they call it a "forum" [Which I definitely find annoying].
2. Unjustifiably - they get attacked by one of the many trolls that hang
around the various newsgroups. This happens quite a bit.
And after that, they don't come back. Alternatively, they find the group
infested with trolls, flamers and jerks battling back and forth. Admidst
this are serious and interesting conversations, but the newbie doesn't
know how to get to them. Web boards aren't like this- well, good ones
aren't. Moderation keeps stuff like that under control [Heck, I've even
seen politics discussion carried out in a respectful manner on certain
well-moderated [read: heavy] boards].
Quite simply, the toxic environment created by a few problem people [and
spammers, too] really drives the potential audience away. Some might say,
"screw 'em, if they're so weak and easily offended", but I say instead
that no one should have to put up with crap in order to participate. We
lose too many voices that way.
I'm not sure we can call a usenet group a "democracy", as there is no way
for the bulk of people to definitively deal with a problem person, at
least not easily. Anarchy is a better definition, and it seems to fall
into the same traps online that it does in real life.
> You can never go wrong with giving someone "too much" freedom.
> Not to mention the wonderful simplicity of unadorned text...
I think the vast majority of people deserve as much freedom as possible,
but some people need boundaries enforced, in order that those other
people don't get trampled on. I think spam's a good example of this.
I agree entirely that text is best. The speed of usenet, owing to
locality and text are unmatched.
>
> I know the numbers are small, but it could be worse. Imagine how
> lonely a KOR group would be...
>
>
> -==Kensu==-
> Who went online in 1994, getting a good couple of years of KOR fandom
> before it all went away.
It's funny how fandoms come and go. For example, I just got a little Jung
Freud figure [Gunbuster- a really nice gashapon] that was produced
recently. Admittedly, I'm not a huge Gunbuster fan, but it's still rather
nice.
Chika
<dinn...@cadvision.com> wrote:
> This is the reason that I'm really, really angry that usenet is so
> under- utilized. Web forums just can't compete with the distribution and
> survivability of a newsgroup. I tried to persuade some of the forum
> members to come over here, but it seems that I have not succeeded.
I'm not really surprised. A lot of newer net users are convinced that
anything they can't do through their browsers, with tons of graphic embeds
and stuff like that, is somehow inferior. It's bad enough with Googlenews
and gmail, but persuading some folk to use Usenet is just a battle you
can't win. They've been too thoroughly brainwashed.
--
//\ // Chika <zvl...@penfuarg.bet.hx. - ROT13>
// \// Hitting Googlespammers with hyper-hammers!
... Since you're going to die anyway, can we use you as a shield?
Dreamer
If I understand the recent social research on behaviour in
groups, humans seem to naturally form groups associated with
their interests, and if some basic feedback mechanisms are in
place, the groups tend to enforce 'good' behaviour.
Spammers and trolls are those who have not bought into the group,
in terms of agreeing what is good behaviour, and the existing
feedback mechanisms do not affect the former, and may tittilate
the latter.
Flame wars occur because the feedback mechanisms available are
not always adequate.
The idea is that the group 'rewards' good behaviour, and in some
way punishes bad, which in some case might be by ignoring it, the
recommended response to trolls.
Of course, this might just be a lot of social psychological
rubbish! [grin]
Though, I thought the idea that if there was enough feedback to
form a community in a peer to peer environment, that this seemed
to discourage 'bad behaviour' like downloading pirated music, and
instead make people willing to pay the (small) download fees, was
interesting.
(Assuming that I haven't got this all 'round my neck', of course!)
So, how's the BGC art and fanfics going? [grin]
--
Dreamer
dre...@romsys.demon.co.uk
http://www.romsys.demon.co.uk/
Dreamer
<URL:mailto:dinn...@cadvision.com> wrote:
> I haven't seen it mentioned on alt.fan.bgcrisis, but "The Bubblegum Crisis
> Center" has shut down [has been, for at least a week now]. According to
> Lynk [the site maintainer], it was only receiving a few thousand hits a
> month, and did not justify the expense of maintaining that. The site itself
> is down, and all the information included. Along with the site, the
> associated forum is gone, too.
Do I misunderstand how sites work in (I presume) the US?
In the UK, most e-mail accounts come with some web space, 10M or
20M is not uncommon, to use how you like, sometimes with a
download bandwidth restriction.
Once you've put the site up, the only overhead is you keep the
e-mail account, though it might get a bit 'stale' if you aren't
updating it very often. Free e-mail companies tend to die, every
so often, or get taken over, forcing all their web sites to move
to a new address.
The only other cost I can think of, is if a site has a domain
name, which seem to cost about $25/year, a moderate amount to pay
for a hobby if you are employed, and any re-direction costs for
the domain name to the web space (say, another $40/year from
www.easydns.com).
What other expenses am I missing?
And, maybe there should be some way to tell someone like
www.archive.org, that a site is going down, and, if they want to
preserve the last state it was in, taking a snapshot now would be
a good idea?
I understand that the trend to sites that just exist as a
database, that you query to dynamically generate pages, has been
reversed to some extent, as these didn't used to be very web
crewler friendly, and if Google can't see your site content, it
might as well not exist?
Also, as these sites dynamically generate pages, www.archive.org
can't hold a backup of them, once they've gone. (I'm not sure
about the status of Wikis in this context.) It's a pity there is
no way to provide a web site archive organisation with the site
database.
Did "The Bubblegum Crisis Center" fall in this category?
> To be honest, I'd be ecstatic if I could get similar hit rates for my site
> [over its entire [at least] 4-year lifespan that was counter-monitored,
> I've received an averaged 220 hits per month, though with the majority
> coming nearer the end than the start].
>
> This is the reason that I'm really, really angry that usenet is so under-
> utilized. Web forums just can't compete with the distribution and
> survivability of a newsgroup. I tried to persuade some of the forum members
> to come over here, but it seems that I have not succeeded.
I am quite upset about the way some forums for discussion have
moved from non-moderated newsgroups, onto web sites, and then the
web site has folded, taking all the discussions, and frequently
the whole community, down with it. Information is lost, and
connections between people.
I am a bit reluctant to say anything good about Yahoo, given the
way they seem to be in the business of carving bits off the
internet, and trying to turn them to profit... But, at least they
and yahoo groups seem to have survived, so far, and provide a bit
of continuity.
Dr Raven
Dreamer <dre...@romsys.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> Do I misunderstand how sites work in (I presume) the US?
>
> In the UK, most e-mail accounts come with some web space, 10M or
> 20M is not uncommon, to use how you like, sometimes with a
> download bandwidth restriction.
>
> Once you've put the site up, the only overhead is you keep the
> e-mail account, though it might get a bit 'stale' if you aren't
> updating it very often. Free e-mail companies tend to die, every
> so often, or get taken over, forcing all their web sites to move
> to a new address.
>
> The only other cost I can think of, is if a site has a domain
> name, which seem to cost about $25/year, a moderate amount to pay
> for a hobby if you are employed, and any re-direction costs for
> the domain name to the web space (say, another $40/year from
> www.easydns.com).
>
> What other expenses am I missing?
In Canada I'm paying $59.00 a month CDN for a Hi-Speed 3 MB DSL account
and domain hosting for my 2 domains and a static IP address for my
server that has tons of storage space. That's about to change as I am
about to begin hosting my own domains so my costs will be down to around
$49.00 a month. The 2 domains themselves costs $35.00 a year US each
(yeah there's cheaper out there but I deal directly with Netsol for
reliability reasons).
I've said it before, I've got tons of storage so if anyone needs raw
webspace for a BGC-related website then drop me a line.
> And, maybe there should be some way to tell someone like
> www.archive.org, that a site is going down, and, if they want to
> preserve the last state it was in, taking a snapshot now would be
> a good idea?
If anyone has a snapshot of the site, and if Lynk agrees, I can host the
site at ravensgarage.com.
Dr Raven
--
My Homepage
www.rainycitynights.com
BGC Tech
www.ravensgarage.com
Brian Dinnigan
news:ant24105...@romsys.demon.co.uk:
>
> If I understand the recent social research on behaviour in
> groups, humans seem to naturally form groups associated with
> their interests, and if some basic feedback mechanisms are in
> place, the groups tend to enforce 'good' behaviour.
People seem to lack a lot of those control mechanisms when they get
online, however. That's why you need more direct control mechanisms. So,
beyond "ignoring", you need "banning". This is especially true when a
troll tribe attacks a group. Attacks are self-feeding- they are fun for
the attacker not purely because they annoy people, but also because they
are having fun with their friends. That helps to keep the attack going,
regardless of what the group members do in the way of ignoring.
Again, that lack of control blows a group apart. If you want to see some
real awful stuff, check out a web-board with little or no moderation, or
perhaps a game that is easily abusable with cheats. At least there are
some limits to the cranks we get on usenet. John Gabriel had a good
explanation of all of this in his theory:
[Not safe for work, there's swearing]
<url:http://penny-arcade.com/view.php3?date=2004-03-19>
> The idea is that the group 'rewards' good behaviour, and in some
> way punishes bad, which in some case might be by ignoring it, the
> recommended response to trolls.
That's true, but ignoring takes time, and a lot of co-operation. As long
as even one person participates with the troll, they stay. That's enough
to turn people off of newsgroups. Web boards have two things [well, if
properly run] up over usenet- they are easier to get to, and they are
more carefully controlled. The average person wants freedom to speak,
yes, but they aren't going to stick around if someone is shouting
obscenities every time they do.
> So, how's the BGC art and fanfics going? [grin]
>
I'm working on some original art pieces at the moment. I'm not sure when
I'll start on some BGC stuff, however. There's a lot I've got to do.
Brian Dinnigan
news:4d608ee3...@no.spam.here:
> I'm not really surprised. A lot of newer net users are convinced that
> anything they can't do through their browsers, with tons of graphic
> embeds and stuff like that, is somehow inferior. It's bad enough with
> Googlenews and gmail, but persuading some folk to use Usenet is just a
> battle you can't win. They've been too thoroughly brainwashed.
>
I don't know if we can say "brainwashed". Perhaps merely ignorant [not
meant as an insult, but as an observation]- the challenge is to convince
them otherwise.
It's not just ignorant people, however- a lot of users who would have
gone onto usenet in the past skirt around it now. There are many factors
for this, one I've seen mentioned often is how the signal-to-noise ratio
is so bad on usenet [though it has improved more recently- maybe the
troll tribes are having more fun attacking people on web-boards. I can't
say the same for spam- it seems like it's on the rise thanks to Google
Groups' behaviour].
Brian Dinnigan
news:ant24100...@romsys.demon.co.uk:
> Do I misunderstand how sites work in (I presume) the US?
I'm pretty sure Lynk was paying for his extra hosting space. There was
quite a bit on that site, and quite a bit of data transfer used every
month.
Just as an aside, Lynk is an Australian. I'm a Canadian. You're British.
The Commonwealth is well-represented in the BGC fandom.
> The only other cost I can think of, is if a site has a domain
> name, which seem to cost about $25/year, a moderate amount to pay
> for a hobby if you are employed, and any re-direction costs for
> the domain name to the web space (say, another $40/year from
> www.easydns.com).
>
> What other expenses am I missing?
You caught the domain name, but the server space itself is a bit more
money, too. Also, as he was running a forum, which eats up quite a bit of
processing power as well as space [again, adding to cost].
>
> And, maybe there should be some way to tell someone like
> www.archive.org, that a site is going down, and, if they want to
> preserve the last state it was in, taking a snapshot now would be
> a good idea?
It's a bit too late now, however. Here's what the current site looks
like:
http://www.thecrisiscenter.net/
> Did "The Bubblegum Crisis Center" fall in this category?
I never paid attention to whether the site was automatically generating
pages upon request, or serving pre-generated pages [re-generating every
once in a while], but they were coming from a database, as far as I could
tell.
>
> I am quite upset about the way some forums for discussion have
> moved from non-moderated newsgroups, onto web sites, and then the
> web site has folded, taking all the discussions, and frequently
> the whole community, down with it. Information is lost, and
> connections between people.
That's my key concern, too. Well, that and chatting. Chatting is killing
forums. People are content to chat with their friends [frequently in
their own geographical area], and forums all around are suffering.
Ah, maybe I'm over-reacting.
>
> I am a bit reluctant to say anything good about Yahoo, given the
> way they seem to be in the business of carving bits off the
> internet, and trying to turn them to profit... But, at least they
> and yahoo groups seem to have survived, so far, and provide a bit
> of continuity.
>
Yahoo can be very capricious in their dealings towards groups-users,
however. Groups seem to be shut down on a regular basis, especially anime
ones with H content [and in their minds, I expect the nudity in BGC would
count].
Dreamer
<URL:mailto:dinn...@cadvision.com> wrote:
> Dreamer <dre...@romsys.demon.co.uk> wrote in
> news:ant24100...@romsys.demon.co.uk:
>
> > Do I misunderstand how sites work in (I presume) the US?
>
> I'm pretty sure Lynk was paying for his extra hosting space. There was
> quite a bit on that site, and quite a bit of data transfer used every
> month.
>
> Just as an aside, Lynk is an Australian. I'm a Canadian. You're British.
> The Commonwealth is well-represented in the BGC fandom.
Special BGC Commonwealth version? [grin]
Which BGC cast member get to come from where? [grin]
So, is Priss the Australian, or Sylia, from previous discussions?
[grin]
> > The only other cost I can think of, is if a site has a domain
> > name, which seem to cost about $25/year, a moderate amount to pay
> > for a hobby if you are employed, and any re-direction costs for
> > the domain name to the web space (say, another $40/year from
> > www.easydns.com).
> >
> > What other expenses am I missing?
>
> You caught the domain name, but the server space itself is a bit more
> money, too. Also, as he was running a forum, which eats up quite a bit of
> processing power as well as space [again, adding to cost].
Server space does push up costs...
The other big option, I suppose, is if you have already got DSL,
and the site doesn't eat up unacceptable parts of your bandwidth,
or resources for storing stuff, or running a forum. Then, I'd
expect the only overheads to be the domain name and the
re-direction.
Then, I suppose there is the personal cost in time, of admin for
the site on your own DSL-connected box.
> > And, maybe there should be some way to tell someone like
> > www.archive.org, that a site is going down, and, if they want to
> > preserve the last state it was in, taking a snapshot now would be
> > a good idea?
>
> It's a bit too late now, however. Here's what the current site looks
> like:
>
> http://www.thecrisiscenter.net/
I used this to have a look at the last http://www.archive.org/
snapshot, Nov 26th 2004, and as I suspected, just the front page
got saved. All the links point to the current 'fin' page.
Dynamic pages = no proper archive.
> > Did "The Bubblegum Crisis Center" fall in this category?
>
> I never paid attention to whether the site was automatically generating
> pages upon request, or serving pre-generated pages [re-generating every
> once in a while], but they were coming from a database, as far as I could
> tell.
Does look like that.
> > I am quite upset about the way some forums for discussion have
> > moved from non-moderated newsgroups, onto web sites, and then the
> > web site has folded, taking all the discussions, and frequently
> > the whole community, down with it. Information is lost, and
> > connections between people.
>
> That's my key concern, too. Well, that and chatting. Chatting is killing
> forums. People are content to chat with their friends [frequently in
> their own geographical area], and forums all around are suffering.
>
> Ah, maybe I'm over-reacting.
The closest I've got to chatting is to use the text message
facility that comes with the VOIP app, skype. I tried the MS
product, and killed it as it was too annoying and generally
intrusive. It took a lot of killing...
I'm not sure you are over-reacting...
> > I am a bit reluctant to say anything good about Yahoo, given the
> > way they seem to be in the business of carving bits off the
> > internet, and trying to turn them to profit... But, at least they
> > and yahoo groups seem to have survived, so far, and provide a bit
> > of continuity.
>
> Yahoo can be very capricious in their dealings towards groups-users,
> however. Groups seem to be shut down on a regular basis, especially anime
> ones with H content [and in their minds, I expect the nudity in BGC would
> count].
The five or six yahoo groups that I know of, which I treat as
glorified mailing lists with a bit of file archiving, all seemed
pretty stable, so I didn't know about this. Still, yahoo has
really caused problems on occasion, with the way it handles
bounces - just cutting people off.
It's a while since I read the Yahoo AUP, but I seem to remember
it was a bit vague on the subject of H.
I wasn't proposing a BGC Yahoo group, anyway, as I wouldn't
really see the point of it. Just giving it as an example of a web
forum that seemed to work, and from what you say, not as well as
one might like.
What we really need is a peer-to-peer system, that is independent
of the ISPs, except to use them for connectivity, and allows you
to create distributed community groups, immune to the web forum
single point of failure problem.
Capable of working both with dial-up and DSL. Sort of cross
between a mailing list and a newsgroup, but scalable to all the
facilities of a web forum, including distributed archiving.
Thinking about it, this makes me recall Fidonet... On steroids
...
Rob Kelk
wrote:
>In article <Xns96426824C8B3...@66.18.192.242>, Brian Dinnigan
><URL:mailto:dinn...@cadvision.com> wrote:
<snip>
>> Just as an aside, Lynk is an Australian. I'm a Canadian. You're British.
>> The Commonwealth is well-represented in the BGC fandom.
>
>Special BGC Commonwealth version? [grin]
>
>Which BGC cast member get to come from where? [grin]
>
>So, is Priss the Australian, or Sylia, from previous discussions?
>[grin]
Obviously, Priss is the Australian - you need a one-syllable name for
the "Prisses Knightsabers Sketch".
"... Priss [points to one person] is the close-in-combat specialist,
and Priss [points to another person] is the ranged-combat specialist,
and Priss [points to a third person] is the tactical commander. What do
you do, Priss?"
"My name's Nene."
"You're name's not Priss? That's going to be a problem. ..."
And later comes the reading of the rules. ("Rule 1: No Boomers!")
Okay, maybe not. ^_^ But she does have the "rough-and-tumble"
reputation...
Sylia has to be British, and upper-class at that - she's got the
charisma for the role. (Mackie would also be upper-class British, but
his behaviour fits in more with those occasional scandals that involve a
less-than-prudent member of the House of Lords. But even the best
families have someone like that, right? <g>)
Linna, of course, is Canadian - the oft-forgotten, more-oft-ignored
member of the Commonwealth. (Not that I'm bitter or anything...)
Nene would be... hmmmmm... a New Zealander, maybe? Nobody outside the
group understands her unique contribution to the group.
And Reika is the Bermudan of the group - obviously rich and good at
appearing carefree, but (like everyone else) hiding a few problems
behind the facade.
<snip>
--
Rob Kelk <http://robkelk.ottawa-anime.org/> robkelk -at- gmail -dot- com
"I'm *not* a kid! Nyyyeaaah!" - Skuld (in "Oh My Goddess!" OAV #3)
"When I became a man, I put away childish things, including the fear of
childishness and the desire to be very grown-up." - C.S. Lewis, 1947
Brian Dinnigan
news:ant24174...@romsys.demon.co.uk:
> Special BGC Commonwealth version? [grin]
>
> Which BGC cast member get to come from where? [grin]
>
> So, is Priss the Australian, or Sylia, from previous discussions?
> [grin]
>
Nene and Reika are from Canada. Calgary, to be exact. Near [insert my
location here] to be precise.
> Then, I suppose there is the personal cost in time, of admin for
> the site on your own DSL-connected box.
Yeah, management of a box can get to be a hassle, even with something
good and secure like OpenBSD. Personally, when I start building on my
site, I'll just pay money to have someone else deal with that particular
hassle. I don't have enough free time to do it myself.
>
> The closest I've got to chatting is to use the text message
> facility that comes with the VOIP app, skype. I tried the MS
> product, and killed it as it was too annoying and generally
> intrusive. It took a lot of killing...
>
> I'm not sure you are over-reacting...
>
Chatting is a serious time sink. Unfortunately, the only way I can really
talk with some people is via chatting. There are some old members of this
group who can only be reached by chat, for example. They don't answer e-
mail, and don't participate in forums.
Whenever I chat, I find myself wasting massive amounts of time. I try to
limit it, but even so, it still wastes time like mad.
>
> Capable of working both with dial-up and DSL. Sort of cross
> between a mailing list and a newsgroup, but scalable to all the
> facilities of a web forum, including distributed archiving.
>
> Thinking about it, this makes me recall Fidonet... On steroids
> ...
>
We have it right now, well, parts of it. Usenet could be torn down and
built up again, incoporating what we've learned so far.
Dreamer
<URL:mailto:rob...@deadspam.com> wrote:
> On Sun, 24 Apr 2005 18:26:49 +0100, Dreamer <dre...@romsys.demon.co.uk>
> wrote:
>
> >In article <Xns96426824C8B3...@66.18.192.242>, Brian Dinnigan
> ><URL:mailto:dinn...@cadvision.com> wrote:
>
> <snip>
>
> >> Just as an aside, Lynk is an Australian. I'm a Canadian. You're British.
> >> The Commonwealth is well-represented in the BGC fandom.
> >
> >Special BGC Commonwealth version? [grin]
> >
> >Which BGC cast member get to come from where? [grin]
> >
> >So, is Priss the Australian, or Sylia, from previous discussions?
> >[grin]
>
> Obviously, Priss is the Australian - you need a one-syllable name for
> the "Prisses Knightsabers Sketch".
>
> "... Priss [points to one person] is the close-in-combat specialist,
> and Priss [points to another person] is the ranged-combat specialist,
> and Priss [points to a third person] is the tactical commander. What do
> you do, Priss?"
>
> "My name's Nene."
>
> "You're name's not Priss? That's going to be a problem. ..."
>
> And later comes the reading of the rules. ("Rule 1: No Boomers!")
s/Bruce/Priss/
Hmm...
> Okay, maybe not. ^_^ But she does have the "rough-and-tumble"
> reputation...
Yes, but would she wear the hat with the corks dangling down???
[grin]
And, make bad Rolf Harris jokes? [grin]
> Sylia has to be British, and upper-class at that - she's got the
> charisma for the role. (Mackie would also be upper-class British, but
> his behaviour fits in more with those occasional scandals that involve a
> less-than-prudent member of the House of Lords. But even the best
> families have someone like that, right? <g>)
I think it is very generous you letting the UK have Sylia, and I
suppose we have to have Mackie as well! Most people might
consider him to be a bit young for the House of Lords, though...
Mackie = black sheep of family
Of course, if she is a boomer, I suppose she might count as an
'ethnic minority'...
> Linna, of course, is Canadian - the oft-forgotten, more-oft-ignored
> member of the Commonwealth. (Not that I'm bitter or anything...)
Very important Canada! The British royal family need to have
somewhere to flee to! [grin]
No chance Linna is French-Canadian?
> Nene would be... hmmmmm... a New Zealander, maybe? Nobody outside the
> group understands her unique contribution to the group.
Well, from the POV of the UK, New Zealand lamb and butter, but I
have trouble seeing how you fit Nene in, there.
> And Reika is the Bermudan of the group - obviously rich and good at
> appearing carefree, but (like everyone else) hiding a few problems
> behind the facade.
Don't forget that until recently you could consider Hong Kong to
be sort of Commonwealth, but China wanted it back, for some
reason...
Leonardo-McNichols
open with Site and Hosting taken care of. My Email was never answered or
was refused. But in relation, I did open a BGCO Forum for MadMax and His
Artist friend Maverick. I don't even know how many here are from tcc
forum.
Dreamer
<URL:mailto:dinn...@cadvision.com> wrote:
> Dreamer <dre...@romsys.demon.co.uk> wrote in
> news:ant24174...@romsys.demon.co.uk:
>
>
> > Special BGC Commonwealth version? [grin]
> >
> > Which BGC cast member get to come from where? [grin]
> >
> > So, is Priss the Australian, or Sylia, from previous discussions?
> > [grin]
>
> Nene and Reika are from Canada. Calgary, to be exact. Near [insert my
> location here] to be precise.
How convenient! [grin]
> > Then, I suppose there is the personal cost in time, of admin for
> > the site on your own DSL-connected box.
>
> Yeah, management of a box can get to be a hassle, even with something
> good and secure like OpenBSD. Personally, when I start building on my
> site, I'll just pay money to have someone else deal with that particular
> hassle. I don't have enough free time to do it myself.
Speaking as a computer consultant, with a human factors/
ergonomics bent, all these computer set-ups are far too difficult
to use, and we need a re-think in basic operating system design,
to bend the computers to fit the people's needs, not visa versa,
as currently often seems the case.
Setup, management, fault finding and maintenance; all need a
major overhaul.
I wonder if this will be sorted by 2033? [grin]
> > The closest I've got to chatting is to use the text message
> > facility that comes with the VOIP app, skype. I tried the MS
> > product, and killed it as it was too annoying and generally
> > intrusive. It took a lot of killing...
> >
> > I'm not sure you are over-reacting...
>
> Chatting is a serious time sink. Unfortunately, the only way I can really
> talk with some people is via chatting. There are some old members of this
> group who can only be reached by chat, for example. They don't answer e-
> mail, and don't participate in forums.
>
> Whenever I chat, I find myself wasting massive amounts of time. I try to
> limit it, but even so, it still wastes time like mad.
Obviously I've not used chat enough to comment. A number of
people that I've used it with, seem to be chatting to several
people at once, on different links, or watching TV, or using the
phone as well, or even in one case, frequently playing a video
game!
I suspect part of the problem with chat is that we've not learned
the cultural cues to tell if others want a brief chat, just want
to get something over, or wish to chat at their leisure. Text as
a restricted medium for feedback may well be an issue.
Maybe we need a clock running associated with chat to tell both
sides how long we have been? [grin]
Do you think Nene would have problems with chat overrun? [grin]
> > Capable of working both with dial-up and DSL. Sort of cross
> > between a mailing list and a newsgroup, but scalable to all the
> > facilities of a web forum, including distributed archiving.
> >
> > Thinking about it, this makes me recall Fidonet... On steroids
> > ...
>
> We have it right now, well, parts of it. Usenet could be torn down and
> built up again, incoporating what we've learned so far.
Unfortunately, I don't think Usenet is likely to be torn down and
re-built. It is far more likely a new system will be constructed
from scratch, built on something like peer-to-peer systems, like
Kaza.
So, we will have to re-build the communities all over again, very
likely loosing more people in the process.
shanejayell
> forgotten, more-oft-ignored
> member of the Commonwealth. (Not that I'm
> bitter or anything...)
Not bitter, either.
(Canadian!)
Getting back on topic... no chance of a 'CRisis Center' revival, then?
Rob Kelk
wrote:
>In article <837q61dcv0e65jtgg...@4ax.com>, Rob Kelk
><URL:mailto:rob...@deadspam.com> wrote:
<snip>
>> Linna, of course, is Canadian - the oft-forgotten, more-oft-ignored
>> member of the Commonwealth. (Not that I'm bitter or anything...)
>
>Very important Canada! The British royal family need to have
>somewhere to flee to! [grin]
>
>No chance Linna is French-Canadian?
Nah - French-Canadians have personalities, unlike the rest of us...
^___________________________________________________^
>> Nene would be... hmmmmm... a New Zealander, maybe? Nobody outside the
>> group understands her unique contribution to the group.
>
>Well, from the POV of the UK, New Zealand lamb and butter, but I
>have trouble seeing how you fit Nene in, there.
Y'know, I have trouble seeing why I suggested that, too. Okay, bad
idea.
>> And Reika is the Bermudan of the group - obviously rich and good at
>> appearing carefree, but (like everyone else) hiding a few problems
>> behind the facade.
>
>Don't forget that until recently you could consider Hong Kong to
>be sort of Commonwealth, but China wanted it back, for some
>reason...
True, but I thought we were going with the current state of affairs.
--
Rob Kelk <http://ottawa-anime.org/~robkelk> robkelk -at- gmail -dot- com
Leonardo-McNichols
that way people "can" chat and post and chat at the same time? Plus I do
have a offer. If you'd like to hear it. It has to deal with a "muck" and a
text based Megatokyo. Like the old game of Zork. Its aready being built
with the help of teh admin and myself. 6 of the original charaters are
already registered as well. But it all depends on how people will react to
it? Let me know.
Brian Dinnigan
>>Well, from the POV of the UK, New Zealand lamb and butter, but I
>>have trouble seeing how you fit Nene in, there.
>
>>> And Reika is the Bermudan of the group - obviously rich and good at
>>> appearing carefree, but (like everyone else) hiding a few problems
>>> behind the facade.
No no no, darnit! Reika and Nene are from Calgary, Canada. Near my house.
Brian Dinnigan
news:1393c73578bb6065...@localhost.talkaboutpeople.com:
> Well I've been thinking (Ouch that hurts) Why not setup a channel at
> IRC that way people "can" chat and post and chat at the same time?
Alt.fan.bgcrisis has had quite a bit of trouble just keeping itself
afloat as a newsgroup. I'm not sure we'd be able to sustain an IRC
channel as well. Plus, there's the setup issue- as in, someone would have
to take some time out to set that channel up.
> Plus I do have a offer. If you'd like to hear it. It has to deal with
> a "muck" and a text based Megatokyo. Like the old game of Zork. Its
> aready being built with the help of teh admin and myself. 6 of the
> original charaters are already registered as well. But it all depends
> on how people will react to it? Let me know.
I am unsure- what exactly are you proposing?
Brian Dinnigan
news:a24142b9d462d9cb...@localhost.talkaboutpeople.com:
It's probably best to wait a bit before trying to e-mail Lynk again.
Perhaps in a little while, he'll be more willing to discuss matters
regarding The Crisis Center.
I was on the Crisis Center forums, but I was on alt.fan.bgcrisis first.
Brian Dinnigan
news:ant26070...@romsys.demon.co.uk:
>
> How convenient! [grin]
Yes, it's funny how these things seem to work out.
>
> Speaking as a computer consultant, with a human factors/
> ergonomics bent, all these computer set-ups are far too difficult
> to use, and we need a re-think in basic operating system design,
> to bend the computers to fit the people's needs, not visa versa,
> as currently often seems the case.
I agree with you from the end-user perspective, but not necessarily from a
maintainer's/administrator's perspective. I don't think that administration
of a box should be difficult for the sake of difficulty, but it should be
optimized to suit the level of expertise that an admin should have. That
means command line and text files for configuration and operation, as that
combination allows an expert to blaze through admin tasks. Oh, and a robust
scripting language, too.
Simplification of tasks, improvement of interfaces- these are very
important things to be done [I work with end-users all day, so I can see
that our current set-ups need work], but power-users need the tools to
really cut through the junk and get to the core.
>
> I wonder if this will be sorted by 2033? [grin]
Best guess of mine- we'll have developed entirely new access and interface
paradigms that fail in interesting new ways.
> Obviously I've not used chat enough to comment. A number of
> people that I've used it with, seem to be chatting to several
> people at once, on different links, or watching TV, or using the
> phone as well, or even in one case, frequently playing a video
> game!
Oh, I multi-task to some degree while chatting, but I cannot do what I
really need to- I can't draw and chat at the same time. I can either be at
my drawing table, or at the computer- it's a bit hard to do both. CGing a
pic is a bit simpler in this respect, as it requires me to be seated in
front of the computer.
>
> I suspect part of the problem with chat is that we've not learned
> the cultural cues to tell if others want a brief chat, just want
> to get something over, or wish to chat at their leisure. Text as
> a restricted medium for feedback may well be an issue.
Experience has shown me that even people who have "grown up" with chatting
have some difficulty keeping track of time while IMing.
> Do you think Nene would have problems with chat overrun? [grin]
I suspect yes. Then again, I also expect that she has a little timer
program that lets her know how long she's been doing something, and chimes
at the appropriate time.
[That, incidently, is one of my chief complaints regarding windows- nothing
even resembling an egg-timer comes standard.]
>
> Unfortunately, I don't think Usenet is likely to be torn down and
> re-built. It is far more likely a new system will be constructed
> from scratch, built on something like peer-to-peer systems, like
> Kaza.
Well, we're sorta peer-to-peer at the moment. I don't think the metaphor of
usenet is incorrect, or flawed- I just feel some of the implementation
could be improved.
Leonardo-McNichols
mac...@rhinokaosol.net
What, AnimeMUCK wasn't good enough for them? ;]
Ye gods, old memories coming back... Please tell me you didn't let
the old Priss from AnimeMUCK be a wiz. ;D
-Ben
--
I am Ben Cantrick. I still think the AnimEigo BGC dubs suck.
To foil spammers, no e-mail adress will be given here. (Spammers also suck.)
If you want to e-mail me, remove any African animals in my e-mail address.
http://soyokaze.biosci.ohio-state.edu/~gavigan/magnum.html
Leonardo-McNichols
said anything about her being at FictionMuck at all as of yet.
Leonardo-McNichols
be the follwing.
Either
#BCG2041
#ADP2043
Or
#MegaTokyo-2043
I will update as soon as I hear back from thier Admin on this matter.
mac...@rhinokaosol.net
>Ben, is that you?
There are many Bens in the world, but if you're thinking of
Macky @ AnimeMUCK, yes that's me.
>My god its been a long time. No I don't thing Panda-san
>said anything about her being at FictionMuck at all as of yet.
Oh, I have no problem with her being there. It's being a wiz that
would rub me the wrong way. ;]
-Ben
--
I am Ben Cantrick. I still think the AnimEigo BGC dubs suck.
To foil spammers, no e-mail adress will be given here. (Spammers also suck.)
If you want to e-mail me, remove any African animals in my e-mail address.
"You are the perfect drug, the perfect drug, the perfect drug..." -NIN
Leonardo-McNichols
#MegaTokyo-ADP if those that wish join please feel free.
lynkf...@hotmail.com
> I haven't seen it mentioned on alt.fan.bgcrisis, but "The Bubblegum Crisis
> Center" has shut down [has been, for at least a week now]. According to
> Lynk [the site maintainer], it was only receiving a few thousand hits a
> month, and did not justify the expense of maintaining that. The site itself
> is down, and all the information included. Along with the site, the
> associated forum is gone, too.
>
> [over its entire [at least] 4-year lifespan that was counter-monitored,
> I've received an averaged 220 hits per month, though with the majority
> coming nearer the end than the start].
>
> This is the reason that I'm really, really angry that usenet is so under-
> utilized. Web forums just can't compete with the distribution and
> survivability of a newsgroup. I tried to persuade some of the forum members
> to come over here, but it seems that I have not succeeded.
>
> dinnigan *at* nucleus *dot* com
> Visit my page of anime(style) fan and original pics at:
> http://www.nucleus.com/~dinnigan/fanart.htm