Alpha Centauri 2

Community => Council Room => Topic started by: Buster's Uncle on June 11, 2025, 11:17:53 PM

Title: Forum Downage
Post by: Buster's Uncle on June 11, 2025, 11:17:53 PM

I still don't know just what happened - the hacker script that was breaking the forum w/o accomplishing anything seems to have gone away in mid-April while no one was looking.  Then there were server shenanigans for the last month, possibly something the script did as a going-away present, possibly just because iFast, our hosting service, sux.

I'm trying to arrange for a migration to another host, fingers crossed.

---

-Now, to what I really want to talk about...

Quote from: Buster's Uncle on June 11, 2025, 04:27:44 PM

I just wanted to observe here that the newest theme, Alpha Centauri, never had a good chance to catch on, what with our downage problems --- it's excellent; check it out, please.

(https://alphacentauri2.info/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=4304.0;attach=24195)

Title: Re: Forum Downage
Post by: Fibonacci on June 12, 2025, 05:09:10 AM

That sure was some sunspot activity!

Title: Re: Forum Downage
Post by: Dio on June 13, 2025, 03:18:21 AM

The forum returned with some functionality. :)

Title: Re: Forum Downage
Post by: Buster's Uncle on June 14, 2025, 09:22:30 PM

-Anyone who does Reddit, word that we were back got out within a day at r/alphacentauri - please generally be bumping that news, and convey this message, s'il vous plait:

Quote

Hi; I'm Buster's Uncle, the Owner and Manager of Alpha Centauri 2 Forums.

There are plans in the works to head off future downage like the extended period we just seem to have passed, and I think this forum is a superior format for SMACers to come together in.  We have patches, mods, and custom factions, wallpapers, over 15 years worth of content accumulated, including -my personal favorite part- conversations as early as 2010, and it's WAY easer to find the old stuff than most social media formats, to put it (ridiculously) lightly.

We're a community, and we're made out of people.

I'm in it for the PEOPLE, and always have been, much as I love SMAC(X).

We see a lot of traffic, and always have, from people cynically following links to something in our Downloads, downloading and running.  -And that's okay; in addition to being great gaming content, the various patches, for example, also serve as bait to the percentage who go up a level or two and have a look around the forum, and the percentage of those who sign up and join in.  MORE people to do tech support with/ teach game art modding/post AARs/discuss SMAC(X) in whatever way/ discuss other games -we've got a subforum for that and several dedicated to specific other games-/ and even talk about whatever we please in our Off-Topic, Recreation Commons. (And that's not even getting into a lot of optional fun forum bells-and-whistles like Shop items and the 20 themes/skins.)

I invite YOU to be one of those people.

Title: Re: Forum Downage
Post by: Vidsek on June 18, 2025, 02:25:50 PM

Awesome!!!

After almost giving up hope, I had an impulse to check the site and here it is!

My sympathy for the pain and suffering you must have gone through, my withdrawal symptoms were probably trivial compared.

Here's hoping lots of folks migrate back and we see some life in this prehistoric game.

Title: Re: Forum Downage
Post by: Buster's Uncle on June 18, 2025, 02:54:44 PM

Possibly someone -one of our tech d00dz or iFast staff- did SOMEthing and hasn't told me yet - the .php file the hackbot kept at size zero -the tell I used to see when it was active- is at 4004 bytes and hasn't been overwritten since the 17th of April.  I don't actually know how that file works or who posted it -forum auto function, maybe?-, mind you.

Title: Re: Forum Downage
Post by: Buster's Uncle on June 25, 2025, 10:35:31 PM

Quote from: Buster's Uncle on June 14, 2025, 09:22:30 PM

-Anyone who does Reddit, word that we were back got out within a day at r/alphacentauri - please generally be bumping that news, and convey this message, s'il vous plait:

Quote

Hi; I'm Buster's Uncle, the Owner and Manager of Alpha Centauri 2 Forums.

There are plans in the works to head off future downage like the extended period we just seem to have passed, and I think this forum is a superior format for SMACers to come together in.  We have patches, mods, and custom factions, wallpapers, over 15 years worth of content accumulated, including -my personal favorite part- conversations as early as 2011, and it's WAY easer to find the old stuff than most social media formats, to put it (ridiculously) lightly.

We're a community, and we're made out of people.

I'm in it for the PEOPLE, and always have been, much as I love SMAC(X).

We see a lot of traffic, and always have, from people following links to something in our Downloads, downloading and running.  -And that's okay; in addition to being great gaming content, the various patches, for example, also serve as bait to the percentage who go up a level or two and have a look around the forum, and the percentage of those who sign up and join in.  MORE people to do tech support with/ teach game art modding/post AARs/discuss SMAC(X) in whatever way/ discuss other games -we've got a subforum for that and several dedicated to specific other games-/ and even talk about whatever we please in our Off-Topic, Recreation Commons. (And that's not even getting into a lot of optional fun forum bells-and-whistles like Shop items and the 20 themes/skins.)

I invite YOU to be one of those people.

I'm never signing up at Reddit, yet would REALLY like to see this invitation/sales pitch posted there.

Title: Re: Forum Downage
Post by: Green1 on June 26, 2025, 11:02:26 AM

What's the issues with Discords and Reddit?

I get it's feeding lord knows what as far as some large language model or marketing data. But you had bots and companies lurking in the PhPbb's of old. Right now, there are hundreds of lurkers and this is at 5 AM CST. Most of those, probably crawler bots.

You don't have to move all content to them. Reddit is heavy handed on some things and Discord is not a saint, either. But A LOT of news happens there. And a lot would prefer go one place.

I personally do all my games on Discord/Reddit. As a dungeon master, I can go right now and post a game I run on r/lfg and get 10-20 nerds. And I run wargame-y type ORS-ish type stuff. Some of the "heavy arrrpeee" DMs that run popular modules have so many, they need an applicant tracking system on google docs or be overwhelmed.