Bleach Forums and the Ban Hammer

Keyword, MORE FREQUENTLY. Macs and Linux DO get viruses, just not as often. In no way is it smart to get rid of your anti-virus, ESPECIALLY FOR FUCKING VIDEOS!

AAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHKFJDSIofal!

SHUT UP, SCRIPTY!
Now I will smash my keyboard violently.
...
nkfseg\ ryaetreljgfsdkmxz,.dhfkp'bth nmrhiu[k,ew,t iaugbgdhbgidrjfp\p]e http://static.zerochan.net/full/42/10/430542.jpgFklwhekbgnrekpo rkhojishksgzlkp\g ;wrhg d;z'lhb; gdbhkgdjbolj

And there's a fokin' URL in there 'cause it was on my clipboard, but whateva.

That wasn't nice... Quit being mean to me.

Don't tell me what to do.

I'm kidding, I'm kidding!
I was just joking around, that's all! ^^

Okay. I think I'm done raging about him for right now though.

About who?

Quote :

BleachForums & Adam - Status

Hey everyone. I'm sorry I haven't said anything since the incident last week. The past two years have been something of a very tryin time for me, and it just sems like things haven't wanted to let up.

Last week we were not hacked. The old version of vBulletin we were using had a simple exploit that was used to gain access to the database, and through that they were able to obtain the passwords of our admin accounts. The entire database was copied. No data was deleted.

This means a number of things. First of all, if you used a password that was tied to any other account, ie your paypal account, bank account, email account, etc... then its likely they were able to use it and gain acess to those accounts. This is unfortunate, but I'm sure that at least once in your life you've heard some other nerd tell you: don't use the same password for everything. Nothing I can do about that.

I spoke to the group that did it, particularly: I spoke to the individual that did it, and they were at least relatively nice in discussions. I believe I've come to an agreement with them. That is all that there is to that.
Where is the forum?

The forum is offline for the moment. There are a number of reasons, the main one is I don't have time or money to patch it. The other, is that my stress level is so high right now that I just simply didn't have the energy or heart to deal with the compromise in any way other than turning it off. I'll get to why later.

No data was lost. I'll put them back online soon. I just want everyone to read this first.
Where have you been?

Last November my mom had a transplant done of her small intestine/small bowel. I moevd to florida temporarily at that time to deal with it. I told some but not all of you about this. At that same time, I started having strained relationships with my job, and I became very stressed out and unhappy. When I returned to San Antonio that March, I made an effort to reconnect with my girlfriend as well as find a new job. As time went on further, my mom did not get much better, and though she is still alive right now, she has been in and out of the hospital VERY frequently... this has taken its toll on me as I have been very stressed out. I left my job at Peer1 and moved to a new company in austin, where I have been commuting back and forth. Three weeks ago I totaled my car. Two weeks ago I moved up here and I caused major harm to my back, which some of you already know is actually already broken. My mom took a turn for the worse and we're not sure what it is, we are waiting on a lung biopsy. On top of this, this past weekend was my birthday and supposed to be my one year anniversary with my girlfriend, and she told me she wanted to take a break.

I am currently still looking for a new car. I am trying to get my girlfriend back. I'm praying and worrying about my mom, and soon my parents might have to face hurricane irene. The new job is create, its the most amazing place I've ever worked for.
Where am I getting at?

I'm going to be relatively blunt now. In the midst of everything I've had going on over the past couple of years, I've done my best with the time I have had to keep BF up and running. I've kept it going, I've done my best to make improvements, and when needed I've come in to try and shake things up a bit and try and generate new users. Unfortunately, new users have been decreasing over time. I've asked for assistance, input, advice, and volunteering to attempt at getting it to increase... but either no one pays attention, or I just see new users getting treated like crap.

BF is a community that is dying. It is dying, and it is dying fast. It's been dying. I have been getting the impression that, no one has really cared to begin with. This place used to be great... and now its turned into a pit for arguing whether or not someone is getting out of line, and when to kick them out. We have tons of spam and are frequently targeted - and at one point, the answer to resolving these issues was to disable the ability for users to request their activation letters again. This seems silly, as it ultimately means that you basically disable the ability to register at all. This isn't a solution. This is exatly the opposite - its a solution for killing the site faster.

So, its up you guys. I've been paying to keep BF up and running for the last 6 years. I've kept it going, I've provided the server space, I've fixed the problems when they came up. Some of that time was a little annoying, and the downtime was a bit crap - but thats what happens when you have admins that don't know what they're doing and trun a mysql dump that locks the entire database every few hours. With the exception of a couple months where some people helped, this has largely been a one man task, with the exception of spam control and user moderation.
Time for a decision.

The ball is in your court. Do you want bleachforums around? Do you want me to restore the forums, back to their original state? Do you want me to start over, give it a fresh look and a fresh new design, and a new beginning? Do you even care?

Email me your thoughts, your requests, what you want to see, if you want to help, whatever. Email me if you just want to bitch me out or if you hate me. I don't care. But, your thoughts and your desires will ultimately determine how I proceed with BF, and what I'm going to do. It's up to you guys though. The only thing I won't do, is let BF operate at a loss anymore. There will be some changes no matter what we do. BF is killing me and I can no longer afford to make compromises simply because you guys don't like a decision. It's not free, and no one really seems to want to help out to keep the ads off, so they're coming back and in full force. So, keep that in mind.

I am very grateful for all those who did put in the effort to try and rebuild the BF community. I really do appreciate all that you guys did, especially those who tried to help me when I was down, and lent an ear to listen.
E-Mail

E-Mail Me Here: bleachforums@x-zen.cx. I'll reply.

Adios.

- Adam

Emphasis mine (as it preaches to the fucking choir.)

Not sure if this has been posted, or if anyone has seen it.

I don't know about anyone else, but I actually do like Adam, or at least the things I know of him, and what I've been shown.

I realize I'm a key player in what led to the "great exodus", which was the eventual downfall of BF, but I'd feel a bit bad to leave it like that. If BF can be rebuilt, why not do it in a way that allows for us to exist without major conflict. I don't know about the rest of the former BF members, but I wouldn't be opposed to joining for more than simple trolling if there were changes made.

And nothing of value was lost.

You're absolutely right, that is why I suggested building something that actually does have value.

Well, I read it. Now what? I feel bad for the guy...

Script-Z wrote:

I realize I'm a key player in what led to the "great exodus", which was the eventual downfall of BF, but I'd feel a bit bad to leave it like that. If BF can be rebuilt, why not do it in a way that allows for us to exist without major conflict. I don't know about the rest of the former BF members, but I wouldn't be opposed to joining for more than simple trolling if there were changes made.

Mailed him, suggested a forum/community merge. I can't think of a better option atm.

I'm not taking any action concerning that just yet.

Well it's up to how you feel, I have time to spare and I used to hang at BF so I thought hey why not.

If I thought that BF was going to be totally redone, I'd help out. If it'd just be the same old thing brought back from the dead... no.

It's not that I don't care, WZ4E, it's just that I am thinking about what to do next.
I don't hate BF, there were just a few idiots there, and I hated them.

Where did you find this?

I don't know, maybe I should drop him an E-mail to ask what kind of responses he's currently getting.

Here's my response

Quote :

So far the new beginning part is looking like thats where we are going. I'm working on the moderators. It'll be a all new tryout. No moderators that we used to have. There will be new rules, everything. This will not be like bf used to be. There will be a LOT of things that will change.

On Aug 25, 2011, at 7:43 PM, Anthony Clark wrote:

> It would be great if you brought it back, but you should start all over with a new beginning. Like some of the admins were never on and it took forever for things to be fix, such as trolls and spam. Sometimes I would send report, it would take forever for something to happen and then more time before action is takin. So pretty much fix the mods, the design, and try to get new members to stay.
>
> But ya It would be nice if you can bring the site back, it’s a place I go to talk about bleach and sometimes other things.
>
> from Bigace360

Seems like he's getting rid of the old admins that did shit for the site. Maybe with a new team of mods, hopefully ones that know what there doing, we would have less spam, trolling, and ignorance rolling around.

Bleach forums are a bastion of idiocy though. There's no real way around it because Bleach is such a divisive fandom. There are people who want an all canon forum and there's people who want a totally Alternate Universe forum just like there are people who loath the fillers and people who think they're alright and a necessary evil.

There's not much of a middle ground to stand on.

I assumed the whole project was going to go nowhere. Eh, only time will tell.

That's why I'm not going to do anything except wait and see.

If you're all jonesing for Bleach rp goodness and don't mind it being AU I can see if I can kick my co-admin in the hindend and try to res our site for the... third time...

Holy shit, it just occurred to me: What happened to Halcyon Days when the board went belly-up?

That JUST occurred to you? That was the second thing that came to my mind.
It must've died. Or maybe they had it all backed up and opened a new site or something.

A quick Google search turns up no results. Evidently, they were not as self-sufficient as many people thought.

So it's all gone, then.