The new forums will be named Coin Return (based on the most recent vote)! You can check on the status and timeline of the transition to the new forums here.
The Guiding Principles and New Rules document is now in effect.
Jesus, that's a lot of very basic features. But also 12k/yr for just the tech seems expensive. I'm having a hard time believing it costs that much
The expense isn't just the tech; it's that plus the human support on Vanilla's end (which has been a source of Fun since the forum-admin-Vanilla comms chain got disrupted, but we're working on the stuff-breaking wonkiness), plus the CDN for media going back years, plus all the under-the-hood stuff keeping the forum from bursting into flames with about 1,750 active users, a bunch of less-active users, six quadrillion attempted spammers, and decent amount of traffic from all of them. Some of that might also have been scaled for the forum a few years back when things were busier here - I definitely wasn't in the loop back then - but there's still enough going on to require some resources even if not necessarily requiring five figures' worth of resources.
Should it become necessary, migrating/rehosting/recontracting the setup would obviously change those numbers since PA Forums Now are not the same creature as PA Forums 2020 or the like, but other techier-than-I types would know the specifics and options better there.
Jesus, that's a lot of very basic features. But also 12k/yr for just the tech seems expensive. I'm having a hard time believing it costs that much
That is a very large amount of money in today's market for a forum. That's like a large Jira engagement. It's Salesforce enterprise money.
It's a lot of money for a forum of our size but comparing it to a large Jira engagement is a bit of an exaggeration. That's about 150 Jira users on their lowest tier.
every person who doesn't like an acquired taste always seems to think everyone who likes it is faking it. it should be an official fallacy.
Sterica, question regarding the super-structure of the forums, in a situation where a post was made that brought the attention of the federal government to PA, who exactly would field that now?
They would contact the site owners so I assume Eebs would still handle that.
People who donate money to things like a forum may have weird values not really driven by how supplicant the forums are to their desires
Marty: The future, it's where you're going? Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
No town more barren than our town
No haven safer than the one they tore down
No greater love than to lay my life down for a friend
No sweeter pleasure than to see the credits clear through to the end
No one knows where the admins gone
No one sees it camped out right there on the front lawn
We played for you but you would not sing
No one was going to get away with anything
The river goes where the water flows
But no one knows when the Forums closed
The river goes where the water flows
But no one knows when the Forums closed
Now that Geebs is gone, could someone to verify that money IS indeed being spent on the forums, since it appears to not be common knowledge among the mods that it exists.
Undead Scottsman on
0
ASimPersonCold...... and hard.Registered Userregular
Thanks for the update Sterica.
Getting into the speculation zone, Tycho is one of the primary presences on my social feeds talking about the un-homogenization of the Internet as Twitter continues to circle the drain. I suspect the larger PA Megacorp is not done with Internet forums as it seems to maintain a social presence on the Internet, but the question is if it comes back to traditional forums where you post asynchronously (like this) or if something like Discord becomes the thing. (I am already on like 3 different official PA Discords.)
Of course, even if they do decide to turn their attention back to an asynchronous forum, there's no guarantee it'll be this one. I could see them cutting this loose and going with something that looks/feels a little more modern.
Now that Geebs is gone, could someone to verify that money IS indeed being spent on the forums, since it appears to not be common knowledge among the mods that it exists.
Hosting costs alone are like five digits last I checked.
The biggest contributing factor is like 20+ years of images.
This feels like those people who pay like a grand a month for a storage unit full of random garbage they haven't looked at in decades, only to eventually end up on Storage Wars one day.
Ah, it stinks, it sucks, it's anthropologically unjust
Now that Geebs is gone, could someone to verify that money IS indeed being spent on the forums, since it appears to not be common knowledge among the mods that it exists.
Hosting costs alone are like five digits last I checked.
I presume the digital advertisements implemented into the forums help with that though, no?
Now that Geebs is gone, could someone to verify that money IS indeed being spent on the forums, since it appears to not be common knowledge among the mods that it exists.
That part we do know at least. PA has a contract, currently active and ongoing, that covers the forum's hosting, support, licenses as required by the specific setup, yadda yadda. It's been periodically renewed or amended for as long as the forum's been a thing. There have been previous scares near the end of previous contract periods as people at PA weighed the cost of the forum, what they're getting out of it, what we're getting out of it, etc. As of Right Now that's chugging along as it always has (recent software issues notwithstanding).
The current question marks, as Sterica said on the previous page, are:
When, exactly, date on the calendar, does the current contract expire?
What happens at that point?
If the contracts are not renewed this time, what are the options, and what are the community's desires and capabilities to narrow those down?
Having said all that, you now know approximately as much as I or the other mods know about that part of this whole situation. If you find that kinda frustrating we're entirely in agreement.
We're working on chasing down some more specific answers. When we know more, you'll know more.
I’m not a prolific poster here, but without exaggeration this is my favorite place on the internet by far. I really don’t know what I would do if we lost it.
I can toss a few bucks at a ClubPA subscription if it keeps the lights on, but it sounds like losing the forum is a matter of when, not if. Any chance we will be given an opportunity to split off from PA proper without their branding?
The biggest contributing factor is like 20+ years of images.
With the infrequency that I post pictures directly as opposed to imgur links with <img> tags, I'm always surprised that this place even lets me upload files.
GNU Terry Pratchett
PSN: Wstfgl | GamerTag: An Evil Plan | Battle.net: FallenIdle#1970
Hit me up on BoardGameArena! User: Loaded D1
Now that Geebs is gone, could someone to verify that money IS indeed being spent on the forums, since it appears to not be common knowledge among the mods that it exists.
That part we do know at least. PA has a contract, currently active and ongoing, that covers the forum's hosting, support, licenses as required by the specific setup, yadda yadda. It's been periodically renewed or amended for as long as the forum's been a thing. There have been previous scares near the end of previous contract periods as people at PA weighed the cost of the forum, what they're getting out of it, what we're getting out of it, etc. As of Right Now that's chugging along as it always has (recent software issues notwithstanding).
The current question marks, as Sterica said on the previous page, are:
When, exactly, date on the calendar, does the current contract expire?
What happens at that point?
If the contracts are not renewed this time, what are the options, and what are the community's desires and capabilities to narrow those down?
Having said all that, you now know approximately as much as I or the other mods know about that part of this whole situation. If you find that kinda frustrating we're entirely in agreement.
We're working on chasing down some more specific answers. When we know more, you'll know more.
Sorry, I think I was unclear in what I was asking. I wasn't trying to suggest there was some magic pool of money that would pay for the forums, I just wanted to make sure the money going to Club PA is still making it to the forums and wasn't accumulating somewhere that only Geebs knew about.
Yeah, I get what you mean. The mods aren't in the loop on that one.
(My assumption, insert caveats here, is that it finances PA generally rather than the forums specifically given the variety of perks even at that tier, but I could be entirely offbase there.)
Yeah, I get what you mean. The mods aren't in the loop on that one.
(My assumption, insert caveats here, is that it finances PA generally rather than the forums specifically given the variety of perks even at that tier, but I could be entirely offbase there.)
Yeah, there's no way to even say what you're subscribing for.
Thankfully there's a way to pay the money without them sending the merch
what would I do with the merch
I have more backpacks I need to buy with that room
There's a patreon tier that's specifically for the forums.
The Forumer
This tier shows us that you post on the forums, and want to support that community with a dollar!
Geebs said the money would specifically go to forum costs, IIRC.
Huh. Let go/reassigned by higher ups, or did Eebs possibly also ask to be moved? Because boy howdy was it kind of interesting to see him slowly start morphing into Tube. Specifically the "You ungrateful little fucks don't get to demand and abuse free volunteers" attitude. Would not blame him one bit if he just said "fuck this shit I'm out".
And yeah, if you thought there was potential entitlement before, the second you start taking donations? Soon as a single cent changes hands, that shit will blow up. "I paid for you, so you will damn well do what I fucking say!". Absolutely something to be considered if that door ever decides to be opened.
"The sausage of Green Earth explodes with flavor like the cannon of culinary delight."
To echo what others have said, thank you to all the mods and all the work you guys do.
Please let us know if there is anything we can do to help. If moving from a higher tier to the forumer is the way to, glad to do it. This place has been a part of most of my adult life and it’s honestly hard to imagine if it went away.
My question: are any moderators active in the larger PA community? I'm in the PA and Acq Inc Discords, for example, but there's also Twitch and comments in their various official channels. Do you guys participate anywhere?
My observation: I feel like at some point a value proposition will have to be made about what this forum can be for PA. There's currently a bit of a revaluation of forums going on and I just really hope this place looks good in that movement. I think that seeing a webforum as a useful resource and easily searchable database is something to be proud of. We've got a lot of history here and I think that we appear in some deliciously obscure search queries with great information. If we can promote or enhance this usefulness, that could help with keeping this show on the road.
A little disappointed we're not listed under the 'Sex Stuff' category.
Honestly, deleting anything over 5 years old would probably be fine. I mean, it's not great, but all the photobucket and a pile of others have already ruined a bunch of links so...does it really matter?
I'd honestly have still been a bit surprised if it were 5 years, 20 just seems insane to me. I can't see any level of sentimentality towards old images that justifies the recurring cost of keeping them vs just laying out "if you like them enough then save them because anything older than X gets periodically wiped."
Is there any chance we get some clarification on any of these questions from PA at some point?
I'm not saying they owes us by any means, because if anything we owe them, but having the admin of a place like this leave without warning or apparently anything resembling a plan for the future is, uh, very disconcerting to say the least.
Honestly, deleting anything over 5 years old would probably be fine. I mean, it's not great, but all the photobucket and a pile of others have already ruined a bunch of links so...does it really matter?
I'd honestly have still been a bit surprised if it were 5 years, 20 just seems insane to me. I can't see any level of sentimentality towards old images that justifies the recurring cost of keeping them vs just laying out "if you like them enough then save them because anything older than X gets periodically wiped."
Absolutely! If it can save even a few bucks, an annual purge of everything more than 5 years old would be excellent.
Posts
https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/46409035/#Comment_46409035
That is a very large amount of money in today's market for a forum. That's like a large Jira engagement. It's Salesforce enterprise money.
the former would be nuts. the free zboard i would do skies of arcadia rp on when i was 11 had that
Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better
bit.ly/2XQM1ke
>Closed, Incomplete
The expense isn't just the tech; it's that plus the human support on Vanilla's end (which has been a source of Fun since the forum-admin-Vanilla comms chain got disrupted, but we're working on the stuff-breaking wonkiness), plus the CDN for media going back years, plus all the under-the-hood stuff keeping the forum from bursting into flames with about 1,750 active users, a bunch of less-active users, six quadrillion attempted spammers, and decent amount of traffic from all of them. Some of that might also have been scaled for the forum a few years back when things were busier here - I definitely wasn't in the loop back then - but there's still enough going on to require some resources even if not necessarily requiring five figures' worth of resources.
Should it become necessary, migrating/rehosting/recontracting the setup would obviously change those numbers since PA Forums Now are not the same creature as PA Forums 2020 or the like, but other techier-than-I types would know the specifics and options better there.
I'm pretty sure that's nested subforums, since, as you said, forum software without subforums at all would be deeply ridiculous.
(Honestly at this point not having nested subforums would also feel ridiculous given they're everywhere.)
It's a lot of money for a forum of our size but comparing it to a large Jira engagement is a bit of an exaggeration. That's about 150 Jira users on their lowest tier.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
No haven safer than the one they tore down
No greater love than to lay my life down for a friend
No sweeter pleasure than to see the credits clear through to the end
No one knows where the admins gone
No one sees it camped out right there on the front lawn
We played for you but you would not sing
No one was going to get away with anything
The river goes where the water flows
But no one knows when the Forums closed
The river goes where the water flows
But no one knows when the Forums closed
Getting into the speculation zone, Tycho is one of the primary presences on my social feeds talking about the un-homogenization of the Internet as Twitter continues to circle the drain. I suspect the larger PA Megacorp is not done with Internet forums as it seems to maintain a social presence on the Internet, but the question is if it comes back to traditional forums where you post asynchronously (like this) or if something like Discord becomes the thing. (I am already on like 3 different official PA Discords.)
Of course, even if they do decide to turn their attention back to an asynchronous forum, there's no guarantee it'll be this one. I could see them cutting this loose and going with something that looks/feels a little more modern.
This feels like those people who pay like a grand a month for a storage unit full of random garbage they haven't looked at in decades, only to eventually end up on Storage Wars one day.
I presume the digital advertisements implemented into the forums help with that though, no?
That part we do know at least. PA has a contract, currently active and ongoing, that covers the forum's hosting, support, licenses as required by the specific setup, yadda yadda. It's been periodically renewed or amended for as long as the forum's been a thing. There have been previous scares near the end of previous contract periods as people at PA weighed the cost of the forum, what they're getting out of it, what we're getting out of it, etc. As of Right Now that's chugging along as it always has (recent software issues notwithstanding).
The current question marks, as Sterica said on the previous page, are:
Having said all that, you now know approximately as much as I or the other mods know about that part of this whole situation. If you find that kinda frustrating we're entirely in agreement.
We're working on chasing down some more specific answers. When we know more, you'll know more.
I can toss a few bucks at a ClubPA subscription if it keeps the lights on, but it sounds like losing the forum is a matter of when, not if. Any chance we will be given an opportunity to split off from PA proper without their branding?
You can't give someone a pirate ship in one game, and then take it back in the next game. It's rude.
With the infrequency that I post pictures directly as opposed to imgur links with <img> tags, I'm always surprised that this place even lets me upload files.
PSN: Wstfgl | GamerTag: An Evil Plan | Battle.net: FallenIdle#1970
Hit me up on BoardGameArena! User: Loaded D1
Sorry, I think I was unclear in what I was asking. I wasn't trying to suggest there was some magic pool of money that would pay for the forums, I just wanted to make sure the money going to Club PA is still making it to the forums and wasn't accumulating somewhere that only Geebs knew about.
(My assumption, insert caveats here, is that it finances PA generally rather than the forums specifically given the variety of perks even at that tier, but I could be entirely offbase there.)
There's a patreon tier that's specifically for the forums.
Geebs said the money would specifically go to forum costs, IIRC.
You absolutely can? You can pick a tier but donate more than the minimum amount. I'm doing it right now.
Well that’s good to know!
And yeah, if you thought there was potential entitlement before, the second you start taking donations? Soon as a single cent changes hands, that shit will blow up. "I paid for you, so you will damn well do what I fucking say!". Absolutely something to be considered if that door ever decides to be opened.
Please let us know if there is anything we can do to help. If moving from a higher tier to the forumer is the way to, glad to do it. This place has been a part of most of my adult life and it’s honestly hard to imagine if it went away.
A little disappointed we're not listed under the 'Sex Stuff' category.
I'd honestly have still been a bit surprised if it were 5 years, 20 just seems insane to me. I can't see any level of sentimentality towards old images that justifies the recurring cost of keeping them vs just laying out "if you like them enough then save them because anything older than X gets periodically wiped."
I'm not saying they owes us by any means, because if anything we owe them, but having the admin of a place like this leave without warning or apparently anything resembling a plan for the future is, uh, very disconcerting to say the least.
Absolutely! If it can save even a few bucks, an annual purge of everything more than 5 years old would be excellent.