Letter of Thanks To Fan

[Doka]

Dear Fan, It has been a long long time since any of us have acknowledged You and the work, time and money that you have put into keeping the "Fantastic Forum" going. It just can't be easy in this day and age. I for one am for ever gratefull to you. Please let me know, what I can do to help you , I would love to send you a million bucks, If I could, I can send you something , but, it will be in the form of a check, no paypal, let me know where to send it? Who and where? And any thing else we should be mindful of to help with on this board?

Again THANK YOU.

Doka

[Riddick]

Count me in on the Fan gratitude too, Doka! A couple things tho: If not personal recompense, perhaps he could suggest a charity we could contribute to - Also, as from his profile, his last logged-in activity was almost a year & a half ago, a link in a PM and/or email might hasten attention to your letter here

[Fan]

Thanks guys, no money needed. What we do need is people like you who care about the ship and keeping it afloat.

As we know, I am essentially a shadow Captain, it just is hard to be any other way, but I'm always around.

I appreciate the love and dedication you all have for this amazing place, and if I can, I'll keep it going until the day I'm unable to type, and even then I'll try to find someone who will take care of her.

I want to urge anyone who has feedback for me to post about it, and if I am not around to alert me about it at [email protected] (which was just fixed after google shut it down).

Much love to all, and peace.

[Malaria_Kidd II]

The same goes for your care too Fan. We all are in good hands thanks again to our ship's Captain!




MK II

[Raggedyann]

Why would you want to keep this place going Fan? The FF is nothing like it used to be in any way shape or form and never will be again. If you think you are doing any kind of honor to the previous administrator and past posters by keeping it going, you are sadly mistaken. That would be pathetic!

This place was center left and the quality of the many posters that were here then made it a special place to hang out.

Sorry but the FF died years ago.

No response is required as I will make this my last read and for sure my last post.

[Fan]

We all have our motivations. You have yours. I'd be sad not to see any of you around, seems that after all this time we can live and let live I think the FF is an important archive, and politics was what mortally wounded it, like many things in our age.

[Riddick]

We all have our motivations. You have yours. I'd be sad not to see any of you around, seems that after all this time we can live and let live

That's crazy talk! And nuts to you. But seriously, 22 years IS a long time. And even half of that's no short stretch -

Fact is, 2022 isn't 2000 OR 2011. If the FF's not what it was when it started, or you took over, you can't please everyone - YET for we pirates who ARE pleased? It still qualifies as a special place to hang out. And we thank you for that

I think the FF is an important archive, and politics was what mortally wounded it, like many things in our age.

Politics, personalities & pettiness created more than a few schisms over the years. All the resultant FF spin-off forums are long gone but we're still here. Why is that? Some left 'cuz they needed to have it "their way", in time being no way at all.

Unlike the deserters I see the difference here is caring enough to keep it going, as along with you I think as the original Art Bell fan forum, being an archive and a history of the genre, the "big picture" take on the FF is well worth preserving -

So for sure I'm sticking around - taking myself out of the picture is the furthest thought from my mind. After all this time, I'm movitated to remain motivated!!

[Malaria_Kidd II]

Hello Fan and friends,

Weird, just trickery, but why?

Check out the echoes and there was a page 2!

MK II checking who's lurking.....?
Forum locationViewing who is online
Last updated11-05-2022 08:24 PM
UsernameGuest
Forum locationIndex page
Last updated11-05-2022 08:23 PM
UsernameGuest
Forum locationIndex page
Last updated11-05-2022 08:23 PM
UsernameGuest
Forum locationIndex page
Last updated11-05-2022 08:23 PM
UsernameGuest
Forum locationIndex page
Last updated11-05-2022 08:23 PM
UsernameGuest
Forum locationIndex page
Last updated11-05-2022 08:23 PM
UsernameGuest
Forum locationIndex page
Last updated11-05-2022 08:23 PM
UsernameGuest
Forum locationIndex page
Last updated11-05-2022 08:23 PM
UsernameGuest
Forum locationIndex page
Last updated11-05-2022 08:23 PM
UsernameGuest
Forum locationIndex page
Last updated11-05-2022 08:23 PM
UsernameGuest
Forum locationIndex page
Last updated11-05-2022 08:23 PM
UsernameGuest
Forum locationIndex page
Last updated11-05-2022 08:22 PM
UsernameGuest
Forum locationIndex page
Last updated11-05-2022 08:22 PM
UsernameGuest
Forum locationIndex page
Last updated11-05-2022 08:22 PM
UsernameGuest
Forum locationIndex page
Last updated11-05-2022 08:22 PM
UsernameGuest
Forum locationIndex page
Last updated11-05-2022 08:22 PM
UsernameGuest
Forum locationIndex page
Last updated11-05-2022 08:21 PM
UsernameGuest
Forum locationIndex page
Last updated11-05-2022 08:21 PM
UsernameBing [Bot]
Forum locationIndex page
Last updated11-05-2022 08:21 PM
UsernameGuest
Forum locationIndex page
Last updated11-05-2022 08:21 PM
UsernameGuest
Forum locationIndex page
Last updated11-05-2022 08:21 PM
UsernameGuest
Forum locationIndex page
Last updated11-05-2022 08:21 PM
UsernameGuest
Forum locationIndex page
Last updated11-05-2022 08:21 PM
UsernameGuest
Forum locationIndex page
Last updated11-05-2022 08:20 PM
UsernameGuest
Forum locationIndex page
Last updated11-05-2022 08:20 PM

[Riddick]

Weird, just trickery, but why?

Check out the echoes and there was a page 2!

It's been awhile since I looked at the who's online list. But I don't recall a time EVERY page view by dozens of non-members was singularly the index -

Hit counts for topics increase but that couldn't be if such was continually the case, as we few registered users can't come close to accounting for the all the views & living breathing flesh & blood humans can't possibly account for anything more than a sliver of Guests

With intricate knowledge of bot interaction with the board, & access to additional site stats Fan may have more insight into it signifying nefarious activity beyond typical web crawling trickery.

I'm no expert but my wild guess on the answer to "Why" is the echoes may have something to do with search engines re-indexing due to the recent site update.

[Malaria_Kidd II]

Right O Riddick! Here's yeses to all X 4 paragraphs.

I have yet to check today and your quick reply could have possibilities.

The ship's deck needs swabbed.



Edited minutes later: There's 34 index watchers with about 4 real humans counting two of six on page two.

Their time stamps spread are in one minute increments.




MK II ∆=®™ FDNY 343

[Riddick]

A couple hours ago I saw a few "Guests" were viewing topics. Now they're all back to index gawking. In addition to who's online, I took note of the Ship Statistics:

Total posts 451480 • Total topics 43382 • Total members 4446

So on average roughly 10 posts per topic, 100 posts per member - Yet, from an examination of the members list I find never-posters total 1671, making 163 the average number of posts for the one time or another 'participants' - but excluding the top 10 posters that make up 45% of the total brings the average down to 90.

Still, whether 90 or 100, fact is only 350 or so pirates' posting totals are above that range: As it is over 22 years in existence, an average isn't as representative of a typical FF poster as the median of the 2775 participants, which turns out to be 4.

In the end analysis, so far as information goes it's interesting yet not so useful.

[Malaria_Kidd II]

Studying analytics is always worth sharing the results. You got it narrowed down to 4 quite perfectly done!

What if once again it's the FF ghost that was capable of spinning the view count you noticed and reported at 2-5 clicks per second? Whoa!

What was it, three years ago or longer?

That was interesting to catch live for both of us, eh? Then the ghost came back and did it again 30? hours later ending after fewer bumps compared to the first ship load.

Mum will be the word from both cases then and now of hacking FF.

Let hope their rush of tapping energy wanes before long.

Let's give up and blame the Russians. But hey, they never, ever warmed up to that conspiratorial US Deep Extreme Dem tihS! Their being blamed showing early smiles at our idiots in power have now turned to constant frowns.


MK II ∆=®™ FDNY 343

[Riddick]

Studying analytics is always worth sharing the results. You got it narrowed down to 4 quite perfectly done!

What if once again it's the FF ghost that was capable of spinning the view count you noticed and reported at 2-5 clicks per second? Whoa!

What was it, three years ago or longer?

A bit longer: Your 1st post on the topic came 3 years & 2 days ago to be exact. It was quite the rapid fire phenomenom. IIRC the 'visitors' then weren't fixated on the index page, but that doesn't mean the two events are entirely unrelated.

In the discussion Doka cited a study that said 40+% of Internet activity is fake. Not unlike after his offer to buy Twitter Elon finding out up to 30% of accounts were bogus. After the office pruning he can turn to electronic housecleaning.

[Riddick]

Let hope their rush of tapping energy wanes before long.

Signs of subsiding are showing already. In the past few minutes the number of guests fluctuated between a mere 4 to 8 peering at the index page. Of course observations over a brief interval are not a reliable indicator on which to base any future long term trend. It may just be a short period of calm before another storm -

And just like that the board became temporarily unavailable! Good thing I was writing this post in Wordpad. It's one of those impossible to predict things - The 'science' of forum forecasting, being what it is? Always expect the unexpected.

[Malaria_Kidd II]

Yep, Your check in WOL confirms what I found about an hour before sunset.

Hold the beer and cover the cake!Let's wait and see if some individual is taking the time off due to a complete lack of interest!


MK II ∆=®™ FDNY 343