Even though I've been a moderator for a fair amount of forums, I never really banned anyone.  I mean, I've canned the usual spam and pornbots, but banning a long-time member is something altogether different.  For starters, you're reducing the activity of the forum, especially if that long-time member is a top contributor.  Secondly, you risk a backlash from "friends" of this poster(I say "friends" because the chances of knowing the poster personally are slim).  Two days ago I did just that.  I took away the posting privileges of a long-time member, but not before I got the O.K. from 2 higher-ups.

I never liked this particular member, and he the same.  "Bob", as we shall call him, was very opinionated.  Being opinionated isn't what got him canned, however.  In fact, expressing your opinions is the entire point of a forum.  What isn't the point is to throw insults along with your opinion.  Saying "fuck you", along with bashing a certain members choice of music is certainly frowned upon.  It doesn't take a genius, let alone a mod to know that "Bob" was skating on thin ice.  At this point, a few other long-time members and higher-ups started coming back to the forum and were noticing "Bob's" constant trolling of one particular member. 

I was especially surprised, and delighted, when another member of the forums commented on Bob's posts, stating "Half the [stuff] you post is retarded, IMO, but I don't troll you.-Sep 22 2008, 11:13 PM.  This was when I seriously considered getting rid of Bob.  I'd always joke with other members about doing so, but never thought I'd actually do it.  Like I stated earlier, I'd risk a backlash, especially from 2 particular members.  You may think that 2 measly members aren't important, but they are.  With a user base of barely 8, that's 1/4 of the community I'd be getting rid of.

So as of now I don't know what's going down.  One member has claimed he's leaving, as predicted, but I don't know for sure.  There's obvious upset over this, and I really wish I didn't have to take Bob's posting privileges away.  But when almost half the community thinks he should be gone, I took action.  And honestly, this couldn't have come at a worse time.  Right now we're trying to pick ourselves up and revive our small community.  Getting rid of a long-time contributor certainly isn't a move in the right direction.

It's pretty ridiculous that my video is now on the "All-Top Rated (Today)" page on YouTube.  So far it's received roughly 70,000 views and 50 honors, not to mention gaining me 9 subscribers in one day.  Is this all it takes to get on the front page?  A measly 1:14 minute long video referencing an old internet meme I myself never even found funny?

I'm not saying this isn't enjoyable, however.  As a whole it's quite funny seeing my video slowly crawly up the page, getting more and more views as each hour passes.  It's such a stupid, moronic and childish video that it practically personifies the internet.  And having it on the front page only solidifies this.  Seeing "ROFL" and "LOL" in the comments section is somewhat enjoyable, because it's apparently bringing joy to most of those 70,000 viewers.  But there are thousands of more qualified videos out there, either pertaining to our government or the world in general, which deserve my spot.

I can either remove the video, which I'm surprise hasn't happened yet due to copyright claim, or let it continue it's climb.  I'll more than likely let the little bugger survive, because I'm curious to see just how big it gets. 

 

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YouTube - Re: Oprah vs. over 9000 PENISES
  

About a week ago I noticed I couldn't connect to digitalph33r.net.  Now, since DP.net is essentially a forum I wasn't all that upset about it.  However, I knew I wasn't alone and that other people couldn't connect either.  It was a small percentage of the user base, but enough to make me curious.  I was told to contact my ISP about it, and I did just that.  A few days went by before I got an answer, and I was told they were trying to fix it(and blaming AT&T at the same time).

Skip to today when I get another email from them.  This time they said they had fixed the issue and I should now be able to connect to the site.  Lo and behold, they were right.  But it didn't stop there.  A few hours after I got the email I received a phone call from them, confirming I got the email and making sure everything is working ok.  I actually sent them a reply, saying I could now connect, but it didn't matter.  I was surprised they actually called, instead of sending out a simple email(which is what I would've done to be honest).

Oddly enough, I really haven't been active since I got access.  I've noticed I'm cutting down on my internet activities, forum wise at least.  Especially IMDb.  I used to check The Shining boards hourly to see if any interesting discussions had been started.  But now it's ironically just like the movie itself, repeating the same things over and over again.  I only go there a few times each day.  Fortunately, if things go as planned with XA I should get back in the swing of things.  The revival of XA is quite important to me, but even more so for the creators(I'm assuming).  

So, how 'bout those lack of comments?

 

This isn't a review per-se, but merely my thoughts.  This episode was actually better than expected, though my expectations were a bit low to begin with after the pilot.  Anna Torv certainly didn't wow me, but she didn't bother me as much this time.  Joshua Jackson got on my nerves at times, but he was bearable.  Same goes for the actor who plays his father(who seems to be a fan favorite for some reason).  It sorta played out like a Lost episode, with more questions getting raised instead of answering the existing ones.

This worked for Lost, especially in it's 4th season.  But this is just the second episode.  I can only hope at least one mystery gets solved next Tuesday.  The writing this time seemed quite a bit better.  I actually laughed a few times, which is rare these days.  The special effects were mediocre, but better than most of today's horror movies.  One thing I'm not too fond of is getting everything explained to me.  When someone mentions a specific term or brings up something mildly confusing, a character will then explain it all in detail.  It's as if the writers don't trust the audience to know what a catheter is, for example.  While thisn't isn't terribly noticable, it does get annoying at times.

All in all, I'd give this episode a 6.5/10.  Just .5 above my pilot rating, so it isn't saying much.  What is IS saying though is that I'll keep watching.  I'd like to know how it all plays out, and what Joshua Jackson's mysterious "medical history" is.  

Well, episode 2 of Fringe will be airing tonight, after a rather dull and disappointing premier last week.  I've decided to stick with it for the time being, hoping that the writing and acting improve(vastly).  I was surprised by how decent Joshua Jackson was in the premier, but then again, he didn't have a whole lot of screen time.  Anna Torv is a whole other issue.  I pretty much can't stand her, and I'm not exactly sure why.  She has an overall "bitch" attitude about her, but she is an FBI agent, so maybe that's it.

I'm sure in time I'll learn to accept everything, granted I keep watching.  Even if I do intend to stick with the show, it doesn't necessarily mean I'll watch it.  I have the unfortunate ability of completely forgetting about a TV show until an hour or so after it's been on.  Thankfully Fringe will be on in about 40 minutes, so I think I'll remember to watch it.

As you might've noticed by now I've changed the layout of this Space.  Since I'll primarily use this for blogging, I think it looks better this way.

Year: 2005.  Place: Xbox.com forums.  Attitude: Disgruntled.

The original Xbox was on it's way out, and the 360 on it's way in.  Things were changing, not necessarily for the better.  In celebration of the Xbox 360's launch, Xbox.com got a makeover, this including the forums.  What was once a simple, elegant forum, was now turned into a crapfest of crap.  The amount of good mods was diminishing, and late night forum activities consisted mostly of flame wars.  A collection of members had had enough, and decided to create their own forum called Xbox 360 V2.  As more and more members transferred over from Xbox.com to V2, it was decided they'd get a domain: Xbox-Alternative.

XA was now it's own website, but the forum was it's key feature.  The frontpage was updated every now and then with important Xbox news(zomg new Halo maps), and we continued to gain members.  Times were good.  Technically speaking, I'd been with these people since 2003, so it was pretty crazy to still be able to talk with them all.  For an in-depth read on how it really got started, I'll lead you to here.

Skip to January of this year, where a certain someone didn't something stupid.  He let everyone have admin control.  Needless to say, the forum went down.  Even worse, they couldn't get the database back.  So we had to start all over again, but this time on an Invision(Free) Board.  No domain.  No frontpage.  Just a stripped down forum.  It's been like this since January 8th.  This has taken quite a toll on the community.  A toll which is far greater than you might think.

Members started leaving.  Fast.  As of now only 5 or so members actually post.  Things aren't looking good at all, but I'm grateful for those that do still post.  So imagine the surprise I got when I saw a post from Exo, one of XA's "founding fathers" of sorts.  He rarely posts nowadays, so I was curious to see what he posted, especially since it was in the "News" section.  Amazingly he wants to bring XA back from the dead.  Apparently he has plans to get a domain, new forum and skin, getting more members, among other things.  This is the best news I've heard since we switched to Invision(Free).

So this is it.  I need you, yes you, to take notice.  XA could potentially be coming back.  If things go as planned, this'll be epic.  I have no idea what the domain will be or when it'll all go down, so keep checking back here for new information, or just keep an eye on this thread. 

Way back when we first got a computer(98'sh), it wasn't long until I started using a few instant messengers, Yahoo! and MSN being the two I used most often.  One feature I liked about Yahoo! Messenger were the chat rooms.  At the time, it was pretty much open ground.  I frequented the music and gaming chat rooms daily, and had quite a bit of fun.  For some reason I was into Blues/Jazz at the time, and I had this one disc which I used to play for a music room on a semi-regular basis. 

Now, this was when we had Windows 95.  I didn't have a program like Windows Media Player or VLC.  All I had was a very basic CD player, and a little program called Media Rack.  Media Rack was awesome, because I could actually control the volume, wav, synth and mic from one console.  I could also press the record button and essentially rip a CD to the hard drive.  It was a great little program that actually came with Windows 95, so finding it nowadays is almost impossible.  Almost...

You see, I liked this program so much that I copied it to a floppy, for safe-keeping(along with a Tribes mod and WinMx).  Unfortunately, the floppy is unreadable.  I can't access it at all, which really sucks.  I found this out years ago when I tried it on Windows 98.  At the time I could at least open the floppy, but I still couldn't get Media Rack to work.  I searched the internet for the program, thinking it was quite popular and easy to get, but to my dismay it was no where to be found.  Were my Media Rack days over?  I mean, at this point I had WMP and WinAmp(in it's very basic form mind you), so I had access to some good programs.  But they just weren't the same as Media Rack.

Skip to today, where for some damn reason I went searching again for Media Rack.  Roughly 5 or so years have passed since I last searched for it, so I assumed finding it would be, well, 5x harder.  And I was right.  It took me a while just to find out who made the damn thing, but that wasn't much help since they're no longer around(it was Willow Pond, by the way).  I went to a forum and posted my question, and continued my search after that.

I tired more than one search term, broadening my results, but it really didn't help.  One page talked about it and supplied a link, but to no surprise it was dead.  On my 8th page of results, I was about ready to call it quits.  I made my last click and saw a download link.  This is it.  If this is dead, I'm calling it quits for another 5 years.  To my surprise it worked.  The small 400kb .zip file downloaded, and I opened it up.  Guess what?  As of now I'm listening to that exact same Jazz CD with Media Rack.  I'm a happy man.

And guess what?  I'm not letting this happen to anyone else.  If you want it, you can have it.  Get it while you can, though.  I have no idea how long that link will still work. 

To the few who read my blog, you may be wondering where it is.  Well, I deleted it.  After my accidental deletion a few days ago, I really didn't feel like customizing it all over again.  Plus, it just didn't feel the same.  Not having those 130+ blogs already on the blog just didn't seem right.  I'm also...*gulp*...tired of writing.  The main reason for writing was knowing I had an audience.  An audience that cared, and expressed their thoughts.  While I might've "technically" had an audience, no one commented.  So, in a way, this is your fault.

I've never been a big fan of these Spaces, so it's unknown whether or not I'll transfer over my writing habits from Blogger to here.  So for now I bid you a farewell.  I might be back in a few days, weeks or months.  Who knows.