A Modest Proposal

Hello, fine peoples of FFXIAH.

As some of you may know by now--and if you have no clue what I'm talking about, check this post out before reading any further--Google pulled their advertising from this website because of "the amount of sheer profanity, nastiness, and other behavior exhibited on the forums was so bad, they no longer want to be associated with our brand. In other words, the behavior of our forum users has now put the future of the site itself at actual, tangible risk."

Yeah. That doesn't sound too good to me, either. What it boils down to is that the forum users have caused this site to lose one of their major sources of advertisements. Okay, no big deal, you may say. I am now going to point out something on a page that no one seems to visit anymore: "Our current hosting expense is $820/month." That's a bit of a bill, if you ask me. Who knows if that number has gotten larger since Scragg wrote that? The website's user base isn't exactly dwindling by any means.

We, the users, all share some portion of the blame. Oh yes, some more than others, but inactivity and apathy towards the state of the forums has truly hit the website where it hurts now. We, the users, all use this website, and now what I imagine the primary source of revenue that keeps this website afloat has been knocked away. It's been bad enough that I bet half of us used ad-blocking when the ads were there. Now it's even worse than that.

I also cannot find the exact post, but I want to point out that the website doesn't turn a profit. Jaerik has stated several times, as I recall, that this website is a loss straight through and through.

So what am I getting at?

Well, things are looking kind of grim. If you want to thank this website for being a gosh darn excellent tool and the admins for always being attentive to us, if you want to thank them for doing us the favor of running this website even when we haven't been the most agreeable, most thankful users, or if you just want to help keep the site afloat in some troubled times, I implore you to please go to http://www.ffxiah.com/donations and make a donation.

Honestly, after what the developers created for us and what we put the administration through it's the least we can do.

Thank you for taking the time to read this. I truly hope with all my heart that even in these harsh economic times that we can muster up a few dollars to give back to the website.

Would if i had enough money :/ Barely makin it with hubbys paycheck

Wasn't "A Modest Proposal" the name of some literature that was (Satirically) pro-cannibalism?

Yes, I figured people would think of that and see what I was getting on about. It got you to click on the topic, didn't it? ;P

Yeah, but I usually just check all topics to see if there's anything interesting going on, since my LS is kind of a dead otter, in terms of conversation.

I've been kinda gone a while, I didn't realize the forums were in trouble. Am I just throwing blame around when I say it feels like the problem escalated during that period of downtime 'cause of the quake?

If anything, only the admins can answer that question. Even they may not, and I doubt Google is willing to give us knowledge of when it got "too bad" to support.

Ok heres a stupid question... Just put in a donation and at the end it said my order is compleat... does that meen i did it right or is scragg gunna be like the F*** is this guy trying to buy from us? XD

I believe you did it correctly.

Thank you so very much for helping the website continue to run.

Scragg is a bagillionaire! With this cash cow of a business model! He must be raking in money hand over fist. We're talking about wealth beyond measure people. Oh hell yeah. The ad revenue alone is prolly like 14 trillion dollars a day. But here's what you do. Fill up a sock full of loose change and go bop your mom over the head with it, then "borrow" her credit card and just keep hitting the donate button until the card self destructs.


Hit hubby in the head with a tennis shoe while screaming "B**** where's my M***** F******* money!!!" over and over again for fourty five minutes to an hour. That should fix that. Or ask scragg what he did to Xueye

What the devil are you getting on about? If you have nothing productive to say, kindly leave my topic.

Even dumb people can be amusing, but you just flatout fail. Saving up for a big move myself maybe once I am settled into my new home I can send a few bucks, a little is better than nothing eh?

Bump

Have they said yet when we'll get our revised list of rules?

Just curious exactly how much things are going to change. Without knowing what the new rules will be I can't really take a guess at how many are going to be banned because they can't conform.

I think your heart is in the right place, OP, which is more than what I can say for the majority of what I read written by you.

You did a very kind thing here by promoting donations to the website hosts.

However, at the risk of beating a dead horse, there is one other thing the users of FFXIAH forums can do, and I've been saying it for a long time (duh) ....

Freakin' act like adults.
If you want to act like a jackass just for the sake of acting like a jackass, or "just because I can", then go to 4chan or some other basement-dweller jerk-off website. The internet is FULL of such places, I'm sure you'll find one you like.
If you want to do "memes" to pass the time, or fill a board with "OP is a ***" posts because someone told you that's cool to do ... again, go do that in some useless internet dump website elsewhere. There's plenty of choices out there.

"InB4" Flionheart calling me a hypocrite.
"InB4" anyone saying stuff like "but we like our freedom and lulz here @ FFXIAH".

Too bad, really. If you need a laugh, read the Sunday comics or watch Comedy Central.

OP, again, if any apologies are needed due to semi-derailing this topic, please forgive me. I think you're making a kind gesture and trying to do the right thing. It would be great if users donated more $$$ to this website's upkeep. However, if people hadn't taken advantage of and abused the liberties provided by the admins here, then FFXIAH probably never would have lost its sponsorship from Google in the first place.

Pretty sure the use of profanity is one of the reasons google is pulling out.

You are a hypocrite lol. Simply trying to derail this thread into drama like you're doing now proves that.

And that's all I have to say. I've donated to AH before and it was for a good cause.

The old rules were "common courtesy," but the new rules will be more specific, I think.

Personally, I'd like to know what is and isn't OK, so I don't unintentionally step on any toes.

For example: Earlier, I posted in a thread that had an illegal activity as its theme. Afterwards, I became concerned that it might not be OK to talk about that kind of stuff anymore.

In my view, something being illegal does not necessarily make it morally objectionable. However, in the eyes of censorship (in this case, Google), that is not usually the case. And with the introduction of censorship (no matter how mild) I can't trust my own views on what is "common courtesy" anymore, so knowing the rules will be helpful.

We're all hypocrites, myself included by making this topic. I was never a role model poster by any means and that means I contributed to this whole mess.

But that's all part of being human. Now we just have to buck up and own up to what we've done and try and clean up our act. This website is entirely too good to lose.

However, Elana, I'd appreciate it if you stop trying to appear noble while giving backhanded insults to people in this thread. Take that elsewhere, if you please, or take it to PMs. While I agree with what you said that if the website was a cleaner place it would have been better you're only inciting a riot and drama by tossing in those quips you so love to toss in.

And on the whole freedom thing: freedom is what Scragg, Jaerik, and co. decide is freedom for us. It's their swimming pool and if they say "stay in the kiddie section" then you stay in the darn kiddie section.

Elanabelle.

You could have just posted,
and yet, you proceeded to shoehorn your ideals into a topic which is probably best left without them.

Why do you feel the need to do this?

Because he thinks his opinions and ideas are highly valued here.

I'm going to donate, mainly based on the fact that this website is a tool that has been incredibly useful to me during the time that i have played FFXI.

I can't wait to see what the admin come up with in relation to addressing the unchecked bad attitudes many ppl on this site have.

Honestly what did you ppl expect? I'm not a spiritual person but the law of karma tends to apply universally. If you go around shitting on ppl eventually you're going to get ***on. If it's left to those in question (you know who you are) you retards will literally ***yourselves out of the best website/social networking site available for FFXI.

I think everyone is going to get those clear-cut "You will be banned if you..." statements everyone has been asking for (see last derf thread). That is the only reason I can see anyone asking for the rules.