Shabby stuff goes here!
 

With this post I've reached the magical number of 5000 posts. To mark this milestone I made this blogthread, like some of you already have.

Let me start this thread by saying that while 5000 posts may seem a lot, it took me four and a half years to get there. Anarres almost got there in a year and a half, and I have little doubt Propain could've outspammed me if he hadn't had this invasion of little propains in his house. For me, these two are still the top posters, and it's a real pity they don't post here that often any more (or don't post at all). But I can understand how real life can catch up with you, cutting in your civ and forum time. My work takes most of the available hours as well, unfortunately.

Besides all this, the fact that I have more posts than Killer makes me feel like I've spent too much time here. Luckily I can console myself with the simple fact that he easily outspams me if we combine CDZ's and CFC's postcounts. Heh [:o)]

I'll make some time available in the future to add some rants to this threads. For now I want address something that some of you might bother as well: spambots (the real ones, not bclg), site design/content and the lack of vB. We've talked about this a lot, and for a while it seemed like Meli (with the aid of dr. A.?) would rework the site. Somehow I have the idea this plan was shelved, which bothers me. I'm going to look for some people who could work on this transition (because I can't do it myself, not even if I wanted to). Real life people, that I can punch if it's taking too long. Heh.

[punch]

Think ID is the biggest spammer of us all if you include here and cdz.

I'm having trouble getting even to 3 thousand. So, [goodjob] and [beer1]

Spambots suck





Eat at Joes... http://www.eatatjoes.com

For a couple of weeks now I'm back at my familiar 4th spot here with a lot of quality posts (ahum) but some indeed are catching up fast.

Very valid points you make about the site Shabba. I also recall your posts about half a year ago (iirc) adressing the lack of anything happening here. Right now I see a lot of healthy activity. Ok, we're not the leading Civ site but that was never the intention imo and we get enough recognition anyway.

Also quite a number of people (including myself) have been very active here, disappeared and reappeared. Most important imo those people got a very warm welcome back ERIKK being our most recent lost son (read that chapter in the Bible if I sound confusing). Of course I regret as you do we haven't heard shit about anar for a long time now, we also know about PP and Mel. In short imo this site has more than enough reasons to exist and florish.

Technical issues. Let's put it very plain. Most if not all of the shit works about 24/7 with some occasional outages. That's damned pretty good even more considering technical support is poor saying it nice. And imo that is a risk we are facing and also imo we need a person that can both improve running CDZ on a near daily basis (I mean technical) and make valid suggestions how to upgrade.

Hey, I like the blog thread. I have moved back and forth in the frequency of posts and activity on the site. This is still one of my favorite destinations on the web, and I hope I can continue to contribute somewhat to it.

This is more often than not the first webpage i open up if im just idly browsing. I just wish more people would post damn spoilers! or just comment on mine more :)

romeo did you and sz manage to sort out the patching thing yet?

Aye BC, although I'm a low man on the totem pole post-wise, I can verify that this is my homepage. I try to post at least once seriously and once stupid a day. Unfortunatly I'm averaging about 1.7 stupid and 0 serious per day. If I add "seriously" at the end of each post does that change the ratio?

Seriously Mauer, I doubt it.

I have no complaints about the number of daily posts. I think the overall problem with the site is that we don't have a lot to offer to new members, and that they layout makes it hard to figure out what is worth your while. Face it, the front page is crap.

Tubby, Krys and Killer all have passed me, and yet I am the one they called a spambot back in the days.

I guess I can explain it in parts of:

I now have more rewarding work
We are expecting (the hotel unit has a pretty large belly now)
I am trying to not spend as much time on the computer at home, since I spend so much time on the computer at work (actually doing work btw [:p] )

I could make a very long post here but putting it simple there is a lot of outdated shit on the frontpage indeed and what I'm missing is an item about the values of CDZ in general. I mean to say many ppl have registered here, the ones that feel CDZ as one of the places they will participate actively seem to easily pick up those values. Spamming included. [lol]

Well, I can't update the front page anyway...

Could you check permissions?

I love you guys, man with all 2085 posts. [cry]

Truly, I'd like to expand discussions of all sorts since I think there's a lot to learn from talking to you guys across the Atlantic especially since it would consist of more adult conversation than the other site. I hope you feel some of us that have come on board since Propain, Meli and Anarres days have made a contribution.

Worst. blog. ever.[smirk]

(+1)

I love being talked about in the past tense :)

I still lurk around ya bugger.

And Shabba, I've tried to get onto the server and find out whats up, but it's exceeded it's remote connections so wont let me. :(

I've texted Propain to ask him to try and reboot the thing and I'll PM you my RDP access username and pword.

Sorry for not being around more, but these days I am forced to lurk like Col.

[melihere]

Just think about when the last time was you made a useful contribution to a discussion [lol]

What does that mean? I've run the installation check, and it works now. Fine with me, so far.

Well, I've just finished deleting all the spambots. All that's left are some "n/a"/deleted accounts, that can't be fully deleted because they have posted threads that are in the spambot trashcan. Apparently, you can only truely delete members that haven't posted anything. Makes a little bit of sense.

I hope I didn't delete a real persons account. Feel free to make a new one ;)

Oh my god, I was deleted.

No wait, I am still here.

Mmmhh...

Testing.

It'd be so quiet around here if I just deleted some more members...

yeah, you spammers!

Makes me sick

Meli's avvie makes threads look weird.

Whomps threads make my Avvie look weird...

[melihere]

PS. I'll resize it just after the forum upgrade...

We have a winner!

The last days I've been ill, so I had the time to play Beyond the sword. My second game. A good start, fast expansion: I couldn't do much else because my capital was unproductive, yet surrounded with floodplains, corn and fish. Miracle gro. So I got 5 very good cities, blocking the Celts. Founded confucianism in a city that was 1 tile next to the celtic border (tbh, it's on prince or something, lame). So. Good.

Obviously no copper. 15 hills, no copper. The hills I've scouted? No copper (although the celts have axes, so there must be some in their territory). Beeline for iron working, already got horseback so I was churning out horsemen. Guess what? No iron. Not even close! I found iron 15 tiles away to the NW, grabbed by Carthage, and 15 tiles to the E... 2 tiles south from the southern celtic border. I miss colonies! When I settled there, the celts attacked in 5 turns.

Blegh.

I like a challenge, but when you have to work really hard to get either bronze, iron or horses, why bother? I've ranted about it before, but I'll just do it again. It was the same thing that turned me off in civ3, and I fixed that by playing GOTM maps. Perhaps I'll have to give the scenario's a try. What I don't like about scenario's is that you don't play "civ", but "col" or something. It lacks the epic feel of civilization. I want to beat tanks with spearmen, and then win with a spaceship. Or something like that. I fear I'm done with civ.

The last few days it's been giving me a headache anyway ;)

Now, that I played a little more BtS, I must say, that I really like it. Yes, some things are quite annoying...especially the AI is quite smart (or so it seems). You always have the possibility to use the World Builder to give you some ressources...

I've been ill for a couple of days. Again. I sure hope this isn't going to be a recurring end-of-the-month theme. Usually I'm never ill, which makes it even harder this time. And it's pretty boring, I'll be glad if I get back to work (tomorrow, hopefully).

Anyway, monday I continued the game I mentioned above. I got the iron city back, plus a celtic city, I wiped out all invading celtic armies, and got a truce involving some techs plus a sum of gold. All without access to iron, with only mounted warriors, without any losses. Apparently Mauer isn't the only one who thinks he doesn't need to build spearmen ;)

So, war over, I start cranking out knights. And now Hannibal attacks, on the opposite end of my empire. Sigh.

But on the bright side:

Seems like this is a nice challenge? [estwing]

I think I don't like challenges when I'm sick.

So, since I'm going for the gold in the category "most useless link of the day": here you can see how much noise is made in my office. I'm actually almost sitting on the device, it's only a meter away. Luckily it'll be removed next tuesday, and it won't be bothering me much.

Gee, it's getting quiet after 17:30. Fascinating... [tongue]

what is making 100dBA? You guys rockin' out in that office?

That's the calibrator.

This week we got the key of our new house, hurray. So for the last two full months we were trying to get KPN to provide us with internet and digital television. After they cancelled our last order for no apparent reason, again, I decided to go with cable. The girl on the phone promised me it would work instantly, so I'm very curious. Very weird, while we were happy KPN customers for many years, everyone advised against the company. Not so strange in itself, because I know they suck [:O] That even a girl working in KPN management suggested that I should go with Casema does seem weird though.

Ah, KPN digital TV and internet... I know all about that.

My cousin and her fiance live maybe 500 meters west of where I live. I have UPC digital TV, telephone and internet. My cousin has KPN digital TV, telephone and internet. We pay almost the same amount of money each month. I think mine is about 4 or 5 euro's more expensive. My connection works all the time. Literally. I've had one evening in the three years that I have lived at my current address when the digital TV didn't work (but that was scheduled, and we were told a week in advance (something about maintenance, IIRC)). At my cousin's place the digital TV malfunctions about once a month. They've lived there for nearly two years now, so that makes about 20-24 malfunctions.

So, IME KPN sucks. I have no experience with Casema, but I know UPC is good.

Well, a friend of mine used to work for UPC, so from his experience I can tell you that you are lucky ;) Technically OK, yet an administrative nightmare. I've only had 1 problem with the ADSL ever, and that was when I moved to The Hague. Orange (that leases the ADSL from KPN) forgot/didn't know to assign me a new IP-address. You need that when you move outside your area code area (from 050 to 070).

Rereading this thread:

I guess most of you haven't noticed it, but Beam actually made the first step towards our shiny future ;) Thumbs up for Beam. If anyone has a clue how to FTP crap to and from the server let me know, then I'll add you to the tech übernerd subforum (the one without free beer).

can we not all be added anyway or is this to keep it (relatively) clear of spam?