Hacked!

have you backed up the BMG data? (6.00 / 1)

if not, i hope you do it kinda soon.  there's a lot of gold in these here pages.  would hate to see it get flushed.

Click HERE and sign up: Campaign For Military Partners.

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by: Laurel @ Wed Jan 07, 2009 at 12:40:38 PM CST

I was wondering when we'd get a front page on this (0.00 / 0)

I was getting ready to call one of you guys and ask if anyone was minding the store...

In any case, best of luck.

P.S. It's most often written WPMU in my experience.  No space.  And no, I don't know anyone a l337 WPMU ha><0r who's taking any new bidness right now.

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by: stomv @ Wed Jan 07, 2009 at 12:41:52 PM CST

Seriously give Lynne a call. (6.00 / 1)

The back end she's going to port into for her blog looks pretty cool and she's already dealing with the issues of migration from WP.

"It is not because things are difficult that we do not dare, it is because we do not dare that things are difficult." - Seneca (5 BC - 65 AD)

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by: Mr Lynne @ Wed Jan 07, 2009 at 12:57:34 PM CST

Blue Hampshire Lives! (6.00 / 2)

We're Back. But Please Read.

We fell back to Facebook to regroup. That is a good plan, btw.

A consensus formed from the echo of parrots, is no consensus.
I'm Jack Mitchell and I'm confused by this message.

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by: John from Lowell @ Wed Jan 07, 2009 at 13:12:01 PM CST

Note that Wordpress is Open Source (6.00 / 1)

This is important for a number of reasons, but a main practical one is flexibility.  If WordPress were to just disappear one day, and you performed regular backups of your data, you could get up and running somewhere else instantly.

If I were the Soapblox guy I'd open-source my software immediately to restore confidence.  If I hosted my site on Soapblox I'd run like hell unless the software was open-sourced.  The maintainer has demonstrated himself to be highly unreliable (That's it! I'm done! No wait! I'm back!).  No thanks.

Seems like a pretty good system; I'd hate to see it die due to flakiness.  Open source decentralizes around flakiness.

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by: syphax @ Wed Jan 07, 2009 at 13:16:29 PM CST

WP has other problems. A multitude. (0.00 / 0)

Not that I hate WP, it's just it is what it is. It IS one of the best of the open source install-it-yourself blog softwares out there. However, doing what this site is doing, it's not impossible, but nearly so, in WP. There are better solutions.

I have emailed the guys with my offer...if I can help in any way I really want to. I have the exact expertise they need - a web developer working on EXACTLY the same functionality and CMS structure they need. :) If I can ever get a moment's peace to work on my damn blog upgrade! shakes fist at sky for postponing fridge delivery!

Left in Lowell: cuz why read the Lowell Sun if you don't have to? ;)

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by: Lynne @ Wed Jan 07, 2009 at 13:42:19 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Fair enough (6.00 / 1)

All software has warts.  You can tell how much someone really knows about any software by asking them what its worst features/bugs are.

BMG's format might be better served by something like slashcode, which has articles, comments, moderation, etc.  But I'm sure it has awful warts as well.

There are an insane number of CMSs available; I'm sure there's something out there that would mostly meet BMG's needs.

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by: syphax @ Wed Jan 07, 2009 at 15:01:39 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Well (6.00 / 1)

I advocate for a nice EE (ExpressionEngine) install but that's me, after two years of kicking the tires of several open source solutions and none of them being quite useful enough. EE, I find, approaches CMS completely differently from WP or Drupal or what have you.

But though there's out-of-the-box applications for EE, it's mostly not for OotB. That's sort of the whole point - its ultimate flexibility.

Here's a tidbit: after learning EE, I now actually have more work than I know what to do with. I've stopped getting projects that DON'T include EE! I dunno if that's because I can offer a CMS solution that's fairly affordable because the framework of EE allows for total flexibility yet it doesn't take a master PHP coder to work it, or just timing, or what.

Speaking of which, I need to go finish another quote for a project. :)

Left in Lowell: cuz why read the Lowell Sun if you don't have to? ;)

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by: Lynne @ Wed Jan 07, 2009 at 15:19:24 PM CST

[ Parent ]

gotta agree with Lynne (0.00 / 0)

WP is no better. Instead of dealing with being hacked, for example, our LeftAhead site has been attacked by viruses on there. That was a pain. Didn't kill the site, but probably could have.  

---
My thoughts are mine and mine alone. They should not be considered representative of any other organization, group or person - save me.

~Ryan.

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by: Ryepower12 @ Wed Jan 07, 2009 at 15:49:11 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Hosted Drupal (6.00 / 1)

Another possibility: Bryght, which has been offering a hosted version of Drupal for several years now on a platform that is very secure and, ugh, techword here, robust (so think Soapblox but without the drama). Because it's hosted, you get all the advantages of Drupal (powerful community platform) and none of the disadvantages (all that icky/painful setup and maintenance).  And it's $20 a month (I don't know what their bandwidth/disk-space limits are, though).

No, I don't have anything to do with them, I'm one of those weirdos who likes messing around with raw Drupal code, but I know they've been around for awhile.

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by: adamg @ Wed Jan 07, 2009 at 16:25:21 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Emergency Communication? (0.00 / 0)

Hi everyone!

I'd like to invite everyone to take a look at www.fourfreedomsblog.com

I'm offering up my humble corner of the internets for BMG members to use as an "emergency website" to post updates and communications.  A friend did this for our website when we were having server problems, so I think I should pay that forward.

I've read a lot of stuff over here, and if you go through the forum, there's some links back to BMG material from time to time.  Although I'm hardly a contributor, I feel at least a part of the community peripherally, and I want to help out during a time of need.

TriSec / David M. (Waltham, MA)

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by: TriSec @ Wed Jan 07, 2009 at 13:37:49 PM CST

Thanks, David, but the site is working fine now (0.00 / 0)

You can feel free to use BMG normally. We'll chat with the soapblox folks about steps going forward.

BMG: Reality-based commentary.

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by: Bob Neer @ Wed Jan 07, 2009 at 13:42:34 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Sites coming and going. (0.00 / 0)

Don't take the current apparent stability for granted.  Another soapblox blog was up and running well again, and is now having trouble loading again.  

Click HERE and sign up: Campaign For Military Partners.

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by: Laurel @ Wed Jan 07, 2009 at 14:41:29 PM CST

[ Parent ]

I'd run like hell (5.00 / 1)

You mean the Soapblox folk (singular)?

You just got a feeling of what it would be like for your website to go up in smoke.  It could happen again.

I'd consider rapidly moving to something that is not proprietary, so that you could move hosts quickly and easily.  If WordPress doesn't fit the bill, there are literally dozens of other open source projects that offer various kinds of content management, forums, moderation, etc.  

I'd also ask soapblox to consider opening their code.  They/he/she offer 3 things, bundled as one: CMS software, hosting, and administration (they worry about updating the production code, etc.).  The CMS part, I would argue, has less value than they probably think- though Soapblox has some nice features, CMS packages are a dime a dozen.  If they opened their code, a few things could happen:

Good:

• They'd potentially get free help plugging security holes (good)
  
• They'd potentially get free help developing the code (good)
  
• They could attract/retain more paying customers, because said customers would have an insurance policy in case soapblox hosting goes south (b/c they could easily run the software on another host) (good)
  

Bad/ambiguous:

• They'd lose some revenue as people download the code and host it elsewhere (bad)
  
• They'd be vulnerable to security holes that bad people could find and exploit before they get fixed (bad, but clearly already a problem)
  
• Competitors could lift the code into their products (good, bad, or ugly depending on the circumstances- but probably a very minor consideration, given that soapblox doesn't do anything that would be easier to replicate from scratch, anyway)
  

I, personally, think that opening the code has a lot more upside than downside- they need to seriously regain confidence, and offering the code up is one good way to start.

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by: syphax @ Wed Jan 07, 2009 at 15:20:59 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Opening the code (0.00 / 0)

Would only do so much in the short run. The vulnerability is still there and exploitable, and until that (and any other ones) is found I would stay far from it honestly. Just taking the code as is and hosting it would obviously not fix this, and waiting for an open source development community to, well, develop and grow and contribute takes time.

Left in Lowell: cuz why read the Lowell Sun if you don't have to? ;)

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by: Lynne @ Wed Jan 07, 2009 at 15:23:22 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Right... (0.00 / 0)

They need to find and patch the exploited vulnerability ASAP, but then I'd open it up and ask for help.  Given that I'd have no trust in soapblox right now, there's no place to go but up.

I'm glad I use a password for BMG that I don't use on other sites...

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by: syphax @ Thu Jan 08, 2009 at 11:22:19 AM CST

[ Parent ]

WPMU? (0.00 / 0)

Are you fixed on WPMU? I have some experience (but not a lot) with Drupal, and can speak to it being an excellent platform. Not that I have anything against WPMU; I just don't know it very well. Or even at all.

--
If you want to live like a Republican, you better vote like a Democrat. —Harry Truman

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by: dcsohl @ Wed Jan 07, 2009 at 14:26:08 PM CST

Drupal also is good (0.00 / 0)

I agree :-)

BMG: Reality-based commentary.

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by: Bob Neer @ Wed Jan 07, 2009 at 15:05:09 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Ugh (6.00 / 1)

I hated Drupal with the force of a thousand suns. It was like putting on a straight jacket, both as a designer and developer.

Left in Lowell: cuz why read the Lowell Sun if you don't have to? ;)

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by: Lynne @ Wed Jan 07, 2009 at 15:20:38 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Do we need a full-fledged CMS? (0.00 / 0)

I think it probably depends on what you're aiming to do with it. The stuff that Drupal does out of the box is exactly the sort of stuff we already have with SoapBlox (with the additional advantages of being open-source and fully under the editors' control).

With tons of plugins available for additional functionality - for example, the ability to auto-promote posts to the front page based on a voting system, I'm not sure we need much more.

What we do need is a system that is widely supported and used so that we're not left with the "single technical support guy throws a hissy fit" situation again. And we don't really need an ultra-powerful (or ultra-flexible) top-of-the-line CMS. At least, not that I've seen.

It doesn't have to be Drupal, of course, but I would far rather see it be open-source than not.

--
If you want to live like a Republican, you better vote like a Democrat. —Harry Truman

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by: dcsohl @ Thu Jan 08, 2009 at 09:57:12 AM CST

[ Parent ]

Drupal is a full-fledged CMS (0.00 / 0)

Whatever Drupal is or is not, it's a total CMS. It's just rigid and requires a lot of tweaking to create anything unusual, is all. Even putting in lots of plugins requires some tweaking, especially when you can't get two plugins to play nicely (happens all the time in WP too). It occasionally happens on EE but a lot less I find.

Open source is fine, but I really dislike the urge to think that open source is the be-all and end-all. The stuff it produces is a tool, no more, no less. Open source tools can work, or not so much, depending on the needs and the time and expertise for development. You judge the tool on its merits, and as a developer, I don't have room for "oh, commercial software violates my principles!" It either works for a client or it doesn't.

What I dislike about open source is that it's whatever the community can produce (it's also its biggest strength). However, half the functionality of a non-ootb site in Drupal depends on whether or not a plugin can work with your version of Drupal software (or WP, or whatever) and whether or not someone came up with an update of the plugin you care about. A lot of the functionality you'd want for a community blog in Drupal depends heavily on plugins, whereas I can build most of that functionality into the core structure in EE (with some plugins to do really the cool stuff, for instance, ratings), which means the basic site doesn't break as soon as I update the software and the plugins die. Maybe some of the bells and whistles die, but for instance, user posts do not, because it's built as part of the inherent core structure of EE, as opposed to a plugin.

Plus, I'm all for paying someone a reasonable amount for a damn good product. Open source isn't the only "principle" out there, and a commercial product comes with a) support staff that outshines anything in the OS world (trust me, I can tell the difference) and b) a committed group of people who are paid to further develop and incorporate the needs of its customers and respond with new versions that have those things. Anyway, EE IS open source in a sense, there's a huge community of people building out functionality that isn't part of the core code, and EE offers a free slightly limited version for nonprofits and personal use. AND you are allowed to hack the core code as you see fit, if you want, though it's not recommended because future versions wipe it out and you have to redo it (just like with any software development, WP and Drupal have this issue). You just can't sell your hacked code and pass it off as a new product. So I don't see where open source is this big shining awesomeness that can't be matched in the commercial world. I just don't. I'm a results oriented business person, I use the tool that best suits.

I've tried Drupal a couple times, I couldn't stand the way it worked, tried Joomla, am something of an intermediate expert in WordPress, and I think EE is a better product than any of them. ~shrug~

Left in Lowell: cuz why read the Lowell Sun if you don't have to? ;)

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by: Lynne @ Thu Jan 08, 2009 at 10:18:37 AM CST

[ Parent ]

Open-source and portability (6.00 / 1)

My main argument and concern over open-source or not is data portability.

There was a stretch of a couple of hours yesterday where it seemed like BMG and everything on it was just gone, baby, gone. Sure, pacifier (the guy behind SoapBlox) was saying that he could get all the content of the site to the owners, but if it's in some proprietary format, what good does that do? It could be a major project to convert it all to something that WPMU, Drupal or EE could read in and display as the site we all know and love.

Similarly, if down the road EE (or whatever) folded, how easy or hard would it be to get all the pre-existing user data, posts, and comments into the new system?

So I guess it's not really open source I'm after, so much as open format and portability. What's EE got in that box?

--
If you want to live like a Republican, you better vote like a Democrat. —Harry Truman

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by: dcsohl @ Thu Jan 08, 2009 at 10:36:43 AM CST

[ Parent ]

Open standards are very good (6.00 / 1)

They help avoid vendor lockdown.  One thing about Microsoft that really annoys me is that their business model is largely based on making it very difficult for someone to stop using MS software, once you've started.  This isn't an uncommon tactic for software producters, but MS was, until recently at least, wildly successful at it.

I'd much rather have software producers compete based on capabilities, not lock you in with proprietary data formats.

On that topic, does anyone know what ever happened with MA's role in the Microsoft/OpenDocument format wars (dry stuff, but captivating for freedom-loving geeks)?

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by: syphax @ Thu Jan 08, 2009 at 11:28:44 AM CST

[ Parent ]

Cognos buried it. Let's ask Aloisi! (0.00 / 0)

Yr. Obedient Servant, Peter Porcupine, Republican

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by: Peter Porcupine @ Thu Jan 08, 2009 at 11:31:14 AM CST

[ Parent ]

Cognos is now owned by IBM (0.00 / 0)

And IBM is, of course, an opponent of Microsoft and its closed formats.

The irony!  The tangled web!

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by: syphax @ Thu Jan 08, 2009 at 11:42:46 AM CST

[ Parent ]

RE portability (0.00 / 0)

Super easy peasy in EE, actually. Output is completely whatever you make of it, you are not stuck in ANY particular output whatsoever! In porting my stuff from WP to EE, I had to get WP to export to MoveableType format, and that was a pain in my butt to find the right WP script (or I would have had to create one which I really don't have the expertise to do unless I spend hours learning the physical MySQL data structures WP uses). However, in EE, I could recreate my existing posts in a new template, to output to [XYZ] format in a snap - faster than a snap really. Just as long as you know what format you want your data to export into, you can easily template it up.

That's why I <3 EE! It's a whole new way of looking at templating, data, structures, and everything.

Left in Lowell: cuz why read the Lowell Sun if you don't have to? ;)

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by: Lynne @ Thu Jan 08, 2009 at 12:02:11 PM CST

[ Parent ]

I'm not an open source zealot (6.00 / 1)

I do like open source principles- freedom, sharing, etc., but I'm not idealogically tied down.  I'm typing this on a Mac that also runs Windows, because that's the combo that makes me more productive.  I really like Linux (Ubuntu in particular), but I like using OS X more.

But I'm a big fan of the pragmatic advantages that open source can provide.  One is that I don't have to worry as much if the software producer just disappears- worse come to worse, if the developers of an open source project disappear, and the project had even a medium-wide userbase, there are going to be people who can help me.

At my work, we currently use a software package called TM1.  It was developed by a company called Applix in Westboro.  It wasn't the best run company in the world, but the product was pretty good, and I at least had a relationship with a couple support guys- they answered my calls.

Last year (thereabouts), Cognos (you may have heard of them) bought Applix.  Like a day later, IBM bought Cognos.  So now, all the support, etc., is IBM.  Now, I bet in terms of customer priority, our small company is probably not among IBM's top 1 million customers.  I think it's entirely possible that the TM1 product will get killed; while it may have made sense for Cognos to keep it going, I have no idea what IBM's roadmap for this sort of product is.

Fortunately, there's an open-source near-equivalent of TM1 called Palo.  It has a company behind it, and it looks like it's developing a user base and community.  As soon as a couple key features on the roadmap are developed, I'm there.

The worst case with IBM is that I'm stuck with whatever the last release is, with little or no support.  Need a key bug or feature added in the future?  No such luck.

If the folks behind Palo fold, I'm in a similar situation, except that I can, worst case, hire someone to program modifications, or do it myself if I have to.  That's a much better worse case- I have options.

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by: syphax @ Thu Jan 08, 2009 at 11:40:04 AM CST

[ Parent ]

I suspect (0.00 / 0)

That if Ellis Labs went poof, immediately there would be people jumping in to save EE. There's just too many programmers who know EE inside and out to not.

I don't know the specifics of the Ellis Labs license, though I imagine if they closed doors, they'd probably release the thing as open source or sell it to someone who wanted to continue the product.

To be honest, for the short term especially but even the long term, I am not worried about them closing their doors. The product is just that good (and they have a couple other development environments that get as much praise as well, which I don't use because it's not in my purview.)

Left in Lowell: cuz why read the Lowell Sun if you don't have to? ;)

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by: Lynne @ Thu Jan 08, 2009 at 12:05:08 PM CST

[ Parent ]

EE sounds good (0.00 / 0)

From what I read about it, the product (ExpressionEngine, for those wondering what EE is) is very good, and the company is well-managed.  Good for them.  

I imagine if they closed doors, they'd probably release the thing as open source or sell it to someone who wanted to continue the product.

Note the probably, which is your conjecture.  If I have the code, there is no probably.  Further, in the specific case of Soapblox, the future is much less certain.  Opening the code would help them.

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by: syphax @ Thu Jan 08, 2009 at 12:53:20 PM CST

[ Parent ]

But in the certainty... (0.00 / 0)

... of knowing you own the code is only a certainty that you have it, not that you can do anything with it.  In important, if unstated, point.  They are both trade-offs to each-other.

"It is not because things are difficult that we do not dare, it is because we do not dare that things are difficult." - Seneca (5 BC - 65 AD)

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by: Mr Lynne @ Thu Jan 08, 2009 at 13:43:03 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Not sure it's not open (0.00 / 0)

I haven't really looked at that end of it carefully - the license end of it I mean. Except the basic one for buying/downloading. It seems pretty open, a lot of people seriously dig into extendability.

However, if the company goes bellyup, and no one buys the rights to it, you have all the code, it's uploaded to your site(s) - provided you've been updating as you go. I don't see how you couldn't continue to run it if no one ran the product line any more. It's not like you can't hack new code into it now (in fact you are allowed to, like I said, though it's not recommended). shrug

Left in Lowell: cuz why read the Lowell Sun if you don't have to? ;)

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by: Lynne @ Thu Jan 08, 2009 at 17:15:04 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Is EE a dev. tool or a platform? (0.00 / 0)

If it's a development tool, you're good, thanks to the (mostly) open-standards output it must generate- HTML, Javascript, etc.  

If it's a platform, that's a different story.  If you need a bug fixed, or a new feature, or it won't run on Windows 7, good luck with that.

I never argued what the EE people should do, one way or the other.  Again, while I subscribe to open-source principles, I am OK with using high-quality, well-supported proprietary software, especially if there's no vendor lock-in (so I can easily take my data elsewhere, need be).

But I was talking about Soapblox.  For them, I still argue that opening the code would be a good move- the guy needs help with development (something open source can provide, if there's a vibrant community) and trust (you don't have to worry as much about him sticking around if you have the back-end).

It looks like Ellis Labs does have an open source development framework for PHP called CodeIgniter, for what it's worth.

For the record, EE is not open source.

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by: syphax @ Thu Jan 08, 2009 at 21:23:20 PM CST

[ Parent ]

It's server side PHP (0.00 / 0)

The code has to be in the files you download from their site, straight up, because that's how server side software works. If you have the code, you can make changes (people do, referring it as hacking into the core code, to sometimes solve specific thorny problems) and if so inclined, reverse engineer what it's doing.

There would be, if I were a code stealing jerk, nothing stopping me from buying one full EE software license and just using the software over and over on multiple sites, so far as I can tell. I don't do that of course, I'm working for mostly commercial customers anyway, and the license is pretty damn affordable, even more so for nonprofits, and free for nonprofit and personal use via the lighter "Core" version which is pretty highly functional just by itself.

RE Soapblox, yeah, his best bet is to encourage a developer community to help him, since obviously there's a serious choke point...

Left in Lowell: cuz why read the Lowell Sun if you don't have to? ;)

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by: Lynne @ Fri Jan 09, 2009 at 11:00:39 AM CST

[ Parent ]

Small point (0.00 / 0)

because that's how server side software works.

PHP etc., yeah.  But Microsoft has worked around that "problem", clever as they are.  To wit:

<%@ Page language="c#" Codebehind="TM1WebLogin.aspx.cs" AutoEventWireup="false" Inherits="Applix.TM1.Web.Page.TM1WebLogin" %>


The "codebehind" part means that all the good stuff is in precompiled C#.  

But back to EE: So people can hack the code, because they have access to it.  But can they share those hacks?  According to EE's license, they may not:

Restrictions

Unless you have been granted prior, written consent from EllisLab, Inc., you may not:

   * Use the Software as the basis of a hosted weblogging service, or to provide hosting services to others.
   * Reproduce, distribute, or transfer the Software, or portions thereof, to any third party.
   * Sell, rent, lease, assign, or sublet the Software or portions thereof.
   * Grant rights to any other person.
   * Use the Software in violation of any U.S. or international law or regulation.

Maybe Ellis Labs turns a blind eye to sharing hacks, because of the enormous utility of doing so.  But if they don't (you tell me- I never heard of EE 'til this week), and disallow such sharing, that's a huge loss to the userbase.  Everyone would have to reinvent the wheel.

Again, I'm not making the argument that people shouldn't use non-Free software; I'll leave that to others.  My argument is that open source software has inherent practical advantages over proprietary software.  EE's license provides some, but not all, of these advantages.

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by: syphax @ Fri Jan 09, 2009 at 11:22:28 AM CST

[ Parent ]

In the EE forums (0.00 / 0)

I see people share hacks all the time, usually again in response to solving a problem. No one of course is trying to profit from selling their hacking solutions, which I would guess would be stopped pretty quick.

And if all the open source software in a particular realm sucks compared to an affordable commercial version, all its inherent practical advantages are moot.

As I said, I think that open source's strength is also its biggest weakness, as someone who has tried on many many occasions to implement different OS packages and solve problems with bugs and incomplete workarounds and not being a strong programmer myself. It was frustrating as hell to work with Drupal and in many cases, even WordPress, once I got to a very advanced state with it. So much so that I gave it up, even though getting REALLY good could make me money if I had clients who had those needs. I would need to be a programmer to get really good at either of those packages though. Until EE, which had an entirely different approach, and now suddenly I can create custom CMS sites without the headaches associated with the OS solutions. And making plenty of money with clients doing it.

Personally, I'll go where the ease of use and the money is, any day of the week. A tool is a tool. Principles are secondary to getting the job done. I'm in business, after all.

Left in Lowell: cuz why read the Lowell Sun if you don't have to? ;)

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by: Lynne @ Mon Jan 12, 2009 at 10:07:18 AM CST

[ Parent ]

There are dozens of choices (0.00 / 0)

Just making a short list from the huge number of alternatives is a chore, though.

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by: syphax @ Wed Jan 07, 2009 at 15:22:24 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Just Figured Sal And the Boyz at Cognos Brought You Down to Celebrate His Re-election as Speaker! (0.00 / 0)

But seriously, congratulations Sal.  If it weren't for you marriage equity would never have come up for a vote.

But, IOUs only get so much game.  Progressives still expect ethical leadership!

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by: peabody @ Wed Jan 07, 2009 at 15:18:43 PM CST

gotta agree with several others (0.00 / 0)

Run like hell from Soapblox. It was never that good to begin with.

I'd get someone like Lynne to develop your own site and host it for you. This "let's attack progressive community sites" thing is unfortunately becoming a trend. I wouldn't be at all surprised if it's the same people doing the hacking, but this is the second community-hack-attack I've read about in a week or so. Too close to home this time. Having an independent host/creator probably isn't a bad idea.

If it's a matter of money, I have to figure this community can raise $1k+ pretty easy to get a developer willing to do it. If we can raise $50k in one night for Obama, we can raise money to make a killer site that won't be hacked (or force me to open up 5 windows just to make comments in a thread lol).  

---
My thoughts are mine and mine alone. They should not be considered representative of any other organization, group or person - save me.

~Ryan.

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by: Ryepower12 @ Wed Jan 07, 2009 at 15:56:27 PM CST

Your cut will... (0.00 / 0)

... arrive in the mail once BMG's check clears. ;)

"It is not because things are difficult that we do not dare, it is because we do not dare that things are difficult." - Seneca (5 BC - 65 AD)

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by: Mr Lynne @ Wed Jan 07, 2009 at 18:48:07 PM CST

[ Parent ]

hey (0.00 / 0)

a key thing for the progressive movement is to advance its own =p

can't build websites for free!

I'll donate my cut of the check to a charity for shape-shifting superheroes.

(and, yes, that's an inside joke. my apologies to 99.99% of BMG =p ).  

---
My thoughts are mine and mine alone. They should not be considered representative of any other organization, group or person - save me.

~Ryan.

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by: Ryepower12 @ Wed Jan 07, 2009 at 19:04:51 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Hey everybody--- (0.00 / 0)

In case you're all wondering where all my diaries have gone to, they've been deleted from this blog.  Due to the problems that the server for this sight is presently having, I no longer feel safe posting on this site.  Farewell, everybody.  Take care.

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by: mplo @ Wed Jan 07, 2009 at 20:19:30 PM CST

Question for a technological idiot (0.00 / 0)

The problem appears to be data; all Soapblox is providing is format and hosting.

Is it possible, perhaps using RSS, to have diaries and comments sent automatically to a shadow site - essentially a data graveyard - to be called upon if necessary to reconstitute?

Yr. Obedient Servant, Peter Porcupine, Republican

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by: Peter Porcupine @ Thu Jan 08, 2009 at 11:00:10 AM CST

Yes, but regular site backups are simpler (0.00 / 0)

And should be easy. Should be. ;-)

BMG: Reality-based commentary.

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by: Bob Neer @ Thu Jan 08, 2009 at 11:35:19 AM CST

[ Parent ]

As a double poster myself... (0.00 / 0)

...that's why I asked about the automatic thing.  (BTW - it should have read FROM a tech idiot, not FOR a tech idiot).

My blog began on a aggretated site.  When the site left blogger, it asked me to use their new, keen software.  I did, but crossposted on my own Blogger site.  When the aggregator and I parted company, I still had all my posts, which were deleted from that site.  So I know what a pain updating and cross posting is, and wondered if an automatic option might not be better - you guys DO sleep sometime, don't you?

And if you DO choose a new provider - can we get spellcheck?  Every emergency is also an opportunity, I read somewhere...

Yr. Obedient Servant, Peter Porcupine, Republican

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by: Peter Porcupine @ Thu Jan 08, 2009 at 11:45:23 AM CST

[ Parent ]

Complexity (0.00 / 0)

A multi-user site is more than posts and comments, it's passwords, user configuration settings, and so forth.  So it's not as easy as a 1-man blog- there's a lot more meta data.

What browser do you use?  Firefox has built-in spell-check for text-boxes...

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by: syphax @ Thu Jan 08, 2009 at 12:05:14 PM CST

[ Parent ]

sigh. I admit it. I use IE, Blogger and Vista. I TOLD you I was a tech idiot. (0.00 / 0)

Yr. Obedient Servant, Peter Porcupine, Republican

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by: Peter Porcupine @ Thu Jan 08, 2009 at 12:10:24 PM CST

[ Parent ]

spellcheck... (0.00 / 0)

It's built in to Firefox.  Just sayin'.

P.S. For some reason it doesn't spellecheck the subject line, presumably because it's an input and not a textarea or some such.

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by: stomv @ Thu Jan 08, 2009 at 15:15:10 PM CST

[ Parent ]