The season is upon us, and there are a few things worth tossing about.
The server is going to struggle at times this season. The good news should be apparent, the frequent (well, I saw them as frequent, they came roughly every 45 days) crashes from last year are gone. But we're running two sites on the machine, and mySQL/PHP/vB aren't as 'tweaked' as they probably could be under ideal circumstances. What this means is that we're going to be trying to keep in-game threads relatively short (lock one, open another, merge later, etc.), we may be changing how the search function works a bit, vBookie events are going to be have to handled off hours, meaning well after the games have ended on Saturday nights and traffic has died down -- in general, we're going to have to be a little more conservative about server load. What does this mean to most of you? Not much, hopefully you won't notice anything. But right after a big game, if the site is slow(er than normal) to respond, or doesn't at all, the best thing to do is go grab a beer and try again in a couple minutes. Just pounding reload will compound the situation.
Every year we run into the same situation with in-game threads. Posting during a game is dangerous business, inasmuch as even the best of us has a hard time keeping a good grasp on our football-emotions when things are going badly. Pryor is going to make bad throws. The RBs are going to fumble. The coaches aren't always going to make decisions you/we/they agree with. The announcers are going to say stupid things. We'll see the normal flow (and moderator smack-downs) of trolls. Every season I'm dismayed when I see good regular posters buy game/week bans for getting out of hand during a game. Please, consider this in advance, so I have to send fewer emails saying as much during the season -- the mods and admins have an extraordinarily difficult task during the season, particularly during and after bad games. They're as pissed off/distraught/crestfallen as you are, but they're tasked with and focused upon making sure that BP isn't in a state that adds to people's misery. Let me restate that to be clear, BP should NEVER be a site where fans end up feeling WORSE about a bad situation, and that's what happens when a thread gets out of hand. One 'bad moment' remark invites people to respond in kind, with each post the conflict worsens and the opportunity for people to just talk is lost. I've had my own moments where I've wanted to say some really shitty things during and after games, I try to keep them off the boards (sometimes in PMs, sometimes I don't say them at all, sometimes I try to explain myself to the dogs) -- and 99% of the time I'm glad I did because a little distance lends a lot of perspective. It's easy to rage in the heat of the moment; let's make this a season where more of us think to step back, get away from the keyboard for a moment, and come back ready to contribute in the way everyone here on this site is capable. We pride ourselves, as a site, on our atmosphere and demeanor, let's all do our best to maintain that.
Not for nothing, let's also hope everything goes so brilliantly for the team this season that there are no heartbreaking postgames to face. Not likely, but we'll see. It sounds stupid, but I try to even appreciate losses. Every game is a unique moment for this program, a chance to see this particular generation of the team. Eh screw it, let's just win out. :)
The drive has been fantastic. Thank you, again, to each and every single one of you that's sent something in -- even the guy who took my last note on the issue at face value, and sent a buck. That was great (honestly), and they're all appreciated. This is particularly true for those of you that have been participating in automated monthly donations through Paypal. I don't mind saying that all of it got us and the site through to present, during what has easily been the biggest period of economic loss BP has faced. Since March, we've probably brought in (total) somewhere between 25-50% of what we used to make per month. That's off the top of my head, and it may not be perfectly accurate, but it's close. That's just the state of the ad market, as influenced by the state of the economy. Football season is here, and I hope and expect we'll see a change. Which is to say that I hope and expect to see better quality/better targeted ads. We've had virtually no complaints about 'bad' ads the last month or two. You can thank Deety for that, as she was able to swoop in and squash the baddies, or at least erect a virtual fence to keep them out. The drive is still alive, there's still a real need and desire for *new* donors. Even a buck makes a difference. Doesn't buy you anything, but it helps me keep the lights on, literally and figuratively, site-wise and personally.
I'm excited and a little apprehensive about our first two games, for very different reasons. I've been a fan (not the way I'm an OSU fan, but a fan nonetheless) of Navy for a long long time. Never really thought I'd see the two teams play, but here we are, and I want (of course) my team to spank my team -- so no question about Scarlet loyalty there. I just hope the game goes well, and Navy fans (the few that will see the game in person) and players come away as impressed by the Buckeyes and its fans as I was the first time I saw them play as a freshman on campus. USC? Well there's a huge thread dedicated to that already, and one from last year's game as well. Nothing to add there, except the obvious, I can't imagine a more important game, even though some claim we're still title-game viable with a loss. It's going to be an amazing contest, an outstanding opportunity for both teams, and let's just make sure that everyone is heart healthy before it starts.
Have a great season, no matter the outcome (and the sky is the limit, per the norm), we're living through a truly amazing period of Buckeye football. I hope to be posting (as a poster, not an admin) here and there, but this tends to be the time of year I see a downturn. I did last year, and never got the rebound back up that I've enjoyed in the past. Nonetheless, this laptop is only ever about 15-20 feet away, it's always on and reloading the site, and I'm never completely removed from what's going on. If you need something, PM, and don't feel slighted if I read it and don't immediately respond, may just mean that I'll have to get back to you on my next trip over here.
Deep thanks to our admins, mods, and content/feature managers and contributors, both present and past. This site is nothing without you guys (and girls), and I'm just blown away by what you're able to produce around here. Take the recent BPRT article -- where else can you get straight-forward, no-nonsense recruiting insight like that, that comes completely without self-aggrandizing self-promoting "guru" posturing? It's not just loyalty and friendship that leads me to say that I'd rather read the perspectives of this crew (for free, no less) than any I might be able to pay for elsewhere. That's not a knock on our neighbors (BN, BSB, etc.), or the big boys like ESPiN, just a simple matter of personal truth that I hope many of the rest of you share. So thanks again, admins, mods, and content/feature managers.
I wonder if I should have made this an announcement instead of an admin forum post. Too late.
One final note -- even in politics, perhaps most so in politics, there's real value in differing opinions, perspectives, and philosophies. This is not to say that I don't grind my teeth when I'm faced with a strongly worded political perspective that runs directly against everything I'm for and believe in, but without these challenges to our own cores, how do we better define and refine our positions? It's important that the poliboard be better than the type of mindless polarized babble, name-calling, and trolling that you might find in the comments area of any politically charged "news" article on CNN, Fox, MSNBC, ABC or CBSNews. We are Buckeyes first (except for Gator and a few others like methomps who claim to still support their original teams -- it's just a matter of time fellas, you're home now and you know it), and then we're X, Y or Z politically. Agree to disagree where necessary, but when one side or another avoids the forum for any reason, then it loses value. You don't have to find ways to agree in there, you just have to keep things smart. I'm sure more has and/or will be said about it, I jut wanted to throw it out there. I want to see compelling threads in there that make people want to post, not threads and posts that make people not want to.
That is all, have a blast this season. So happy to be enjoying another one with our community here.
The server is going to struggle at times this season. The good news should be apparent, the frequent (well, I saw them as frequent, they came roughly every 45 days) crashes from last year are gone. But we're running two sites on the machine, and mySQL/PHP/vB aren't as 'tweaked' as they probably could be under ideal circumstances. What this means is that we're going to be trying to keep in-game threads relatively short (lock one, open another, merge later, etc.), we may be changing how the search function works a bit, vBookie events are going to be have to handled off hours, meaning well after the games have ended on Saturday nights and traffic has died down -- in general, we're going to have to be a little more conservative about server load. What does this mean to most of you? Not much, hopefully you won't notice anything. But right after a big game, if the site is slow(er than normal) to respond, or doesn't at all, the best thing to do is go grab a beer and try again in a couple minutes. Just pounding reload will compound the situation.
Every year we run into the same situation with in-game threads. Posting during a game is dangerous business, inasmuch as even the best of us has a hard time keeping a good grasp on our football-emotions when things are going badly. Pryor is going to make bad throws. The RBs are going to fumble. The coaches aren't always going to make decisions you/we/they agree with. The announcers are going to say stupid things. We'll see the normal flow (and moderator smack-downs) of trolls. Every season I'm dismayed when I see good regular posters buy game/week bans for getting out of hand during a game. Please, consider this in advance, so I have to send fewer emails saying as much during the season -- the mods and admins have an extraordinarily difficult task during the season, particularly during and after bad games. They're as pissed off/distraught/crestfallen as you are, but they're tasked with and focused upon making sure that BP isn't in a state that adds to people's misery. Let me restate that to be clear, BP should NEVER be a site where fans end up feeling WORSE about a bad situation, and that's what happens when a thread gets out of hand. One 'bad moment' remark invites people to respond in kind, with each post the conflict worsens and the opportunity for people to just talk is lost. I've had my own moments where I've wanted to say some really shitty things during and after games, I try to keep them off the boards (sometimes in PMs, sometimes I don't say them at all, sometimes I try to explain myself to the dogs) -- and 99% of the time I'm glad I did because a little distance lends a lot of perspective. It's easy to rage in the heat of the moment; let's make this a season where more of us think to step back, get away from the keyboard for a moment, and come back ready to contribute in the way everyone here on this site is capable. We pride ourselves, as a site, on our atmosphere and demeanor, let's all do our best to maintain that.
Not for nothing, let's also hope everything goes so brilliantly for the team this season that there are no heartbreaking postgames to face. Not likely, but we'll see. It sounds stupid, but I try to even appreciate losses. Every game is a unique moment for this program, a chance to see this particular generation of the team. Eh screw it, let's just win out. :)
The drive has been fantastic. Thank you, again, to each and every single one of you that's sent something in -- even the guy who took my last note on the issue at face value, and sent a buck. That was great (honestly), and they're all appreciated. This is particularly true for those of you that have been participating in automated monthly donations through Paypal. I don't mind saying that all of it got us and the site through to present, during what has easily been the biggest period of economic loss BP has faced. Since March, we've probably brought in (total) somewhere between 25-50% of what we used to make per month. That's off the top of my head, and it may not be perfectly accurate, but it's close. That's just the state of the ad market, as influenced by the state of the economy. Football season is here, and I hope and expect we'll see a change. Which is to say that I hope and expect to see better quality/better targeted ads. We've had virtually no complaints about 'bad' ads the last month or two. You can thank Deety for that, as she was able to swoop in and squash the baddies, or at least erect a virtual fence to keep them out. The drive is still alive, there's still a real need and desire for *new* donors. Even a buck makes a difference. Doesn't buy you anything, but it helps me keep the lights on, literally and figuratively, site-wise and personally.
I'm excited and a little apprehensive about our first two games, for very different reasons. I've been a fan (not the way I'm an OSU fan, but a fan nonetheless) of Navy for a long long time. Never really thought I'd see the two teams play, but here we are, and I want (of course) my team to spank my team -- so no question about Scarlet loyalty there. I just hope the game goes well, and Navy fans (the few that will see the game in person) and players come away as impressed by the Buckeyes and its fans as I was the first time I saw them play as a freshman on campus. USC? Well there's a huge thread dedicated to that already, and one from last year's game as well. Nothing to add there, except the obvious, I can't imagine a more important game, even though some claim we're still title-game viable with a loss. It's going to be an amazing contest, an outstanding opportunity for both teams, and let's just make sure that everyone is heart healthy before it starts.
Have a great season, no matter the outcome (and the sky is the limit, per the norm), we're living through a truly amazing period of Buckeye football. I hope to be posting (as a poster, not an admin) here and there, but this tends to be the time of year I see a downturn. I did last year, and never got the rebound back up that I've enjoyed in the past. Nonetheless, this laptop is only ever about 15-20 feet away, it's always on and reloading the site, and I'm never completely removed from what's going on. If you need something, PM, and don't feel slighted if I read it and don't immediately respond, may just mean that I'll have to get back to you on my next trip over here.
Deep thanks to our admins, mods, and content/feature managers and contributors, both present and past. This site is nothing without you guys (and girls), and I'm just blown away by what you're able to produce around here. Take the recent BPRT article -- where else can you get straight-forward, no-nonsense recruiting insight like that, that comes completely without self-aggrandizing self-promoting "guru" posturing? It's not just loyalty and friendship that leads me to say that I'd rather read the perspectives of this crew (for free, no less) than any I might be able to pay for elsewhere. That's not a knock on our neighbors (BN, BSB, etc.), or the big boys like ESPiN, just a simple matter of personal truth that I hope many of the rest of you share. So thanks again, admins, mods, and content/feature managers.
I wonder if I should have made this an announcement instead of an admin forum post. Too late.
One final note -- even in politics, perhaps most so in politics, there's real value in differing opinions, perspectives, and philosophies. This is not to say that I don't grind my teeth when I'm faced with a strongly worded political perspective that runs directly against everything I'm for and believe in, but without these challenges to our own cores, how do we better define and refine our positions? It's important that the poliboard be better than the type of mindless polarized babble, name-calling, and trolling that you might find in the comments area of any politically charged "news" article on CNN, Fox, MSNBC, ABC or CBSNews. We are Buckeyes first (except for Gator and a few others like methomps who claim to still support their original teams -- it's just a matter of time fellas, you're home now and you know it), and then we're X, Y or Z politically. Agree to disagree where necessary, but when one side or another avoids the forum for any reason, then it loses value. You don't have to find ways to agree in there, you just have to keep things smart. I'm sure more has and/or will be said about it, I jut wanted to throw it out there. I want to see compelling threads in there that make people want to post, not threads and posts that make people not want to.
That is all, have a blast this season. So happy to be enjoying another one with our community here.
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