Turn to Community Support

[Wolfblade]

I would like to make a suggestion.

Sooner than feel backed into a position where your only option is to give in to blackmail by the person who is unarguably the single greatest hindrance to the continued growth and prosperity of this site and community, I would suggest that you turn to the community, without which this site would be nothing.

Publicly announce the situation;

"People, this Arcturus guy won't stop hacking us. The first of these recent lockdowns was because he stole Dragoneer's account and used it to harass and ban a user. He says if we don't let him back in and allow him to be unofficial staffmember, he's going to keep doing what he's been doing anyway. We're at a loss of what to do. Do you guys want to keep going on as we have, and just bear with us through the occaisional downtime as we keep showing you our devotion and respect by trying our damndest to keep this guy out, or would you rather we let him back in, and trust that he uses the umpteenth chance given him to actually help this time?"

Or, inform the community of a third option.

"We presently have no good solution to Arcturus' hackings. We might look into hiring a professional full-time coder, not from within the fandom but from an actual business-like arrangement, to patch up the code and prevent further attacks from Arcturus, but this would be expensive and rely almost solely on support from you, the community. So what'll it be? Continue on as we have been, let Arc back in despite everything he's done to disrespect each and every one of us, or you guys help us pay for a professional to step up our defenses against him?"

There is ALWAYS another option. It's just a matter of whether or not you ask people for it BEFORE choosing from the choices you see and don't want to choose from.

 

[Malcolm the Bear]

I don't have much money, but this place is pretty awesome, so I'd be willing to contribute what I could to help protect this place....and send a big "FUCK YOU!!" to the hacker.

 

[Arshes Nei]

Nrr had offered his services before, they got turned away. Considering how FA treats its coders right now, I can't blame other coders for not wanting to get on.

 

[nobuyuki]

hmmm, money-wise, it seems that FA would be wasting a lot of money based on the gut feelings of a few misinformed people. But it wouldn't be the first time you've hoped to rally community support with a scaremonglering as a last measure. Didn't work then, and I doubt it will work now, but rather than be vague in this topic, I think you need to let both sides of the argument stand and let the community decide for themselves.

Barring that, the only other thing I can say is that there's already a thread for this topic open on the forums. Making another one is pointless and I think this thread should be closed for redundancy.

 

[Damaratus]

Barring that, the only other thing I can say is that there's already a thread for this topic open on the forums. Making another one is pointless and I think this thread should be closed for redundancy.

In truth, if the thread goes along the concept of being able to rally the community for monetary support in the times where problems crop up then this is a proper location for this particular thread. Nevermind that he uses Arcturus as an example, it just happens to be the "problem du jour" so to speak.

There's nothing wrong with the suggestion that outreaching to the community may be a good idea in times like these. It's better than dismissing the fact that there are near 30000 members on FA, and some of them may be able to help more than the administration knows.

 

[Arshes Nei]

In truth, if the thread goes along the concept of being able to rally the community for monetary support in the times where problems crop up then this is a proper location for this particular thread. Nevermind that he uses Arcturus as an example, it just happens to be the "problem du jour" so to speak.

Just to respectfully disagree here, the problem isn't a monetary one, it is an administrative one as well as just plain old respect.

While my first post was curt, it still is very true. Many coders are willing to volunteer their time and work if they feel they can accomplish something. Call it "coder's pride" or whatnot.

Seeing how the few coders here have had many stalemates, exactly why would money solve the problem of simply being able to have the access and respect they need to make the site work?

Sometimes money isn't the solution to the problem, and time and time again while money was graciously given to the site, the improvements were actually made when people on the site were given more leeway to do what needs to be done.

Instead it seems like they have to have their time wasted on stuff that should be handled better by other parts of staff. I get the sense they can't work on things they'd like to, and it makes them look incompetent, and unappreciated and disrespected.

I think the staff needs to really work on that first than asking the community for more money on a situation that isn't exactly garaunteed to yield results.

 

[Damaratus]

Just to respectfully disagree here, the problem isn't a monetary one, it is an administrative one as well as just plain old respect.

While my first post was curt, it still is very true. Many coders are willing to volunteer their time and work if they feel they can accomplish something. Call it "coder's pride" or whatnot.

Seeing how the few coders here have had many stalemates, exactly why would money solve the problem of simply being able to have the access and respect they need to make the site work?

Sometimes money isn't the solution to the problem, and time and time again while money was graciously given to the site, the improvements were actually made when people on the site were given more leeway to do what needs to be done.

Instead it seems like they have to have their time wasted on stuff that should be handled better by other parts of staff. I get the sense they can't work on things they'd like to, and it makes them look incompetent, and unappreciated and disrespected.

I think the staff needs to really work on that first than asking the community for more money on a situation that isn't exactly garaunteed to yield results.

I was not suggesting that this (the Arcturus) problem is one that can be fixed monetarily. You seem to think that I'm focused solely on that event, despite me explaining that what Wolfblade said was simply an example. I am suggesting that when future problems arise that it may be good to reach out to the community for support, not just for monetary reasons, but just to see who else is out there.

You actually don't have a full concept of what goes on behind the scene and your speculation is somewhat misguided. There is plenty of support from some of the staff in terms of what the coders are doing. They are not, at least from my perspective, disrespected. They are hard working, but things like this most recent hacking event and the backlash happening now shows just how little respect any of the administration seems to garner overall.

Additionally, coders end up being specialized, sometimes they can offer up help in one area, but cannot necessarily help in another. Hiring a coder who is specifically designed to deal with security could help things run more efficiently and allow the other coders to do what they do best.

 

[Arshes Nei]

You actually don't have a full concept of what goes on behind the scene and your speculation is somewhat misguided. There is plenty of support from some of the staff in terms of what the coders are doing. They are not, at least from my perspective, disrespected. They are hard working, but things like this most recent hacking event and the backlash happening now shows just how little respect any of the administration seems to garner overall.

Errr, correct me if I'm wrong here but at least 1-3 people were hired for security reasons, I at least remember that being mentioned during the time of their inductions.

Here's the thing, if you guys have good guys that are trying to work on the security of the site, you really would have never had to make that deal with Arcturus, in fact, no one should be afraid of him at all because, you'll know how to deal with the situation.

So yes, I say it's a disrespect because you either are showing me you guys have incompetent coders or have no respect for the ones you have.

You don't have to be visibly mean to disrespect someone you can be thoughtless or unintentionally inconsiderate to do so as well.

 

[Damaratus]

Errr, correct me if I'm wrong here but at least 1-3 people were hired for security reasons, I at least remember that being mentioned during the time of their inductions.

Here's the thing, if you guys have good guys that are trying to work on the security of the site, you really would have never had to make that deal with Arcturus, in fact, no one should be afraid of him at all because, you'll know how to deal with the situation.

So yes, I say it's a disrespect because you either are showing me you guys have incompetent coders or have no respect for the ones you have.

You don't have to be visibly mean to disrespect someone you can be thoughtless or unintentionally inconsiderate to do so as well.

I was brought on after the hiring of the coders, I do not know who was brought on for what reasons. I do know that there are sometimes safety issues that even the coders who were brought along cannot deal with. It's not that they're incompetent or poor coders, it's just that their particular knowledge does not span enough to deal with some problems. There does come a time where a professional can help get things back in line and the regular security coders can continue to do what they are doing as well.

You also don't need to explain the finer aspects of respect to me, and I think we've taken this thread off topic enough. Please PM me if you wish to continue this conversation.

 

[Arshes Nei]

Well quite honestly you have this person posting 3 similar threads and sending chain letters, so I think a better solution would be to merge this thread with the other two. It's become rather spammy really. (PS I don't care if you delete our replies to this post when you do so).

 

[Damaratus]

Well quite honestly you have this person posting 3 similar threads and sending chain letters, so I think a better solution would be to merge this thread with the other two. It's become rather spammy really. (PS I don't care if you delete our replies to this post when you do so).

Once again, I will iterate, that if you look at this thread as a suggestion to consider asking for support from the community when problems arise, then it does not belong with the other ones. So if you have something to add to this particular topic please do, otherwise feel free to continue to post elsewhere in the forums.

 

[Ziba the lioness]

I would love to help, but Ive got no money (havnt even been able to pay my houserent yet this month ) and I do have food to buy and a daughter, so a donation is not an obtion from my side even though I would if I could. Does FA however become a pay site I wouldnt stop to think even one second before moving to another free place XD

 

[Hanazawa]

People who want to financially support the site are already doing so through the donations button.

If they donate for any specific reason other than "I like the site enough to give it money", they're just being fairweather friends and are likely the kind who will feel entitled - "I gave you my money, now you will use it as *I* say."

 

[Damaratus]

I would love to help, but Ive got no money (havnt even been able to pay my houserent yet this month ) and I do have food to buy and a daughter, so a donation is not an obtion from my side even though I would if I could. Does FA however become a pay site I wouldnt stop to think even one second before moving to another free place XD

I'm pretty sure that it'll be a cold day in hell before FA turns into a pay site, so I wouldn't worry about that. Additionally, we would never ask for someone to inconvenience themselves just for the sake of FA. You have a life and things that you need to take care of, those priorities come well before a site like Fur Affinity. The thing you can offer is nonmonetary support, helping out other users here on the forums, keeping things generally positive for the site overall, asking questions that help to move the site in a forward direction, etc. There are may ways that someone can become an active supporter of FA without the need of using their money.

 

[dave hyena]

Publicly announce the situation

I think this is a very good idea. On the front page of the site and link to the forums.

After all, these forums can give a massively skewed picture, since only a tiny minority of people actually use them. It allows a few people who scream and shout to drown out other people and make it look their view has more support than it really does.

 

[Wolfblade]

*nods* something that really needs to be remembered is that nobody here on the forums can be taken as a voice for the thousands and thousands site-side (even though several of us claim to be trying to speak for them).

Too much site-related discussion is made only here on the forums, where the vast majority of users are never even aware of it.

I know Y!G comparisons have been a big source of interfering with positive progress lately, but bear with me, this one is valid. If we look at that whole mess (and for the sake of this argument, pretend we believe their publicly presented reasonings) then the issue was: there was a problem the staff was facing behind the scenes (furries not labeling their submissions) which the users were completely unaware of (the rare mislabeled submission got reported in minutes, so no furs thought there was a problem) and so the Staff made a decision that was obviously of controversial nature to the users. The staff felt like it was the only way to fix the problem, but acted without making the users aware of the issue and asking for alternative solutions.

You guys said it yourselves: "Because sometimes your brain is better than ours!"

So if there's a big heavy issue like this where all the options you see have SOME sort of drawback to them, try filling your community in on the actual site, and see what they have to say. Of course that would require that the community be filled in on the whole situation, but by and large, I don't see why that has been such an issue in the past.