[nearly original] An update on what I know from my end

[nicobie]

I guess I'm with Justin. Lets give it awhile to all sink in. Maybe something will jell.

At this point there is no reason to be in such a rush. After all, the forum is still up with no changes.

As to what the new joint will be like, and how it will be ran/owned, let's not put the cart before the horse. Once we get a new place to post in then we can work out the details. One thing at a time folks.

 

[docnjoj]

I'm no wizard but I think a clean break is the most effective way for our donations to make a difference. I would much rather give money to a new, complete and not-for- profit group than to pay for Trevors and MB's mistakes and miscalculations. Just my 2Centavos.
otherDoc

 

[justin_le]

it's beginning to sound like a stall tactic, and maybe you're just being led along, to lead us along. and just because there's an nda, doesn't mean that he can't throw a number out there,

Just to be super clear, Trevor is NOT AT ALL engaged in a stall tactic, he is very much keen to move on and sort out a resolution ASAP, and has been super fast in any correspondence. If anything is causing things to stretch out here it is me, since I obviously have a lot to consider and weigh in on, am slow to write in general, and don't make snap decisions about stuff when there is so much at stake.

Justin

 

[kevo]

As it should be Justin - we appreciate all!

 

[TPA]

Trevor will not likely want to be paid slowly, so a loan would be necessary to capitalize the purchase.
Loans have to be paid on time...What if donations do not keep up with the payment.

If you go this route (keeping the site here) a proven means of income will have to be established.

 

[yopappamon]

The only downside of moving on that i can think of is having to reconstruct everything. We have people who have mirrored the site, but there is no easy way just to pack up our posts and port them to another site.

A full database backup and php folder backup should fully replicate the site as it was at the time the backup was done. Structure, users, posts and all.

 

[Gordo]

it's beginning to sound like a stall tactic, and maybe you're just being led along, to lead us along. and just because there's an nda, doesn't mean that he can't throw a number out there,

Just to be super clear, Trevor is NOT AT ALL engaged in a stall tactic, he is very much keen to move on and sort out a resolution ASAP, and has been super fast in any correspondence. If anything is causing things to stretch out here it is me, since I obviously have a lot to consider and weigh in on, am slow to write in general, and don't make snap decisions about stuff when there is so much at stake.

Justin

Justin;
Many of us have asked the question; "Why do we owe Trevor anything?" Do you have an answer to this question?
Thanks;
Gordon

 

[deVries]

Just to be super clear, Trevor is NOT AT ALL engaged in a stall tactic, he is very much keen to move on and sort out a resolution ASAP, and has been super fast in any correspondence. If anything is causing things to stretch out here it is me, since I obviously have a lot to consider and weigh in on, am slow to write in general, and don't make snap decisions about stuff when there is so much at stake.

At least Trevor is in contact with someone in the know we can trust. 8) It would be worth some amount of money to not have to relocate & change the domain name & reproduce some of the content. Some will be lost for sure with further moves...

I agree with Matt:

The problem with ANYONE having complete control is not related to their personal integrity. I, for one, completely trust Justin, and I mean COMPLETELY. However, if one person has control, eventually he will pass away or have to sell the entity for some serious life reasons. Then what will the new owner do? This is how bad dictators come into power, first a benevolent man changes the country and is elected as dictator for life. He may do a good job, but, eventually, he must be succeeded. When that occurs, problems arise.

This should be a public forum with a board of directors. That board could collectively go bad, but that is much less likely than one person getting greedy or otherwise difficult to deal with once the site changes hands once or twice.

How this would be accomplished, I do not know. But, I think it is the best course of action for the long term.

I think I've posted several times that MWKeefer Mike has setup non-profit(s) ALREADY successfully before & has offered his help to do this.

Let's get Mike involved... Also, his server farm can at the very least do backups offsite if not hosting too!

+1 Neptronix along similar lines...

 

[neptronix]

A full database backup and php folder backup should fully replicate the site as it was at the time the backup was done. Structure, users, posts and all.

Uh huh, and who here has access to the SQL database?

... i thought so

 

[methods]

METHODS; Many of us have asked the question "Why do we owe Trevor anything?" Please answer this question. I am sure, I have made many financial decisions far worse than this one. I have never felt anyone owed me for my mistakes. Life does not work this way.

Sorry Gordo, I would never ignore a direct question. I was off playing in another thread. For future reference, if anyone wants to take me to task please send me a PM to point me to the post and I will gladly come and answer

Now to answer... I dont think we owe Trevor anything.
I am on the fence at this point... On one hand I really want a smooth transition that is legally rock solid. On the other hand I am outraged like you.

I am chugging REDBULL and ROCKSTAR and giving Justin the time he asked for.
Keep up the positive conversation guys

-methods

 

[StudEbiker]

MWKeefer seems to have a plan that would be a long term solution. I certainly like the idea of contributions being deductible. If he has done it before, and thinks it can work in this situation, and is willing to do much of the leg work I think this is the direction The Sphere should take a serious look at.

 

[ebent]

JUSTIN has asked for 12 hours. Justin has very high credability in this comunity. I say let's give him 12 hours! No need to speculate, do or say anything that might influence the next 12 hours. 12 hour truce! If it is garbage take action. But Justin involved adds to the probability of a positive outcome. Fingers crossed!

 

[MitchJi]

Hi,

This should be a public forum with a board of directors. That board could collectively go bad, but that is much less likely than one person getting greedy or otherwise difficult to deal with once the site changes hands once or twice.

How this would be accomplished, I do not know. But, I think it is the best course of action for the long term.

I agree.

The value here is the community and collective knowledge not the ip address and a copy of phpbb. knightmb sold and Trevor paid for the former which knightmb should not have sold, at least without the knowledge and consent of the community. Also Trevor should have been wise enough to have known that.

One suggestion:

• Lets try for the easy, seamless and workable solution. I have no interest in spending hours manually deleting and moving all my old posts. Even if they couldn't be restored from backups and locked.

I am trying, here in the open (which is bad tactics) to see if there is ANY middle ground.

I agree!

One request:

• I don't think there is a perfect solution to this problem. But if the community as a whole can make some reasonable compromises and come close to a solution that minimizes or eliminates Trevor taking a big hit I think thats a better direction to go than a scorched earth everyone loses solution. For example any costs that would be incurred in moving the forum as opposed to buying out Trevor should be automatically on the table as a minimum offer.

No Matt
This was not about "someone" defending Trevor. This is about "someone" pushing to monetize the site along side Trevor.

Don't mix up the interpersonal Trevor stuff with the ethical stuff.

I think its possible to honestly believe that the site could be monetized in a way that benefited the Community and that it is the best way. The issue isn't wether someone earns some money from an enterprise but how the enterprise is run that determines the ethics. For example Justin earns his living selling ebike components and because he does this ethically and competently the world is a better place due to his business. OTOH there are a lot of crooks selling ebike components.

Maybe its a good time for everyone to take a few deep breath's, try to be patient and see if Justin, Patrick et al. can work out a solution that's at least close enough to a win/win that most of us can support it?

 

[liveforphysics]

Use this 12hrs to backup your valuable content.

Seriously, if everyone was backed up, there wouldn't even be debate about what to do, they could buy and sell the domain we camped at every month and it would be only a minor inconvenience.

Nobody like Justin would get stuck carrying the bill for another mans gambling error.

 

[MitchJi]

Hi,

METHODS; Many of us have asked the question "Why do we owe Trevor anything?" Please answer this question. I am sure, I have made many financial decisions far worse than this one. I have never felt anyone owed me for my mistakes. Life does not work this way.

Now to answer... I dont think we owe Trevor anything.
I am on the fence at this point... On one hand I really want a smooth transition that is legally rock solid. On the other hand I am outraged like you.

I think all of us as human beings owe it to ourselves and our fellow human beings to try to go beyond just solutions and try to find compassionate solutions. Do any of us owe the millions of starving refugee's in Somalia anything? No, but we are better human beings if we all try to help each other as much as we reasonably can.

Also we all benefit if we can work out a "a smooth transition that is legally rock solid".

 

[Gordo]

METHODS; Many of us have asked the question "Why do we owe Trevor anything?" Please answer this question. I am sure, I have made many financial decisions far worse than this one. I have never felt anyone owed me for my mistakes. Life does not work this way.

Sorry Gordo, I would never ignore a direct question. I was off playing in another thread. For future reference, if anyone wants to take me to task please send me a PM to point me to the post and I will gladly come and answer

Now to answer... I dont think we owe Trevor anything.
I am on the fence at this point... On one hand I really want a smooth transition that is legally rock solid. On the other hand I am outraged like you.

I am chugging REDBULL and ROCKSTAR and giving Justin the time he asked for.
Keep up the positive conversation guys

-methods

I appreciate the massive effort you are going to in order to save us as much pain as you can. I have lost lots of good opportunities in my lifetime by not waiting and thinking. I just had trouble understanding the negotiations, when you are not offering anything.
I have sat in talks for days with people who try to keep taking while appearing to also give. Each following day, they restate their beginning position from the previous day and your ending position the previous day. Because my client did not listen, they lost 100% in the end. The buyer bought the product from a customs auction for 10% of the value. When the other party has no need to negotiate in good faith for an enduring business relationship, most deals are a total waste of time. Shit can the deal, take your lumps and get on with business.
Take it easy on the sugar/caffeine, life is short and then you die.
Justin is a good man and I will support him large, but not if he pays for Trevor's lack of due diligence.

 

[mdd0127]

I've got it all backed up and I'm out regardless.

The only way I'd ever join and post at another forum again is if it was a non-profit, open source, member supported, PRIVATE forum with very tightly screened members that are chosen for their commitment to the cause, their principals, and their ideas.

Probably not going to happen.

 

[ptd]

Should be a 501(c)3 structure. Then our donations are tax deductible! We can even sponsor grants for college and such if we make some $ somehow... taint' that a loaded statement!

i wonder, with respect to "fund raising", is the use of advertising appalling because of it's nature? it's content? or that it benefits a sole entity, not responsible for the body of work? as a nonprofit, with a board (or the mods) to determine distribution of funds, the benefits could be incredible. it might be an interesting time to create a few mission statements. maybe define some core beliefs or intentions.

think of the creative minds here, that have a day job. what if they could create full time, and be compensated in some way. who's to say that the "nonprofit" couldn't sponsor it's own product. high quality, high performance, and reasonably priced. talk about self supporting, and furthering the revolution at the same time. might be nice to further define the revolution as well.

 

[GGoodrum]

Justin is a good man and I will support him large, but not if he pays for Trevor's lack of due diligence.

This is exactly how I feel. The problem with waiting for 12 hours is it could be a done deal by then, and I'm not sure I could live with the outcome.

-- Gary

 

[yopappamon]

A full database backup and php folder backup should fully replicate the site as it was at the time the backup was done. Structure, users, posts and all.

Uh huh, and who here has access to the SQL database?

... i thought so

What backup do you think the moderators have? They said they have backups, there is nothing else to backup. :wink:

 

[nicobie]

I think all of us as human beings owe it to ourselves and our fellow human beings to try to go beyond just solutions and try to find compassionate solutions. Do any of us owe the millions of starving refugee's in Somalia anything? No, but we are better human beings if we all try to help each other as much as we reasonably can.

jesus H christ...

Just what in the hell does that have to do with what is going on here?

Is trevor starving?

compassionate? owe? reasonable?

This is getting stupid. I thought most here were engineering types, free thinkers. How about lets crunch the numbers.

I'm posting too much about this problem. Time for a break

 

[nicobie]

I've got it all backed up and I'm out regardless.

The only way I'd ever join and post at another forum again is if it was a non-profit, open source, member supported, PRIVATE forum with very tightly screened members that are chosen for their commitment to the cause, their principals, and their ideas.

what fuc'n bullshit

 

[beast775]

Maybe there should be a board of members set up now,as there is big decisions on the table.and move forward with intention.

 

[grindz145]

Looking at parallel-paths, does anyone know of any automated tools that would allow a user to grab all of their posts? I looked into writing scripts to do this, but it will undoubtedly take me longer to do than would be necessary. I'm manually backing up myself.

Hell, it might be better to start new with a hand-edited version of ES anyway....

 

[bigmoose]

mdd take a break, have a Tullimore Dew on me. Think it over. We will be looking for you to join us on the other side.

No human endeavor is ever perfect; no human is perfect. But remember, we sure all got along pretty well before the sellout. Let's try to recapture that. It won't be the same if the core looses some of the battalion. We are all in this together.