The BlogShares Blog

Hopefully we can get regular blogging going again. This is my first post here, so please be gentle! --Adam.

The thing about BlogShares, as many have noticed, is that volunteers keep it alive. Our Index Managers with their indepth expertise in all-things blog related; the GIC and their analytical minds helping to formulate the future of the game and coming up with innovative contests and competitions; the BSEC, rule enforcers and providers of justice for all; Tengrrl, our tireless Editor, ensuring that the documentation keeps up with the game and its myriad of changes. Everyone on this team each provide a unique and very necessary part of the puzzle and challenge of keeping BlogShares going. They all come in for continual demands from above, and hassle from below.

Thank you for doing what you do. If you've not thought of getting involved before, you can apply to join the team. Click here for more information.

Many of you, old and new, will probably by now be aware that the lead developer of the game suffered a stroke earlier this year. He has now returned to the UK from the USA to continue his recovery. I hope everyone will join me in wishing him a full and speedy recovery. We miss you, Subwolf.

This has sadly impacted on where we are with the continued development of the game. Dave, primarily committed with other Santa Cruz Tech projects (the owners of BlogShares), offers what time he can. I try and do the most pressing, small improvements or bug-fixes. We do have a great deal planned; changes to share play, share math, the voting process, and much, much more. We are accutely aware that there are issues with the game. The GIC have formulated a way forward on many of those fronts. Sage has grand plans for fixing what is wrong with a lot of the issues surrounding voting and more.

Please bear with us on these fronts. We're not burying our heads in the sand as some accuse, or simply ignoring the issues; It goes back to the volunteer nature of the game development. It has become over the years, a very, very complex beast. Even the smallest of changes have to be checked against a whole host of factors to make sure fixing one thing, isn't going to break 3 others! We will get there with time. I promise you that. Our walking-talking reference manual (Subwolf) isn't available, so everything takes 3 times as long.

With all that said, now, some good news!

The recent database crash reminded us just how pressing the need is for getting the new database server plumbed in. I am hopeful that this will finally be happening over the next 2 weeks. We were lucky that there were sufficient options available to finally get the repair to work, although it was touch-and-go at one point with just 118mb of free disk space remaining! The things we can do with the raw processing power available on the new box is almost limitless, and I'll be trawling through the forum suggestions for the last 2 years or so looking for the immortal phrase "maybe when we have a new db server"!

There's a new GIC Competition running right now and a side bet to go with it. Free chips and an artefact are the main prize, as well as potentially, many more thousands on the side bet. You'd be mad to miss it!

That's it from me for now. Until next time.