i know that i've said that i will not login into this forum again, but i still read it. since no one of the admins was
MAN enough to say nothing, let's try make an little chronology to try explain why i've quit:
- a few years ago, erik has quit. the reasons: he was basically working alone, forgetting about his own life, his beloveds, etc;
- then, one of erik beta testers (aka james) has joined the team and we was working night and day to make the things work. james even did an task that wasn't supposed to (like replace that garbage of captcha by recaptcha. the difference? one can be readed easily by any automatic spam bot, the other one, don't). that task was supposed to be from the owner of this site (aka frank and/or caesar), but none of them was reachable for months;
- finally, we realized that to put an end to the spammers (because we had access to the admin control panel, but we didn't had rights enough to update the forum software, that could help a lot), we had to set a lot of undesired measures, like lock most of the free mail accounts to activate the account and also set IP bans. also yours may have noticed, there's a dozen of bad words that was banned as well (not all english bad words, because i didn't born speaking english and my vocabulary to this kind of word is very limited. this did any problem to the users? it bring problems to ourselves, in deed. james had an gmail account and once said that if we set an ban to gmail (the host of 99% of the email accounts taken to register spammers in here) we was setting an ban to himself. well, that just locks the new accounts, not the old ones. also, to be honest, yahoo was locked as well (and guess where my email is?). of course, it stopped the spam at once. i can look into the log of bans that i was doing and take a few dates, but to be practical, we had 1 spam every 6 months, if so
- then, james has quit. for months, i've tried reach frank (and to be honest, i didn't had any hope of this). as an miracle, he replied. i almost had an stroke when he said that was bringing new blood, that the old guys was coming back, etc. the forum software was even updated. this in did was an huge joy and to make the things work again, i've toke almost all the scripts and started to work with. please notice that at that time, i had 2 jobs and my paid works was from 8am to 2am, every single day one the week. no vacations, no nothing and besides that, i had my own life, an wife and a few cats;
- one day, my work load finally stroke and my marriage was over. yes, i was working a lot in deed, but i've said to anybody that she had leukemia and didn't had any job due that? no, i think that i didn't said that to no one and toke that as my own fault. for months, i was a lot depressive, but i was still working. and no, this isn't any lie, she is alive and well even today, but has moved to Rio de Janeiro. today, we are nothing more than friends, but ok
- to help my depression at that time, i had an fight with the wrong person at my job (the other one was as self-employed) and my life become an real nightmare. but i still was working;
- after an long time, i've got an girlfriend, just to loose her after a few months due my work load. that's ok, i've realized then that my workload was too high and quit from my work as self-employed. i remember that some guys said that i was being crazy, because i was quitting from the job that paid me more, but i also didn't had an "that's it" time and i also deserve an life. also, i've found another girlfriend and loose an girlfriend again due my job was really out of the question. also, at that time, i've started to fix some issues that was bothering me since long ago. with that, i've discovered and i've already have lost part of my left kidney (about 3cm and was growing 0,6cm by month) without any particular reason, my doctor only said that my stress level was too high and i had to decrease it. at the same day than the doctor said that, my work as self employed was history. no more and i've started to fix a few other things that was increasing that. even now, i'm with an metallic smile (sorry, i don't know the proper name for it in english). due some reason that i don't know for sure, i've started to sleep a lot better and i no longer require any medicine to breath. i hope that be like that forever, but so far, so good
- then, an user has reported an issue with url123. also we was without any right to reach the forum control panel anymore (this was the very first action taken after that so called "new blood" thing), i've tried reach frank again. and it worked. frank has fixed the issue, by upgrading the forum software. at this point, my nightmare has started: spam, spam and more spam, the forum only had that. some days, we was having 5-6 spams and lock the user didn't worked (of course not. they wasn't being banned by ip, nor we had any free mail lock anymore). it was really hard, but tracking those guys, i've realized that all the restrictions for registration was out... what i've did? i've tried reach frank again. no reply. by luck, i've saw that caesar was logged and send him an pm. i know that he has readed it, but no reply. some time after that, i've finally reached frank, that said that my mails was going straight to the garbage. that's ok, it happens. he said any word about unlock the free email domains? no. we only said that "gmail wasn't the problem". at that point, i've realized that i was being an idiot by working day and night to keep the things running, without any hope or tool to put an end to all those spams. the only one thing that i could do was ban them, one at a time over and over (to someone amusement, perhaps?). when i've realized that, i've noticed that i was doing all this alone, for nothing, that i already have lost some of the people that i've loved and that's it. everybody patience some day runs out. and mine was over
oh yes, the so called "new blood", so far, i didn't saw it. and no, i don't have any patience anymore to keep mailing someone that will reply only when rains (or something like that).
so, i've quit. some of the things that i've already lost are forever. before i loose all that remains, i've quit
i'm pretty sure that this will bring a lot of extra work to domenico, i'm pretty sure that a lot of users will stay without any reply and that the project may even die due that, but that's it.
before criticize, read the post and put yourself in my place
thanks for your patience by reading this, but it is like it is. some things may be out of time index, but it's it anyway
ps: i've saw a lot of spam over the forum, but i will not ban or erase it. that job is to the ones that have unlocked pandora's box
oh yes, the reasons that make erik quit are all still present, without any change
[]s
Edited by Cristiano, 24 January 2011 - 08:53 PM.
1
. That is incredibly unfortunate for us as users, since he was the maintainer for several of the releases (for me, the XP SP3 and the Addon Packs). I have to question gUiTaR_mIkE's future involvement after reading this thread too. gUiTaR_mIkE has proven quite helpful in resolving various problems that have cropped up in releases in the past. I suppose it'd be hard to help when there is nobody to assist 
.
Let's not forget Antony, for without his updates to the software, we would not have the ability to update a Windows 7 machine.
