What is clear is that apparently the community's technical needs were dependent upon one person, which is never a good thing if that person isn't as available as he or she once was. (I know this from personal experience, as I've been down that road myself.)

It's also a matter of priorities, as well as the technical complexity of how the forums were setup. It's easy (it took about an hour to setup these forums) to setup forums for a small group (10,000 or less members). But when you hit numbers like 50,000+ members, well, you definitely have to plan for additional technical resources (2 well-configured, hardy servers at about $300/month total would easily handle that). We have 1/5th the size of the community but have never been down for more than a day in 7 years.

I am happy to lend a hand (or technical hand, if need be) to help in any way possible in getting BT back up and running. JL knows me and my background, and he knows where/how to reach me if needs anything (he lives down the road from me!).

DocJohn

If it's to be a success, he also needs to reavaluate his moderators. Too many good people were banned, unwarrented for alot of them. No explanations were given by DH, just **Boom, your banned**. that isnt fair.

you got that right

MSWorld seems to be funded in large part by Berlex so certainly approaching the Big 4 would seem to be the order of the day.

To whomever started this place while the regular forums are down...Thank you.
Cherie

Who's Got the Database
 

I don't know anything about how John was running the site, but I do know how much I missed having it, even though I had not been posting much in recent months.

If John's "moved on" to other interests in his life, does anyone have the ability to get the database?

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation sure has a lot of money they HAVE to give away, and soon. This is one really good cause for them---if there was someone to run the thing.

Mr. Lester HAS NOT moved on from BrainTalk. There is a new update at the BT site that gives a little more detail as to what happened.

The timing of the crash is why it's taken so long to get BT back up and running.

While I personally think BT needs a "mirror server" desperately, that is something that Mr. Lester has to realize.

I also think that he needs at least 1 person he can share the responsibility with. Only Mr. Lester can make this decision however.

What is a 'mirror server'???

A secondary or another server to function as a "mirror" or backup for the main server.

Bobbi is correct :)

A mirror server most likely would've kept BT online while the main server crashed and gets repaired.

It would depend on how the mirror was set up though...so it's not a 100% always work never fail solution.

Just a thought:

Since a mirror's purpose would be to function as a backup, wouldn't it cost less to have a mirror site running off hosting servers - as is this domain? Anything goes wrong with those servers (being used "as needed"), the repair cost falls to the host. Too, an advantage would be that the mirror site files could be accessed from anywhere ;).