Clan of the Angry Monkey (FFXI) - Admin Notices

The end of ClanAM FFXI

sam — Wed, 02 Jan 2008 14:12:40 -0500

Many of you knew this was coming, and a recent broken 360 that has kept me out of the game for a month has spurned me to make it official...

Effective immediately, Clan of the Angry Monkey FFXI is closed.

We've had a good run, operating since May 2004 and running several hundred events. We've been a part of everything from an in game wedding to getting many players to end-game and past many missions. We've had an excellent community-driven guide section, thousands of forum posts, and active polls. All in all, I'd have to say we've exceeded any expectations I ever had when I first started the FFXI branch of Clan of the Angry Monkey, and I wanted to say "Thank you" to everyone who made ClanAM-FFXI such a great place for as long as it's been around.

Why are you ending ClanAM FFXI?

I know a lot of people are asking this, I've certainly been asked in private many times, but the main reason I'm ending ClanAM-FFXI is because I personally have little interest in running it any more. I'd personally rather focus my efforts on ClanAM FFXI End Game as well as ClanAM 360.

I've actually felt this way for many months now, but my 360 dying (forcing me out of the game for over a month now) was the catalyst that made me realize I needed to make it official.

Are you leaving FFXI?

I am not leaving FFXI. Maior (and all his mules) will still be around. I will still be leveling, leading up the occasional end game event, and doing other game things.

I will, however, be playing much less. I will also probably not be hanging around in any social LSes. Honestly, I just kind of need a break from it all.

What will happen to the ClanAM FFXI website and LS?

Both will continue to operate until January 2008. In January 2008 I will discard the ClanAM FFXI LS and disable all accounts on the ClanAM FFXI website. The website will remain online as long as I still host websites (e.g., likely for a very long time), it's just that no one will be able to create new accounts or make new posts after January 2008.

I am leaving the website running normally and the LS running as usual until January 2008 to give people a chance to say their goodbyes, get the word out about ClanAM FFXI, and find other alternatives. Sure, I could just {/breanklinkshell} and disable accounts on the website now, but that would be kind of a rude thing to do to all my friends :-P

ClanAM FFXI End Game and ClanAM 360

If you're interested in joining ClanAM FFXI-EG then head over to our site. You can also contact me in the game, or just show up for the events. ClanAM FFXI-EG will be events only, there will be no social aspect to it beyond the events. People are free to drop the ClanAM FFXI-EG pearl after the events are over, we will make you a new one for the next event. If we ever start hosting large events that would make this difficult, we may change this policy, but for now keep it or drop it between events... we don't care.

If you are interested in the ClanAM 360 events, note that until my 360 comes back from repairs there will be no events. This means that the next ClanAM 360 event wont be until October (2007). If you are interested in joining us in ClanAM 360 events, please watch the ClanAM 360 website or contact me in Live (gamertag of 'criswellious'). Starting in October (2007) we will be hosting Halo 3, Team Fortress 2, Burnout, and many other events.

Thank you all

In closing, I'd really like to thank everyone who made ClanAM FFXI such a fun place to be. I sincerely hope that I will see you all again in other ClanAM venues!

Legacy problems

sam — Wed, 28 Mar 2007 14:27:03 -0400

Apparently in the last Drupal upgrade the Legacy module stopped working for our old posts.

For those who don't know, the ClanAM sites have been powered by Drupal since the Drupal 3.x days (for 3+ years now). Previously, Drupal had various URLs for different things. Every top-level post on the site has a specific node number associated with it. However, depending on what type of node the node was, the URL would be different.

For example, if we had node number 232 that was a book, the previous way to access that node was with the following URL:
http://example.com/book/view/232

Site Admin Update

sam — Mon, 05 Mar 2007 11:23:52 -0500

Just as a heads up to everyone, I'm currently in the process of moving. Combined with my job, I've become entirely too busy to maintain this site or to lead up any events in the game.

Until my move is over, I wont be leading any events and my online time will be sporadic. Please be patient, as everything should return to normal once this move is over.

I've removed the 2 Week Event schedule from the front page temporarily. After I move, I will put it back on the front page and maintain it again. My weekly ENM/EXP page open-invitation static will still be running, and everyone is invited.

Right now, my move is scheduled for 07/16/2007. Expect more activity from me within a week or two after that.

Thanks folks.

2007-02-20 Site Administrative Update

sam — Tue, 20 Feb 2007 17:14:49 -0500

The update I mentioned here has been partially complete. I've upgraded to the latest Drupal and incorporated some new modules.

However, not everything is working perfectly. Read on for the details.

2007-01-22 : Site Issues

sam — Mon, 22 Jan 2007 18:28:56 -0500

Hi, folks.

In case you haven't noticed, we've been having some site issues lately. These were partly due to an attack on the site for the last few weeks, and partly due to the fact I haven't had much time to deal with these problems for a while.

I will be upgrading some things on the server and this site in the coming week, so stay tuned. But please keep in mind that, during these upgrades, you may find some errors and problems on the site. Don't worry and don't fret about them, they will be temporary during the transition.

Also, the attacks we've been having have been from spam-bots submitting links to generate link spam. I've done my best (considering how little time I've had lately) to block the offending bots and close up the holes. But if anyone finds any further uncaught spam on this site, please let me know (with URL) and I'll deal with it ASAP. Please post found link-spam in this thread.

Thanks for your patience, guys. -Sam

Private Messages Beta

sam — Wed, 04 Oct 2006 14:46:11 -0400

We have a new feature on the ClanAM FFXI site that allows our users to send and receive private messages between eachother on the site. If you look at the user navigation box on the right side of the page you will find a new "my inbox" link:

You can see how many new messages you have, as well as access your messages by clicking on the "my inbox" link.

I'm not 100% we will keep this feature yet. Please try it out and let me know if you like it. If enough people say they like it, I will make the feature permanent.

Spam bots on the attack

sam — Tue, 03 Oct 2006 09:36:27 -0400

Recently our humble little site has been besieged by spam bots. They have been creating a lot of accounts and attempting to post spam to the site.

I'm asking all administrators to keep an eye out for entries in the admin logs that are suspicious and could be spambot activity.

I am also evaluating anti-spam modules for Drupal in an attempt to quell this invasion before it really begins.

Server reliability issues

sam — Wed, 27 Sep 2006 09:23:08 -0400

Well, there's been a number of complete and partial database failures on our server. Additionally, some people who have IRC accounts on them have been reporting many problems with them. I think we may be taxing our poor little server too far.

By way of an announcement for the admins, I will be conducting research into the cost of migrating the ClanAM portal sites to some new, beefier, server. Something with
* More RAM
* More CPU alottment (right now, we get shared CPU bandwidth)
* Higher transfer speed
* More monthly bandwidth usage

would be keen, I'm just concerned about the cost.

Announcing the Clan of the Angry Monkey Portal Sites

sam — Wed, 20 Sep 2006 19:10:48 -0400

We're pleased to announce a family of gaming-related portal sites here at Clan of the Angry Monkey. These sites will help foster the Clan of the Angry Monkey community's expansion into other areas. The new sites are as follows:

ClanAM Portal
This is the portal site for all of the ClanAM sites. The news and discussions from all of the sites are aggregated here.
ClanAM Phantasy Star Universe
Phantasy Star Universe is a new MORPG from Sega that will be released on PS2, Xbox 360, and PC in October 2006. As soon as it is launched, we wanted to have a community site ready for it.
ClanAM 360
Dedicated to all aspects of gameplay on the Xbox 360. Here you will find forums relating to new and upcoming Xbox 360 games as well as playing older Xbox games on the 360 hardware. Eventually, once we decide on some games and times, we will start hosting 360 online events and matches.
ClanAM PSP
Dedicated to all aspects of gameplay on the Sony PSP. Forums and discussions of PSP games and a schedule of upcoming online PSP events.
ClanAM Gamer Blogs
Would you like a place to blog about your gaming? Have an opinion on some new hardware, announce your latest gaming accomplishment, or just want to expound on the virtues of a game you love? If so, this is the place for you. Additionally, we have forums for a large number of gaming consoles and environments where you can have specific discussions about specific consoles.
ClanAM Final Fantasy XI
This site is nothing new, it is the ClanAM community-site centered around Square Enix's FFXI and has been operating for nearly 4 years now. The site isn't going anywhere, however we will probably be disabling blogging on it to encourage the usage of the ClanAM Gamer Blogs site.

These sites are already active right now, so check them out today!

2006-09-12 : Retirement of old ClanAM site

sam — Tue, 12 Sep 2006 12:05:55 -0400

A month ago I moved the old ClanAM site to old.clanam.org when we migrated to a newer Drupal version. I have now given the new site a chance to prove itself and, short of some minor stability problems, it's worked well enough that I feel comfortable retiring the old site.

Persons curious about what the old site looked like (if you have forgotton, or just never saw it) can check this post which gave side-by-side comparisons of the old site with the new site.