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Stratics Plus

L

Lady Starr

Guest
Stratics has become like a second home in the online world to me. I will do whatever I can do to help it stay intact! I have made numerous friends and the info in itself is worth it! Keep up the good work!

Lady Starr
 
T

themagi

Guest
Is this a subtle hint that we are going to have to pay for stratics soon or we wont be able to access it?
 
L

Lady Starr

Guest
I dont think it was no. I think they will keep stratics plus as a "choice" Which IMO I think is a good move. Let those "choose" to support or not to support.

Lady Starr
 

Den

Founder
VIP
Alumni
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
No, if that were the case, we'd just block everything and charge for it. /php-bin/shared/images/icons/wink.gif The reason we're posting this request is so we never have to do what you've described.

Hope that helps clear things up!

-Den
 
D

Dern_Ironskull

Guest
Without Stratics, where would the GMs tell you to go when they don't know the answer? /php-bin/shared/images/icons/members/krakrani.gif
 
G

Guest

Guest
Stratics will never go to that visitors have to pay. The contributions you make by becoming a Stratics Plus member are all volunteer and we will never ever make Stratics completely subscription based. The problem is just that people do not realize how much operating such a network costs and that the ads dont pay that anymore. Without the + members, the network would be forced to go offline, which would be a desaster. If people pay a small fee to help pay the monthly fees and maybe even some upgrades for our hardware (which benefits all) on their own, by joining the + membership program, we can continue to flourish and expand, to become a better community resource for all the games we cover. Those who cannot contribute or do not want to are free to not do it, however, we count and depend on the many who have had and will have a use for Stratics in their daily visits to the internet, to support us financially. Money makes the world go round as you know - that also counts for Stratics. We do our work for free, but the hosting fees and bandwith is quite expensive - each month. Once again: we will never force people to pay if they want to use Stratics. All that you contribute to us is your decision and we are thankful for every member, since it helps us greatly to continue our existance as a community oriented MMOG media network.
 
G

Guest

Guest
Considering the value I have gotten out of UO, EQ, E&B and NWN stratics sites, the 50 cents a week I pay is a deal.

If that not good enough...for 50 cents a week you can rename your post title to.....Old Grump /php-bin/shared/images/icons/smile.gif...ok, maybe you would want something else for your personal title.

But seriously, how many times have you read a post on stratics that has saved your butt in the game, or helped you gain that title/loot/house/ kill that boss MOB etc.

The number of times Crazy Joe's post on unstealable boat keys saved me from loosing my stuff at the Fel moongates is priceless :0
 
F

Farquhar

Guest
will stratics shut down if you don't get enough plus members?
 

Den

Founder
VIP
Alumni
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Whatever chance there is of that happening, we'd like to avoid through informing our readers of our current predicament. Hopefully, if enough people understand and sign-up, we will not be forced to resort to more desperate measures in order to stay online.

-Den
 
F

Farquhar

Guest
Was OSI aware of this when they canned their boards?

They said everything was secure...
 

Den

Founder
VIP
Alumni
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Everything in relation to the UO Boards is secure, and will be for some time.

This situation pertains only to the bulk of the Stratics Network, as well as its growth and stability over time. Please understand that this isn't a black and white situation; not just a light switch that may or may not be flipped off at some point.

We're trying to continue a service that has a very high level of expense related to it's operation and maintenance. Stratics is multi-faceted and has many different portions that may or may not be affected simultaneously.

Don't everyone go Chicken Little on me, now. /php-bin/shared/images/icons/wink.gif We're politely asking for assistance so we don't have to worry about the sky actually falling.

-Den
 

Den

Founder
VIP
Alumni
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Howdy,

As you may or may not be aware, we have been adding more and more advertisements to our pages over the last couple years. This was an effort to offset the declining ad revenue we have been receiving during this period. Over the last two years we have seen our overall number of daily impressions go up and our ad revenue go down. This is very important to note because this means our expenses have gone up, but our income has gone down. We worked very hard to overcome this by adding more pop-up ads, more intrusive forms of advertising like takeover ads, flash ads and so forth.

Even with these additional advertisemets, our ad revenue is no longer enough to cover our hosting fees. Let me reiterate the importance of that statement. Advertising alone no longer covers our monthly hosting expenses which cost us thousands of dollars a month. The irony of growing expenses and declining revenue should not be lost here. I’d laugh if it were not so serious for this network. We have done everything in our power, and I do mean everything – we’ve sacrificed quite a bit - to keep this network online.

We have worked hard to provide a valuable service to the MMOG community by providing as much information and services as we can for each title we cover. By offering community forums, news and information, guides and reviews, developer chats and interviews and so much more we’ve strived to become a complete online resource. We hope that you’ve come to count on Stratics as a source for information about your favorite MMOG title.

We tried hard to avoid exactly what I am doing here with this message to you; asking you for help. But really, it has come to just that. We need our visitors to help us stay online. Yes, it is that serious. We have done the best that we could to keep the Stratics Network online without any cost to our visitors, but we just cannot achieve that end through advertising alone anymore. The trend we’ve seen over the last year or so has been sites like ours asking for donations or offering membership services. It seems we now must move in that direction as well.

In order to try and help offset this declining advertising market, we’ve launched a new service called Stratics Plus. In partnership with Flashlink, we can now offer an ad-free Stratics, as well as promising future enhancements for our Plus (and, as always, non-plus) customers. Beyond that, a Stratics Plus membership helps to pay for our hosting support, and the Flashlink membership provides you with access to a number of other sites that have had to move in this direction.

We believe we offer a valuable service to the MMOG community and we hope you feel the same way. Help us continue to provide these services by joining the Stratics Plus program. I must admit, it is pretty cool to browse the network completely ad free! We do understand that many people have their own pop-up and ad blockers (which ironically might have helped the decline in ad revenue), but Flashlink gives you much more. You also gain some great new perks in the forums. Like the ability to edit your own title, the ability to post polls, special search functions, access to a special smiley icon library of over 55 icons and much, much more. We’ve also added a new EverQuest Database that includes over 11,600+ detailed items and three new modules are in development. They will be added over the next few weeks (one module a week). These include a reference material on spells, quests and factions. A new DAoC database is also going to be released in the very near future! We really want to show our appreciation to those who help us by providing as many tools, features and services as we can. Be sure to watch for announcements as each new item is released.

Your help is greatly appreciated and we hope that with this new service we can not only continue to provide great content and services to you, but we hope it grows enough to allow for us to expand our services even further. So please, consider helping Stratics by becoming a Stratics Plus member today. We appreciate the contributions that so many have made in the past and we really did not want to have to ever ask for a financial contribution from anyone. We have done our best to find other ways to keep the network financially viable; we're just running low on options at this time. For now any help, even the smallest commitment you feel able to make really can make a difference. Please help us so that we can continue offering you the services you’ve come to expect from Stratics.

Warm regards,

Ryan "Den" Findley
Founder

<center>
[ Become a Stratics Plus Member today! | Learn more about Stratics Plus ]
</center>
 
G

Guest

Guest
I'd love to help but you don't take Money Orders and I don't have a credit card.
 
P

Peaches

Guest
Den, I did get plus service, and I have written to the email that dor had given me, as a plus member, I am still getting ads and popups. No response and its been about a week now. Why am I still getting them? Yes, I am logging in and I did what Dor suggested with saving the link to stratics desktop and I don't log out of flash, so when I come in, I am still within flash. Please advise?
 

Den

Founder
VIP
Alumni
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Sorry about the inconvenience! I'm looking into it personally for you...

A couple questions: what type of browser are you using, and is it set to accept cookies?

-Den
 
G

Guest

Guest
Peaches, have you looked for adware on your PC? I found some recently on mine that was generating pop-ups.
 
G

Guest

Guest
now why didn't I see that? hehe

Tnx, I'll send the MO friday when i get paid /php-bin/shared/images/icons/smile.gif
 
G

Guest

Guest
Peaaches could not post, and would not show the + membership icon if he/she did not accept cookies.
Peaches, after they got mine to work I still had to delete all cookies and delete my cach, then chut down the browser and restart and log back into both Stratics and Flashlink it to make it work.
 
G

Guest

Guest
* blinks *

I forgot just how large Stratics is at times. I have no clue who you are and we are both Admins.
 

Den

Founder
VIP
Alumni
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Hehe, I'm the guy who started it all. Nice to meetcha. /php-bin/shared/images/icons/wink.gif

-Den
 
P

Peaches

Guest
Den, I am using internet explorer. I dont know what version and don't know how to find out. Am not all that computer literate. ;(

Yes, I do know it uses cookies, but thats all I know. ;(

Thank you and sorry for my lack of ability to be more computer literate!

*sighs*
 
G

Guest

Guest
Ahh...Ok Peaches, to fix this you need to do the following:

From the top tool bar select the TOOLS
On the tools menue Select INTERNET OPTIONS.
Push the DELET COOKIES button
Push the DELETE FILES buton. (This clears both the cach and cookies, you will be logged out of both stratics and Flashlink by this)
Close your browser.
Start your browser and log back into Stratics and Flashlink.
Wolla, it will work.
 
E

Egg

Guest
I love you stratics! Thanks for the years of info, I'm finally able to give back! /php-bin/shared/images/icons/laugh.gif
 
S

Selenna

Guest
Any idea on when additional information for Plus members (special databases and such) that pertain to UO will be implemented?
 
P

Peaches

Guest
Ok, my problem seems to mysteriously disapear, what did ya guys do? And thanks! Am getting no more popups!!!!
 

Den

Founder
VIP
Alumni
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Riiiiight on! /php-bin/shared/images/icons/laugh.gif
-Den
 

Den

Founder
VIP
Alumni
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
We don't currently have a set timetable for the UO side of things, but we do plan on eventually moving existing UO data over to a more comprehensive database system. Right now, our priorities are fleshing out the info for games we do not adequately cover at the moment (such as DAoC), so we don't know exactly when UO-specific DB features will be rolled out. We'll definitely keep you posted.

We should be able to release a calendar of scheduled database rollouts in the near future, but that can only happen after we've got bugs and technical issues totally locked down. /php-bin/shared/images/icons/wink.gif

My next Plus wish: @Stratics.net e-mail addresses for members. This will be coming as soon as we lock down the bandwidth situation.

-Den
 
W

Wyrmsbane

Guest
...that @members.stratics.net would be more appropriate to reduce confusion with Staff.

Damien
 

Den

Founder
VIP
Alumni
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
We'll definitely work out any logistics problems internally before launch.

-Den
 
X

Xena Dragon

Guest
I'm stirring in the pot already Selena. It most certainly is my goal to bring Stratics Plus members lots of UO goodies in the near future /php-bin/shared/images/icons/smile.gif
 

Shelleybean

Certifiable
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
OSI needs to step up to the plate and help out Stratics. I'm sorry, but it's just not right that OSI gets to reap all the rewards with Stratics promoting their game, providing information, etc and leave you guys with all the responsibility and financial burden. It's just not right.
 
G

Guest

Guest
"Hehe, I'm the guy who started it all. Nice to meetcha.

-Den "


Mo....Mo....MOMMY?!?!!

* Thrust head against Den's Bosom *

Where have you been all my life? LOOK! I TURNED OUT CRAZY!!!!

* sobs *
 
P

Peaches

Guest
But, this is what Stratcis chose to do, for many many games. It seems to be that it is a fair exhange between stratics and the other game companies as well.
 
G

Guest

Guest
Actually it's a growing trend in the "Free" Websites that I've seen start YEARS ago.

Fark.com, provides free links to funny news articles. For a little extra donation, you get the links before anyone else, including the naughty links, which will most certainly go down with the massive bandwith.

Some news sites offer the same service, even headlines emailed to you - as an incentive to donate to keep their site open.

I think Gamespy network years ago added pay program to get first dibs on the FTP downloads, because the amount of downloads were INSANE and they had to keep it up somehow.

So, this trend started long ago by many other companies, more than I listed of course.

It comes down to a very simple equation.

If Stratics can't make enough money to pay the server host, then the site simply goes down. If anyone can't make heads or tails of that, then we can't make it any clearer, and they will be the ones complaining how 'poorly run' it was when (if) it does go under.
However their complaints won't be heard as much, as the flood of posters go to the next best free site, load their servers down, and cause another crash.

As the saying goes, "Nothing in life is ever, truely, free".
 
Y

Yugiri

Guest
Well, I for one have finally decided that supporting Stratics is definitely worth the cost. I have used Stratics almost religiously for the two and a half years that I have played UO, and I don't know where I would be with out it.

I remember how disappointed I was when Stratics first went to the pop-up ads. It was quite a shock, but it is the nature of the Internet. Now with the state of advertising on the Internet, the quality of free content is slowing dwindling. The fact that Stratics has moved to a voluntary paid support model is commendable. I for one have no problem sharing my contribution with those who are unable or unwilling to support such an important service.

There will always be people who will absolutely refuse to pay for any online content. That is the freedom of the internet. In fact it was the immature and vitrolic response that I have seen to the roll out of Stratics Plus, that has pushed me to finally place my money on the table.

Stratics has always been the first place I have turned for news and information. I believe in Stratics, and I for one want to, for the first time, give a big Thank You to all of the people who donate their time to making Stratics the place that it is.

Now if only Stratics could set aside a little money to buy a spell checker for the forums!/php-bin/shared/images/icons/smile.gif
 
B

bone daddy

Guest
Well the condom ad with the flying condom (there are actually two ads, one looks like a blown up condom and the other looks like a discarded condom) has convinced me to get on Stratics plus. May be is you guys put more seedy ads on more people will switch...
 

Den

Founder
VIP
Alumni
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
*jots down the note about a spell-checker for Stratics Plus members* /php-bin/shared/images/icons/wink.gif

-Den
 

Ludes

Babbling Loonie
Alumni
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
I am with those that are glad to be able to give a little back. 30 bucks a year is a small pittance to pay for the comraderie and info I gain from Stratics.
 
D

Dern_Ironskull

Guest
While you are jotting things down.......

How about a discussion board?

The current discussion board is...
not formatted to actually hold a discussion,
the current stratics posters have claimed it as a clique board,
The mods don't want to have anything resembling the MuUO boards in this forum, and especially the MyUO posters...
And they are willing to "fight" for this

I don't want to "fight" your mods.
They don't want MyUO posters in their forum, thats cool...One more board can't be that difficult.

Thanks for listening...
 

Den

Founder
VIP
Alumni
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Well, we definitely don't have a policy of "fighting" users who have come over from the myUO boards. If anything, our number one priority has been to make the transition as smooth as possible, and to make all new users feel at home here. Of course there are always some rough spots when combining two forum populations into one community; but if you notice anything out of the ordinary, please e-mail me.

We will be ensuring that Stratics Plus members have a private forum or two. These will most likely not be game-specific, however.

-Den
 
D

Dern_Ironskull

Guest
From your response, it doesn't sound like we will be getting a new UO forum, a discussion forum, and that is too bad.

One other option would be the ability for plus members to toggle between date-slip and bumping, but the latest word on this says that it might not even be possible.

If the two options above can't be developed, then I think we may have a real problem on our hands. Removing the current date slip fomat of Uhall, would be in effect, like taking that board away from the posters who have always posted there. As an ex-UO board poster, I know what this is like, and would not wish that on anyone. However, leaving that forum with the current format would also be the insult added to the injury of the UOboard abandoment.

Unless the date-slip option can be modified for plus members, the ex-UOboard posters like myself will still be without a discussion board we can use in the format we have come accustom to. We can only post in a forum that does not function for us, or not post at all.

Hopefully there will be good news soon.
Thanks for listening.
 

Den

Founder
VIP
Alumni
Stratics Veteran
Stratics Legend
Yeah, and it doesn't rain candy raindrops either, what a world...

Seriously, we have a ton on our plate and must prioritize our limited staff and resources. This isn't on the top of our list--and won't be in the near future unless we see a huge demand for it.

-Den
 
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