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[News]Stratics Continues Under New Management

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Stratics Continues Under New Management

In 1997 Ryan Findley founded what would eventually become Stratics in connection with Ultima Online as a source for information and interaction with a community of players and the developers of UO.
In the following years, Stratics continued to grow along with the community eventually expanding to other games and stands today, almost 13 years later, as a communication source and guide for news and information on your favorite MMO.

In January 2010, Justin Hall took over as General Manager with the goal of positive forward momentum for all gaming, old and new. While Ryan Den Dragon will always be referred to as Stratic's founder, we look forward to testing the waters with JHall at its helm.
We asked Justin to answer a few questions for us to become familiar with our new GM and the experience he hopes to bring to Stratics Central.

Can you start by telling us a bit about your past experiences in gaming and fan sites that lend towards leading this site at the start of a new decade?

First of all, let me thank you for this opportunity to sit down with the community, I appreciate you're time and the time of all of our staff members!

I've been playing UO since beta, and I've played every major MMO, and more or less every major game title, that's been released in the last 15 years. Gaming is in my blood, and I understand the wants and needs of gamers. Moving forward we're going to design and operate Stratics in a way that will cater to these needs by offering the most in-depth, news, guides, walk-throughs, and editorial available.

What made you decide Stratics was the right venue for you?

It's been a website I've read every few days for 13 years, I've known Den for a long time, and I've always had an overwhelming desire to make things succeed.

What are your short and long term goals for Stratics Central?

In the short term: There's lots to learn. I need to meet with the CM's (Community Managers) for every section of the site and focus on getting the sections updated. I'm going to be updating some of the
systems the site uses to make it easier for people to use and navigate, and I'm going to involve myself a little more in the community - possibly with some good giveaways and bringing more volunteers on board to manage some of our currently non-updated sections.

Are there plans to host more contests for gamers and if so could you name a few ideas?

Excellent lead in! Yes, the plan is to spice things up a bit with a few contests and things to get people using and enjoying the site more. Contest goodies will range from gaming monitors, mice, keyboards, and headsets to any number of different game gear items. It'll all fall under the "cool stuff only" rule.

While many volunteers offer their experience and time to Stratics, there is always room for more help as the evolution of the site continues. What type of incentives do you hope to offer anyone ready to hop aboard?

Well something I've always believed in is rewarding kindness. Taking on a volunteer position to post editorial and educate people about the more difficult areas of a game is a pretty awesome thing to do. I'd like to reward people with exclusive staff only contests, and exclusive game gear we'll get from our relationship with developers.

Keeping in mind that Ultima Online became the start of Stratics Central, specifically what are your feelings towards UO and the community that has stuck by these forums for almost 13 yrs now?

I still play constantly, I've always been a fan and I think it's safe to say...You and I...we're in the same boat. forward, forward, back one, back one, drop anchor.

We look forward to testing out our new GM and the goals he has for staff and community improvements at the start of this New Year. Thank you, Justin for taking the time to let us get to know you a bit.

Interview by AirmidCecht




More...
 

Pawain

I Hate Skilling
Governor
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What user name did the new boss use?
 

popps

Always Present
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How sad that the old Stratics' archive got lost without chances to retrieve it.

It would have been nice to go back all the way to 1997 and read again the old story of Ultima Online unfold through the posts of players.......

As a player of Ultima Online, Stratics was always my preferred source for informations and discussions about the game. I would feel strange to see either one without the other.

Best wishes to the new manager.
 
S

Stupid Miner

Guest
How sad that the old Stratics' archive got lost without chances to retrieve it.

It would have been nice to go back all the way to 1997 and read again the old story of Ultima Online unfold through the posts of players.......

As a player of Ultima Online, Stratics was always my preferred source for informations and discussions about the game. I would feel strange to see either one without the other.

Best wishes to the new manager.
Stuff that's lost? I wouldn't know about that, maybe misfiled, but probably not lost.

Dig around with the search function, you can find some strange/old stuff like this: http://uo.stratics.com/bones/html/comics/
 

Taylor

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Awesome interview. I just love that he's a UOer, like the rest of us. He's clearly got a lot of energy and motivation, as well. Though I'm sad to see Den leave, I'm really excited about what the future holds for Stratics.
 
J

JHall

Guest
Awesome interview. I just love that he's a UOer, like the rest of us. He's clearly got a lot of energy and motivation, as well. Though I'm sad to see Den leave, I'm really excited about what the future holds for Stratics.
I appreciate that, thank you!
 

jbfortune

Slightly Crazed
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So how did you take over as general manager? Just ask?

Can I be general manager please?

EDIT: HI!
 

Pawain

I Hate Skilling
Governor
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UNLEASHED
Stuff that's lost? I wouldn't know about that, maybe misfiled, but probably not lost.

Dig around with the search function, you can find some strange/old stuff like this: http://uo.stratics.com/bones/html/comics/
Something happened a few years ago that caused many usernames and threads to disappear. I was posting on a different games stratics forum so I do not know if it affected the UO forums.
 

Nok

Lore Master
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Welcome Justin as the new General Manager of Stratics!
 
S

Stupid Miner

Guest
Something happened a few years ago that caused many usernames and threads to disappear. I was posting on a different games stratics forum so I do not know if it affected the UO forums.
Yea, i know of those... this account name is a product of the more recent account wipe. Just not sure what all was affected by what, I just know we've still got a ton of old pages collecting dust in odd corners of the site.
 
B

Beer_Cayse

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<snicker> Welp, you've been reading and playing ... now you control (sort of). Should round out the experience somewhat, eh?

Welcome to the fray ... in your new position.
 

wanderer1origin

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couldnt have been since begining without out a past please tell
if not a lie and u a manager not player or participant
 
L

Lord Urza

Guest
It sounds like stratics has a very competent new boss, I look forward to seeing what JHall has in store for us, and being of any help that I hopefully can. Good Luck JHall!!!!
 

Basara

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Stuff that's lost? I wouldn't know about that, maybe misfiled, but probably not lost.

Dig around with the search function, you can find some strange/old stuff like this: http://uo.stratics.com/bones/html/comics/
Something happened a few years ago that caused many usernames and threads to disappear. I was posting on a different games stratics forum so I do not know if it affected the UO forums.
Petra, etc. Correct me if I misremember the specifics.

I believe what happened was that we had a 3rd party host for our server in late April or early May 2008, and some tech at said host (who found himself in an unemployment line within 72 hours) took a work order to format & reinstall someone else's machine, and grabbed ours (sitting next to it) by mistake - this was discovered far enough into the process that some sites were near total losses (I think Sims Online/EALAnd, whose game was already within days of shutdown, and Vanguard, were two of them; UO Stratics was pretty much untouched). Attempts to recover backups that we paid for proved unsuccessful.

After a lengthy data recovery (paid for by the VERY apologetic host), we got back 99% of everything else, but the forums were a bit garbled due to corrupted index files, and having to convert from UBB to vBulletin. Only a fraction of the older (over a year old in 2008) files from the forums made it to the new format. I believe the archives still exist, but haven't been converted (it was a massive headache to convert what we did, but it so happened we already had test boards going for vBulletin, that the "Great OOPS!" forced our hand into converting to, months ahead of schedule).

Maybe Justin can find a way to recover and convert all the archive posts, now that HD space is so cheap, and restore them to the forums (hell, I'd settle for a second, stand-alone, read-only format) - if they survived. A lot of Dev comments I'd dearly loved to have referenced, were in the archival posts, that I had to in some cases rebuild the data for the hard way.*

Originally, in the middle of the decade, there had been an archive function set up that moved to archive all year-old posts, except certain posts designated culturally important for their forums, in order to speed up the forums. Only those older posts with that "save" setting (including stickies, by default), ended up making the transition to vBulletin initially.


* (the 5 skill groups for jewelry, for example, were originally described only in a post from the Beta era of Samurai Empire, from both having to tell where Ninjitsu & Bushido would fit in, as well as explaining how a certain bug, being fixed at the same time, that plagued the first couple years of AoS had made Skill Group Five 1% as likely as the other 4 groups - thereby making melee weapon, music or magery jewelry so rare at the time that they brought premium prices compared to other skills)
 

popps

Always Present
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Petra, etc. Correct me if I misremember the specifics.

I believe what happened was that we had a 3rd party host for our server in late April or early May 2008


Unless I remember wrong and my memory fails me, the crash I remember dates way before 2008.
Possibly around 2004 if not before.
 

Lord Chaos

Always Present
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There were in total 2 great wipes and 1 crash. And this lead to vBB.

Last time I looked on the server they still had UBB lying around, though dumped away in a far away corner of the massive mess the server is. Though at this time it might have been deleted as its no longer needed.
 

Petra Fyde

Peerless Chatterbox
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That's essentially correct, to the best of my knowledge, Basara. The server that should have been formatted was our back up though, not someone else's. Some forum accounts were lost - mine being one of them. I seem to be cursed, mine was one of the lost in the last crash too. My post count was partially recovered the first time and set to last remembered the second, which considering I only notice it when someone mentions it, could be quite a long way wrong :D. The date is right though. It's my father-in-law's birthday.
I've no idea whether UBB is still around. I don't have that amount of access.
 
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