Allright, I'll be waiting for the changes.
I'll go with your words.

Banana Hammock! http://www.furaffinity.net/view/14892437/

Yis

THAT is a banana hammock?! ...I never looked up what they are! XD

Ok, i thought "underpants with braces" was just a variation of "troubled childhood, wooden toys nailed to the floor" meme thing.

where are the weekly updates/announcements going to be made? it seems like a lot of things get posted to twitter that dont make it here until days later, and i know twitter is an easier platform to make frequent updates on, but nowhere near the majority of FA users follow either the FA twitter or yours :x so a lot of it just gets completely lost.

glad to see about everything else though. looking forward to what happens in the next few weeks. i know a lot of people are bailing, but a lot more are still holding on to FA and want it to succeed.

They're going to be posted to site announcements and on FA's official Twitter.

Not my personal one. Official FA news only through official FA channels moving forward.

sounds like a plan. some people might get annoyed by the frequent updates, but theyll probably be annoyed by anything (lmao) and its worth the tradeoff anyway.

thank you for replying!

Hey 'Neer, go look at the forums and tell me why a thread you found okay and agreeable was closed by Chase, who also banned me from there. (And deleted my journal on here.)

PLEASE tell me how YOU own the damn site and yet he thinks he can do whatever the hell he wants.

I *just* started to get more respect for you, and this shit happens. I made that thread for a reason, and what Chase did SHOWS EXACTLY why he has no right to be in an administrative position.

You helped calm a user down, and he just threw oil on the dying fire that you tried to put out.
Is that the kind of person you want on your team? Someone who destroys the things you try to preserve?

I'm putting in a TT about this, just in case its needed (which I hope it's not, since your the damn leader around here).

What really? why?

Ya, might as well. :P

I'm assuming here: https://forums.furaffinity.net/thre.....read-Changelog

man i didnt even know about that, ill keep it in my FA bookmarks. thank you!

The beta changelog is probably going to move from the forums to a text file on site. I may have some of the forum mods make posts if they're up for it, but juggling forums, site, everything else can be a bit daunting at times.

We all fuck up, big guy. I personally don't hold a thing against you.

We're all idiots in our own unique way.

Well, in time... But please Dragoneer, finally make it possible to change the original account name.. like in my case the Icefoxy... I think, its possible somehow... anyhow...

It's something we want to do (as well as permanent removal of accounts) but getting folders done is a much high priority for the community.

Thats definitely great to hear. The folders would be totally great too. Otherwise, just.. change miy name for Ryanwuff on any possible way, I have that name since 2 years now, and its really annoying when everyone call me foxy... Thats all what I want, and also, good luck with the future plans, I truly hope they will turn back FA on the good way soon.

(And just as a small and quiet ~please, take only a minute to look on the note what I sent you)

foldersssssss *drools*

and good bye accounts that aren't used anymore woo that would be nice. I know people with several old accounts that wish they could go bye bye.

Those two ideas would be really great too. And i'm just here want to change my account name, and waiting for an answer X3

yus that would be nice as well, that's part of why some people make new accounts

And so you have more and more abandoned accounts what only eats the space etc etc.. well, yep~ I would do the same, but dont want to take space for a new accound. If I got a new name, all is fine, otherwise one more abandoned acc.

Getting rid of accounts will hopefully include merging their galleries across to the new accounts where that's appropriate. For those folks who opened a new account prior to renaming becoming available.

so far everything the sites staff has said about everything has been just a bunch of bullshit, it's really hard to keep trusting you guys when every time something goes wrong you promise it was a mistake and will never happen again, and then when you try to fix it it all just gets worse. just admit that selling furaffinity to imvu was a mistake, you know it, the other admins know it, and everyone who uses this site knows it.

The original adult ads, and mature ads were really really wrong, but I've seen how much they've changed, and hell, they're actually getting as interesting as the user-made advertisements, so I'm going to say kudos for you.

And it really does take a big person to admit their faults, and how they're working on fixing them. So good job Dragoneer.

But you literally said "adult content" was going to be in those ads, what exactly did you have in mind?

It wasn't meant to be dicks flying through the air like Australian pornorangs. The as were MEANT to be those intended for a mature audience (vapor cigs, dating sites, etc). Not out-and-out porn.

Well I'm sure you'll get it right someday, funny how IMVU is just as upset when they have a history of doing similar things, both on their site and inside their ads

IMVU's interest have only been in making the site and community better. IMVU has legitimately been nothing but courteous and upfront with me since things happened.

When I worked for Amazon, they were pretty much like "Hey, we're going to screw you here! Bend over..." and then sent us links to buy lube from Amazon so we could be ready when we got screwed. And I was Amazon AWS (helping keeping sites like Reddit and Netflix online). I can only imagine how bad the warehouse/fulfillment guys got screwed.

As someone who has worked in a fulfilment centre of Amazon's via a recruitment agency I can tell you that all of that is true but multiply it by ten. Your boss may be an awesome person but the company loves to blame the lowest common denominator. Had to pack boxes using a machine that would break down every 5 seconds and it was always constant complaints that me and the other 2 guys were not doing our job, we explained it but Amazon basically said, "Screw you, you are the problem, not engineering. You are blaming engineering for your own lazyness!" I've worked for em twice in the past and really don't like them as a company, seeing as I've seen what they are really like.

But at least they are upfront when they screw you! XD

For us it was "You're going to work mandatory overtime until we tell you're not. Cancel Thanksgiving, cancel Christmas, cancel anything. Unless you're dying... you're working. Oh, and if you complain, we'll make your life a living hell."

And they did! If you weren't willing to work 80+ hours a week and dedicate your life to Amazon you weren't viewed as a good employee.

Yeah they did that to me when I worked full time for them. "Oh you said no overtime on your contract? Bend over and take it because you are working and extra hour each day and an extra day on top! Don't like it? Then leave, we'll just replace you." I left soon after as it was during my first year of my course and I needed to focus on assignments.

Otherwise, good work on the site despite the mistakes. I know how hard it is to run a website or even to create one!

Sounds totally similar to my old workplace as security.

Australian pornorangs...new awesome addition to my vocabulary, thanks!!! :D

It's their version of Bukkake.

My icon couldn't be any more appropriate to that LOL

Just take your time, don't rush it because taking on to much at any given time will overload you, and that is when things tend to fall apart. I for one have enjoyed this community for a long time now, and I look forward to whatever may be around the corner, (kind of like marriage) for better or for worse.

I'm not rushing it. Rushing it does no good and leads to really botched implementation that ends up being about as pleasant as skinning your big toe (e.g. FA's sidebar on the classic template).

We will see what happens I guess.

Managing a big community is hard and I know it <3

Glad to recognise one mistakes, cuz we all make ones!

The good part is that we learn from mistakes and they're not bound to happen again.

Sadly many users already ragequitted and are having salt overdose, and y'know how furries are. But oh well.

Making a new public apology caaan work, but dunno if those that are more skeptical would get it.

People are always going to think I have an ulterior motive. It's the nature of the game. Part of what I need to do involves prioritizing things in my personal life. FA needs to be my priority across the board (with some exceptions to some life things and spending time with the wife!).

Indeed =3

Just don't give up! Ppl will just want to drive you down!

Looks to me like you're trying your best here. Keep giving it a good shot. I do not have adult on so I did not see the ads so I am not sure what the problem was there, but I am glad you rectified it. You have some support, even if it seems like it's lacking! Good luck!

Good luck Neer. Really want to see site folders. We all do. Sub folders as well if that's possible.

Good on you for somewhat admitting your faults, you've my respect for that.
But keep to your word, and you'll go a long way.
Don't, and you'll be crucified. It isn't a personal promise to you; It's how this community and society works. You make a promise, and you need to follow through or anything you say will be treated as slander.
Impress your users and gain their trust back.

I'm reluctant to take your word for it, but I guess you've still got good intentions. That counts for something.

I'm still pretty pissed off about you doing a massive donation drive and then selling the site immediately after. :l

I had no idea the sale was going to happen. The Donation Drive was needed because I couldn't keep up hardware replacement on the site, and the previous DDOS from a few years ago ended up costing some $1,800.

When the DDOSes were going on I was honestly having a panic attack that I was going to be slapped with a massive bill, and FA was already putting me back more than the ads were bringing, plus the tax bill...

Ahh, I guess bad timing then. The whole situation seemed reaaaally shady from the outside, at the time it looked like you were trying to cash out and run @.@

And from inside, it was notion of "If I get hit with a DDOS bill, do I lose my apartment?". FA already needed cash at that point, and I wanted to try to get the site moved to the cloud, upgrade the servers and try to streamline things. Getting FA on Cloudflare added $400 to our monthly costs alone.

Yeah I guess having to foot the bill if shit goes down can be pretty scary.

Hopefully things look up from here, I'm still pretty uneasy about where the site will be in the future with IMVU in charge but only time will tell.

This is very relieving to hear! Good to know not all of the rumors are true! You are doing good Neer now just keep it up and this website will thrive!

_{TBH I still had some faith left thank you for rekindling the flame I have high hopes for the future to come! :)}

I'm assuming the ads were meant to be more like that generic "game" ad that shows up on my adult submissions? Because if so you really can't tell at all that it's adult oriented.

Well, right now the ads were shut down on mature/adult content because the levels of what we were getting and what we were told we were going to get are two different things. I posted the most recent site article, and somehow ads showing skin tight banana hammocks started showing... and I literally almost threw my keyboard across the room.

I just... I'm not happy with how they turned out. And I know if I'm not happy, the feeling is mutual across the 100K regular users here.

Oh my word. I haven't seen any of these ads; all of my ads are in Spanish.

http://i.imgur.com/yTrviPk.jpg

Likeshine posted it in the comment right below yours. I literally saw this one and just lost it.

I
well, alright that's something.

I don't mind ads like that - ESPECIALLY that one. Is there an option to indicate: "Send any ad you want."? If it helps make y'all money, great. Don't know how often I'll click, but... There are already some VERY adult themes on here anyway, so... Might be something to think about.

I'm getting a LOT of spanish ads... I can ask for a beer and a cigarette in spanish, and that's pretty much it.

I've gotten some ads in Spanish too. I'm surprised to learn I'm not the only one getting them.

Thank you, it is very much appreciated!!! Hoping to never see this shit around here again :
http://i.imgur.com/yTrviPk.jpg

Yeah, that ad... somehow the company behind that particular ad go their ad through when our ads were set to *NON-ADULT*. That ad is the one that got the mature ads taken down.

If I was ever at risk of having an aneurism that ad almost did it to me.

That one is extra extra special, for sure!

I appreciate all that you are doing and I am very glad for the responses I have seen thus far. Everyone can make mistakes and I am just glad that both IMVU and you are taking steps to fix it. Thank you and the entire staff for all that you are doing, dear god knows I wouldn't fare well with that level of pressure.

the mature ads didn't bug me much but the people they DID bother were very vocal about it. I just adblocked and was done with it so not much to complain about here haha.
I'm still using the old UI thought until we get "featured" submissions back on the new one. but honestly I don't care one way or another if the UI is ever changed.
#unpopular opinion

also
I have to admit
some of those ads
fucking hilarious

The issue is accountability. We users still do not have any voice. Whether you do a great job or whether you fuck up, the result is the same - you're in charge. What gets worked on and how it's shaped is up to you. Not us. Its your discretion to listen to us but we really haven't been able to hold you to your promises or guide your decisions in any way aside from your personal choice to adhere to the community's wishes.

As it stands, this is one more 'black mark' on your reputation, a reputation that means nothing because we have no power to make decisions. At no point are we able to say "Enough is enough" and vote in a new leader.

Because this is not a democracy. We're stuck with you.

All we can do is endure. All we can do is hope. Some will convince themselves it will all work out. Others will convince themselves it will never work out. Some will drink the koolaid. Some will abandon ship.

---

Best thing I can suggest, in this circumstance, is for you to ask us what we, collectively, want. What do we want worked on. What do we want fixed. Be our hands, not our voice.

...Some will drink the koolaid.

taking what dragoneer writes/speaks as the truth.
He isnt actually taking responsibility here. It just another action to put the community back in line. people are already kissing up to him again as if the years of true factual criticism of corrupt leadership and bad choices never existed, this isnt the first journal like this that was posted but like the numerous times before the community is so quick to forgive and trust someone that does not deserve forgiveness.

the problem is he did have such a chance you speak of already, many, and he'l just be given another the next time he tes... errr makes a mistake on the community, this is a repeat, nothing more and people like you have already in the past been guilted into giving him a second chance. I am still here because just moving to another site is not the solution. the community needs to change. And we do not rely on Dragoneers will for that, you seem to forget he is an employee no different then any other that can be removed by the community...

And ya ive seen weasyl i do have an account there that i use but the text formatting codes there is something i don't really like lol...

and ya thats why i didnt bother arguing with those above, they just wont care even if facts would be put in their face

I didnt say i was done with FA, just that it isnt the solution right know to move completely anywhere, nor are those the only choices, like i said like any other employee dragoneer can be removed by the community if it just worked together and didnt put its head in the sand in hundred different directions.

And if it comes to moving, might i remind you that the community has moved before if leadership of a website hosting them has dug in on their bad choices rather then complying with the communities will so moving without losing floods of watchers is possible, the community just needs to take action collectively. something that im keep saying, change wont come from dragoneer of his own will, it will only come from the community acting collectively and putting pressure on all parts of this supposed relationship that was forced on us. they will keep pushing till we start pushing back and keeping at it.

it still stands the guy didnt actualy read the whole contract so the notion that he has it on paper that he cannot be removed is questionable, also part of the deal is making FA profitable, Dragoneer so far has done the opposite to meeting that condition of the contract the thing the community would have to do is to convince possibly threatening IMVU that no profit will ever be made while Dragoneer is in his position.

Weasyl and Inkbunny didnt exist back then but there where others just as many as today, just no monopoly...

steps that are 6 plus years late if their really are steps being done. Also Issues that he stands to have instigated, Im not happy because he hasnt did anything but reverse a so called mistake that he instigated in the first place to again test how far the community is willing to be pushed around before the community starts pushing back on him and IMVU. Also i never said asking him to leave but rather forcing IMVU to force him to resign. And the community can do that regardless of the contract considering that IMVUs money does depend on keeping the community here. Its not as if a corporation hasnt made concessions before if enough people speak up against it in a community or social media.

whatever i said what i wanted to say, you can ether encourage collective action to hold those accountable or just continue believing in a inescapable fate.

You've got the balls to say what you know needs to be said at least, so good on you for that. I think everyone could use some more real talk in general, not just here. ...Also, I admit, this was still amazing with the ads and such. ( Vore warning for the unsuspecting )

Bad communication is always a bad sign; now to see if the future will be better or not. But for now, not removing the addblock, because I have the feeling that the adult adds will be back.

Bad communication is not intentional. Being an artist, I tend to get into that "zone" where you start working on something and get so lost in focus that you look up and go "Where the hell did the past five hours go?".

I'm using Trello to better stream communication, and it's helped a hell of a lot. The entire FA team is using Trello to communicate back and forth and it's really made planning/issue tracking night and day. So much better.

Actually, there is reports of you replying to some people and ignoring some, so it does seem intentional in some aspects. A good PR person replies to all, for any dropped messages come back and harms the organisation reputation. Communication is not only about team communication, it's also communication with the public; if you don't respond fast, you lose their trust. (btw, I am a PR for a convention and there is no such thing as letting con goers waiting for a reply on their question, even if it's a simple one)

Second this. Trello's amazing since you legit can see progress being done. Use it for commissions now and it's made being an artist so much easier. In this respect sounds like it's been working wonders for the FA team.

I agree. Here's a screenshot of my UI dev Trello:
http://i.imgur.com/ANXtTpc.png

I love that fave buton entry for journals :)

Awesome!!!! Yeah I personally love the header/footer feature for journals and really want it implemented on the old UI too so when one puts in a header/footer in the new UI they can edit it from there too and not have to switch to the beta to access certain feature like that. Just is a bit frustrating. An internal help page/faq has also been needed for a while to sort out some of the more common issues people have. That would streamline a lot of stuff here I think.

However, Trello doesn't help with PR; helping the communication within the team is great, but if you have bad PR, what's the point?

Trello wouldn't help with PR directly duh, but trello helps with team communication.... which in the long run helps with PR so why not have it? It's great to see them making progress on that front.

I'm doubtful about it; to have good PR, it's not only organization, it's also attitude and vision. You need to see each comment as something that needs to be addressed and learned from it (unless it's an extreme one or a simple greeting) and you have to take time to listen to the people and respond to them. This takes time and is usually done by one person dedicated to it, if it is cared for it. That's what my experience as a convention PR taught me (along university training), but what do I know about PR?

Yeah... but a convention ends, has downtime, and doesn't equate to web PR which is not in-person and is much harder to maintain with the who knows how many tens of thousands of constantly active users on FA. It's kind-of not the same? Just within like 10 minutes there's over 50 comments on this journal dude.

Being in the zone can only excuse so much, it's been DAYS since the problem erupted, okay so you had to yank the adverts, and maybe you spent some time drawing, but what about the rest of the time?!

The worst of the ads were cut by day 2. For a while, we had ads which were fine (ecigs, vapor, etc). Then a particular set of adult ads showed up again, and we pulled those... and it happened again a few days later.

Still that you took so long to publicly address it doesn't help improve your reputation, I've given some good solid advice further down.

Nice to see that you have written this journal, really. I like the idea of the weekly updates, that's something I think was necessary.
Nevetheless, I and I'm sure many others will keep being sceptical until there not only words, but also actions.

I think at this point a lot of problems that people have with FA are beyond fixing. So much has happened in the past that sufferend from bad communication. And that is something really hurts the site and the community. New decisions and updates need to be available before they are implemented so that feedback can be taken into accunt before the shit hits the fan.

Now I'm not saying that you should base every single decision about the site on the community, but you should at the very least hear what they have to say. And then tweak and alter your ideas based upon that feedback.

I've been here for almost 10 years now and I've made lots of great friends here and I love the community, so I will continue to support FA and other sites. But there really needs to be better communication and more care for the community than just presenting them with final decisions.

You're 100% right.

Aww it sounds like you need hugs... *hugs*

It would be nice if we could block /just/ the google ads. I have no issues with seeing ads for/by the community. It's the ads for dating sites and HBO that I object to.

Do not speak ill of the HBO. Anything that gives us Game of Thrones is one of the greatest entities on the planet.

Speaking of: have the Game of Thrones Western theme. The Good, the Bad and the Lannisters.

Yea, except I don't have cable so there's no way for me to get a subscription to HBO

Winter is coming... to a TV neer you

You can, with AdBlock Plus, as that's exactly what I am doing. I see the original community sponsored ads, and I don't see any of the third-party google ads / juicy ads, etc. My recent journal shows which filters to add to accomplish it. Some say that it's bad to block ads because it robs the site of its income. That's not true though. Those of us who don't like the inappropriate third-party ads aren't going to be clicking on them whether they are blocked or not. Blocking them results in a faster and safer browsing experience, and I still get to see all the community-sponsored ads, that I might click on from time to time.

Furry ads support the furry community, so I allow those.

Google ads and juicy ads only support IMVU and google, but not the furry community, so I block those, and I don't wish them to show up along with my content for other users. They have a higher risk of being a conduit for malware, and there's no such thing as a google ad that isn't being used for tracking and marketing purposes.

Thanks!

I'm still getting all or nothing, I can't get just the google banner to block

Are you using AdBlock, or AdBlock Plus? They are two different addons made by two different programmers. You might need to install the Element Hiding Helper for AdBlock Plus to get it to work.

I still see the furry sponsored artist ads at the top, and the ones at the bottom around the orange FA logo. The wide google ad at the top is blocked, and google ad before the comments on submission pages is blocked.

Just blocking this:
||googletagservices.com^$domain=furaffinity.net
with AdBlock Plus, OR blocking these:
furaffinity.net###ad-extra-flat
furaffinity.net###ad-extra-square
furaffinity.net###ad-extra-comments
with AdBlock Plus's Element Hiding Helper effectively kills all of the google and juicy ads, without affecting any of the furry sponsored ads.

If you also block this:
||rv.furaffinity.net^
with AdBlock Plus, OR this:
furaffinity.net##DIV.ads
with AdBlock Plus's Element Hiding Helper, it will kill the furry sponsored ads too.

In other words, you can block the new third party trashy ads, the old furry sponsored ads, neither, or both. I tested these in Firefox and Chrome on a desktop system using AdBlock Plus with the Element Hiding Helper. I can't speak for other blockers or browsers though. I think FA could make more money and earn a much better reputation if they stuck with furry community ads only, and totally dumped the idea of third party ads. The porn ads we were getting have no place on an art site like FA at all.

The google/juicy ads can also be blocked with NoScript, without affecting the furry sponsored ads, though it probably won't compress the wasted screen space where the ads were in that case.

I have ||googletagservices.com^$domain=furaffinity.net set to block. I'm using Adblock Plus. But if I have it on, it hides everything, off and it hides nothing.

That's odd. I simply went into the Filter Preferences screen (Ctrl+Shift+F), clicked on the Add Filter button, then entered the filter. Toggling it on or off has no effect on the furry-sponsored ads for me, but it effectively kills the google ads.

I don't use any pre-made filter subscription lists in my AdBlock Plus, as all of my filters are custom ones that I added myself. It is possible that some filter rule or exception from a filter subscription list is preventing your filter from working properly.

You could try just hiding the elements instead. That's these rules.
furaffinity.net###ad-extra-flat
furaffinity.net###ad-extra-square
furaffinity.net###ad-extra-comments
These simply hide the contents of any HTML tags that contain an ID of "ad-extra-flat", "ad-extra-square" or "ad-extra-comments", and only when you are on FA. Those tags are only surround the third-party google ads, so nothing else would be affected. The ad images would still be downloaded to your browser cache, but they'd at least be hidden from your pages. Hiding page elements requires having the Element Hiding Helper installed. It adds element hiding capability to the Ad Blocker.

The ad-extra-flat one is the wide ad near the top of each page. The ad-extra-comments one is the wide ad above the submission comments. The ad-extra-square one was the big sidebar ad beside submissions, but doesn't seem to be used in the classic theme any more. For faster browsing, it's better to block ads than to just hide them, but if blocking isn't working, hiding is still better than nothing.

Just do your best 'neer, unlike many here I DO see you and others trying hard to make FA better, more up to date and all. Plus things happen, it happens no matter if it's a business, fair, party or what the hell ever... So don't be too hard on yourself and just keep working and improving yourself, the site and the community here! Just don't over work yourself, we need our 'neer! Rather some wanna admit it or not. *hugs tight* I look foward to see what stuff y'all bring soon to here.

Well, I still believe in FA and you. Though, at the same time, the adult AD fiasco was a little funny and annoying, but yeah I figured they weren't quite the ADs you wanted from the start. With that said, I know you are just as pissed off as we all were, and (complements of my mom, who used to be a self-employed webmaster) know that changing one portion of just a PAGE can take countless hours. Then, add in the fact that you likely have what...10+ servers, 1B+ pages, 5+ Parties, and much more...the workload just snowballs.

i hope u get things worked out soon bud mean like fa does NOT need to have pord ads >< but i hope u guys get things all worked out though

But what about all the porn on the site already? I guess I'm confused that a site that features sex, vore, and god knows what balks at ads featuring ads with underwear wrapped around a weenie. Not attacking - just asking: What's the difference here?

I will admit that despite moments of concern in the past, I have never once felt like I had to leave the site over an issue... until the mature ads. As a fulltime G-rated freelance artist that makes a living off this site for nearly 8 years now, I feel it's imperative that my art and reputation keeps a certain level of class and decency and the ads have made me extremely uncomfortable. I know you have said you are removing the sleezy porn ads, but personally I wish there weren't -any- mature ads. I'd be perfectly fine with general ads, as I have family and occasionally younger kids who check on my art and I just really don't want to be associated with those things.

That said, I really do like FA. It's allowed me to make a living off my art and I will always be appreciative and grateful of that. I just don't want to feel like I can't stay because of something that wasn't my choice. I sincerely hope you will consider informing your userbase before making questionable changes like this in the future, I would hate to see this site slowly die over something that could have been completely preventable with a little communication, something you have had issues with in the past. I'm really hoping this will be taken care of properly so I can remain here and continue to enjoy this site with the rest of the users.

I would have thought you would have learned this lesson with Zidonuke and then the Sidebar.

Kind of meaningless to say you won't make the mistake again, when you already did.

You could plaster your butt over the adult ads actually! That could work too!

So, just... post a picture of a gelatinous cube?

Could work it out!

Foolproof.

never saw those ads, I feel like I missed out on something... I even tried to go looking for them

Good luck, buddy <: 3

Everyone makes mistakes, and it takes a lot to admit to them, and even more that you try to fix them, instead of just being like "oh... damn" and sweep it all under the rug and expect the problem to go away, and bury our heads in the ground like nothing happened.

NDAs, hah!
Think that's gonna make mods stop bitching about the site?

It's about making sure mods aren't leaking user details or private details. I'm not trying to censor mods. There's nothing in an NDA that says you can't bitch about me on the site, just that you can't share private user data or discuss confidential things (e.g. a user ban).

So what, previous kicking of mods that didn't utterly agree with your views on some things have nothing to do with this? Over the last few years, there's been several mods that went against much of how you conduct the site. And every time, it seems that they were removed from staff on the basis that they didn't "Have our best interests at heart." Your staff is currently composed of mostly yes-men and women. Differences in opinion create innovation. Staying as you are creates a deadline free and responsibility free community for staff. As well as trust free.

Well look, its only my opinion, but I totally would join anytime for the site staff. And the reason would be not that when for example Dragoneer says "kick out this guy.. cuz.. he have.. a yellow tail" or so. Nah. In 2009, I found the complete fandom via this website. here I found great friends, as well as great and amazing artists too. For this, I would stay at FA till the last minute, maybe even as staff. But for that I need a miracle XD At the moment a new user name and a answer for a note would make me enough happy afterall.

As would I, in a heartbeat. I have previous associations with FA, under a different name from years ago. In any case, it's not his staff or even Dragoneer himself. It's his morals and conduct in how he treats the staffing of FA. He's surrounded by others who fit the profile of yes-men rather well. That's why many of them have lasted on staff for as long as they have. Chase for instance, was only initially meant to deal with harassment tickets. Now, he's the "First Officer" or something similar of FA. Dragoneer's kicked mods from staff for differences in opinion, and he'll likely do so again. The Mods of FA are are anonymous, and that's a huge transparency issue. Mods who fuck up should be accountable, and yes, I understand it's a dangerous commitment, but you have to be responsible for your actions. This is life. If you fuck up, you'll hear about it. FA is a society, just like any other.

Well, since I dont have so deep look into the "system" or so, I dont want to say anything. Enought to say, I work as a security officer, and theres no -other- name if you do anything. But afterall, I will stay here till the end, what hopefully never will come. Maybe even as staff, who knows.~

It's totally okay. We all make mistakes, and this one isn't something we should all hate you for. I know you'll bring us some great improvements to the site in the future! Most sites don't care at all about user opinions. Personally though, I never noticed those mature ads everyone has been talking about.

I do have one problem though... WHERE ARE MAH BANANA HAMMOCKS?!

Sorry to say but your word is worthless to hold trust in, im not so easy to keep forgiving 100s of times of mistake after mistake for years now, many that could have easily been avoided. Your going have to do more then cosmetic changes and changes to ads to regain some kind of trust.

Explain to me what reasoning is there for any kind of mature/adult ads in the first place, what was wrong with only having the general ads from google that you noted in the original announcement (where you where pitching to the community that you sold Furaffinity to IMVU 2-3 months earlier) as being the only ads service that the community would be subjected to?
Might note just because people draw gore or art depicting intercourse here doesnt mean they all want to see adult products advertised on their page.

to be flat honest Dragoneer you did fuck up you fucked up royal. alot has lost faith and trust in your ability to manage and maintain FA. but if you can freely admit you fucked up like you did Maybe there's hope yet. (dont take that there as my trust or faith in you is there anymore. i see this all as just "Honey'd words.)

it's not just the adult ads thats got people upset, its the fact now trust that we're safe from getting a virus here w/ ads not blocked shattered (a line of logic "it happened once it can happen again.") while the one user that put up a shopp'd "Reported attack site" screencap a few allready have seen it show up briefly till the ads were removed. and that leaves a deep stain on what left is the site's image.

Personally i'd like to just block the 3rd party ads but Ublock origin's Custom rules isnt as straight forward as ABP (and i dont plan on switching back Firefox lags alot less now that i switched.) the whole problem is in this yea people can just block those but new people or passer by's or guests will still see them, and new people that arent lying about age for visiting the NSFW content, could potentially see these ads that could make someone who's just looking at an adult art orientated artist with what some of the ads could imply/ that these said artists may openly be happy to draw anything Nude (tastful nudity) has no desire to be associated w/ such ad-content. ( think thats why a handfull of these artists left.)

As about NDA on mods, yea i can see why Some censorship or atleast restrictions needed. (as you just mentioned to a SammyFox a inch above my reply at the time of this .) "it's all about making sure mods arent leaking details." we've seen time and time again the nasty community backlash when this happens and that stricter policies should be in plats to deal w/ any kind of leaks.

Hoooo boy, where the fuck do we begin?

Given the recent issues that have come to light, I wanted to let you know that I'm listening... and that I'm sorry. Communication between myself and the users needs to be a priority and to better share timelines and where we plan to be.

Oh, you mean like those constant promises of transparency that, as of yet, haven't materialised? Step yer fuckin' game up, this shit is unacceptable, particularly when you've been at this site for ten years and should know fucking better. If you're bad at PR, don't just go 'teehee, I'm bad at this!' - hire some cunt to do it for you who can actually speak to the public worth a shit.

That's something I'm trying to get done, and going through the feedback left in the past few days to try to better address the shortcomings.

Expect that feedback to have the general bent of 'Dragoneer, you're a fucking useless cunt and have been for ten entire years'. People are generally beginning to wake up and realise exactly how quickly this ship is sinking into the shitswamp, and you don't have a bucket big enough to start bailing it out.

I know I've not always followed through on a lot of things

Truer a word was never spoken...

but we're working to improve the site (new servers, larger uploads, site folders, forum upgrades, etc).

Coming 20xx Soon.

Unfortunately, some of the things have taken longer than I anticipated.

Understatement of the century.

That said, I'm going to start following through on my side and make updates to the Beta UI every Friday, and start posting weekly postings about what we're doing, why we're doing it.

Hang on - isn't coding Yak's job? So, shouldn't you be saying 'we're going to get Yak off his lazy Russian arse and put him to work'?

The forums are long due for an upgrade. We're getting a license for XenForo, and will be upgrading the forums soon (I'll post an announcement once I have the dates set).

The forums?! You're fucking around with the forums while the main site is still crumbling around your ears?!

The mature ads did... not go as planned. I'm really angry at it, and IMVU is as well. The ads we were supposed to get are not the ads we *did* get. IMVU didn't want, I didn't want that. A lot of people think it was intentional, but riling up the community and causing anger and user frustration is the *last* thing on our mind. It's not how we wanted things to happen, and it's... well, to be bluntly honest it's a really black mark on my reputation and made me look like a total idiot (more-so than I do to myself at times).

At this point we may as well just dip your reputation in black paint to save time.

But I'm also not going to post "Holy shit, I fucked up" on a news post even if that's the truth (and it is).

And why not? "Oops, I fucked up" is pretty much what the community needs to hear, rather than flib-flobbing around the point and then hiding behind your own personal journals. Man up, get your words out, or hire somebody else to do it.

So I can post it here in my personal journal: I fucked up.

Instead, I'm taking the opportunity to get off my ass and try to fix things to show that I'm in listening to feedback and I'm trying improve the site, broaden the community and make FA a better place.

First time for everything.

I can't change/fix things overnight (oh, how I wish I could) but I'm trying to correct things. Words only go so far, actions go farther. I'm hoping my actions in the next couple of weeks can will prove that I'm working to fix things for the long haul.

Coming 20xx Soon.

I love this site. I love this community. It's why I've been here as long as I have, and I'm committed to making it bigger, better and more spiffy across the board.

No, what you love is the money, and being able to say 'I'm the head of the largest furry art site online'. If you actually gave more than two shits about anything other than your own monstrously-towering ego, FA would have been fixed years ago by somebody competent, because you'd have realised how utterly fucking inept you are and handed over the reins to somebody more capable. We wouldn't be in half as much shit as we are now if you hadn't let your ego obscure the fact that FA was crumbling half a decade ago, and taken on some of the help that's been constantly offered to you from the fanbase at large.

How, how, how you can keep standing up and begging for another chance, time and time again, is beyond me. After all the shit you've pulled over the years, how the hell are you able to say any of this with a straight face?

I'll expect a ban for this, or at the least, a removal of this comment, much less so a response, so I'll have this screencapped for posterity. If you dare to actually address any of this, it'll at least prove you're willing to face some of the well-deserved vitriol aimed at you. Otherwise, feel free to cower away and only deal with the easily-handled questions.

I understand your frustration. I'm not going to justify or even pass excuses off for what happened in the past. It's not exactly a legacy I enjoy having.

What I can and will say is that for once I have the resources to fix things, and that's what we're doing. Yak is working on FA full time as am I. I don't love money. If I were solely after money I'd have thrown countless ads and other features up on the site years ago. It's not about money. Furry is something I enjoy and love and want to foster.

I've mistakes -- more than my fair share, but I've been in the fandom because I love it. The new servers are installed (we're just waiting on a few things to setup before we flip them live), forum upgrades are coming (and they're coming because vBulletin is awful, and we've been wanting to upgrade them for a long while), folders, too.

I'm not going to cover this up, nor try to hide. While I think you may be angry, I think you have good reason to be. I may not agree with you on every point, but I'm also dead set on fixing it. And if I can't, and if I won't, IMVU is not going to have any issue getting rid of me and finding somebody to fill my shoes who can.

I understand your frustration.

Do you? Do you actually understand, or is that just a platitude you keep trotting out to try and get people to feel sorry for you?

Somehow, I'm considering the latter. You truly don't understand just how pissed-off you're making the community, or how pissed-off you've been making them for a decade now. If you did, this shit wouldn't be happening.

I'm not going to justify or even pass excuses off for what happened in the past. It's not exactly a legacy I enjoy having.

Well, shit. Your first up-front 'I've managed to fuck up this site for almost a decade' admission. Screencapp'd.

What I can and will say is that for once I have the resources to fix things

For once? For ONCE?! You had the entire fur community eating out of the palm of your hand! You managed to crowd-source an entirely new fucking server on multiple fucking occasions, Dragoneer. You have had the 'resources' you needed since day fucking one, you just refused to let anybody else help since - yet a-fucking-gain - you let your ego stand before getting shit done. How the hell can you keep a straight face and tell me 'I never had the resources in the past'? All you had to do was open up donations and people would fall over themselves to keep the site chugging along. People were practically throwing themselves at FA to help restructure the base code and get the site working more efficiently.

You turned down most of the help people offered you through ego and pride, and now you have the grit to tell me you only now have the resources to fix this broken-arsed site?

Yak is working on FA full time as am I.

Don't even get me started. Yak's about as capable as a slap from a wet tissue, and the site's current state reflects that. Again, you've had ample opportunities to take on help - and, fuck, the rare occasions that you do, you either take on untrustworthy shitballs, or people with an otherwise-unsavoury past that have no fucking business being in a staff position to begin with.

I don't love money. If I were solely after money I'd have thrown countless ads and other features up on the site years ago. It's not about money.

This is why you've managed to turn FA into a full-time job that keeps you happily chugging along for as long as it takes for the furry fandom to tire of your shit - which is rapidly becoming a very real, very apparent scenario. Let's face it - you kept a hold of FA long enough, in the hopes that you'd manage to turn it into a profession rather than a side-hobby, and now you've managed to monetise the fandom to your own advantage. Please, correct me if I'm wrong, but FA now provides you with a wage - I'd call that 'all about the money'.

Furry is something I enjoy and love and want to foster.

Spend less time favouriting smut and slinging shit across Twitter, and get shit done. Maybe then you'll foster something other than seething rage every time you manage to balls something up.

I've mistakes -- more than my fair share, but I've been in the fandom because I love it. The new servers are installed (we're just waiting on a few things to setup before we flip them live), forum upgrades are coming (and they're coming because vBulletin is awful, and we've been wanting to upgrade them for a long while), folders, too.

Coming 20xx Soon.

I'm not going to cover this up, nor try to hide. While I think you may be angry, I think you have good reason to be.

Me? Not personally, I have no investment on this site whatsoever. I could give less than a shit about the site. What does piss me off is the fact that you think meek platitudes are going to cut it after ten entire years of pantshittery. Saying 'oopsie, Dwaggy dun goof'd! :D' is, at this point, the equivalent of sticking a band-aid over an open lung wound. Cover it all you want, but it's still going to suck loudly, haemorrhage a whole bunch, and be extremely uncomfortable for all involved.

I may not agree with you on every point,

Better start agreeing with me real quick, because revisionist history isn't going to help you when I, and the rest of the fandom, has ten years to look back on and judge you with. I'm not slinging shit for the sake of it - this is the seething undercurrent of a very angry fandom. Get used to looking at it, it might help provide you with some perspective.

IMVU is not going to have any issue getting rid of me and finding somebody to fill my shoes who can.

Better start planning your resume, then. And heaven help us when you DO get the boot - can you imagine a non-furry corporation fumbling around to replace you? We'd be lucky even to get somebody to replace you that even knows what a furry is, much less one who's sympathetic to the needs of the fandom.

Before I go, though: I'm not lambasting you because I'm getting enjoying it. I don't like sitting around and setting a fire under your tail; that's a waste of good fap time. But, fuck's sake, words cannot begin to describe how much you need this fresh-coffee, boot-up-the-arse, slap-to-the-face, splash-of-cold-water WAKE THE FUCK UP. I just happen to be the only one who doesn't give a fuck enough about the consequences to do it.

I agree with this post.

Read this entire thing with Deus Ex voices.

I also agree.

same, in agreement...

You can tell this is what dragoneer needed because nobody with a dragoneer-shit caked tongue has rushed to his aid.

No, dragoneer, it's okay, we'll always love yu :c

He's as much an issue as the people who keep telling him it's okay. No. Dragoneer. It's not okay. It's not okay at all. You are fucking destroying the site and then your blind asslickers come to defend you from people like this guy who are telling you a monstrous truth, but you always look to the asslickers first because you can't handle being told you're wrong.

The Dragoneer Defence Force hasn't rushed to his aid because, for the most part, Dragoneer's let this journal go un-advertised. He's put it up as a meek little side-note rather than openly standing up to the site, publicly, and saying 'alright, people - I fucked up. You all needed to hear that, and I really am sorry for the way I fumbled this'.

You will never, ever hear a full apology from Dragoneer in the places that those apologies need to be made, because he's too much of a coward to stand up and say the things that need to be said, to the people that need to hear them. He'd much rather leave these things as a timid little footnote, and then go back to favouriting porn and fucking around on Twitter, thinking that something like this will do the job.

Ah. Indeed. Still, pretty impressive to not see them. xD

Given how the ratio of positive to negative comments regarding FA's upkeep - and Dragoneer's competence - has been steadily leaning in favour of negative responses over the past two years or so, I can't say I'm surprised, to be honest.

There are always going to be a few die-hard bootlickers who want nothing more than to blindly defend the establishment in the hopes that they'll curry some favour from the staff. That much is inevitable. But, it's good to see that people are - at long last - finally beginning to think more critically about Dragoneer and his competence. Which, honestly, is what the site needs a lot more of, since complacency and apathy is what's allowed Dragoneer to stagnate the site for as long as he has.

Don't get me wrong, I don't hate the man, and I'd much rather praise him than bring him down constantly. The fact that he's even saying 'I fucked up' at all is a positive sign, but I'm not deluded into thinking that one admission of guilt is enough to cover up a decade of sins.

You still haven't gotten a reply to this eh? It must be so easy to come up with excuses with generalizations and then conveniently disappear when it's time to actually answer specific criticisms. How unsurprising.

I got one response out of two. Not bad considering I'd expected absolutely nothing, but yeah - Dragoneer does have a habit of ducking for cover when the questions start getting specific.

Fucking utter destruction. lol

If you're owning up to your mistakes, does this mean weekly floggings from here on out?

Dragoneer, the forums don't need fixing. (Well, they might, but I don't really know, since I don't ever go on them.)

One thing I would like to see, and I'm sure the community would appreciate this too, is a filter system for FA's content. Now, I know there's an add-on for firefox that does this, MADE BY AN FA USER named Syncra, I believe.

Have a system that hides content that has certain words in titles, descriptions, and tags.

I know Echoen is an awesome artist, for example, but I had to unwatch him when he posted three or four scat pictures in a row. There's also someone who has really cool art, but most of it is hidden behind a wall of such pictures. If I could hide those, I'd see wonderful things.

Work with Syncra on this, please. Pay him/her money if you have to. The content is THERE already, make use of it.

(Also, funny note: IMVU tries to be a clean, porn free site, but in the Adult chatrooms, anything goes. AND, better yet, they added Furry content...and we all know the "reputation" furries have...)

I understand, trust me. I hate seeing scat art and extreme gore. I have no issues saying that, too. I'd love a better a filtering system that's efficient for our servers and works based on a fluid tagging system.

And IMVU knows damn well the content FA has. Unbirthing, hyper, anal vore, etc. They're aware it exists, and knew it going in. I made sure they did, to, because I didn't want them to be caught off guard.

...

Which, I might add, was a really awkward conversation to have.

Work with Synchra, she has a system already in place for it.

why bother splitting up the UI's across mobile/desktop. Why not start with something like bootstrap or foundation.

Something that is designed to help you design for mobile AND desktop at the same time. We did this for a project at work, 4 column display when on desktop that scales down based on screen size. We design a SINGLE design and don't have to deal with two different code bases

I have NO problem willing to discuss what I do and how we do it at work. I help design and maintain an internal portal, so the target is a little different, but we deal with probably deal with 15K users a day and over 2 million hits a day

Please...don't reconsider the mature ads...at all. They made FA look like a stroll through a shady part of a decaying metro. We don't need that image associated with our art or profiles.

I've said plenty on the past two Fender announcement journals. (Wordy and thought out after my initial shock at the pron ads.) I won't rehash it unless you wish in a pm, to have it all in one spot.

That said, thank you for removing them all. I hope that remains the case. I rarely comment on your personal space and am pretty quiet about my opinions usually. I hope my verbiage in the Fender journals was helpful.

Now...IMVU owes every user an apology for this, not just putting it all on you in your personal journal. I suggest a case of "Unsee" for each remaining user as well.

One could even say 'dogfuck'.

Oh lookie there.
Hidden by page owner.
How shocking.
Not.

So are you going to introduce the new mods or will it be another "transparency" case?

Well, good luck doing what you want to do around here. Hopefully it works out, chief.

Shame humans see one thing and go off, thinking the wrongs things and assume people are just bad, when in reality these could be people that just made mistakes or didn't even have a say in what happen because it randomly happen. :/

Have you taken in coinsideration to rethink the whole plan with adverts with IMVU? Cause I really think you could succeed and make a whole lot more profit from expanding the community ads instead (say, replace the spots with 3rd party ads with community ones that are a lot more expensive than the small ones, even that 100$ spot was mighty succesful since it never seems to have slots open, you could easily sell even more expensive space for the really wide adverts). The third party stuff is just making people activate adblock on site, which will disable artists ads aswell... which will lead to artists noticing it's not worth getting those anymore. It's even a more reliable plan to have people pay for adverts in advance instead of you getting something little per click.

You kind of ruined the last of FA's really positive sides by putting in the thirdparty ads that you cannot seem to even control, since before people used to talk alot about FA being the only site they disabled adblock on... and now within a short period of time it's turned to 'better keep adblock on or you might get malware from there'.

It's really important to make decisions that are good for the community, since they are the ones making this site what it is, and the furry comminuty has proven many times that they'll do what it needs to keep FA alive, as long as you let them help you by making the right decisions.

Well, look what the worm dragged in.

You make this journal and people are already kissing up to you and forgetting the past days. Allow me to remain 100% skeptical about your words and motives because as the apparent 'head' of the site, you haven't done anything to keep it relevant in the past years. Let's go through this by the numbers:

- "I wanted to let you know that I'm listening..."

You've been listening for almost 10 years now, but not doing anything. While other art sites (not naming any because I'm sure that alone would be enough to get me suspended) go a long way in 10 months, FA is pretty much still where it was 10 years ago.

- "...and that I'm sorry."

Sure you are. If you said this before the IMVU sellout, I might have been more inclined to at least try to pretend that I believe it.

- "Unfortunately, some of the things have taken longer than I anticipated."

Basic, trivial stuff every website should have such as HTTPS? Oh wait, even now my connection to FA is not encrypted.

- "...I'm going to start following through on my side and make updates to the Beta UI every Friday..."

Don't make promises you know you won't be able to keep. Back in January, you promised you'd post regular updates about what's happening behind the scenes. You promised to give us an update every 2-3 weeks. How many have you posted since then? I could count the occasions on half a hand.

- "Yesterday we interviewed two new mods and accepted them on the site." "...so we can start their training and have them start to focus more on art theft."

I'm sure you meant crowd control, right? Gotta keep the rioters in check, right?

- "The mature ads did... not go as planned. I'm really angry at it, and IMVU is as well. The ads we were supposed to get are not the ads we *did* get."

Really now...my heart is breaking for those guys, really. These malware-infested ads that were most prevalent in the XP era were on the site for almost a week. As a result, several artists I watched simply packed up and left to other art sites (again, not naming any because I know it can make the staff trigger happy). Others are contemplating doing so. This is not only inconvenient for the artists, but also for the watchers as well.

And you had the gall to ask us, the users, to view these adds (off-site) and report the results to you? You had the gall to ask us to risk having our computers infected with who knows what when there should have been a dedicated team screening these ads BEFORE you even considered releasing them?

You probably have no idea about how much damage you and IMVU caused with this. I used to turn off AdBlock now and then just to view the artist ads, but this recent fiasco ensured I will never turn it off again, and a crapload of other people are now using it as well. As such, any artists deciding to advertise on FA will receive only a small portion of viewers they could hope for before this entire fiasco.

Do you at least plan to compensate the poor sods who lost traffic because of this?

- "...to be bluntly honest it's a really black mark on my reputation and made me look like a total idiot..."

Well, at least you got that right.

- "Words only go so far, actions go farther."

And you've been doing nothing more than saying words and more words and more words for the past couple years.

---

I wish I could say at least there's a silver lining, but there isn't. The damage has been done; people are now more skeptical of you, the entire staff and the entirety of IMVU itself.

#transparency

LOL

"Words only go so far, actions go farther"

Orly neer

Why not do something then
Instead of hiring new mods with larger and larger criminal records and ignoring the community with an impressive amount of ferocity.

Here. I'll put it this way.

You act like you own the community. You just tell them what you're doing and that's it. And their opinions dont matter, unless they support you. If they say something's wrong you're like NOPE LOL B& (like any other 9 year old with a position of power over anything) or you let your fans do it for you.

When you tell us 3 months after the fact that you sold the site to IMVU, I'm genuinely flabbergasted that the 100% full reaction by the community wasn't "and were just learning about this now WHY?" But the community is stupid so that's really not as surprising as I made it sound.

I think I speak for a lot of people when I say don't bother making any more journals go whore for asspats cuz too many people have been telling you you fucked up. Don't make a fucking journal again until something has fucking changed. And not just "we changed the banner" or "we made admin comments red." People with brains don't care.

I really hope that you will announce to the community first before making a decision that might have a chaotic result. Come to us, let us help out with this site.

"Given the recent issues that have come to light, I wanted to let you know that I'm listening... and that I'm sorry. Communication between myself and the users needs to be a priority and to better share timelines and where we plan to be."

From one core staffer of one site to head of this site, I'm gonna be blunt.

Recent issues? Neer, this isn't a new phenomenon, the latest completely balls out bad mess is a result of issues that have gone unaddressed for nearly a decade. You haven't listened to the community for that decade, why should anyone believe it's changed? It's not about communication, and even if it was, taking days to address the mess and two months to tell us "hey I sold the site", and then talking about "we need better communication" is a kick in the teeth to people.

Two new mods? Can the community dare hope that they're better than some of the other choices you've made? I mean honestly, I wouldn't have 99% of the mods you are willing to tolerate on my team.

Here's the thing, you run mod selections like you're choosing friends rather than co-workers, it's a JOKE. You know why? Because every single bad mod I've ever encountered, whether incompetent or actively malicious, was extremely charismatic and got away with being incompetent or malicious because they were popular/friends with core staff, that's why you can't base selections on "this person is my friend/seems nice" because bad people get on staff that way.

Your organisation skills seem to always resort to you controlling everything and running around like a chicken with your head cut off, and thus not doing a decent job on anything. Delegation is a staffers best friend. I don't try to do the jobs of other staffers, I do my job and I do it well and teach those who help me to do it how to do it well. You cannot be everything to a site. I don't do PR though I'm capable of it, because there are staff better suited to that. I do what I do best and leave other tasks up to those who are better at those tasks.

The forums do not need fixing, they are functional, it's your working process that needs fixing.

Here's what you need to do:

1. Stop being such a control freak and stop letting Yak being one as well.

You have an entire community of talented individuals. Yet the site struggles to improve it's UI chiefly because you wear too many hats and because Yak doesn't seem capable of working with anyone. Either be a manager or be a programmer, you can't be both. Stick Yak on something he doesn't have to work with others on in you must keep him on and get some of the talented programmers in the community in to fix the every loving mess that is FA's code. When you have a individual who doesn't work well with others, either shuffle them into an area that won't be a disadvantage in, or remove them. You wanted to be a manager, you need to manage because that is what the head of a site does.

2. Find yourself a decent community manager and team.

You need a team that can organise taking suggestions and paring them down to just present you with the ones that are A: Achievable and B: A good idea.

You need a team that has credibility, you have solidly murdered yours. So get someone in who can get things done and who knows how to make the community feel valued and listened to. You know you're not great at communication and get distracted easily, so you need someone who can come in and do that job.

3. Fix up a proper robust policy team.

And stop handling reports yourself, you're not only terrible at it, but you can't do three jobs at once. Nobody can.

You need a head of team who is empowered to handle policy, get your fingers out of that particular pie, find someone who knows the laws regarding these thing, or if you can't, find someone who is willing to learn, who cares about the job and I'll teach them a good grasp of the relevant laws including safe harbour, and copyright laws.

For a site this size, that department should also have four regular staffers working under the head of team.

In short, do one job and do it well. You want this site to thrive, learn to give up control and stop trying to do everything yourself.

I notice that I didn't get a response from Neer to this. I bet you could, I've got my own tales from working at sites with similar issues under managers who weren't very good at some or all of their jobs.

Well if you ever want to visit a site run by someone with a point or ten, try storm-artists.net, I'm one of the main staff there, which is why Neer's obliviousness frustrates me. I know what a well run site should look like, and FA is not it. (our main problem is getting visitor numbers up, people want the great service we offer but they also want dA level busy and it's just not happening, so they disappear off).

Oh yeah, I used to work for dA, and I learned as much about what not to do from watching them do things they shouldn't do as I did learn about the legal side of things.

I asked why he's splitting the mobile version into 2 code bases and offered to help in regards to mobile first design...No response

Doesn't surprise me, Neer doesn't seem to appreciate how many people are willing to help with FA.

I've re-read and re-visited your orginal post in this journal many times, because it is a precise and tasteful and constructive criticism of his behavior. There's no reason you aren't deserving of a response from him, and the obvious act of him refusing to respond to you particularly speaks more than his own silence.

Thanks, it's a shame that Neer can't just admit his shortcomings and do something about them.

I'll be honest.

I don't trust you any more.

You put people into the staff position who are nothing but yes men. You leave questionable people on staff, both with past issues, and with a bit of conflict of interests sprinkled in.

You fling things at us without asking what WE, the people who are the patrons of the site want.

You go behind our back, selling the site to a company who's thusfar, proven to simply be people who share the same interests as you, money.

And even when people are here to genuinely help, you self insert people who make the project crash. ( Zaush with the Ben Anderson event, and Phoenix. )

You made the ' I'll have it fixed ' promise already, and broke it, already. And now you're making it again?

I have an idea. Put one of us naysayers on staff. High up. Same level as you and your girl, and Chase.

Give them free reign to fix up this site.

And WATCH, I swear, WATCH, as it improves.

Throw out your yes men, put in some ' That's an idiotic move. Better idea. ' men.

7/1/15

Hey Draqoneer.

As you are aware; I have also been around this fandom a long time (since about 1994) and like you, I also love this fandom and this site.

And unlike many, I simply do not decide to have a problem with any particular thing let alone hold a grudge as some decide to do. Such as those who actually maintain names on block lists that date back 20+ years over long forgotten problems they decided to have and do remember but nobody else does.... *shrugs*

I personally never even noticed the ads and only heard about them because OTHERS had decided to have a problem with these things and they would bring their problems they decided to have into other areas such as IRC or forums and this where I finally heard about their problems they decided to have with this FREE site... And I am like; huh? What? There are REASONS for these things....

At any rate; I for one certainly do appreciate ALL your efforts AND your learning of these lessons and all your efforts and energy being expended to solve THEIR problems...

I feel for you Dragoneer and I am STILL here.
This is what we are all here for. Merely for the experience and the enjoyment of BOTH our successes and failures and helping others.

I am one who is a problem solver. Not one who decides to have a problem then NOT solve the problem I decided to have by running away, crying about it or holding a grudge or blocking my chosen problem for 20+ years.

I am here to HELP and if there is anything I can do; please let me know and I would be very happy to help in any way I can possibly help.

I do love this site and all your efforts and no reason for you to apologize.
Followers apologize while leaders merely ask forgiveness. Then leaders immediately clean up the mess, solve THEIR (other people) problems, move on and continue leading while solving everybody ELSE'S problems with this site and/or the leadership or WHATEVER.

This is what you are feeling. You are having to solve everybody Else's problems they decided to have and this can be a tremendous burden upon you and drain of energy from you. Especially when they FAIL to provide their desired remedy to solve the problems they decided to have then they expect you to provide their remedy as well. Then they get mad again when they decide to have a new problem with the remedy you provided FOR them... Bleah!

At any rate; I am NOT going anywhere. I am here for the duration.

Thank you again for all you do and just being you and being here for all of us.

Kindest regards and have a great, scaly, day! *huggles*

}:>

Who and what is Scorch?
A short bio-
www.furaffinity.net/journal/6436082/

Technically it's not a free site, it costs us time and effort to provide the content that keeps FA as a big hub of the furry community. Many artists also buy advertising.

7/3/15

This is true and certainly a very good point.

Although beyond some monetary and equipment donations I've provided in support of this site; I personally have never purchased any advertising and all my content is non-profit and offered for free.

Thank you for pointing this out as I had not considered that not ALL users are 100% "free" accounts so to speak.
Please forgive my failure to realize the nature and cause of some of these problems some decided to deal with.

At any rate; I still believe Dragoneer is doing his best with good intentions and he deserves our support and respect as he continues to help us solve these problems.

Kindest regards;

}:>

The mature ads did... not go as planned. I'm really angry at it, and IMVU is as well. The ads we were supposed to get are not the ads we *did* get. IMVU didn't want, I didn't want that. A lot of people think it was intentional, but riling up the community and causing anger and user frustration is the *last* thing on our mind. It's not how we wanted things to happen...

I call shenanigans on this.

The porny ads first popped up around June 22nd. The journal announcing the "adult" ads being removed was posted June 29th. That's a week. You can't tell me it took a week to notice the huge amount of backlash on Twitter, on the site itself, and on the Forums.

If the ads you were getting weren't the ads you were supposed to get, and were way outside your guidelines, why weren't they pulled sooner/immediately, while the "problem" was fixed?

I think there's more to this story than you're letting on, and I would assume it has something to do with money and IMVU.

""That's a week. You can't tell me it took a week to notice the huge amount of"" Meh, this comment reply thing is a piece of...pie..

Anyways, YES It does. I learned it now, because since two days theres no reply to my message too, as for much others too. And for your last sentence, I think the same. (Just live the two weeks no answer when an artist wanna have ad space... soo yeah)

And as Drag sayd "Words only go so far, actions go farther." " Instead, I'm taking the opportunity to get off my ass and try to fix things to show that I'm in listening to feedback and I'm trying improve the site, broaden the community and make FA a better place." Maybe he should start wit even answer for the community. Typing a note can be really hard, I feel eeeet~

As I posted earlier, the ads went up and went back down *two days later*. There were not adult/porn ads for a week straight. However, some other adult ads did slip through for a short period of time until the day we posted that journal where we killed them outright.

I don't get money from this. I get no benefit, no money from them. I do, however, get backlash when things don't get right, and that's quite literally one of the last things I want.

You get the same thing all of us get, fame, and kudos. Which might explain why you keep on insisting on keeping a job that you're not very good at because if someone else manages the site, you might get shuffled out of the limelight.

See my above posts - for Dragoneer, this is all about two things, and two things alone:

Ego, and being able to get paid for 'running' FA.

The dude refuses to let go of FA and hand it off to somebody more capable because he's always seen it as 'his baby', even when the entire community has, at this point, risen up to voice their utter disgust at how he's treated it for the past decade. And now that he's employed by IMVU, it's very unlikely he'll let such a cushy, comfortable position slip him by without a fight.

What's unfortunate is how much the average user is going to have to suffer before either a new, competent head is installed, or enough becomes enough and a true exodus to a more deserving site begins.

I know.

You'd think he'd just keep the cushy job, and hire a competent middle manager at the least. But then I guess that would mean having to give up a scrap of control and having to deal with someone who might speak the truth to him.

It's not a matter of 'truth' - although I'm more than willing to accept that Dragoneer's a control freak who doesn't want to lose any sort of power over FA, I'm more in the camp that letting anybody else in to help govern the day-to-day running of FA will have the following effects:

- Dragoneer will shown to be utterly incompetent in comparison
- All the dire shit Dragoneer's been up to over the last decade will be revealed

Well he does tend to surround himself with yes men and almost never responds to anyone who is on point about the problems.

I doubt it would expose much, because for that to happen, he would have had to have been doing more than commissioning artwork, taking praise from the ass kissers, asking for bail outs from the community and playing video games.

*Still sitting here hoping for the best yet still prepared for the worst*

Popcorn anyone?

I waitin' since two days for an answer, lets pass the time *omnomnom popcorn*

And then the broken record plays once again. Saying this same thing over and over again just ends up becoming a moot point. Because anymore people keep expecting things to go south and get fucked up and when something is finally said about it it's not taken seriously or believed. Especially when it takes so long to get any kind of response from it and when you constantly will just pay attention to twitter and respond on there doesn't help anything either. And no people should not have to get twitter to get anything from you.

Also the new mods don't matter if they're being hidden under fake accounts. Because you know so much for transparency. Because all that leads people to believe is it is someone that either left or was forced off because of one problem or another. And if you're worried about other users harassing them or whatever that just further solidifies that whole thought. Because if the right people were put on then there shouldn't be a reason to hide them.

And again I bring up the whole comment of, "caring about everyone on the site and not wanting anyone to feel uncomfortable using it" is still bs and you know it. And even attempting to say something like that just makes it seem even more stupid. Especially after everything that seems to happen anymore on here.

People should not just up and forgive you because you finally put this up and did the usual, "I'm sorry." They need to actually stay firm and keep everything that has happened in mind. Because it keeps happening and it's going to keep happening. Because you won't and don't listen and especially after the selling of the site the users don't matter anymore. That was apparent when you sold the site to IMVU so you could get paid to do this crap and so you could still be relevant.

can we just get updates other than more adds....

so, it's been ~a month since this journal. there was 1 round of updates, then Anthrocon happened (so I'll give you a by-week) and it's now the friday afterwards...any news on a beta update that you promised weekly?

I really enjoyed this week's weekly update. It was a lot like the past three weekly updates:Nothing to read.