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VCL is dead? Vixen Controlled Library is gone???
2 years ago
General
So...apparently the Velan Central Library, popularly known as the Vixen Controlled Library, is dead since about one month.
I dunno why, but knowing this quite old Furry gallery has died...it makes me sad.
Well, it is not fully dead, there is an archive of it, kind of. Pretty much all art and all stories posted there have been preserved by a single person, creating a mirror of that very first dedicated furry gallery website. But all the meta-data, like artist information, text description of the things posted, as well as comments, did not transfer over to the archive unfortunately. I know that was done to save on data-size, making it easier to host, but I stil find it sad. I don't now really why it saddens me so much.
I can recall when I here and there found my way back to VCL again and again in my early days of the fandom, not really looking for anything specific. Though I did look up some specific artists, since you could watch all the stuff there without needing an account. You could even use google itself to search the website, I recall that much.
I think the reason why I find this so sad is that I am a hoarder. Of knowledge, of information, and the likes. And that a bit manifests in my current job as a librarian, I guess. Trying to preserve as much as possible for future generations. So seeing that website go down, and with it so much information, especially the comments...it saddens me. Because comments in a gallery are to me an integral part of a community, it shows people's appreciations, their thoughts, their ideas, their disgust even, it is a mirror or a fandom's social fabric. And now that is gone.
So...yeah. Seems the website already has been dead mostly for close of a decade, since around 2014 you could no longer create new accounts, and the website's creator named Ch'marr has disappeared years ago as well, and now since around a month ago, it was taken offline entirely.
So, if anybody of you had hoped to look at art there, you can now only look at the mirror of the website.
https://vixencontrolled.net/
I wonder now...when will such an end come to Furaffinity? Because...then I would be even more sad. For all its flaws and things that don't work here the right way, to me this website is stil a truly magical place. I truly hope it will be preserved in some sort of way.
I dunno why, but knowing this quite old Furry gallery has died...it makes me sad.
Well, it is not fully dead, there is an archive of it, kind of. Pretty much all art and all stories posted there have been preserved by a single person, creating a mirror of that very first dedicated furry gallery website. But all the meta-data, like artist information, text description of the things posted, as well as comments, did not transfer over to the archive unfortunately. I know that was done to save on data-size, making it easier to host, but I stil find it sad. I don't now really why it saddens me so much.
I can recall when I here and there found my way back to VCL again and again in my early days of the fandom, not really looking for anything specific. Though I did look up some specific artists, since you could watch all the stuff there without needing an account. You could even use google itself to search the website, I recall that much.
I think the reason why I find this so sad is that I am a hoarder. Of knowledge, of information, and the likes. And that a bit manifests in my current job as a librarian, I guess. Trying to preserve as much as possible for future generations. So seeing that website go down, and with it so much information, especially the comments...it saddens me. Because comments in a gallery are to me an integral part of a community, it shows people's appreciations, their thoughts, their ideas, their disgust even, it is a mirror or a fandom's social fabric. And now that is gone.
So...yeah. Seems the website already has been dead mostly for close of a decade, since around 2014 you could no longer create new accounts, and the website's creator named Ch'marr has disappeared years ago as well, and now since around a month ago, it was taken offline entirely.
So, if anybody of you had hoped to look at art there, you can now only look at the mirror of the website.
https://vixencontrolled.net/
I wonder now...when will such an end come to Furaffinity? Because...then I would be even more sad. For all its flaws and things that don't work here the right way, to me this website is stil a truly magical place. I truly hope it will be preserved in some sort of way.
Either way, most that are still active would move to FA or other sites to show off their work. Course checked it out over the years myself.
It's definitely part of furry history and early Internet history as well. I'm glad someone archived it. I feel like once FurAffinity became a thing it sort of faded, and it more or less was left behind entirely with the advent of e621, Facebook, and Twitter.
I kinda see VCL going offline as an old friend who has seen better days finally ready to rest. As you say, it was in zombie mode more or less forever - though I do think someone was still posting their art to it.
IMHO VCL comes from a time when it seemed to be a place of total freedom and also before the toxic social media landscape. It would be awesome if FA would outlive Twitter.