Great Canadian Grid shut down?

[Dakota Tebaldi]

I just heard a rumor to that effect, that the GCG suddenly closed yesterday for some reason. Anyone here able to confirm/deny/explain?

 

[Free]

The Great Canadian Grid

The Great Canadian Grid is a virtual world where you can create a home, build a business, establish relationships and do all the things you can do in real life but in a virtual world.

www.greatcanadiangrid.ca

TL;DR: Yeah, looks like it.

 

[Chav Paderborn]

Aww, it seemed like a nice enough place.

 

[Monica Dream]

This has happened before -long story short, it's a dispute with the guy who does tech work for him. The primary thing it affects is his DNS and word is that that is already in the process of being fixed.

I know there's burnout and behind the scenes drama that might make him not want to work shit out -but I'm expecting it to come back in the next short while (1-4 months).

 

[Beebo Brink]

Umm, that's a very generous interpretation of the meaning of "short while". In the next few days would be a short while, but up to 4 months is a very long while.

 

[Monica Dream]

Umm, that's a very generous interpretation of the meaning of "short while". In the next few days would be a short while, but up to 4 months is a very long while.

Osgrid was out for 6 months (or more?) a couple of years back -I expect this to be over sooner than that.

 

[Beebo Brink]

Osgrid was out for 6 months (or more?) a couple of years back -I expect this to be over sooner than that.

And? That STILL doesn't make 1-4 months a speedy recovery. Those are both long-term outages, even if one is worse than the other. A better description of the grid downtime would be "don't hold your breath, it's not coming back any time soon."

 

[Monica Dream]

And? That STILL doesn't make 1-4 months a speedy recovery. Those are both long-term outages, even if one is worse than the other. A better description of the grid downtime would be "don't hold your breath, it's not coming back any time soon."

1 to 4 months isn't that kind of a death sentence either; I definitely wouldn't qualify it as "not coming back any time soon".

Even if I felt like I couldn't wait a month or two, I still would not phrase it that harshly.

 

[Monica Dream]

Opensim isn't a 5 nines kind of proposition; that's Linden Lab's job.

 

[Pr1m]

Happened for a shorter period once while I was on it - hopefully they come back at some point. I liked GCG and wanted to set up something neat there once I had more of my own 3d assets to use.

 

[Chin Rey]

There are a few articles about it at hypergridbusiness. These two are probably the most relevant:
Personal feud takes down Great Canadian Grid – Hypergrid Business
Great Canadian Grid launches fundraiser to save grid – Hypergrid Business
This one may also be related:
Great Canadian Grid will cease new land rentals next year – Hypergrid Business

One quote I find itneresting in the first article is:

Ford (DigiWorldz' owner) said that there were other issues as well, that he did not want to talk about on the record.

I may be wrong but I suspect IP protection is one of the issues he doesn't want to talk about on the record. Copybotting has been a very hot topic on the hypergrid recently and whilst DigiWorldz has taken a clear stand against it, GCG is well known as one of the "dirty" grids in that respect.

 

[Monica Dream]

There are a few articles about it at hypergridbusiness. These two are probably the most relevant:
Personal feud takes down Great Canadian Grid – Hypergrid Business
Great Canadian Grid launches fundraiser to save grid – Hypergrid Business
This one may also be related:
Great Canadian Grid will cease new land rentals next year – Hypergrid Business

One quote I find itneresting in the first article is:


I may be wrong but I suspect IP protextion is one of the issues he doesn't want to talk about on the record. Copybotting has been a very hot topic on the hypergrid recently and whilst DigiWorldz has taken a clear stand against it, GCG is well known as one of the "dirty" grids in that respect.

It's more likely that the problem is that Terry was letting GCG use the control panel that they were licensing from PioneerX, and was hoping to keep that under wraps for the sake of competitive edge.

If it was about IP then Terry would have been beating his chest and making hay over it -not being quiet. This fight has been dirty as hell I can't see Terry giving away an advantage that big for any reason.

 

[Chin Rey]

It's more likely that the problem is that Terry was letting GCG use the control panel that they were licensing from PioneerX, and was hoping to keep that under wraps for the sake of competitive edge.

Does PinoeerX still exist? The website seems to be gone.

 

[Monica Dream]

Does PinoeerX still exist? The website seems to be gone.

I'm not sure -but either way It's likely that Terry didn't want that part out. As far as GCG goes, Roddie's said that he's hired someone to recreate their own panel so we'll see how that goes.

 

[Chav Paderborn]

Was Digiworldz the one that kept opening and closing all the time? I lost track of the different grids out there.

 

[Dakota Tebaldi]

Was Digiworldz the one that kept opening and closing all the time? I lost track of the different grids out there.

No that was Inworldz. Digiworldz is the grid that I think absorbed the most Inworldz refugees after that grid closed for good.

I visited DigiWorldz a couple of times while HG-hopping and I did notice signs and information that there were some grids you could not get to from Digiworldz, banned for hosting ripped stuff. I think I also saw a notice that Digiworldz would ban any visitors seen wearing a certain very popular OS mesh body which is a rip of some SL body - Matreya maybe? I don't know, one of those.

 

[Dakota Tebaldi]

Personal feud takes down Great Canadian Grid – Hypergrid Business

The optics, however, are damning. And Digiwordz, as the service provider, is going to bear the brunt of the blame.

And it should. What kind of jerk cuts off paid-for DNS service because of some petty and unrelated personal disagreement with the grid owner?

The comments of that article are amazing. The DigiWorldz guy says repeatedly over and over again that he cut off the DNS service because in the midst of the argument the GCG owner told him to, e.g.

I did not "Take it upon myself" to take his grid down, during our disagreement he told me to do it, so I did. I even suggested he let people know first, but he didn't.

Then you get halfway down the comments section and you find out what he means by "he told me to do it, so I did":

"I told him if he presented the snapshot and it did indeed prove the remarks were meant for me I would still quit helping him, but I would give him time to find other DNS services. He refused.
I told him if he couldn't prove those comments weren't directed at me, and did not take ownership of what he said about me, I was going to quit on the spot and discontinue my services. He told me to go ahead, so here we are."

Come on, that's intelligence-insulting. You give someone an ultimatum, and then try to make it sound like the penalty you specified for not meeting your demands was entirely their idea?

 

[Chin Rey]

No that was Inworldz. Digiworldz is the grid that I think absorbed the most Inworldz refugees after that grid closed for good.

Yes, Digiworldz was the answer for the Inworldz refugees at first but many - maybe even most - of them eventually ended up on TAG, the only surviving alternative grid that is off the hypergrid. (TAG actually grew from 50 to more than 500 sims in the months after Inworldz collapsed.)

I visited DigiWorldz a couple of times while HG-hopping and I did notice signs and information that there were some grids you could not get to from Digiworldz, banned for hosting ripped stuff.

Unfortunately that is fairly standard procedure for serious grids these days, even the OS Grid was forced to do it eventually. There are two grids, based in a Central Asian rather lawless country, that are all about copybotting and other grids had to block them partly to avoid being caught in any legal issues that may turn up but also to protect the work of their own content creators from being ripped. GCG may be in the darker end of the grayzone (and is blocked by several other grids because of it) but those two grids are pitch black.

And it should. What kind of jerk cuts off paid-for DNS service because of some petty and unrelated personal disagreement with the grid owner?

The comments of that article are amazing. The DigiWorldz guy says repeatedly over and over again that he cut off the DNS service because in the midst of the argument the GCG owner told him to, e.g.

Yes, he really doesn't argue his case very well.
But with that being said, it does take two to have a fight and I think we should keep in mind that GCG has a history of being involved in conflicts and Digiworldz hasn't.

I do not believe those "rude things being said in public" were the real reason for the mayhem. That's just business as usual for the CGC owner and I think everybody are used to it by now. It's more likely they were the last straw.

Even so, Digiworldz' reaction was unprofessional and out of place, there's no doubt about that. How it will affect their reputation is hard to say. Most people won't care of course but some will resent it. But on the other hand, there will also be people that will think it was about time somebody stood up against CGC.

 

[Brenda Archer]

I tried reading some of the comments but the whole thing was amateur hour.

Setting up A records is easy. So someone is lying, and it’s impossible for an outsider to know who.

 

[Chav Paderborn]

It's certainly put me off everyone involved.