Next steps for VVO

[moo Money]

I haven't said anything that isn't open knowledge amongst people who were also communicating with him at the time, so I don't believe any of it is a secret.

Joshua messaged me on Reddit when he found out and actually apologized for his past behavior god knows how long ago. That was the last thing on my mind, but still appreciated. He mentioned trying to save VVO and looks like he managed to do so.

When chatting with people privately about Cris’s passing, if they revealed they knew a crucial detail left out to everyone else, I knew that they were a close friend of his. When his relative reached out to me with contact info, I relayed the message to only a few people who knew, including Joshua. None of them would have contacted the family about him.

FWIW, I echo the thing about Snapzilla going down while he was in the hospital. I strongly encouraged him to contact his host to see if I could pay to get it back, but he never brought it up again. I think too much time had passed and it was just gone. Now with Gyazo being down, I suggest everyone back up their Flickr pics just in case. Hang on to your memories and hold your loved ones close. No one is getting any younger.

 

[mixvio]

On the subject of VVO itself, Bart, Free, and Noodles have been organising things in the background; Bart has managed to get a local installation running of the current version of the forum as a proof of concept. I believe that purchasing a new license is going to be a requirement — the current installation is registered to Cris under his email that no one has access to, and it's also significantly out of date anyway. Buying a current Xenforo license under an account that all of the admins can access and handle is probably the next step, then locking this for a couple of hours to do a final backup and migration and setting things up on the new system.

Bart and Free both said the test site is running faster for them. I don't notice a difference one way or another but that could be because nearly twenty years of internet being delivered by angry magpie has desensitised me to the idea of "fast broadband."

 

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

As outlook for the road ahead: we can do the migration itself quite quickly now. DNS zone has prepared to propagate changes quickly for that task. Which is fancy pants words for saying the TTL on all entries is now 300 seconds, or 5 minutes. This enables a very quick transition from old IP address to new one.

Unpacking all files takes about 2 minutes, populating the empty database is about 12 minutes. I don't know how long backing up that stuff takes, but probably around the same.

Sending mails out aka SMTP delivery needs to be configured, one way or the other. On here it is using the infrastructure of the hosting provider. On the new home running a local Postfix instance for that should do that trick including properly setup SPF, DKIM and DMARC. Because without it email will never through to Outlook.com, Gmail and other biggies. And without a working mail connection nobody ever will receive notifications by it, so we do need that.

The license itself only checks the domain name it is running on. The same will most likely apply to the addons. The software itself will be totally happy and purring after the switch under the domain name virtualverse.one. Also the license itself is a lifetime license, the forum will just continue to run with 2.1.1 until eternity. So just running as is is not the problem.

There are though major problems, which we will need to address after the switch happened: lifetime license does not mean lifetime access to new versions and security updates at Xenforo. A lifetime license only grants you 12 months of feature and security updates. After that you will have to buy an extension fee, which is $60 for another 12 months.

Also several paid add-ons are in use here, some of them run on that model as well. So in order to run this in a sane and safe way this means reoccuring, yearly payments.

The problem this installation has got is that it is horribly, horribly outdated. Xenforo 2.1.1 was launched at 2019-03-12. The new host is based on Debian 13 (Trixie), which comes by default with PHP 8.4. I had to downgrade PHP to 7.3 to make Xenforo running. PHP 7.3 had its end of life at 2021-12-06. Yes, this forum is so horribly outdated it is giving me major headaches.

On the bright side I ran some malware checks on the forum files. There was no malware or other funny stuff detected, which is a small miracle but its great. I don't mind, let's keep it that way shall we.

As conclusion running just as is is no option: the forum engine itself has got almost 7 years of no security patches and PHP almost 5. Which makes all these moving parts exposed to the internet a security nightmare.

So we will definitely be busy sticking our heads together on how to improve this after the switch. The easiest way would be just to renew the licenses and then update all software components to its modern status, which most likely will mean having to buy them first. We would the definitely need to review which paid add-ons are still worth keeping, and which one are done anyway since nobody has been using its functionality in years, like e.g. Raffles (last used in 2018 for reaction buttons).

Even if we are able to jettison some add-ons nobody has been using since years the initial upfront cost will be a mid range 3 digit number.

To give you an impression on the obvious stuff anyone can see and loves:

Name	Price tag
Xenforo 2.3 new License (incl. 12 months of updates)	$195
Xenforo Resource manager (heavily used here)	$70
Theme House UI.X 2 Dark Theme (which everybody here loves)	$59.95
XF2 Moods Add-on (lifetime license)	$74.97
Discord integration add-on	$30
	$429.92

And that's just a fraction of the functionality installed here, but which are add-ons I am certain are crucial to the user experience. We got lots of more commercial add-ons installed here, so the potential price tag is probably much higher.

Please note: I am not disclosing these numbers here to ask for donations. I just want to highlight - for now - as a rough idea what keeping this running as is in an updated, secure and sane way would mean. To me running such a platform in the most secure way possible, which means always being on top of the most recent updates, it a top priority and nothing I am willing to compromise on.

This amount is not set in stone, nothing is decided yet. It can go up or down. But it's a good starting point to showcase what the rebuilding the functionality from scratch most do love and enjoy would cost us in the initial payment. The following years renewing licenses would be cheaper, but most likely still in the low 100s.

So overall it's not a cheap solution.

Currently our top priority is making the switch. After that though this will be for sure our next discussion as admin team on how to move on with the platform, and then you can expect more on that.

 

[Sid]

So ecerybody that could not be bothered for years to be around VVO (mind you talking about VVO no other sites Cris was involved with) and can start playing the first violin, as if nothing has happened and as if it is all natural?

Look at Luci, storms in and declares that Joshua can be the only admin.
Duh.
Look at Couldbe, jumps in and calls my critisism mud slinging.
If you want to see mud slinging look back at the posts from Joshua in the past.
Why do others have to pretend that it never happened and never will happen again?

It is sad to see what is happening.
But no longer my beer.
A thanks to all who did stay active here over the years. I liked your posts and stories. I hope that things will not go along the path that I for see for the future. Don't let nowadays strangers from the past (for this site), who could not care less for years and years, trample over you because they need a new toy to play with. It is your VVO, not theirs.

No need to respond on this. I will not show up any longer on VVO for a long time.
If Someone wants to contact me, I'm Harrie Belmonte in Second Life.

 

[mixvio]

Sid, did you want to be an admin? Is this what you're upset about? I asked the community who should be in charge of things and three people kept being recommended to me over and over again — both in public and in direct messages. None of those three raised a hand to specifically ask, the community volunteered them. I asked if they wanted to do it and they said yes. Are you mad because you didn't get offered? I'm really bewildered. On one hand you keep saying that it's great that things seem to be different and then seconds later start complaining that I'm still alive. It's incredibly strange to me. I've directly offered to try and provide whatever sort of mea culpa you feel you're owed and you've not taken me up on the offer, instead being passive aggressively woe-is-me. While my objective — repeatedly stated, publicly reaffirmed through my actions — was to keep the site active and the community together so it didn't fracture and fall apart, I cannot help your martyr complex if you choose to feel personally victimised by the fact that I managed to successfully save it. Like, did you want the forum to get shut down or what? I didn't beat anyone else to getting access to this place, there was clearly no one else who was able to do anything and the site was going to be shut down in literal weeks because payment was already overdue. I really don't know what you want.

 

[Amelia Freund]

I'm only just catching up on all the news! RIP Cris.

Thank you Joshua for all that you're doing. I know how hard it can be for the family left to administrate everything Cris left behind, and especially harder when things pop out of the woodwork like intellectual property/virtual interests. It certainly takes a heavy load off them when there's one less thing for them to deal with.

Just another stark reminder that we really are living second lives, aren't we?

 

[Noodles]

Just another stark reminder that we really are living second lives, aren't we?

It's also a bit of a reminder that we could all sort of "go at any time" because Cris wasn't that old from what I knew of anyway.

What gets me personally, is that Cris is essentially the second time in like a month this exact thing happened. There is a blogger community around an annual event called Blaugust (happens in August), and the guy who runs that, passed quite unexpectedly like a week or so before it started. Like Cris, he wasn't like, real old or anything. Those people came together and grieved very much like everyone here has done, and they picked the pieces up, and continued on, because it kind of felt like the right thing to do. To continue that legacy that the community builder had built. To carry on and create something from that loss, and not just let it get squandered on fighting and drama.

 

[Free]

In an attempt to make things clear(er) to anyone unsure of the behind the scenes drama:

mixvio stepped into a administrative role on the website when no one else could. He was able to do this because he made contact with a member of Cristiano's family, and through some effort on their part gained access to the host account.

Ever since then, mixvio has been clear on what he was doing and why, asking the members what to do next, and also quickly elevating three other members here to admins, each of who have been bothering for years to be around VVO. I'm pretty safe in claiming even more so than Sid has.

I know the drama isn't over, but I hope this might lessen the public parts.

 

[Kamilah Hauptmann]

I really don't know what you want.

I'm not sure Sid does either. But he's crashed out a couple times over the years where he trashed his own login and rolled back in months later.

 

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

Just one thought: what the forum needed were technical minded people with deep web knowledge to make the move. That's a skill set not everybody here has. We got a great team for that now.

Once the move is done it will need up and foremost people running the community, which requires a different type of skill set. So this then will then open up more opportunities for participation for all interested people.

But this is a discussion for the time after the move.

 

[Isabeau]

I also have difficulty understanding what Sid is referring to. It’s almost as if he didn’t read or comprehend anything that has been posted since his first post where he admitted he was reticent about how it was being handled.

I admit I was a tad surprised when it was decided who were now the admins, not because I have any wish to be one, but only because it was stated as a done deal, chosen in a Discord channel. I do understand, though, that sometimes, things need to get done when time is limited.

In any case, I do appreciate all the work and time those who are now the administrators have put in. We will see how this goes, and if it wasn’t clear before, I have no misgivings in any way about Joshua’s intentions.

 

[Free]

I admit I was a tad surprised when it was decided who were now the admins, not because I have any wish to be one, but only because it was stated as a done deal, chosen in a Discord channel. I do understand, though, that sometimes, things need to get done when time is limited.

I'd say it was more a case of Joshua choosing based on who was mentioned here as candidates and deciding not to wait on a vote of something. And it is a situation where all the candidates were hired.

And to reinforce Bart's point, once the site is moved moderation becomes more important. And other members will need to be included in that.

 

[mixvio]

I admit I was a tad surprised when it was decided who were now the admins, not because I have any wish to be one, but only because it was stated as a done deal, chosen in a Discord channel. I do understand, though, that sometimes, things need to get done when time is limited.

I had asked for suggestions and volunteers and while I got a bunch of recommendations, the volunteer end of it was pretty inconclusive. After Cristiano's real family told me that someone had contacted them and warned them from helping me — basically stating that I was secretly trying to steal Cris' identity for some nefarious unknown means or something — given the fact that they're grieving the loss of a loved one I didn't want them to have to stress about whether or not they'd made the right decision by helping to keep this place up. I'd already been talking with Free/Noodles/Bart to ask if they were interested and had intended a more orderly handover but given the situation I chose to give them the same access I had. Technically moreso now, as I don't have access Cris' hosting account at all anymore whatsoever. Nothing was chosen from a Discord channel, I had asked people openly who was interested and there were no enthusiastic volunteers — while their names kept being recommended.

In a perfect situation where all of this hadn't needed to be sorted on the spot with little to no notice I would have loved to make the process more democratic (or, preferably, Not My Problem™) but that wasn't really a luxury. I have already said to Free/Noodles/Bart that I think a formal policy needs to be developed and given to the community to contribute to deciding on moderation going forward and new mods and all that jazz, but there are other things that need to be stabilised before things are settled enough for it.

To the extent that I did arbitrarily decide who to make admins it was only after asking publicly for suggestions here and those names came from the community already. If there's any specific pushback about that I don't think any of them are going to ignore community will, but from the conversations I've been listening to between the three of them they certainly have the technical expertise necessary to salvage this site and get it stable for whatever community decisions need to happen next.

 

[Beebo Brink]

I'd say it was more a case of Joshua choosing based on who was mentioned here as candidates and deciding not to wait on a vote of something.

The three people with expertise and motivation pretty quickly stepped up and got to work. This is a good thing. For the situation we're in, I could not ask for a better resolution than the one everyone has taken to keep this place going and bridge to a newer more secure solution. Many thanks; I very much appreciate the hard work.

As for Sid, he has some nerve getting his knickers in a twist. I have forgiven, but not forgotten, that he absolutely roasted Cristiano when he disappeared last year and the forum went down. Of course it turned out to be a medical emergency, as most of us feared, because we knew Cris would not have just abandoned the forum on a whim.

 

[Isabeau]

I had asked for suggestions and volunteers and while I got a bunch of recommendations, the volunteer end of it was pretty inconclusive. After Cristiano's real family told me that someone had contacted them and warned them from helping me — basically stating that I was secretly trying to steal Cris' identity for some nefarious unknown means or something — given the fact that they're grieving the loss of a loved one I didn't want them to have to stress about whether or not they'd made the right decision by helping to keep this place up. I'd already been talking with Free/Noodles/Bart to ask if they were interested and had intended a more orderly handover but given the situation I chose to give them the same access I had. Technically moreso now, as I don't have access Cris' hosting account at all anymore whatsoever. Nothing was chosen from a Discord channel, I had asked people openly who was interested and there were no enthusiastic volunteers — while their names kept being recommended.

We've been all busy today sticking our heads together in Discord. And then some.

Let's just say we had a very good kick-off meeting today. And we're all on it now.

This is probably where I got the idea that decisions were being made on Discord instead of here. I read it while catching up on the thread, and remember thinking who “all” and “we” meant in those posts, especially since nothing had been mentioned previously about anyone having been chosen yet. Whether you were part of these discussions or not, I believe you if you say nothing was chosen from a Discord channel. I‘m going to assume now that “all“ and “we“ meant Bart, Free, and Noodles, and the discussions were only about the technical aspect of it all.

As I already said, I understand the urgency the situation demanded, and appreciate all the effort and work, so I’m not trying to make things awkward. You did exactly what you said you were going to do.

In any case, I don't participate here as much as I used to, so I will let others decide from here on out about anything important.

 

[mixvio]

This is probably where I got the idea that decisions were being made on Discord instead of here. I read it while catching up on the thread, and remember thinking who “all” and “we” meant in those posts, especially since nothing had been mentioned previously about the chosen ones. Whether you were part of these discussions or not, I believe you if you say nothing was chosen from a Discord channel. I‘m going to assume now that “all“ and “we“ meant Bart, Free, and Noodles, and the discussions were only about the technical aspect of it all.

As I already said, I understand the urgency the situation demanded, and appreciate all the effort and work, so I’m not trying to make things awkward. You did exactly what you said you were going to do.

In any case, I don't participate here as much as I used to, so I will let others decide from here on out about anything important.

I added the three of them into a group discord chat just since that was easier to talk in real time instead of DMs here, but that was after plenty of people had expressed their names as folks who should be tapped to run stuff.

I personally don't want to gatekeep anybody's level of engagement or opinion and as far as I'm concerned you've all got the same right to weigh in on how things should be run as anyone else does. If there are things to do that would make you want to participate more, I don't want anyone to feel discouraged from sharing it. I don't want to run anyone off or make anybody feel unwelcome and I'm too old to see victory in a flounce however silly and self-victimising I find it.

 

[mixvio]

Can everyone please stop hating me now?????????

 

[Isabeau]

Are you including me in this everyone? So far as I can see, only Sid has voiced any reticence about you.

 

[mixvio]

It's a royal everyone, just covering all bases.

 

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

This is probably where I got the idea that decisions were being made on Discord instead of here. I read it while catching up on the thread, and remember thinking who “all” and “we” meant in those posts, especially since nothing had been mentioned previously about anyone having been chosen yet. Whether you were part of these discussions or not, I believe you if you say nothing was chosen from a Discord channel. I‘m going to assume now that “all“ and “we“ meant Bart, Free, and Noodles, and the discussions were only about the technical aspect of it all.

As I already said, I understand the urgency the situation demanded, and appreciate all the effort and work, so I’m not trying to make things awkward. You did exactly what you said you were going to do.

In any case, I don't participate here as much as I used to, so I will let others decide from here on out about anything important.

As I said I do consider myself as a technical plumber for the time being - that's what I am doing here, while still giving some updates when I feel the need to.

So for now we do keep it mean and lean to just move VVO gently to a new home, where it will continue to run. Then all the security problems need to be adressed.

After that's done it's time to come to terms here in the forum about how a moderation/community team might look like and work.

But for the technical stuff: yes, we've been using part the forum part Discord. Discord has the advantage to still function once we are in the move.