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+---- Thread: State of the Site - November 2024 (/showthread.php?tid=432)
State of the Site - November 2024 - Paul - 11-02-2024
It's been a while since you've all had an official Admin Update, so it's definitely time for a State of the Site address.
Membership
Artemis: 11 (11 PRCs)
Aquila: 10 (10 PRCs)
Titania: 8 (5 PRCs, 3 SRCs)
Yeager: 11 (10 PRCs, 1 SRC)
Membership has remained stable at 36 players since my last update in August. We've had a few prospective members join, but either not post, or drop out during the Academy. The good news is that nobody has left the site, and that we currently have two Cadets who have just joined, both of whom show promise and will be an excellent addition to whichever crew they join!
However, a reminder: If a department doesn't have a Department Head, we can't assign new players to it. New players need a contact point and role model to mentor them and help them grow, and mentoring new players is great training for those who have their eye on further promotions.
If you have friends who are looking for an RPG that prefers quality over quantity, with in-depth missions and larger crews for a richer role-play experience, please feel free to recruit them. Not only do you get a points bonus and medal ribbon when they make Ensign, you're helping the site as a whole as well!
Stardates
To be honest, the way we have done Stardates on this site has been unfortunately lacking in consistency. As Admin teams changed, so did the way they wanted to do things. This means that bios, mission logs, and site history can be something of a mess when it comes to reading them.
To simplify and unify Stardates, we are going to go with the following (former) format - {Current Year}{Current Month}.{Current Day}. This would appear in a YYYYMM.DD format. So a log posted today, November 2, 2024, would be written as 202411.02.
I have directed the Creative Team to start adjusting dates on the wiki, prioritizing active character bios and mission logs.
Bios and Logs Follow-Up
We've seen some improvement here, but a member e-mailed me the other day stating they believed the process of doing the updates was too complicated, and that there was a lack of clarity on how to complete it.
It's actually a very simple process: You e-mail your CO with the updated details or history that you want to add for your character. It is the CO's job to upload it. Job done! If this does not happen within a week (without a reason being given), please direct the e-mail to the Wiki Manager who will do it. Note: if your ship has a dedicated wiki editor, please contact them first before emailing the Wiki Manager.
Holiday Party
I'd like to bring back the tradition of the yearly Holiday Party on the site. This would be an in-game party that takes place outside of mission timelines, allowing everyone to congregate and mix with players from other ships. It would, of course, be voluntary and mission posting would take priority. I'm looking for a volunteer to run this; they would be responsible for planning the different events, any shenanigans that may occur, etc.
If you're interested please E-Mail me or DM me via Discord.
Reflections
As 2024 starts to draw to a close and FedSpace prepares for its 25th anniversary, I want to reflect on how things have been since the most recent change in Administration. I think we can all agree that any change of leadership can be challenging, but the members of this fine site made it as painless as possible for Autumn and I, and for that we thank you all.
Forum Change
We moved to this forum in August 2023, due to the fact that our last forum software was horrifically out of date, expensive to update and maintain, and open to security threats. That transition was not seamless, and unfortunately data was lost. We have also had to learn to cope with E-Mail notifications not working correctly, archiving posts being more difficult, and no easy way to switch between accounts.
We did, however, come together as a community and move past these ''growing pains.'' The new forum may not come with all the bells and whistles we were used to, but it's still our home as writers, and over the last 18-ish months, we've seen some excellent stories being told!
Availability and Changing Times
Over the last few years I've started and then abandoned a number of projects on this site; part of this was due to lack of player interest, partly due to my ADHD brain getting bored or forgetting, but mostly due to the changing times we live in. When a lot of us joined the site, we were in our late teens or early twenties (some of us were even younger), and had the sort of free time that allowed us to embark on subplots and have dozens of characters, et cetera.
It's 2024 now, and I'm pretty sure that very few of us are still in our twenties. Our founding members who are still around, either active or lurking, are mostly in their late forties or older. The younger generation of players, at this point, are all in their thirties and have careers and families.
This means the site appears to have slowed down; the two posts per week guideline remains in effect, but in most cases now it's a guideline rather than a hard and fast rule. For some, that might be disappointing, but personally I've always been a fan of quality over quantity - if you're only posting on average once a week but they're good, solid posts, that's preferable to rushing two posts a week just to meet a quota.
Note: This does not stop players being declared AWOL after 30 days with no posts or communication. Nor does it stop players being declared Abandoned after a further 30 days of no contact.
Closing
We're still here, nearly 25 years after founding. I've been a member for 20 of those years, and FS has been a major part of my life for the entire time. Times may be changing, and we're taking things one day at a time these days, but with such a dedicated group of writers, I see no reason we can't get to our 30th anniversary!