TWC Today Forums
Other => General Discussion => Topic started by: Mike M on April 13, 2011, 09:30:22 AM
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More than 50% of the time I try to log into the 4000 emulator msg boards, I keep getting these 403 forbidden or 504 errors saying that I am a malicious user, when I'm not. Does anyone know if Bill or someone on the admin team has an email I can reach so I can have them unban my IP addresses? If so please PM them to me, thanks.
PS: Bye Taiganet, we'll miss you (not)
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I'll ask Nick about it and let you know.
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its not banned.. just take out the part past index.php in the URL
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Apparently this was due to a user they were trying to permaban who kept uploading preview videos of version 3 of the emulator to YouTube:
http://www.taiganet.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=2023 (http://www.taiganet.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=2023)
I was getting errors aswell.
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I CANT GET INTO TAIGANET EITHER! PLUS, I'VE BEEN WAITING 4EVER FOR THE V3!
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I CANT GET INTO TAIGANET EITHER! PLUS, I'VE BEEN WAITING 4EVER FOR THE V3!
Someone must be desperate. :rolleyes:
I have never been a member of Taiganet, but it looks like that is the only "TWC Fan" forum that still has very tight security restrictions for guests. I guess the admin (Bill?) has had some problems that TWCC and TWCT one experienced. :hmm:
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I can't get in either. The site has been "temporary overloaded" for the last two days.
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I can't get in either. The site has been "temporary overloaded" for the last two days.
I got the same error, too but assumed it was an issue with my IP so I didn't think it was a site issue
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I have never been a member of Taiganet, but it looks like that is the only "TWC Fan" forum that still has very tight security restrictions for guests. I guess the admin (Bill?) has had some problems that TWCC and TWCT one experienced. :hmm:
Those forums are screwed up in so many ways. Here's my list of flaws:
- Too locked down on security. It shouldn't be such a hassle to get onto the forums.
- Their development team is extremely conservative with their work.
- Some (not naming who) development team members have quite the attitude. I can think of a few things that I have been told, but I will not disclose it due to the fact that I will get banned here for having quite a colorful vocabulary. :bleh:
Yeah. Those forums aren't the best around...
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Their development team is extremely conservative with their work.
What do you mean?
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Curt, you took the words right out of my mouth, couldn't agree more with what you said... :D
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Their development team is extremely conservative with their work.
What do you mean?
I mean that they release it to their "veteran members" before everyone else. That was something I found pretty much unnecessary. And then they keep trying to keep the program away from this Justin kid, and I am sure that's their whole reasoning behind the enhanced security. And I also believe that you have to be a registered member with more than a certain amount of posts to download it. I just find all of this stuff to be unneeded.
Curt, you took the words right out of my mouth, couldn't agree more with what you said... :D
Glad you agree :happy:
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yes the life lesson is
(http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3255/3183789521_13f5ef88c9_z.jpg)
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Yah, the security is over the top. I understand wanting to keep the bad people out, but I think he goes a bit overboard. If that madden guy wants to get the program, he'll get it. Security doesn't matter if it also keeps the good people out. As far as the download goes, though, I really don't see what the big deal is in only letting legit members get it. And if the "older" members get it first, so what? I know, I'm an old timer, but I'd feel the same way even if I wasn't. It's no different than a company giving its repeat customers pricing lower than its one-time or casual customers.
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Bill needs to learn to upgrade his forum. Yes, it may look like "the next Facebook," but you can disable those features. <_<
And, has anyone notice how he edits topics in tech support so they say 'I didn't read the important threads up top!"? :lol:
Honestly, that site has torn apart. If Bill doesn't care about his members thoughts on improving the forum, what is the point of coming there?
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When you join a forum, you are under their rules no matter how fair or unfair they may seem. It's an unfortunate fact of life. The drama I constantly hear from you all when that forum is discussed does scare me. :fear:
All I ask from you as members of this forum is to please don't let things here get to that point. My PM inbox is always open if you want to express concerns.
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And, has anyone notice how he edits topics in tech support so they say 'I didn't read the important threads up top!"? :lol:
I thought that was pretty funny. It's amazing how many people refuse to read the instructions. They're not that hard to understand, and you only really need to read the install section.
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Errr it says my IP has been blocked? Has this been done to everyone or did I actually get banned? Haven't visited in months so I am curious
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Errr it says my IP has been blocked? Has this been done to everyone or did I actually get banned? Haven't visited in months so I am curious
I know this happened to someone else; he said he had to download the WS4000 Emulator in a nearby coffee shop because his IP had been blocked. :blink: But don't count on me, I'm not a member. :P
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Errr it says my IP has been blocked? Has this been done to everyone or did I actually get banned? Haven't visited in months so I am curious
Yeah, it's done that to me like 5 times already. <_<
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If you have a Taiganet login and are getting 502/503 errors, use this page to whitelist yourself http://www.taiganet.com/zbblock/unbanme.html (http://www.taiganet.com/zbblock/unbanme.html)
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For some reason I cant get passed the unban thing. Perhaps I forgot my username. Not sure why this seems to be so hard for Bill. There are many forums out there and those that are kept up to date and have the built in security settings activated are just fine. I am not going to waste my time with this
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I was able to get in today. I had to re-authorize my computer. Not sure why, but I got in without any problems.
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Had to re-authorize my computer. This is getting annoying. :thumbdown:
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I keep getting blocked and I ran out of whitelist requests. This frustrates me as I was planning on downloading the emulator next week
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from what i know i try to go on the forums once every 2 to 3 days and the whitelist count resets back to 5.
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Does Bill know you all are having these problems? Is there anyway you can contact him? I can't believe those of you who are posting in this thread would be banned from that site, because you are all so well-behaved. :biggrin:
Like I said, I am not a member of the TaigaNet forums, but unfortunately I don't think trying the "unban" thing and just crossing your fingers everytime and hoping it works is going to get you very far. :hmm:
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Bill is very well aware of these problems, as he is the one who is actually causing them, for a good reason, and it's to keep his forum protective of spammers, but as far as detection goes, there is no such mod that can detect spam or not. Just be glad he has the whitelist function, or else you wouldnt be able to post at all anymore. The whitelists are refreshed so they can be somewhat unlimited to you, but it's just a nuisance that has to be dealt with. I don't mind whitelisting myself every other day, to be honest.
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Bill had recently did away with the post count limit and just promotes newbies to regular member status manually, so hopefully that will ease things up a little.
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This is getting very annoying because now I am getting messages to provide the emulator for download since people can't get to it. I don't know what Bills problem is but he needs to start understanding how to work a forum and manage it properly. It's not rocket science
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There should be some way to contact him about this, looks like i'm down to 4 whitelists now :(
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Hey folks,
I'm Centurion Wind, a member of the Taiganet dev team - this thread came to my attention a few days ago and I wanted to clear up a few things that have been said in this thread. A lot of the things that have been said have ranged from being simple exaggeration to being outright false. I had a chat with Mike about some of the things he wrote in this thread, and he acknowledged that he was not telling the truth when it came to certain aspects of his posts. Unfortunately, this pattern has continued and I would like to clear a few things up.
1) The current restrictive measures in place are due to spambots and certain other miscreants who have tried to evade bans via proxies and the like. I wish these weren't in place, but unfortunately the alternative is letting these guys get through. As a lot of you may remember, we once had a case where a spambot signed up and began sending virus-laden URLs via the PM system to Taiganet users. Bill would prefer to err on the side of caution rather than risk this happening again. Yes, I hate that it has false positives too, but for the vast majority of board users, it isn't an issue. And there are pretty easy instructions to follow if you need to be manually whitelisted, whether it's because you don't have a forum account or because you've run out of whitelist attempts.
2) When curtjr4 referred to "development team members [who] have quite the attitude," he really just meant me. When he referred to "colorful vocabulary," he really meant my tendency to use swear words - something I make no apologies about. He specifically referred to a case in which we had a discussion at length about his inflammatory behavior on the forums - something he vowed to change. If you would like to know what else we talked about, I suggest asking him, but I don't see how it's on-topic to this discussion.
3) Not a single user has run out of whitelist attempts since October 17th; since the whitelists refresh every 2 - 3 days, what localonthe8s posted is absolutely, completely untrue. I can only speculate as to why someone would post something here that is false, but it's really not beneficial to anyone involved in this.
4) Finally, a lot of you, like Martin, have criticisms about the way the Taiganet forums are run. I give you this challenge in response: if you have specific criticisms about the way the forums are run, I suggest bringing them up to the person that runs the forums. There are people on this site who have no interest in the health of the Taiganet community - you really don't do any good giving your criticisms to them. Bill is not a close-minded, Machiavellian dictator who will ban you at the first word of criticism, I promise. Sometimes I criticize him myself, but I do it to him, and not to other people. You ought to do the same.
I'm sure you have a great, thriving community here - my interest is solely in helping foster a great, thriving community at Taiganet. Discussions like these don't really help further that goal. I have no authority on this site; I am just a simple member, but I (and Bill) would appreciate it if more thought, honesty and sincerity was put into discussions about Taiganet. We don't bite and we really do appreciate feedback - we'd just prefer it if it was in the form of constructive criticism rather than insults on a site where it doesn't really matter. And for what it's worth, there IS an easy way to contact him: via PM on Taiganet, via the #taiganet channel on freenode.net (he goes by the handle "Salador"), or via me - cw1nd - in the same channel.
Thanks very much for your understanding. I hope we can keep this discussion civil and polite.
CW
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Welcome to TWCT/TWCC, Centurion Wind! :wave: I admit that it was difficult listening to everything being discussed about your forum here. I know virtually nothing about your site, but the constant drama mentioned made me nervous and gave me a false impression of your forum. I'm glad to hear more than one side of the story now. I hope whatever is causing this disconnect on your forum gets resolved. Being open with communication and clarity is all I can really advise for you and your team.
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I was trying to log in at least 3 times 2 nights ago and I kept getting the 403 error server overloaded message. I then tried logging in but the system kept flagging Rutgers' IP as hostile. I haven't logged in since but thiis was 3 days ago. Hopefuly it refreshed as I haven't gotten on my computer yet. Doesn't mean I have it to report it to make it seem like an "untrue" statement to you.
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Being open with communication and clarity is all I can really advise for you and your team.
We're working on it - maybe we've not been as great as we could be when it comes to communication, but it's difficult when people seem more interested in sowing discontent than being truthful and honest. We'll get better about it, but users have to do their part as well. I appreciate your kind words and classiness.
I was trying to log in at least 3 times 2 nights ago and I kept getting the 403 error server overloaded message.
According to Bill, the server overloaded problem was fixed last week; he says on the 9th, you whitelisted approx. 5 minutes before the whitelist system did its automatic reset (which, as the 503 page says, resets every few days.) He says it looks like you gave up when you got the 503 error a few minutes later. Either way, there's a dedicated link to the freenode webchat on the 503 page - if you'd come in and mentioned it there instead of here, you would have been whitelisted fairly quickly.
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Ok, thanks for the information, I'll keep that in mind should it happen again.
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What is whitelisted?
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What is whitelisted?
Basically a "safe list" of sorts, a list where you are not considered a spammer.
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I wonder why Bill's forum has such a problem with spam bots? I ran one for several years and spam bots were almost a non-issue.
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I wonder why Bill's forum has such a problem with spam bots? I ran one for several years and spam bots were almost a non-issue.
Well when you run a forum using software that is nearly 7 years old things happen. I think 2.1 was released way back in 2005.
1) The current restrictive measures in place are due to spambots and certain other miscreants who have tried to evade bans via proxies and the like. I wish these weren't in place, but unfortunately the alternative is letting these guys get through. As a lot of you may remember, we once had a case where a spambot signed up and began sending virus-laden URLs via the PM system to Taiganet users. Bill would prefer to err on the side of caution rather than risk this happening again. Yes, I hate that it has false positives too, but for the vast majority of board users, it isn't an issue. And there are pretty easy instructions to follow if you need to be manually whitelisted, whether it's because you don't have a forum account or because you've run out of whitelist attempts.
Nobody is arguing that there shouldn't be security measure to prevent this. The argument is that Bill has the forum on such a lockdown that its nearly impossible to get into. It's like the TSA. There is a limit to how much someone is going to put up with just to view the forum. I am curious as to why this is such a problem for a forum devoted to a Weather Channel emulator. I remember seeing people like Henry post gloating images of "trolling/spamming" of the Taiganet forum and several other names I recognized who seemed to approve. I guess the childish nonsense like this has to be accounted for.
Anyway I appreciate you posting here Centurion Wind. Thanks for clarifying a few issues.
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Well when you run a forum using software that is nearly 7 years old things happen. I think 2.1 was released way back in 2005.
Bill has stated that he doesn't want to upgrade because of the features that make the forum software more like a social networking site. I do agree that those new features are pointless, but I'm pretty sure they can be disabled and that customizable themes can still be installed to make it look like the older version. I can also assure them that upgrading the six-year old forum will cut down on spammers significantly and will avoid having to implement these intense measures that make it almost impossible for new members to log onto the forums to enjoy the emulator.
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There are certain features of the site that Bill has coded himself; if he were to adopt a newer version of IPB, many of these things would be lost. I've brought up this suggestion before and he's discussed why it wouldn't be very practical.
Ultimately, the choice is his - the forum is his to run as he sees fit. But I've said before and I will say again that if you genuinely feel that Bill could be doing something(s) better, you should bring those concerns to him directly. Using it as fodder in a "hey guys, let's gather 'round and talk about why Taiganet sucks!" discussion, especially on a completely different site, will not get those suggestions adopted any quicker - if at all.
Why not come into the IRC channel #taiganet on freenode.net and talk to him about it?
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Help!!! I cannot join the TaigaNet IRC FreeNode Channel because I got a (+b) meaning I was banned from that channel. Now I cannot enjoy the forums now. :( :cry: :cry3:
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Sorry you will need to contact someone over there for your issue
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Sorry you will need to contact someone over there for your issue
How can I do that? :dunno:
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Sorry you will need to contact someone over there for your issue
How can I do that? :dunno:
Not our problem. More than likely you were banned for a good reason. Its not the job of anyone here to help you fix your problems over there
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Thank you for mentioning that point, Martin. I don't understand why people keep using this thread to see how we can help them get into Taiganet. That is not the problem of any of the admins or members here. ;)
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You mean that their security script flagged my IP as hostile? :blink:
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You mean that their security script flagged my IP as hostile? :blink:
We don't know. If you are really concerned, you need to contact an admin over there. Not to be rude, but, once again, this is not our problem. ;)