Whedonesque : Comments on 9121 : The Browncoat board is gone.

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January 03 2006

The Browncoat board is gone. Browncoats.serenitymovie.com was dead, to begin with. There is no doubt whatever about that.
(ETA) Notice of demise and a brief message can be found here - with thanks to Relight.

The register of its burial was signed by the clergyman, the clerk, the undertaker, and the chief mourner. Gossi signed it. And Gossi's name was good upon 'Change, for anything he chose to put his hand to. Old Browncoats.serenitymovie.com was as dead as a door-nail.

Mind! I don't mean to say that I know, of my own knowledge, what there is particularly dead about a door-nail. I might have been inclined, myself, to regard a coffin-nail as the deadest piece of ironmongery in the trade. But the wisdom of our ancestors is in the simile; and my unhallowed hands shall not disturb it, or the Country's done for. You will therefore permit me to repeat, emphatically, that Browncoats.serenitymovie.com was as dead as a door-nail.

[with apologies to Dickens]

gooddog | Firefly&Serenity | 09:22 CET | 53 comments total | tags: firefly, serenity, board, death of, and resurrection

Let it rest in peace. I look forward to the resurrection.

TamaraC | January 03, 09:42 CET

Sorry about the dead link. But, then, that's the story. RIP UB.

gooddog | January 03, 09:49 CET

We'll be back!

Harmalicious | January 03, 09:53 CET

Why not make the link go to the Pronouncement of Death thread on the new gossiforums and give them a shout-out: http://browncoats.serenitymovie.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=511 ... and take out the [edited] tags (if you're able to).

Relight | January 03, 10:07 CET

Yep, checkout the new Browncoats board,

http://browncoats.serenitymovie.org/forums/

Thanks goes to Gossi.

Zoic_Fan | January 03, 10:28 CET

Per suggestions, link has been changed to the forums page. After all, a dead link - pregnant with symbolism though it may be - is still a dead link.

SoddingNancyTribe | January 03, 10:44 CET

Much appreciation, SNT, Thanks!

gooddog | January 03, 10:56 CET

Oh my God. I...I can't believe...it's gone. I was just there only two hours ago. I just had no idea they were going to take it down. Well, I knew it'd be taken down one day but not so soon. DVD's just started selling forgoodnesssakes.

Was there a warning of any kind? I've been away from the internets for a few days, and I come back to this. I think I might cry...

It's like an end of an era. Oh, who am I kidding? It is an end of an era.

There was so many great things on there that I would have loved to grab if I knew it was just going to evaporate. I'm glad I had saved all Joss's posts. Did anyone snag all Nathan's posts? I never had gotten the chance to, and I'd loved to have saved them.

But 'round of applause to gossi for getting a new Browncoats Board up so fast. Standing up like a Browncoat. I'm glad no one was just gonna let it go. As Mal said, "There are alot of fine ways to die. I'm not letting the Alliance choose mine." And just maybe, we will rise again. ;)

zimshan | January 03, 10:56 CET

To be honest, although it is sad that the big 'Versal board is gone, what I feel is happiness, happiness that the new gossiboard has been born. It's run by someone with love for the 'Verse, and everyone who used the old board can use it, too. Not only that, but we -- "we few, we happy few" ;-) -- also have wonderful Whedonesque!

The ('Versal) board is dead. Long live the (gossi)board! :-)

billz | January 03, 11:01 CET

zimshan, all of Nathan's posts (except his last crazy few which need to be updated), as well as Joss', are available at this site: http://www.fireflyguidebook.com. This new site will have much more Firefly / Serenity stuff added to it, including more collections of threads and posts from the now-gone Universal boards. Reminder to all who were saving threads to submit them, and any other goodies for this archive, according to the instructions on the site.

[ edited by Relight on 2006-01-03 09:04 ]

Relight | January 03, 11:04 CET

Oh goodness, that's a wonderful link! Thanks for posting it, Relight!

zimshan | January 03, 11:15 CET

Yes, yes! I forgot to say, long live Relight's archive! :-)

billz | January 03, 11:29 CET

I wouldn't worry about Nathan posting online, he was on the Firefly board a few hours ago. God help us if we get Nathan and Adam on the same thread together.

Simon | January 03, 11:41 CET

Funny though, the only reason Nathan saw that thread was that obviously Adam told him about it.

TamaraC | January 03, 11:53 CET

Simon wrote:

>>I wouldn't worry about Nathan posting online, he was on the Firefly board a few hours ago. God help us if we get Nathan and Adam on the same thread together.<<

Link, pretty, pretty please?

bschnell | January 03, 14:39 CET

Can't beat a bit of Dickens bastardisation. Thanks to Universal for the party at their house for the past 18 months (and thanks to the extremely talented and handsome man who moderated that website for the last year free of charge).

gossi | January 03, 16:11 CET

link please to Nathan on the Firefly board--assuming you mean FFnet...

rivergirl | January 03, 16:29 CET

It's likely the Prospero Firefly board, rivergirl.

gossi | January 03, 16:31 CET

Did anyone ever see the pictures that Nathan was trying to post?

Lioness | January 03, 16:53 CET

Nope. It was a photo of his Mal gun with a ruler, I believe, so I doubt it's that exciting. Unless he's big on the olde euphuisms.

gossi | January 03, 17:28 CET

Gossi! I just snorted Earl Grey out my nose.

redfern | January 03, 17:34 CET

Farewell to the Universal Board!!! It has been a blast!! Major thanks from this browncoat to gossi for taking the reigns and keeping the signal going...remember...you can't stop the signal.

[ edited by haven on 2006-01-03 15:35 ]

haven | January 03, 17:35 CET

I always wondered if Joss realised the 'impact' (meaning frequency of quoting) the "You can't stop the signal" lines from Mr Universe would get.

gossi | January 03, 17:42 CET

Nope. It was a photo of his Mal gun with a ruler, I believe, so I doubt it's that exciting. Unless he's big on the olde euphemisms.

This would make sense. When I saw all those posts go up yesterday, I started reading at the beginning of the thread. It was a request from someone who wanted to make a model and needed to get references. He had talked to Nathan about it at a con, I think was what the guy said.

I always wondered if Joss realised the 'impact' (meaning frequency of quoting) the "You can't stop the signal" lines from Mr Universe would get.

I have thought that Joss was sending a shout-out to us when he wrote that. Because we had the Internet, we kept "the signal" going. He had to know that line would be noticed. Or, maybe we should ask The Man directly! ;-)

(and thanks to the extremely talented and handsome man who moderated that website for the last year free of charge)

ahem Guys? I think we've been cued...: Thanks, talented and handsome man! ;-)

billz | January 03, 18:13 CET

Did Nathan get his pictures up?
: (

ETA: I just realised the lovely Lioness asked a similar question.

[ edited by nixygirl on 2006-01-03 16:32 ]

nixygirl | January 03, 18:31 CET

They just put the forum back online, unsure why.

gossi | January 03, 19:44 CET

I think Mr Universe was a shoutout to internet fans and the original (broadcast, cancelled yet unstoppable) show, making Fox, um Chiwetel Ejiofor? BTW I tried to join gossi's site last night but didn't get an email. Should I wait or try again?

bunnykitty | January 03, 19:50 CET

Ok first the board goes down earlier in the evening Eastern Time Zone Canada, then it comes back, and then it goes again right before midnight. Why, for the love of god would they do this to us? I do not think my heart can take anymore stomping on.

kurya | January 03, 20:09 CET

>> They just put the forum back online, unsure why.<<

The error message I got all day was the same one I got when it hiccupped last night, so maybe it just crashed again, and someone will _really_ turn the lights out ... later? I mean, it's still the 3rd, even longer so over in the States.

[ edited by bschnell on 2006-01-03 18:12 ]

bschnell | January 03, 20:10 CET

>>BTW I tried to join gossi's site last night but didn't get an email. Should I wait or try again?<<

Have you checked your "junk" box? Several folks seemed to have that problem and found out that their spam filter had eaten the message.

bschnell | January 03, 20:12 CET

It would be better if people emailed gossi with any problems etc about his forum rather than post about it here.

Simon | January 03, 20:14 CET

Yes, please do. I'm having to queue the 'junk email folder' issues as there's a ton of them and I don't have time to sort them (at work).

From what I can gather it crashed over night, but it's still due to go off shortly (with a bye bye message).

gossi | January 03, 20:23 CET

Yes, thanks to the talented and handsome man who moderated the board free of charge all year. Those were the exact words just about to come out of my mouth.

I just checked the "deceased" U board and it's still up. I'll bet it's back since it won the Wooden Rocket award as Best Official Movie site. There must be loads of new surfers checking the site because it's slowed to a crawl. The unfortunate thing is it's not the same site we looked at all year since it's been ursurped by the (appalling) DVD cover. Bleh!

Drifter | January 03, 20:37 CET

They've put it back up for a short period to pull some stuff of it before it closes, just to spoke to them.

gossi | January 03, 20:47 CET

Oh, good that stuff is being saved. Any notion what said stuff will be, and where it may turn up?

AnotherFireflyfan | January 03, 21:06 CET

Well, that's kind of kool then. I would've thought they would have gotten it before closing time!
Oh well, last drinks anyone?

nixygirl | January 03, 21:11 CET

Hey nixygirl, did you see me waving at you from over in the corner at the Uni board? (I was feverishly copy-pasting all of Joss's posts into one big text document, just for the thrill of it. Did somebody get Nathan's)?

And now, back to work.

m'cookies actual | January 03, 21:19 CET

Relight did, m'cookies, check out the http://www.fireflyguidebook.com to see the entries.

[ edited by kurya on 2006-01-03 19:25 ]

kurya | January 03, 21:25 CET

AnotherFireflyFan - no idea, presume it's just for their internal use. Note that the archive I have might not go online now as a fan has complained about their posts being available in the archive.

gossi | January 03, 21:32 CET

gossi wrote:
"Note that the archive I have might not go online now as a fan has complained about their posts being available in the archive."

???
Seriously, what is wrong with people? ~shakes head~

Ariane | January 03, 21:36 CET

Thanks, kurya - oops, guess I should have read the entire thread more thoroughly first! And props to Relight!

(Now joining Ariane in head shaking AND eye rolling.)

m'cookies actual | January 03, 21:38 CET

That's really disappointing that a fan would want to prevent an archive being posted. How is it different to them than if the board just stayed up?

Maybe you should just delete the posts of anyone that objects? It still seems strange to me that somebody would, but you have all types...

AnotherFireflyfan | January 03, 22:46 CET

I think Mr Universe was a shoutout to internet fans and the original (broadcast, cancelled yet unstoppable) show...

But it could be so much deliciously and horribly more than that.

The One True b!X | January 03, 22:46 CET

Hee hee, theonetruebix.

newcj | January 03, 22:53 CET

(Shaking head over fan objection) I wonder gossi whether in taking over the file all rights of publication transfer to you, if there's an official piece of paper saying such. But, yeah, I know, there's probably nothing so official and you're a person and not a corporation and have no legal firm on retainer, and therefore you are unprotected should (*$!?*$#!) fan continue to object. Since more than 75,000 signed up, odds are several others might object. Big shame, eh?

Drifter | January 03, 23:21 CET

gossi wrote:
>>Note that the archive I have might not go online now as a fan has complained about their posts being available in the archive.<<

Come to think of it, though, if the old place _had_ a copyright, policy, I certainly never saw it enforced, and an archive of it might be more problematic that it seems at first. Because people merrily copied and pasted whole articles, images and whatnot into it, and you'd end up with a lot of stuff that can never belong to you on your site.

That's one of the things I love about Whedonesque -- the absolutely crystal-clear copyright policy.

It may seem hopelessly conservative to a lot of folks, but that doesn't make it any less --- right.

bschnell | January 04, 00:25 CET

My opinion of it is - if somebody doesn't want something in the public domain, don't post it in the public domain. I have checked the privacy policy of the site and a transfer is okay, so we'll see what happens. Re copyright - no images were transfered, and any text articles could be manually stripped out if required.

I think one interviewer (it was posted here, actually) asked Joss about Mr Universe, and he said it was just because they needed a location for the space battle I seem to recall. Although I could be horridly misremembering things.

[ edited by gossi on 2006-01-03 22:29 ]

gossi | January 04, 00:28 CET

Gossi wrote:

>>My opinion of it is - if somebody doesn't want something in the public domain, don't post it in the public domain.<<

Again, something I'd spontaneously agree with.

But then ... there's this author whose books I translate, and she's a very helpful person, and she loves to teach, so she used to post excerpts of her stuff on the CompuServe forum that used to be her cyber haunt -- where any post remained the property of the poster. Then AOL took over the place and claimed the copyright for everything posted there. Do we all still post there? Sure. Do people leave their work up there indefinitely? No.

I just used a whole message I posted there as part of a review that I sold to a paper. Which means that _theoretically_ I stole my own text from AOL. Not that I care -- but it _is_ a bit more complex than "if you don't want it in the PD, don't post it there." Beginning with the fact that the internet is not the same thing as the Public Domain ...

bschnell | January 04, 01:05 CET

Yeah.. The US site says;

"The content on this Site and any material submitted via this Site is the property of Universal and is protected by US and international copyright laws."

So by posting you hand your post rights to Universal, so I think I'm fine on that score. In theory somebody could try to submit a DMCA notice to me to get posts removed, but I live in the UK so that doesn't apply.

gossi | January 04, 02:06 CET

>>"The content on this Site and any material submitted via this Site is the property of Universal and is protected by US and international copyright laws."

So by posting you hand your post rights to Universal, so I think I'm fine on that score.<<

Yes, whoever posted anything there made it a permanent gift to Universal, so if Universal gave it to you, you have nothing to worry about. Of course _Universal_ should have kept an eye on the people who merrily posted whole articles from the NYT and other copyrighted sites there, but since they didn't, again, I guess you have nothing to worry about.

(Still. The stuff belongs to Universal. It is _not_ in the Public Domain. Important difference.)

[ edited by bschnell on 2006-01-04 00:32 ]

bschnell | January 04, 02:31 CET

I don't understand why someone would object if a post they made on a public board was available in an archive on another public board. If they didn't want it to be read, then why did they post it to begin with? It makes no sense to me.

And my thanks, as well, to the extremely talented and handsome man who moderated the official site free of charge for the last year :)

KimberlyJ | January 04, 02:40 CET

Kimberly, they said they didn't want to be part of the community any more. Reading between the lines I think it might be one of these, or one of the many trolls that forum had.

gossi | January 04, 04:34 CET

Gossi, the thing that is interesting to me is the number people who are/were fans of Firefly, and more so Joss, that were so outraged at this (I don't know if we're aloud to include spoilers in this thread, but "this" is in regard to your link). I was as upset as anyone that he was killed (honestly, there were tears), but anyone who is a fan of the Whedonverse should know that Joss kills off main characters. But I won't revisit that topic, it has been discussed over and over. It's just rediculous to me that someone wouldn't want "to be a part of the community" anymore because of that. As much as I dislike trolls, I would almost rather that be the case instead of someone not wanting something to be archived because of this. But, oh well. What can ya do, right?

Thanks for starting the new site! I registered earlier today. It's good to have somewhere to continue what was.

KimberlyJ | January 04, 10:54 CET

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