Insimenator.org

As you may or may have noticed, in about a week and a half, we will be celebrating the first anniversary of our GLORIOUS REVOLUTION in which Insim was liberated from vile Waltian Oppression! Someone append links to postings from the time of the Glorious Revolution so that those who missed it and those who miss it can relive the memories of those fun times.

Viva la Revolucion! :D

A blow by blow description of those...tumultuous...times:

http://www.journalfen.net/community/fandom_wank/1188549.html

Most of the screenshot links are dead in the fandom wank entry... but I did find a couple of screenies of that week.  ;D

"In the beginning..."

It all started one fateful day, when all of InSim was slapped in the face with the most second most EPIC FAIL of posts in the history of the sims community:


(insert fandom wank details here)

In the end, he pulled the dumbest move anyone could think of...


That... did not go over very well.


Anyways, if anyone has any of the missing screenshots of the FW epic, feel free to share them... that is a time that should never be forgotten.  :P

I think I still have some screen shots, but they're mostly of conversations between Walt and myself. I'm pretty sure I still have the ones where he brought up the subject of the site staff being paid and my typo-laden resignation to him.

Nicely done, Tenshii! I'm totally stealing those screenshots for Viva la Revolucion week on ISA. :P

I think I have other screenshots of the comedy that was Walt's take-over; stuff like that you just have to save. If I can find them, I'll post them as well. :D

...and consider this topic Stickied.

Ah hah! I had more than I thought. There's a lot more I'd had on my former hard drive but it died a tragic death along with the drive.

OK, Walt marched in, announced his acquisition, which was met with a crapload of WTF from the populace. I was bombarded with PMs and emails from folks asking questions I didn't know the answer to because I was as much in the dark as everyone else. Being the type to give a person the benefit of the doubt until I given reason not to, I sent him the following:

(You might have to click on the thumbnails twice to get them to full size)

(http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g54/caffeinatedjoy/Miscellaneous/th_pm1.jpg) (http://s53.photobucket.com/albums/g54/caffeinatedjoy/Miscellaneous/?action=view&current=pm1.jpg)

And this was Walt's reply, in which he gave me the "important respected site member" BS and proceeded to tell me he wanted to ban the people who were demanding to know the facts:

(http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g54/caffeinatedjoy/Miscellaneous/th_waltreply1.jpg) (http://s53.photobucket.com/albums/g54/caffeinatedjoy/Miscellaneous/?action=view&current=waltreply1.jpg)

Here is my reply where I suggest that starting his career out as site owner by handing out bans would be a Very Bad Move and suggest he just be honest. I'm still trying to give him the benefit of the doubt, but inwardly am rolling my eyes at the "pillarstone of the community" bit.

(http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g54/caffeinatedjoy/Miscellaneous/th_answerpm3.jpg) (http://s53.photobucket.com/albums/g54/caffeinatedjoy/Miscellaneous/?action=view&current=answerpm3.jpg)

Now here's where I'm missing a few things. Walt disappeared for a few days and during this time I was still getting PMs and questions I couldn't answer because Walt was (still) telling us nothing. I sent Walt PMs and emails asking him to at least talk to the staff and get to know how things ran before blundering though and doing more damage. After almost a week, he hits the site with another announcement without talking to the staff, and sends me the following PM. After days of me begging him to open a discussion in the Staff area, he finally decides to do it at Gothplague 's suggestion (oh and hand me more crap about valuing my help). My a$$hat alert isn't just clearing it's throat at this point, it's yelling in my ear. Especially since this is the PM in which he suggests he take the first step into turning the site into a TSR clone by offering me money:

(http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g54/caffeinatedjoy/Miscellaneous/th_waltreply2.jpg) (http://s53.photobucket.com/albums/g54/caffeinatedjoy/Miscellaneous/?action=view&current=waltreply2.jpg)

My response to him (which is quoted in Walt's ensuing reply to me):

(http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g54/caffeinatedjoy/Miscellaneous/th_meandwalt.jpg) (http://s53.photobucket.com/albums/g54/caffeinatedjoy/Miscellaneous/?action=view&current=meandwalt.jpg)

OK, now let's move to the Q&A thread he opened in the Staff Area. I don't have a screen shot of his opening post, but it pretty much stated he wanted to open a discussion and mentioned he had an important announcement to make (but didn't say what that announcement was). Gothplague responded first and I (unfortunately) lost that screen cap, but I have mine and Odessa's. Here's mine and I'm getting fed up with his song and dance by this point:

(http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g54/caffeinatedjoy/Miscellaneous/th_Joyqa.jpg) (http://s53.photobucket.com/albums/g54/caffeinatedjoy/Miscellaneous/?action=view&current=Joyqa.jpg)

And Odessa's response:

(http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g54/caffeinatedjoy/Miscellaneous/th_Odessaqa.jpg) (http://s53.photobucket.com/albums/g54/caffeinatedjoy/Miscellaneous/?action=view&current=Odessaqa.jpg)

Finally after he proceeds to ignore all of us and demote the entire staff without warning, I tell him to stuff it. During this time he'd messed around with the AdminCP - something he admitted knowing nothing about - and borked it completely. The private staff area was public, member IPs were public ... it was a mess:

(http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g54/caffeinatedjoy/Miscellaneous/th_Myresignation.jpg) (http://s53.photobucket.com/albums/g54/caffeinatedjoy/Miscellaneous/?action=view&current=Myresignation.jpg)

And that is my collection.

 

Someone should find/make some Kathy/Eric/Walt Sims and Puddings and post them up so we can have a thread of effigious burnings.

I would gladly volunteer to make some if I knew what they looked like ;).  I vaguely remember creepy Walt from his fail video (I could only bear to watch a few sad seconds).

I wish I had copies of his "my mother survived the depression and that's why capitalism rocks" epic post. Viva la revolucion!

Oh! I found the first email he sent me (no idea why I still have this. I deleted the others. LOL). It was a blanket email he had sent to entire staff and he lines out his plan$ for the $ite (A straight cut and paste - all I did was bold and make big the words he did):


Then, without waiting for our feedback, he went ahead and plastered his polls on the site, asking people how much they would be willing to pay on a monthly basis.

A Walt sim. I seem to remember someone had made one and offered it up for sharing. I wonder if it's still about. I'll have to hunt for it.

Edit: Guess not. Thinking about it, it may have been a sim someone made, tortured and took pictures of to share here.
 

 :cool:  Pescado's Proposal of Pure Awesomeness:


Hoping someone actually does have more of those missing shots captured somewhere.  It's kind of hard for those who weren't here to get the full picture of what happened.   ;)

Hah!

I'm still digging through my flash drives trying to find the ones I saved; they included a copy of that email, and some other really amusing ones. Hell, I think I saved all of the old screenshots.

I think my favorite of the batch was where Walt declared "the future of the site is bright!" and Pescado replied with "Much the same way a BFVFS is bright."

Dasi was asking about a picture of Walt. My photobucket account shall not be sullied by his image, so I give you a link to one of his sites.

Clickity! (http://www.free-website-design.com/link-farms.asp)

Edit: Broken coding! I'll get it right yet!

That reminds me...

(http://i115.photobucket.com/albums/n283/comicalmuse/insim/walt_insim.jpg) (http://i115.photobucket.com/albums/n283/comicalmuse/insim/walt_insim.jpg)

(click it)

I like the part where he declared I was no one important, no doubt to the snickers of everyone else.

Just as I remembered him, expect completion this weekend...though I don't know if I have dorky enough hair in my CC.  ;D

I like how he ignored you and went on Thanksgiving vacay (completely oblivious)--to the outrage of some and snickers of those of us who knew he seriously underestimated you.



P.S Where should I post said Walt sim?

We should to make a special category for that: "FAILSAUCE" or some such thing. :P

Insimenator Group Projects? We can do a sticky post for any sims/clothes/whatever people make to commemorate this special day and link to it in the first post of this thread. :) What do you think?

Ooh, not a bad idea. Hmm, but what shall we name it? The Glorious Revolution Project?

...or, hell, I can think of a thousand different names for it. :D

The Glorious Revolution Project sounds good to me! :) Or even "The Glorious People's Revolution Project" ;)

Well, if I can get my computer running properly again (yes, again), I might be able to do a couple of t-shirt recolours to contribute to the project, but I can't promise anything right now. My laptop does not do the sims at all.

If I may add a few words. ;D Can't believe its been a year now. I wish I had saved some screencaps myself. He really got under my skin with the whole mother thing too. I would like to help with the shirts. I can't make good sim to save my life, but a shirt shouldn't be too hard for me to handle. LoL. If anyone has ideas they want me to try, I will. I also will make it so everyone may get it with no trouble.

Somewhere I still have a screenie of my resignation and I must say, I had a lot of fun writing that thing out. Oh, and Pes? You are unimportant, you just haven't figured it out yet, you old turd. :D

Actually, I have a copy of it I think...let me go digging. *grabs her shovel*

ETA:
Here it is, in all it's lulzy glory. Stumbled upon it when I was putting together a similar thread on ISA.

(http://i115.photobucket.com/albums/n283/comicalmuse/ISA/revolution/th_paden_retire.jpg) (http://i115.photobucket.com/albums/n283/comicalmuse/ISA/revolution/paden_retire.jpg)

ooh i didn't know insim imploded about a year ago. i am still fairly new to the site and havent been on for a awhile.

Ok He's uploaded, go nuts.  Viva la revolution!

( Grab him above: 5 posts before this one, mmkay ;D?)

To DaSi, I moved your Walt Sim to our brand new section just for the Anniversary!

The Glorious People's Revolution Project - located in the 'Insimenator Group Projects' section - is now open for your uploading enjoyment. :D

Glorious People's Revolution Project:
http://www.insimenator.org/index.php/board,782.0.html

Okay so I know I'm late getting in on this, but I do have some postings on about that time. I had copied "Walt's Q and A" section, and I do have it on my woohoosims2. Here is the link for that.

http://woohoosims2.darkbb.com/gossip-area-real-life-and-sims-2-stuff-to-share-f8/insimenator-walt-s-q-and-a-t145.htm?sid=23b1a134affbab5920991eee192dfc42

I do apologize. I have been away for some time here. Still in newlywed zone/mode/whatever and just haven't been around.  We also have dialup here, so another excuse/note for ya there!

I will probably add to this message, the other links. Some of the photo thingys I saved to my photobucket, cos I noticed a lot of pics disappearing.

Here's when someone 'wanked':
http://woohoosims2.darkbb.com/gossip-area-real-life-and-sims-2-stuff-to-share-f8/wanked-t148.htm?sid=23b1a134affbab5920991eee192dfc42

We have to register and sign in to see them, Skye. Would you mind posting them here for people who don't want to do that?

Sound good--give me a sec OK? LOL (slow pc)
Okay, so I myself was able to get in on the site for a short time. I am going to copy and paste part of what I found here, so you can see Walt's plans for this site. Since no one has been able to get into the site, I have brought the info to you all here!
Dude thinks he should make money off of this site! (Gee, where was OUR paycheck for all OUR hard work? I never saw a dime, never even Asked for a dime, for all that I did for that site! And that's just the creative end-what about all those who have to help run the site with all it's tech parts?!!!

This posting is so you would see what the questions and the answers were, not so to poke fun at those who asked, okay? These are questions we all had, and it's very hard to be diplomatic about it...

This is the link this posting came from. http://www.insimenator.org/showthread.php?t=100208 And if I could stay online long enough, I would request ALL my work be removed from that site too!!!!


Q&A about the future of the InSIM websites
Walt
Gothplague made an excellent suggestion that I start a dialogue with the moderators, super-moderators, and admins about the current crisis to give each of you the chance to ask questions, share your views, etc.

Let me start by saying that I'm well-aware of the chaos that has been created and am sincerely interested in doing what I can to help calm things. Gothplague felt that if I made myself available to this group to try to answer your questions and concerns, it could give you the tools you need to do what you can to help calm the community's fears.

I also want to let everyone know that I am working on a statement that I plan to release to the community tomorrow, although I'm not yet ready to discuss all that I'm planning to put into that statement. I'm hoping to use that statement to calm some fears.

Please feel free to post your concerns, and I'll be checking back periodically throughout the day.
Walt is online now

gothplague
thankyou for setting this up walt
Walt
You're quite welcome.

gothplague
well i'll get the ball rolling;
* the server issues are needing to be fixed
* the staff both here and on the adult forum are very worried about the future of the sites and their staff posions. takeovers almost always include staff turnovers and that has us concerned.
* the future of the site as a free site is very much a concern too.
* will the staff be able to continue to moderate the forum, will you be a silent owner or do we have to ask for many tasks to be done.

these are but a few of our worries.
you see, this forum has been a growing community for many years and many people have invested alot of their time and energy here. it is like a second home. and we are very passionate as to what may happen to our 'home'
Walt

Quote:
Originally Posted by gothplague View Post
well i'll get the ball rolling;
* the server issues are needing to be fixed
* the staff both here and on the adult forum are very worried about the future of the sites and their staff posions. takeovers almost always include staff turnovers and that has us concerned.
* the future of the site as a free site is very much a concern too.
* will the staff be able to continue to moderate the forum, will you be a silent owner or do we have to ask for many tasks to be done.

these are but a few of our worries.
you see, this forum has been a growing community for many years and many people have invested alot of their time and energy here. it is like a second home. and we are very passionate as to what may happen to our 'home'
Very understandable. Let me try to put your minds at ease as much as I can.

Quote:
Originally Posted by gothplague View Post
* the server issues are needing to be fixed
I've got a professional server team looking at the server issues. I'm also preparing to order a new, larger server because the current server is under-powered. Because of all the concerns that users have raised in their comments, the server will only be four processors rather than eight processors, but it still should remove most (hopefully all) of the issues.

Quote:
Originally Posted by gothplague View Post
well i'll get the ball rolling;
* the staff both here and on the adult forum are very worried about the future of the sites and their staff posions. takeovers almost always include staff turnovers and that has us concerned.
My intention is to keep the current staff in place. I have no plans to replace anyone. My sincerest desire is to keep the site on the same overall track it has always been on, and I'm hoping that the staff will all want to stay. Rest assured...I do not want to replace you if I don't have to!

Quote:
Originally Posted by gothplague View Post
well i'll get the ball rolling;
* the future of the site as a free site is very much a concern too.
I fully intend to keep the site a free site. I regret the way I presented and explained my plans earlier, because it caused so much confusion and consternation. Let me see if I can make those plans plain, and you can let me know if I've confused the issue in any way.

Really, I'm not planning any changes in the way the site's forums, downloads, etc. are offered. The only proposal I was trying to make was to go from a donation-drive approach to fundraising toward a monthly donation approach via PayPal's automated subscription system. I'm pretty sure the big problem this idea has caused in the minds of so many is the word "subscription." This is actually PayPal's term, and I was just using their term. A "subscription" as they mean it is nothing more or less than any regularly scheduled transfer of funds. Thus, if someone wants to make a donation on a regular basis, it could be scheduled as a donation subscription that automatically draws from their PayPal account and sends the funds once each month.

Now, let me clarify the other side of the picture that seems to be causing so much frustration, consternation, etc. By "subscription" I do NOT mean that people will have to pay a monthly fee in order to access some select part of the website. Regrettably, in my original email to the super-mods in which I announced the change in management, I posed the idea of possibly doing some sort of subscription-based access for the insimadult site. This idea was never intended for the insimenator site, and it was only a floating of an idea. My hope was to get feedback from super-mods about it, because I wasn't sure how it would be received by the users. What happened instead is that the word got out to the user base and all hell broke loose.

Therefore, I have since backed off that idea entirely. Not even insimadult is going to get such a system. Neither site is. I'm not sure how much more clear I can make this, but if it isn't clear, please let me know. Mandatory subscriptions of any kind for any purpose are now off the drawing board, permanently.

Quote:
Originally Posted by gothplague View Post
* will the staff be able to continue to moderate the forum, will you be a silent owner or do we have to ask for many tasks to be done.
Absolutely yes, the staff will continue to moderate the forum. That's precisely what I want to happen. I want YOU GUYS to be in control of the day to day functioning of the boards. In fact, I'm counting on you all to exercise your good judgment at all times in this regard. I get the impression that Kathy was rather heavy-handed in the way she handled the staff. I'm quite the opposite. I want to delegate as much power and authority as I possibly can to you, the staff.

The only time I would step in to overrule in some case is if it was brought to my attention that a particular moderator's decisions were causing problems for the site or if the staff were requesting a new overall rule of some kind. My sense is that this site is well-enough developed that you guys already have all the necessary rules and principles in place and that I don't need to interfere in any way.

Let me see if I can summarize all this in a helpful way. I really don't want to change the site's essential nature. After this crisis is weathered, I want (from time to time) to propose to you the mods and super-mods (and through you to the users) additional features that can be added to enhance the site. In other words, I want to make the site even more attractive than it already is to users, to keep them coming back more often. My purpose was never to take away what makes the site so successful in the first place.

I also want to take a moment to apologize to you, the mods and super-mods, for not taking more time to clue you guys in on what was happening. I was left adrift by the fact that Kathy and Eric had said nothing to anyone, so I was trying to feel my way through. I made the mistake of only giving the super-mods one day to get back to me about the message I had sent, and I didn't even include the regular moderators at all. Big mistake on my part! So please accept my apologies to all of you. You deserve better communications from me than that.

caffeinated.joy
OK, Walt, here goes. I tried posting earlier, but the database error had it for breakfast. First off, I apologize if this comes off as abrasive, but I'm frustrated. I've been trying to put a positive spin on this to no avail. The first thing I did the day you made your first public post was suggest you come in here and talk to the staff so you could get to know us and open a dialogue about the issues at hand. I suggested it again when you asked for my advice. I even emailed you practically begging you to do it, in the hopes of salvaging any sort of good relationship with the site staff. No one likes to feel ignored.

Maybe now that Gothplague is echoing a lot of what I've been trying to tell you, you'll take it seriously. This place is more than just a site where people with a common interest meet. Sure that's what first brought us here, but it was the sense of community and friendship that kept us here.

We've just been asking for you to be honest with us. What's your motive here? Are you looking to make the site profit or are you hoping to make a profit for yourself. The previous owners assured us all money raised went to the upkeep of the domain and server costs, but now we're seeing numbers that refute that. If people are suspcious, it's because they've been burned badly. I'm among the group of people who thinks if you're going to be relying on our donations to keep this place going, then we have a right to know how it's being spent. Think of the donating member as your investors, if that helps. I work in an industry that relies on investor financing to run. If any one of those investors asked to see our Annual budget or MD&A we couldn't say 'none of your business' or we'd risk losing their funding. It's the same thing here.

One of the reasons some people are so concerned is because they make, for free, items for the sims game based on another franchise (star wars or marvel comics, for eg). Because they offer them for free and no one makes a profit off their work, they're fine to upload them, but the moment someone starts making money off their work, directly or indirectly, there are legal issues.

Before you release this statement, are you going to discuss it with the staff first? We've been the ones keeping this site up to date and running for the past year and some months. We have a vested interest in what happens here and the way you, Kathy and Eric have been excluding us is the crux of the matter. If we're going to be helping you here, we need to be informed.

J00wish
Hi Walt! I am really glad that you posted this. I also requested it and think that working with the mods and admins is your best bet. Right now InSIM's name is being tossed around with very negative things. It's hard to defend something when you don't know what's happening. I don't put the blame squarely on you. Kathy and Eric should have given us notice, either together with you or separately. Coulda, shoulda woulda, right? That's done with and the general consensus is that it's a one man show and we're just floating. It's good to hear that you plan on including us in the discussions.

*Profit. I agree with those above. People gave to InSIM because it was a NON profit site. People offered their creations freely and explicitly to InSIM. There are many members who are anti paysites. This is one reason why you are seeing a mass exodus. My advice? Get to know people. People freely donated money and clicked on the ads because they genuinely cared for Kathy and Eric. InSIM was their home and they wanted to keep it running. Now it's being compared to paysites and I have people screaming on both sides to have their creations removed.

*Let people rant about the situation. This is really a grieving process. Many people, myself included, spoke to Kathy on almost a daily basis. We shared many personal things and felt a connection. Now people are learning about profit, a site being sold that was a home and an introduction that was less than calming. Saying 'get over it' hurt so many people. We've got kids, disabled adults and your general population all coming together to be a family. That statement alone cut to the bone for many people. A little kindness goes a long way. When they rant, it's not all at you directly. It's about the whole situation. They don't expect you to make it better. They just want you to listen and understand where they are coming from. I don't know if you've ever been a part of a community online but this is a tight knit group of people. Please keep that in mind.

*I'm glad that you apologized for your first introduction. I wasn't able to respond (I was shocked) and then you posted the email on the board before I could gather my thoughts. Again, it's best if these sort of things are discussed in this section. Like any place the 'customers' don't need to know the inner workings, just a feeling that it's working.

*As Joy (and others) have said... knowing about where the money goes has always been important. This is where I find the biggest issue. You bought this site for profit. The site was created on the belief that it was NON profit. People gave to keep it going, not make Kathy and Eric money. Other sites will have a meter and if they get money over the amount needed it is listed as being for the next month. THIS is the mentality you are going to have to work with.

*Again, I think Joy has the right idea. If you are going to put something out for the general public it might be a good idea to post it here so we can give some input. It would seem that so far your statements were geared towards those who openly helped to make Kathy and Eric a profit. I hope now that you see that is incorrect.

I look forward to hearing more and hopefully working to give the members InSIM a better impression than they have been given so far.

Odessa

Walt

Quote:
Originally Posted by caffeinated.joy View Post
OK, Walt, here goes. I tried posting earlier, but the database error had it for breakfast. First off, I apologize if this comes off as abrasive, but I'm frustrated. I've been trying to put a positive spin on this to no avail. The first thing I did the day you made your first public post was suggest you come in here and talk to the staff so you could get to know us and open a dialogue about the issues at hand. I suggested it again when you asked for my advice. I even emailed you practically begging you to do it, in the hopes of salvaging any sort of good relationship with the site staff. No one likes to feel ignored.
I hear your frustration Joy, and I'm sorry about not being as communicative as you needed me to be. I'm still learning about this site, and I'm still learning about how best to work with you all. Please understand...my ham-handedness is not ill-intentioned. It's just that I'm still learning.

Quote:
Originally Posted by caffeinated.joy View Post
Maybe now that Gothplague is echoing a lot of what I've been trying to tell you, you'll take it seriously. This place is more than just a site where people with a common interest meet. Sure that's what first brought us here, but it was the sense of community and friendship that kept us here.
Contrary to what you seem to believe in that statement, I do take this site seriously. Community and friendship are very, very important to me. I know I haven't expressed this well enough yet, and I'm working to fix it. Hopefully, it won't be too little, too late.

Quote:
Originally Posted by caffeinated.joy View Post
We've just been asking for you to be honest with us. What's your motive here? Are you looking to make the site profit or are you hoping to make a profit for yourself. The previous owners assured us all money raised went to the upkeep of the domain and server costs, but now we're seeing numbers that refute that. If people are suspcious, it's because they've been burned badly. I'm among the group of people who thinks if you're going to be relying on our donations to keep this place going, then we have a right to know how it's being spent. Think of the donating member as your investors, if that helps. I work in an industry that relies on investor financing to run. If any one of those investors asked to see our Annual budget or MD&A we couldn't say 'none of your business' or we'd risk losing their funding. It's the same thing here.
That's very reasonable. I reacted the way I did previously because I felt that I was under attack. When under attack, my inclination is to batten down the hatches. I think most people would react the same way.

I can see now that there was some very important unfinished discussions between previous management and staff. Frankly, if I had known about them in advance, I would not have been interested in purchasing the site in the first place. I was led to believe relationships with the staff (and users) were terrific and that there were no issues of any consequence, including the handling of funding.

Let me be as clear as I can be. I had no clue that Kathy and Eric were telling you that they were not paying themselves for the work they were doing, that they were claiming that the only costs being covered were "server and domain" costs. That idea seems ridiculous to me. Anyone who has ever taken on the large time requirements and not-inconsiderable financial risk involved in running an expensive server who claims that they don't expect to benefit from rewards earned for that risk is asking for trouble. They're also not telling the truth. I get the impression that there are some in the community outside insimenator.net who infer that they're not making any personal money (even a little) on the servers they're running. I sincerely doubt the truth of such a claim, if that's what they're claiming. No such enterprise ever breaks even perfectly. Even non-profit organizations earn positive net incomes, in that they often collect more income than they have in expenses. The only difference is that, while they're paying their staffs or reinvesting the funds directly into the enterprise, they are not distributing their "profits" to shareholders or owners purely for their shares of ownership.

I am not planning to retire and just sit back and live off the income that rolls in from this site while moving to the Bahamas. If that's what you mean when you refer to profit-making, then no, that's not my intention. Do I intend to pay myself for what I actually do to help the site prosper and flourish? Sure. Nor do I want to limit such distributions to myself. Actually, in the long run, I forsee reinvesting most income directly into the site, and that very definitely includes the idea of paying people to make the site better. Besides adding features and benefits over time, I would love, for instance, to be able to provide some compensation to the mods and super-mods for the work they do. You guys do a lot of work. Even though you didn't enter this expecting to be paid, I think you should be paid. I think that people should always be paid for doing what they love, when what they do is beneficial to someone else. If that happened, there would be a lot fewer angry employees in the world, and employers would be much more focused on meeting human needs than on reaping windfall profits.

I also recognize that some people prefer to be volunteers, that to them this is an enjoyable hobby and that they don't want to earn anything monetarily from their efforts. I would never try to force anyone to accept pay for what they do. I certainly respect the volunteer ethic (I've been one myself on many occasions), but I also want to be able to pay people who are willing to accept the pay.

Quote:
Originally Posted by caffeinated.joy View Post
One of the reasons some people are so concerned is because they make, for free, items for the sims game based on another franchise (star wars or marvel comics, for eg). Because they offer them for free and no one makes a profit off their work, they're fine to upload them, but the moment someone starts making money off their work, directly or indirectly, there are legal issues.
That's a very legitimate concern. I can't honestly say I have a quick and clear answer for you about that. I also have to qualify my reply by saying that I'm not an attorney, and I venture to guess that no one else here is an attorney with an expertise in copyright, trademark, and patent law.

What you're talking about here are intellectual property issues. IP issues are going to be very big on the 'Net over the coming years, and they're not going to go away until the courts start issuing some consistent rulings in a lot of actual cases. A lot of people have what they believe to be very firm legal opinions about what constitutes "fair use," but no one really knows how it's all going to iron out because almost none of those legal opinions have been thoroughly tested in the courts with consistent results.

Many people believe that if you offer something for free, that it will be covered under "fair use" doctrine. I believe that's true. There's a risk where a franchise is concerned, and I'm not even sure that "fair use" applies in such cases, but I still don't think that it's going to be a problem. If it does appear that the courts are going to make it a problem, I think you'll see a lot of websites disappearing in response, and not just sims-related sites.

Some people also believe that if you offer something for free on a site that is earning an income from advertising that this will somehow undermine "fair use." I don't believe it, although I also appreciate the need for caution. Frankly, in order to survive and keep a website going, advertising has to be used to help cover the costs. I doubt very much that the courts are going to trample on this or make a big point about advertising. If the opposite were true, if merely offering advertising was going to be a problem, then even this site in its current configuration would pose a problem for those who contribute items and mods to it...even if no one was being compensated for their work in running the website. Under such a doctrine, merely collecting income for any purpose, even just to cover expenses, would have to be considered a violation. I don't believe that will happen.

Take a look at search engines. They clearly make gigantic amounts of money from advertising, and their ads appear on their search result pages. Yet, much of what is listed in their search databases include the very same mods and items being uploaded onto a site such as this one! Will the courts find that those items are now no longer protected under "fair use" doctrine? I sincerely doubt it. So far, the courts have been very leery of applying hardly any such limitations to search engines, and I think this is going to be an important consideration as other web-related issues arise.

Any site, including this one, that includes items and mods of the kinds we're talking about are going to have to adjust over time as legal precedents are established. If there are people who think that by uploading to a site that doesn't pay anyone to work on that site somehow protects them from any risk, as opposed to uploading to a site where people are paid to work on the site, I certainly respect their opinions, but I also respectfully disagree with them.

I do not believe that the courts will get upset if someone is paid to work on the site where such items and mods are uploaded. After all, if you hire a server management team to administer the server, that would clearly go beyond "server and domain costs." Would such a hire constitute a basis for violation of copyrights and patents? I sincerely doubt it. In my opinion, whether people are paid for doing work on the site itself should not undermine "fair use" interpretations.

Nor do I think that collecting donations would cause a problem in this regard. Now, is it possible that the courts will require at some point that in order to call their donations "donations" that the organization running the site must actually be organized as a non-profit organization? Sure, that's possible. I don't think we'll see it any time soon, but I certainly wouldn't rule it out....not in the current political climate.

Organizing as a non-profit may even be something for us to consider here on this site, although I'm not convinced it will eliminate the risks where mods and created items related to franchises are concerned.

Quote:
Originally Posted by caffeinated.joy View Post
Before you release this statement, are you going to discuss it with the staff first? We've been the ones keeping this site up to date and running for the past year and some months. We have a vested interest in what happens here and the way you, Kathy and Eric have been excluding us is the crux of the matter. If we're going to be helping you here, we need to be informed.
Excellent suggestion. Sure, I'll be happy to post it here for comment before I post it on the main page of the site. I'll leave it up for 24 hours to give you guys a chance to comment on it. Does that seem reasonable?

----------------------------------------------

Let me also try to reply to Odessa, who posted while I was writing the above replies to Joy.

Quote:
Originally Posted by J00wish View Post
Hi Walt! I am really glad that you posted this. I also requested it and think that working with the mods and admins is your best bet. Right now InSIM's name is being tossed around with very negative things. It's hard to defend something when you don't know what's happening. I don't put the blame squarely on you. Kathy and Eric should have given us notice, either together with you or separately. Coulda, shoulda woulda, right? That's done with and the general consensus is that it's a one man show and we're just floating. It's good to hear that you plan on including us in the discussions.
Again...I'm still learning how the site works. Please forgive my ignorance and my learning curve.

Quote:
Originally Posted by J00wish View Post
*Profit. I agree with those above. People gave to InSIM because it was a NON profit site. People offered their creations freely and explicitly to InSIM. There are many members who are anti paysites. This is one reason why you are seeing a mass exodus. My advice? Get to know people. People freely donated money and clicked on the ads because they genuinely cared for Kathy and Eric. InSIM was their home and they wanted to keep it running. Now it's being compared to paysites and I have people screaming on both sides to have their creations removed.
I'll refer to what I wrote above about "profit." If there's something I've overlooked, let me know.

Quote:
Originally Posted by J00wish View Post
*Let people rant about the situation. This is really a grieving process. Many people, myself included, spoke to Kathy on almost a daily basis. We shared many personal things and felt a connection. Now people are learning about profit, a site being sold that was a home and an introduction that was less than calming. Saying 'get over it' hurt so many people. We've got kids, disabled adults and your general population all coming together to be a family. That statement alone cut to the bone for many people. A little kindness goes a long way. When they rant, it's not all at you directly. It's about the whole situation. They don't expect you to make it better. They just want you to listen and understand where they are coming from. I don't know if you've ever been a part of a community online but this is a tight knit group of people. Please keep that in mind.
I agree completely. In fact, that's the main point of my intended statement which I'll show you guys before disseminating it. I don't remember if I actually said the words, "Get over it." If I did, I apologize. At the time, I had no idea that this was such a sensitive situation.

Quote:
Originally Posted by J00wish View Post
*I'm glad that you apologized for your first introduction. I wasn't able to respond (I was shocked) and then you posted the email on the board before I could gather my thoughts. Again, it's best if these sort of things are discussed in this section. Like any place the 'customers' don't need to know the inner workings, just a feeling that it's working.
Like I said, I'm learning!

Quote:
Originally Posted by J00wish View Post
*As Joy (and others) have said... knowing about where the money goes has always been important. This is where I find the biggest issue. You bought this site for profit. The site was created on the belief that it was NON profit. People gave to keep it going, not make Kathy and Eric money. Other sites will have a meter and if they get money over the amount needed it is listed as being for the next month. THIS is the mentality you are going to have to work with.
Again, quite understandable. I'm hoping what I wrote above in reply to Joy addresses those concerns.

Quote:
Originally Posted by J00wish View Post
*Again, I think Joy has the right idea. If you are going to put something out for the general public it might be a good idea to post it here so we can give some input. It would seem that so far your statements were geared towards those who openly helped to make Kathy and Eric a profit. I hope now that you see that is incorrect.
Yup, I like that approach. Frankly, that was what I was trying to achieve with the initial email I had sent to the super-mods before making the big announcement, but clearly that approach failed.

Quote:
Originally Posted by J00wish View Post
I look forward to hearing more and hopefully working to give the members InSIM a better impression than they have been given so far.
Thank you!

(if I'm taking up too much room with all this, go ahead and get rid of it if you like, won't hurt feelings--lol)
caffeinated.joy
Just so you can see it, here's the post we're talking about Walt, from this thread:

Quote:
Originally Posted by Walt View Post
Sure, I understand. What I don't understand is why some people think I can fix the way they left. I can't. No one can. Get over it.

Walt
Another Option
I would like to also propose another option, since I haven't seen any other replies about what I wrote here so far. I'm really very concerned about this prior understanding that the community supposedly had with Kathy and Eric, the one that said that only server costs and domain fees were to be covered by donations and ad income. Obviously, you can tell from what I wrote earlier that I don't think much of that approach, but I also am quite willing to accept the idea that the community feels strongly about that approach anyway and is insistent on following it.

So here's my suggestion if that is the case. The only way I can see for you (the community) to keep going with that approach is for me to be out of the picture entirely. I'd be willing to make an arrangement with the community that would basically make it possible for the community as a whole to buy me out. I'd recommend that it be structured something like the following:

You guys would organize under a board of directors (or whatever name you want to give it), either formally or informally. If I were in your shoes, I'd formally file as a non-profit organization with the state, but that decision would be up to you. We could use the site to collect nominations for board members. I'd suggest that all super-mods and perhaps even regular mods be nominated. I'd also suggest that you include users like Delphy who have already expressed interest in buying me out but who don't seem to have sufficient resources individually to do it. Then, have an election where the top 7 or 9 vote-getters are elected to the board. It can actually be any number you choose, but I'd recommend an odd number between 6 and 10 as being the most workable. I've actually founded a non-profit organization, and I've also run another non-profit organization, and in both cases I found that boards larger than 10 are often unworkable, while having too few is too risky. The reason for an odd number is to help insure that there are no tie votes.

Once the board is elected, they'd be thereby empowered by the community to contract with me to buy me out. I would only require that you pay me what I've put into the project, including my payment to Kathy and Eric and my payments of server costs, etc. to date. I would provide copies of receipts for all monies that have been spent, so that the board would know for sure that the expenses were legitimate.

All Google Adsense ad revenue earned by the site since I took over would be used toward the purchase price, as would all donations received to date since I took over. Thus, in the end, I would merely get my money back and nothing else, and you guys would get full control of your websites forever. Based on prior fundraising numbers that Kathy and Eric shared with me, I think it's very reasonable to believe that the entire amount could be raised over a three or four month period. The timing would just depend upon how aggressive the board decides to be in raising the funds. I saw some suggestions about a fundraising thermometer. That would probably be a good idea for something like this, to help keep the community motivated and focused on achieving the final goal.

The board and I would work out a transition plan, and I would prefer that we do the transition using escrow.com. This way, both sides would be protected while the funds are being raised. As funds are raised, they'd be deposited into the board's escrow.com account. This way, I'd know that the board's obligation in the deal was being met. The funds wouldn't be released to me until the domain name, server, and full control over the website were released by me to the board, and I obviously would do that once the funds were all on deposit at escrow.com.

You may be wondering why I'm willing to do this. Frankly, I've wanted out of this deal from the moment that the spam hit the fan. I would gladly extricate myself from this mess if I could and leave everyone in peace.

If the community really believes that only server costs and domain name costs should be covered, this is the only way I can see to make that happen. What I need from you now is feedback as to whether you want to go with this alternative plan, or whether you are willing to support the first plan I outlined earlier in this thread. If you can think of a third alternative, I am, of course, willing to listen to it.

J00wish
I'm going to try and post quickly before it locks me out again. I am trying to respond to your post so please don't think I am not interested. I just keep getting locked out and this is the first time I've been able to get on since 5am this morning. I'll try and retype it quickly.
I am sorry to hear that you were misinformed about the status of the site. Perhaps that gives you more insight as to why so many people are angry. If you look through the posts in the announcement section about the drives you can clearly see that Kathy and Eric stated they were in debt and that the server costs were NOT being met and they would end up paying $500 or $600. I honestly don't know which to believe. Whether they mislead you into thinking the site made money or us into thinking it didn't Either way it's a sad situation to be in and we're all trying to come to grips with it.

I'm glad that you are able to see the uniqueness of the community. I'm sorry that it had to be under these circumstances. Even though you have moved on from your original response I do want to mention that I have a dedicated server and have 11 sites on it. It's not a lot, but I started it as a hobby and offered it to people who needed a home for their blog, etc... I don't have ads and only one person pays me ($5 a month) because he has a large site. The rest is on my bill. I happily do so and know of quite a few other webmasters within the sims community who do this as well. It's a different breed than that of the rest of the group, but one that I am happy to be with.

How much are you talking about here? I honestly don't know what the server costs are and what you paid. Everyone was tossing up numbers and graphs, but I'd rather hear it from you. I know people need to discuss this so I am not going to raise any hands just yet. I also know that many people have been trying to access the site and are unable to. I wanted you to know this because it's not a lack of interest, but a lack of access that stops many from answering.

J. M. Pescado

Quote:
Originally Posted by Walt View Post
You may be wondering why I'm willing to do this. Frankly, I've wanted out of this deal from the moment that the spam hit the fan. I would gladly extricate myself from this mess if I could and leave everyone in peace.

If the community really believes that only server costs and domain name costs should be covered, this is the only way I can see to make that happen. What I need from you now is feedback as to whether you want to go with this alternative plan, or whether you are willing to support the first plan I outlined earlier in this thread. If you can think of a third alternative, I am, of course, willing to listen to it.
I have a new proposal, then. Here is what *I* propose:
1. That you turn over the server and domain to me immediately.
2. Upon the presentation of relevant receipts, you will receive compensation for ONLY the cost of the server bill from LT, and the DNS registrar renewal(Maximum assessed value: $500, probably less, receipts only, in public: No backroom deals here) incurred since your acquisition (Nov), MINUS the amount of donations and advertising revenue received since. All other expenses you may have incurred were purely discretionary and have nothing to do with the site. If this happens to resolve to a negative number, we will give you nothing, but you can consider yourself fortunate to walk away from this trainwreck with your skin. Your costs you have incurred from Kathy are not my concern. If they somehow managed to convince you that this was ever a good idea, I suggest you take this up with them. This, however, is not relevant to my interests.
3. Upon completion, you disappear and never return, firmly regretting you ever heard of the Sims community.

WHY DO I PROPOSE THIS?
Simple.
Because I have all the files and DBs, and if you refuse or fail to agree in a timely manner, because I'm not especially patient, I will simply start them up without you, leaving you with a gutted husk of this albatross around your neck on a server you can barely manage to keep running for as long as it takes to read this message.

Incidentally, none of your crazy business proposals or services interest me in the slightest. The fact that you in this mess proves to me that you have no idea what you're dealing with. This matter is not up for debate. Accept, or do not. And choose quickly. Before you run up some more bills on a server that can barely function.

darsky
Walt, I believe you should arrange to sell to Pescado. You clearly had no idea what you were getting into. The Sims community is HUGE. It is made up of smart people of all ages and professions (I am a 52 year-old retired executive).

You mentioned you are not a lawyer... Well, some in the community are very, VERY familiar with the law as involves Sims sites and custom creations. Legalities have been discussed for years because of intellectual property, paysites, licenses, and more.

Since you admittedly know nothing about The Sims and it's community loyalty, I think your instinct to remove yourself is a good one. Trust me, you do not want the headache.

Go in peace.

PS... J.M. Pescado is well-known and very respected in the community. I predict he will have the support of the entire community.

Here's another one-the wanked one
From this link we have a wonderfully accurate, and fun take on the recent 'unpleasantness' (sarcasm, another bonus we offer) for you to enjoy!
http://www.journalfen.net/community/fandom_wank/1188549.html

miss_padfoot ([info]miss_padfoot) wrote in [info]fandom_wank,
@ 2008-12-04 18:38:00
Current location: home
Current mood: *thud*
Current music: my sister playing Mozart downstairs
Entry tags: enormous clusterfuck, yay screencaps!

Implosion in Simworld!
Boy, oh boy. May I present to you one of the most epic wanks ever to befall the Sims 2 community - the revolution involving Insimenator.net. Thanks to [info]simscribe (Devilfish) and [info]simmiesworld for the writeups. I've just made a few minor tweaks.

Be warned that this is a wank of epic proportions. It's hard to tell what happened when and who said what. I've given most attention to the facts that can be supported by screenshots. Hundreds of people were involved in this wank, everyone has their own opinions on it and events may or may not have occurred in the order described.

Insimenator.net is a very large, completely free Sims 2 fan site featuring contests, stories, and, most importantly, downloadable custom content like clothing, hair, and houses. For many years, it was owned by a couple named Eric and Kathy. Eric and Kathy had many loyal friends in the community. In the months leading up to the buyout, Eric and Kathy were increasingly absent from the site, only appearing every few months to beg for donations in a panic, stating that they didn't have enough money to cover the servers and if they didn't get [random amount here, normally around $600] in a week, the site would have to close. They would also keep the updated Insimenator hack hostage until they received said donations. Because they had been in the community for so long and had many friends, they would always manage to get enough to keep their servers running.

Then, much to everyone's shock, Kathy and Eric sold the site and left without so much a “goodbye and thanks for all the fish.” They had sold the site to the highest bidder, a "businessman" named Walt Thiessen.

Details of the financial transactions are not clear. Here is the info they posted on the auction site where Insim was eventually sold:

(Insim information according to http://www.dealasite.com)

This means one of three things:

1. Kathy and Eric inflated the numbers, presumably in an effort to sell the site for much more than it was worth;

2. Kathy and Eric did not inflate the numbers and were making a profit of Insim donation drives and advertising on the site, while claiming to be in constant financial problems and begging the community for donations to keep the site running; or

3. they inflated the numbers but were making a small profit regardless.

While we're not sure which of those three is correct, most people seem to conclude that Kathy and Eric were using the donation money for personal profit. Walt is aiming to do likewise.

Anyway, they didn't make clear to Mr. Businessman Walt what was ACTUALLY up for sale. All content on the site was made and submitted by the users, who feel that either they own the creations or EA does (probably the latter), but that Insimenator definitely does not. Without the custom content, Insim is just a forum worth roughly $10. Nothing is certain, but there's strong suspicions that Walt paid well over $2,500 for it (since he later rejected a $2,500 offer for the site - more on that in a bit), or possibly even something close to $10,000.

Enter Walt , the new owner. Notice how he proudly announces that he's not even a gamer!

Walt joined Insim at least two weeks prior to buying it, but he did not bother to contact any of the staff and moderators on the site. Instead, he chose to announce his presence in grand public speech where he lays out his plans for the site: There are problems and he's going to throw money at the problems until they go away. Money he plans to get from the users of the site, whom he evidently also expects to pay him for his services.

In the Sims community, free creators and many downloaders generally believe that custom content creation should be a labor of love and not money. Completely voluntary donation drives for server costs are accepted ( Wicked Nouk Family , which releases special creations for everyone, not just donators, as a celebration/thank you prize every month that they can pay their server costs), but charging money for downloads, having subscriber-only areas of a site, or otherwise trying to profit from one's creations is generally not taken well. (Charging money for custom content is technically illegal anyway, but EA doesn't do anything about it.) Someone trying to profit from other people's creations, like Walt, is even worse. Even though he doesn't technically want to make Insim a paysite, he does want the Insim members to line his pockets with subscription payments - not for the downloads themselves, but for ad-free browsing. According to an email he sent to the Insim staff, he is considering making Insim Adult a paysite, since it is not currently profitable. (Walt later retracts this once he sees everyone going apeshit over the possibility.)

The entire community goes “Waitwut?” Shit hits the fan.

Walt is offered advice by both the mods and users. He largely ignores it, instead opting to put up polls everywhere while everyone panics, asks questions and generally pisses their pants. (You can't see the poll results in the screenshot, but over 75% voted for "No subscription fees plz".)

Synapticsim, one of the creators, posts a nice summary of events and reveals some financial data.

Delphy, the owner of ModtheSims2, an even more successful Sims 2 site, chimes in multiple times and offers to buy the site from Walt for $2,500, seeing the epic shitstorm on the horizon. But again, Walt doesn't take all this very seriously.

Walt is asked numerous questions by moderators and users, but refuses to discuss anything with the community members. Instead of replying to concerns in the original thread, he makes a new one giving us all a brief history of the Great Depression, and also telling us that his elderly mother has also invested in the site, so it must be great, amirite?

Let it be noted that no personal attacks on Eric and Kathy had been made at this point. People were still kermitflailing, wanting to know what happened and if the financial data provided was correct. Walt's little Great Depression speech didn't satisfy the increasingly pissed-off forum members and his insistence that “The future of this site is bright!” didn't exactly clarify much.

And this point, Walt gets a little irritated. Unfortunately, we don't have any screenshots of this, but when asked about the chart showing that Kathy and Eric were supposedly making a PROFIT from Insim, Walt refused to talk finance with the peasants. The exchange was thus:

carlymichelle: walt can you understand why so many of us are concerned and upset though we had NO warning whatsoever and IMO that isnt right what we need now is honesty
Walt: Sure, I understand. What I don't understand is why some people think I can fix the way they left. I can't. No one can. Get over it.

People are not happy about that.

It's now Thanksgiving weekend in the United States, and since Mr. Businessman apparently keeps OFFICE HOURS, he logs off and goes to enjoy his turkey, and leaves the site to implode, not to come back for a couple of days while the community was confused and angry. If there was any more chance to save the ship, it was well and truly gone then.

Meanwhile, back at the Paysites Must Be Destroyed forum , something called Warplan Beige is conceived. J. M. Pescado, Pirate King and head of the Sims 2 website More Awesome Than You , sets to work making a mirror of Insim and Insim Adult (the 18+ section of Insim). In the Sims community, Pescado is acknowledged to be ruthless and harsh, but he's got a lot of technical savvy, and he takes the fight to paysites, for which a lot of people respect him. He was also featured in this wank . (oop, sorry, this wank has been yanked too)

Pescado's plan is to make a mirror of the Insim and Insim Adult sites, and let all the users who don't want to be under Walt's management move to his site instead. Since nobody likes Walt, and Pescado is an ass but he's our ass, most of the active creators will probably go ahead and migrate. He'll have an admin position to work out technical kinks, but appoint another admin to do the day-to-day running of the site. He acknowledges that there will be voluntary donation drives, but they will be infrequent and announced in advance In the meantime, he asks everyone else to stay off the site so he can get the data efficiently.

By this time, the community has gone from hurt and confused to LIVID. Sim Oasis is founded as a haven for former Insimenator members and staff. Many creators begin deleting their creations from Insimenator, wanting to leave Walt nothing but an empty husk of a site when he returns from his holiday. The servers melt at various points during this process. The page is up and down more times than a tart's knickers. Much wank ensues over everything, up to and including who's allowed to disrupt Warplan Beige by going on Insim while Pescado's servers work their magic.

In the end, Walt decides he wants out. He's had enough of it, really, and makes the community a generous offer , wherein he goes on about creating a board of directors, and actually proposes that the community buy him out so that he breaks even. People piss themselves laughing, since they know that Insim is definitely not worth that much money, and they have no desire to give this dude any of their cash. At this point, Walt has already declined an offer from Delphy to buy the site for approximately $2,500.

Pescado finishes his cloning of both sites and a complete backup of Insim and Insim Adult is now in his possession. By this point, the people following this epic wank (hundreds of them, all angry, some of them with admin access) are aching to tear the site down rather than participate in the new Insim.

Pescado gives the order to pillage and burn (as pirates do), and makes a new Insim front page , styling himself as a revolutionary (which many of the Simmers accept). Then he makes Walt a counteroffer he can't refuse , basically telling Walt to sell the site for $500 and GTFO, never to be seen again.

In the melee, one of the moderators changed Kathy and Eric's new sigs and avatars

All this is accompanied by copious use of lolcats and fail macros.

And there was much rejoicing.

At this point, Walt is back in the game and it's his turn to go WTF. His server melts again. But not before several moderators quit , most in truly lol-worthy fashion.

With a press of the FAIL button, Walt messes up the forum, makes private forums public, reveals IPs and email addresses, demotes all the administrators and supermods to ordinary moderators (so the only people who can understand the admin panel can't help him even if they are inclined to, which they aren't), and generally kermitflails through the forums.

At the moment of this writing, a test mirror for Insim Adult is up and running . Pescado plans to give full control of the mirrored Insim to the old moderators. Delphy has offered his help with the forum software and Walt is still kermitflailing - or so we think. There has been new speculation that Walt has already made a copy of the site and is just biding his time until his new server goes online, thereby luring a whole bunch of uninformed people to his new site, to make donations. None of this speculation is supported by evidence, however, and Simmers are occasionally prone to tinfoil hat theories about their least favorite site owners.

For the complete and unabridged lulz, go to any of these sites:
Paysites Must Be Destroyed (the thread is over 200 pages and counting)
Garden of Shadows (50 pages and counting)
Sim-Oasis (30 pages and counting)
The Garden of Shadows also has some miniwank (that's the start; the comments are spread out) when BlooM, a well-known Insim creator, gives Walt the benefit of the doubt and says he doesn't want his creations up at a Pescado-owned Insim. People argue over whether Pescado or anyone else should respect his wishes.

The situation is still subject to change, since Pescado's Insim mirror is not up yet, and Insimenator.net is still down (Walt seems to be pretty incompetent). Somewhere, people make T-shirts and posters for their sims with red "no" signs over Walt's face and Kathy's boobtacular avatar, for which she was well-known. They're over on the original Insim, which is currently down.

Oh, and finally, a helpful mousie has uploaded a bunch of Insim threads here . There's Paden's (a former admin's) hilarious flounce, some Q&A, and SynapticSim's explanation of the whole thing on his profile page.

Suddenly I have the urge to see all of this done as a sim story, pics and all.  ;D

That would be totally awesome!

That wouldn't just be awesome...that'd be EPIC. The whole Walt fiasco also marks my one year anniversary as an Insim member. I started out a career lurker over on MTS, then followed a link to the original insim, and I've festered (and pestered) here ever since. When you look back at the whole situation, it still has to make you scratch your head and say "OMGWTF???" The revolution saw it's unfortunate casualties, but hey...we're still here ain't we? Might not be as strong as the place was before the mess, but with new creators churning out TS2 CC and the wide abundance of TS3 CC coming down the pipe now, what was once a gaping wound is now but a fairly noticeable scar. That's the beauty about being part of a community. Some might not see eye to eye with others, but when the poop hits the fan, we band together. There's a blessing in disguise in that though the insim community took a shot from it all, those who remained became an even tighter knit group. Insim will always be my "home forum" in the Sims Community. I love you guys...*sniff sniff* :P

Aww me too man, I luv you guys 2hug ;D... *swipes Joy's coffee & dodges Jenna's chainsaw*1escape >:D

oh my goodness ... public showings of happiness, light and love ... you guys know you'll need to hide from more than Jenna's chainsaw right?! lol

Okay.  A year after Eric and Kathy left, and Walt was left holding nothing.  But what progress has been made on this new version of Insimenator?  What losses were there to the site and community as a whole?  Who has stepped up to fill the voids left by those losses?  What does the site still have going for it and even became stronger since the Revolution? 

There's got to be some positive things to brag about from the past year rather than just reminiscing about the Walt fiasco.

For one, we no longer have such a backlog of stuff stored that wasn't needed, such as the porn spam we used to get that a former admin/owner used to keep to entertain herself with. For another, it has inspired other people to learn how to use certain programs to learn how to create content, myself being one of these. Honesty about finances is now in place, as well, and let's face it kids, don't you prefer to know that you aren't being milked to keep someone's lifestyle pumping along at a luxurious pace?

Yet, that freedom has come at a price. There's no hidden slush fund to tap when we don't get the donations needed to cover the server. Poor Ali takes that out of her own pocket and she can't keep doing that. Sadly, donations have dropped off and if things don't pick up then we may indeed have to close or find someone like Pescado to host us. Anyone up for being under his boot totally? I know we're in a tough season right now and a lot of folks don't have much to spare, but guys, if we want to keep this place up and going with the degree of self-control we've had for the past year, then please, fling some spare change our way or we're going to have to find some other way to keep on keeping on. My family gives when we can, I know that others do, too.

One of the things that is great about the change is while we still aren't doing the whole free vs. pay thing is, you can now link to the Booty so long as the original creator is linked to as well. We let you make up your own minds as to where you want to get stuff and we give you the locations on where to go.

As a site, we've become much more honest, as well. You won't find the false saccharine sweetness that prevailed, either. Things are much more direct in how they're said and you aren't left to guess if something is actually meaning one thing when in fact, it's the total opposite. People are so much more honest about what they say and in the way they say it, it's refreshing to find that instead of wanting to go into sugar shock.

You also don't find the same repetitive comments made on items uploaded, like, "Looks great, doll!" "Good work, hon!" and a million other trite little things. A person is actually given better feedback on what they upload here these days. The communication between staff is better, too. We can actually discuss things in a manner that makes sure we're all on the same page without getting our tails in a crack with an overlord that is going to come in and throw a tantrum at all of us that in turn makes us total crap at our jobs.

We got our Squinge back making mods and being, well, Squinge. He's top-notch at doing what he does and plus, there is Chaavik helping him and she is some kind of wonderful, to be honest. The lady knows her stuff, that's for sure. Our staff as a whole is tighter knit than before and not a better group of people could be asked for.

A good many of the people that have come here are old faces, welcome for their personalities and intelligence and the memories that they bring with them. More have come in to see what we're all about and fit in so well that you couldn't tell that they weren't here from the time before Walt. They've grown with the new site and have provided more diversity and difference to lend an interesting blend with everyone else. Yeah, we're still growing and experiencing teething troubles, what with some that join just to act like trolls, but every site has those and when it happens, they are dealt with quickly and efficiently.

Now that Sims 3 has come along, there is a whole new field to explore, even if some of us like myself stay rooted in the old game of Sims 2. There is room enough for both here and it's my hope that this can continue. Life is about change and growth, which is exactly where we can go from here, growing and changing. You'll see a lot of the same old faces and many new ones, ain't it grand? I'm just hoping that we can keep it up, though, cause like I said, with the pockets showing nothing but lint and maybe fifteen bucks in the kitty so far, we aren't going to get far. We can't ask that of Ali, she's made up the short fall when it happens. Please, guys, let us make it possible for this community to grow and change and see how much better we can make it. I'm in it for the long haul, how bout everyone else?

*Gets down from her soap box and thanks everyone that has stuck with us, even if she can't bring up each and every name listed in the membership rolls, you are very valued for who you are!*

Paden, that was beautiful; and very inspiring! I'm kind of selfish when it comes to most Sims content site; I take take take and never give back. Well that's going to change. I don't want to lose InSim or ISA so I can contribute too!

Paden expressed most of what I was thinking and then some. Ancient, you may not remember, but you and Engram were the first ones on insim to respond to my (way noob) newbie posts. New to the sims I browsed a few sites but quickly felt at home here. For me, you guys made an unplayable game work, all the answers were here. I tried to learn and help where I could even though I had to defer to expert players on hard issues. It seemed the "Insim" thing to do--give back to the community. MATY, InSim, & MTS2 were my main sources of info, so when things went down I knew all the names involved and where they came from.

I'm sure I'm not alone. This marks my 1 1/2 year anniversary here and while I joke about the whole fiasco, I appreciate those who stayed.  Many of the ones that ran the site in the time I started coming here (June 2008) are still here IMO because the voices I heard then: Engram, Ancient, Joy, Chaavik, Squinge, Paden, Jenna and more...are the same ones that still keep things running now. There are many that I miss as well, Creators, Avatars/names that I was used to running into daily before the blowup.  I hold out hope that many will come back, but even if not, we will all win in the end by being who we are now--not focusing on the misdeeds/betrayal of Eric & Kathy who seemed long gone way before the implosion.

This economy is harsh but I'm glad Paden pointed out that bills still need to be paid.  Many just may not have thought about that issue before, with daily life intervening. I don't know if the site has a P.O. box or address for those that don't use paypal but providing a mail-in type address via post or on request (pms, etc.,) would help those that may have no other method to send in support.

Behind the scenes, with real lives of their own to deal with, Insim members consoled me during one of the hardest years of my life. The death of my brother at just 49 & my mother was devastating to me. Isolated and (unknown to many here) being ill myself I had no way to travel. The soothing words from many here on insim will never be forgotten. .

As far as new talent, I contribute in the only way I know how right now, making sims.  I'm trying to learn careers, recolors, & someday meshing and I'm not alone--there are plenty new faces here doing the same, each trying to contribute in their own way. And that's just for TS2...I have tons of skills to learn there before I even think about modding for sims 3. Really I can't see getting tired of TS2 for years to come. To use Walt's phrase*gags at the thought*  ;): the future for us really is bright, corny but true.

The point is we're here, in spite of it all. To me that's a reason to celebrate :cool:.

Much as we'd love to do that, sadly it's not practical because many of us are based in the States and Ali, who has the server in her name, is in the U.K. and money orders just do not translate well at all. Even if someone here were to put the money into a PayPal account and then funnel it to Ali, PayPal still takes a chunk out of it and that would mean they would be getting two or even three bites when they are entitled to one. Did that make sense?

Makes perfect sense. I used to purchase from a seller in the UK regularly until the dollar began a massive plummet several years ago and it became too expensive.

When I left this place.. The original owners were still here, and now looking back, kathy seemed sincere, but.. From all the info I read, I think it was all just a act. I've been out of the loop for awhile now, and I heard a little about this, I heard the site had been sold, I was in shock. It's still hard to believe that two peole who seemed trust worthy and honest were really living off the donation money. Money people gave to keep the site on line, to keep downloads, and friendships they had here.. And they had no issue with that.

I am glad that Insim did NOT die, and the site feels more, real now. None of the fake niceness that was portrayed before. Thank you guys for keeping this site up and for posting this thread, I needed to be filled in.  :eek:

I think it's okay to look back at the problems, as long as you can look forward to what you have now.

I am not on as much as I used to be (darn dialup anyhoo, but oh well, I may have found a way around that) but when I arrive here, I know I can find my friends here. They know about my handicap (the dialup) and love me anyways LOL!

This is a great place, and well worth the time spent here! This was my home for a long time, and I still consider it my home place! I had to clear out and start fresh with my stuff (some of it--WHAT was I thinking?? But here I am-I am happy to be here, and will remain here as well!
hugs, and much thanks to you all who have made this possible
!Admin!
!Mods!
!Tech Gurus!
!Creators!
Much Love,
Skye

Amazing story, I don't understand how J.M. Pescado can be more awesome than anyone, but I'm happy of this fact.

All Hail Pescado !!!

Gee, thank you for your insightful addition to a thread that's been dead for nearly eleven freakin' months!

*shoots the zombies dead and wanders off*

Does no one see the note in the news about STOP PLAYING WITH THE ZOMBIES!?!?