Hi all,
The past 48 hours has been a whirlwind of activity, but Mug 2.0 is up and alive.
As previously noted, you will need to use the “Forgot Password” option to log in the first time.
We are still missing groups. They imported, but they failed to recognize which members made which comments, so the dev has them tucked away and has made those his #1 priority. They should come up within the next 24 hours or so. At that point, you can resume group activity and will be able to make new groups again.
One of the biggest issues we discovered once the data was uploaded was that none of the privacy settings stuck. In other words, everyone’s private photos and blogs were visible to anyone on the site. Naturally, we couldn’t open the doors with it like this, so we needed to stay down long enough to fix it. There’s no way for me to comb the data and get a list of what was public and what was private, so we’ve marked all blogs and photos as visible to “Just Me” (that’s you). Please take a moment to adjust individual blogs again if you’d like them made public.
Along with the lack of imported privacy settings, we discovered that “private” wasn’t really private. Anyone could still see the blog title and intro and see the cover of an album, even if it was marked as “Just Me.” No, that makes no sense at all. So, we had to go through and do emergency recoding to fix this. We got through the blogs, but not the photos. Because of this, we’ve temporarily hidden all photos. They all uploaded and transferred just fine, but I know many people shared with the expectation of total privacy, so we have hidden all photo features for the time being. They should come back up in the next day or so. Like the blogs, you will need to specifically opt-in to reshare any of your older photos.
You can also post blogs right now and select your ideal privacy settings, but be aware that if you choose to share with “just friends” everyone who comes to the site will be able to see the title and intro. This fix will come soon. If you’re posting for the public, though, post as you normally would. Obviously, privacy settings are irrelevant in this case.
I feel like I owe you all an explanation for what happened, so if you’re interested, feel free to keep reading. If you’re indifferent and just glad the Mug is working again, you can safely skip the rest of this.
answerMug was built on a cloud platform called Ning. It’s essentially a Weebly or Wix, but for social networks. This is well and good for small groups of people, but after our influx of new Muggers, it stopped being enough for us. Moreover, like many of the big social giants of today, Ning’s parent company, Mode Media, started going under. Their communication with website owners like myself was next to nothing and they have hundreds of thousands of sites on their platform. In May, just as everyone was getting settled in here, Ning biffed it, ran out of money, and was down for about half the month. I saw the writing on the wall and started building a new site for us elsewhere- our own site, on our own servers, free of anyone else’s influence or control.
Ning sites are not designed to be moved. They keep a lot of stuff under lock and key that no developer outside of their company can touch. Early Ning sites (called Ning 2.0 sites) have an archive tool, intended for site owners to make backups. Any Ning site created in the past few years does not even have this. They’re stuck. Using this archive tool, I was able to get a fairly comprehensive backup of the site, but remember- it wasn’t designed to allow sites to move. It intentionally doesn’t capture everything. There are some things Ning holds hostage, like your passwords and your friend lists.
Ning didn’t admit it was having financial trouble until the parent, Mode Media, shut its doors without any prior warning a couple weeks ago. They literally called a meeting in the middle of the day and sent all their employees home. Mode Media made revenue from content. They didn’t even pay their writers what they were owed. Their employees got no severance pay. Their benefits abruptly stopped. That says a lot by itself. The Ning platform changed hands, though only to a temporary holding company. Obviously, they still weren’t supporting the networks, because many people like myself were locked out all of last weekend. According to a Ning announcement yesterday, someone has agreed to buy the platform, but that’s not really relevant to us. We’re done with them. For the hundreds of thousands still stranded there with networks that cannot be moved, I really hope the service improves.
It took us a few backups and 4-5 loads of the data to get it all where it needed to go and read properly. I realized after it was in that Ning didn’t let us keep our internal messages and group lists either. For those of you who need access to these things, our old network is still up at answergang.ning.com. I am not supporting the site- we are not moderating it and none of the content you add there will appear on the new site. So, please only use it to grab any lists or emails you need and then depart. Obviously, I can’t keep paying to keep both networks up, so be sure you get whatever you need from there on or before October 1. After this, I am deleting all our data that remains. Someone asked me if they could purchase the network from me. After I told her a hundred times that it was essentially suicide by website, I reluctantly agreed to let her have it. I’m not even selling it. I’m just giving it to her. That’s how strongly I feel that Ning is a piece of junk. She isn’t getting our data. I will remove everything before I transfer just the bones of the site to her. But, you should be aware that the Ning site will abruptly stop recognizing you on/ around 10/2- all your content will leave that site, and a new network that’s totally unrelated to us will take its place. I will not warn you before I do this- this your one and only shot to go in and get your emails or group lists. If you think you will ever need them- go make copies now. Again, I cannot access the back end, so there is no way for me to archive or even view your emails. If you need them, you will have to collect them yourself, manually, using the old fashioned copy/ paste.
Going forward, we are in a really good place. We have a beautiful new site that runs circles around our old one. Best of all, it’s ours. If it has an issue related to service or glitches, I can make sure it’s resolved promptly, without waiting for Ning. We can upgrade it and add features anytime we wish, depending on our revenue. We had a couple people donate to the redesign, but most of it was paid for by me and I am tapped out. Lol So, we’re going to fix the necessary issues and then hold off a few months before we make any remaining improvements.
Fixes you can expect to see happen in the next week or so include the photos, issues that relate to signing up for a new account, the size of the font in some comment areas, corrections to the Q&A that doesn’t let some of the older questions be viewed, and the ability for the activity feed and notifications to jump you to the right place in the thread when you click on something related to a comment or reply.
We do have some other developments slated for the future, including a “Poster’s Pick” for the Q&A and an app. You all are welcomed to make suggestions via the “Feedback” tab on the new site. We obviously can’t implement everything people request, but the existing site and all of its features were chosen by member request. Although I may head up the site, my goal will always be to do what works best for the majority of Muggers and I will implement additional suggestions that benefit the greater community as time and funding allows.
At any rate, we finally did it. We’re up and running. Thank you all for your patience. We already have the best members anywhere, and I’m looking forward to having the best site as well.
See you on the Mug,
Just Asking
