I was reading through old rants on http://fryedsoft.bluecrimson.com not so long ago and http://fryedsoft.bluecrimson.com/rants/calcdeath.htm one reminded me of ticalc.org current situation, with some exceptions of course.

Most of those here who are still active in the TI community probably noticed the drastic decrease in activity on ticalc.org over the past 12 months, while other sites still seems to be alive and kicking. In August they hired two new file archivers. One left, and they decided to fire the other one. He got fired because he became busy and couldn't do the job regulary like he used to, but he said he could at least do some weekly updates. After they fired him they never hired anyone again, so they're left with no file archivers to do the job anymore, so it's the other staff who have to do the job, and they are also pretty busy. Don't get fooled by the fact there is 3 file archivers while looking at the staff page, because it hasn't been updated in a while and all of them are retired now. Patrick Stone announced his retirement from the community last year, Joey Gannon just came back for a short while last summer to help but didn't stayed long and Jason M is supposed to be retired now, considering they posted a news about the hiring of new file archivers. As you can notice on the front page, there is like one update per 3 weeks most of the time. If there is more than that, there is usually only one or two programs added. At the beginning of this month I in fact uploaded Metroid II: The Last Chozo Expansion Set and AaroneusTheGreat uploaded Doom 68k one or two weeks ago, and still none of them got added in the archives. It has beeen like that for about 6 months now and sometimes I am starting considering getting all my files removed from here and making them exclusive to Omnimaga because it's impossible to get anything added here anymore in a reasonable amount of time.

Now the consequences of this: Of course, there is less news being posted on the front page. Less news and updates means that people visit less often and post less comments. You may indeed have noticed the decrease in amount of comments in the past year. Even Omnimaga get more comments on news articles nowadays. This also means less featured programs. Combined with the fact they've been pretty strict in the past 1.5 year in featuring programs it doesn't help their case either, because people feel less like posting their programs, because they never know if they will even be added in archives.

I remember the days where someone used to post their demo/beta on ticalc.org and relying on this one site to show their project preview to public because it would be added within the exact same week. Now it is no longer possible anymore. They now either rely on calcg.org or file uploading services.

Also, if you look at file upload form pending queue, it rarely goes above 150 anymore nowadays, even if the archives didn't got uploaded for months, even in peak periods. It seems like people are getting sick of ticalc.org updates slowness and decide to upload their files on other sites or their own blogs. There is also less reviews, because it can be a month before new reviews are added, and i even seen 6 months once. There has been like 1-12 programs featured in one entire year, while there used to be near 100 some years. Even last year there was twice as much as this year.

You probably also noticed that half of the hosted sites that were still online all suddently shutted down, all at once. I know there was some that were down long ago, but now it's more than half of the list. The server is also slower than it used to be less than 1 year ago, email requests takes nearly half a year, same for the deletion of innapropriate files (recently got a notice that my innapropriate file removal was accepted, even if the request was in early 2007) and now if they're gonna have less traffic, this means their new ads will pay less, thus, making the site stay online and pay for hosting even harder.

It's not that I want to be negative, but it just seems that ticalc.org is going the way calc.org did, minus the downtimes. It's getting less and less updates, and they hire no one else to take over the other staff job. And don't tell me it's the entire community, because on other sites there is the same amount of activity than last year and there is a lot of secret projects being worked on. Also calcg.org file archives increased drastically compared to what it was 2 years ago. At this rate I expect ticalc.org to close or stop being maintained completly around 2009; I don't expect a shutdown anytime soon, but I'm sure if it close it will shut down someday if paying for hosting  isn't possible anymore for the founder. Calcg.org (Calcgames), unitedti.org or tifreakware.net may become the main unnoficial TI website then.

They need to do something. Ticalc.org must be the largest database of calc games, for any platform. I comepletely agree with DJ. Ticalc.org was a place where people could upload their programs to be tested/reviewed/worshiped or whatever, but now that there is hardly any updates, nobody feels like wasting their time. It is possible that if ticalc.org shuts down completely, many of the people that do upload there might look for alternative sources to upload, and we could possibly see an increase in activity here and at other forums. It's a shame that it's going the way it is, I always liked ticalc.org.

it is really sad to know that the TI sites are closing
I have been whacting them for over 3 years and never until recently has it been this bad

that is a good idea, but it would require more man power to check the new stuff meaning they would have to hire more people, therefore costing more money. I think that the TI website's owner has a restricted buget for maintaining the web site

something needs to revamp the calculator community, like a ti-inspire CAS except...good or zelda

That game looks insane.  When that is released, I will be a happy man.

QuoteBegin-DJ Omnimaga+29 Nov, 2007, 18:23-->

QUOTE (DJ Omnimaga @ 29 Nov, 2007, 18:23)

For now my biggest hope is that they continue doing POTY. If the first week (or beginning of second) of december they start voting process then there's better sign of life. If they were to not do a 2007 POTY then I would have my awnser O_O That said let's hope it stay around. I'm sure that even if it would stop being updated completly it would still stay online for about 3-4 more years but it would be better if it was updated like it used to be (especially file archives).