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Is it just me, or are they down again?

Nope, they're down again. Maybe they've decided to take the forum offline for good. BTW Reideen, I got a kick out of all of your last posts over there. I'm interested to see what they say, if they come back at all.

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Is it just me, or are they down again?

Nope, they're down again. Maybe they've decided to take the forum offline for good. BTW Reideen, I got a kick out of all of your last posts over there. I'm interested to see what they say, if they come back at all.

Yeah, I've actually been wanting to bump those posts for a while now. Unfortunately my home PC was down almost all last week - finally got the cable co. out yesterday to fix it, so I was able to give 'em a little nudge. :D

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Essentially he's given AA til about the end of the year, so we'll see.

What do you mean by this?

Seems like things are falling apart over there.

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I saw that Adam had replied. It's about time somebody did! <_<

I know I sued to grumble about the mods before, but things have gone from the sublime to the ridiculous, because there's practically no moderation at all happening now! :blink:

Seriously, I'd had my doubts about one poster who was putting up a number of pointless topics to which no one was replying. I checked her stats and found that most of her posts were in Day Pass and one in Trade (so not much of a toy collector then), where I found a discussion about whether 'she' was really a spambot. Judging by the tripe 'she' had posted in Day Pass, I reported one of her stupid posts, and now all her silly topics have disappeared!! :rolleyes:

The thing is, why had the mods not spotted this, and why am I doing their work for them? :P:P

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Because there used to be fans who cared about the place running it, now there isnt.

The old regieme wasnt perfect, the reason for that is now becoming clear the "rules" etc we were gven seemed not to come from AA but from that "moderator that owes them thousands". Thats the onyl reason really there was negativity, we were running with random rules and input from someone who couldnt care less.

Now its ran by people that dont know the community, nor do they seem to paticuarly care about it, hence not spotting spambots and the like.

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Not surprised at all. Yeah why would you say you've asked for the merchandise back and keep the person/s in their position after not getting it for so long? I would think it would be more serious, don't you? It's a company site.

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Essentially he's given AA til about the end of the year, so we'll see.

What do you mean by this?

Seems like things are falling apart over there.

Adam sez "i leave for Hong Kong wed then have Fall Toyfair after that. Donna, Robert and I will do our best to rectify these situations by next month."

Realistically, it'll be end of the year before I expect to see a resolution, since it's already mid October.

Not surprised at all. Yeah why would you say you've asked for the merchandise back and keep the person in their post? I would think it would be more serious, don't you?

I don't think he's talking about Brandon - I'd wager he's referring to Tim, since he's talking specifically about the AACC in that post.

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Yeah Its Tim, but Brandon did seem to learn a lot from him with regards to presence..

Reminds me of another admin from a forum I used to frequent....

The whole Tim thing beggars belief, i still dont believe half of it myself.

If you'd received a box full of office supplies as part of your AACC welcome kit, you might....

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OK, I got you Reideen. Wasn't real clear there for a sec.

In Tim B.'s defense, he is a good guy and did a lot for the forums. He was a big reason why there was an AACC at all. He took a lot of flak on AA's behalf and I believe he finally finally gave up. I'm not condoning theft or anything else Tim is being accused of, but don't be fooled by AA that this is all his fault, because its not. AA should have always been in control and they never cared to until now.

That being said...I got got some rubber bands and colored paper clips in my AACC membership kit. What did you get?! :huh:

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OK, I got you Reideen. Wasn't real clear there for a sec.

In Tim B.'s defense, he is a good guy and did a lot for the forums. He was a big reason why there was an AACC at all. He took a lot of flak on AA's behalf and I believe he finally finally gave up. I'm not condoning theft or anything else Tim is being accused of, but don't be fooled by AA that this is all his fault, because its not. AA should have always been in control and they never cared to until now.

That being said...I got got some rubber bands and colored paper clips in my AACC membership kit. What did you get?! :huh:

Same type of stuff - once I finally got a membership kit. Anyway - this is turning into a bash the AACC thread, which it really wasn't intended to be.

Sorry about getting us off course (I have a habit of doing that). I'll shut up now. ;)

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Yep couldn't agree with you more Shanester. Once you turn the card, it's in AA's control.

====================================

Yeah my comments are meant to take a stab at AA or anyone, that's why I didn't want to say any names. Thought we were just discussing the comments posted. We really can't speak what we don't know for sure either.

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(I go away on vacation and miss all the drama. Damn.)

My two cents:

I didn't get into the moderator gig for compensation, I got into it because the board needed one in Tim's increasingly frequent absenses and I figured a part-time mod was better than a no-time admin. I couldn't suspend or ban anyone but I could edit content and move and lock threads. Essentially I was the school janitor while the principal was on summer vacation; I got to deal with the unruly little bastards but couldn't boot them out personally. (And for the record, I never banned or suspended anyone even when I did have the authority.)

I'd like to think I did more good than harm for the community. In the beginning I tried to piss out the fires started in the AACC forum but got accused of being heavy-handed and ended up letting the whole thing implode. I can't honestly say I miss that particular cluster fuck. Great idea, lousy execution, and no real support from AA. It deserved to die.

The two things I'm particularly proud of are starting the "definitive" lists (which Lurch continues to maintain, God bless him) and keeping the Q&As flowing. As with the mod gig, I saw a demand and tried my best to fulfill it. Others had made empty promises to get questions answered but DSTChuck and I were the only ones to deliver consistently. Folks might not have liked the answers but at least there was a dialogue, something that, at the time, seemed impossible with anyone at AA.

I never got a "thank you" in any way, shape or form from AA so I sure don't expect an apology for being unceremoniously kicked to the curb when they were done with me. Besides, what I did was for the community they still seem to take for granted, not Adam or Digger or anyone else at AA. I was far from a kiss-ass, at one point asked to be less critical of AA as a mod. Fuck that. Wearing a muzzle was never a condition of my voluntary service that took time away from my work and family.

At this point I don't think there's any swag AA could give me that I would want. With the exception of unreleased DC and Marvel Minimates, I'm all caught up. (Okay, except for the Black Spider-Woman and Frosty Ice Man, but i digress...) Anyway, office supplies would just add insult to injury.

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^^^LOL! I was under the impression that you banned Me and Berns...at least for the initial week!! :P

Anyway, that's all water under the bridge now.

What I can say is that the new AA forum isn't any kind of a real community: sure folks are good to each other, but the unresolved questions over the handling of the last moderating team hang over the forum as a bad smell.

Of all the alternative forums: here and Mark's forum seem to be the places with the most community spirit because people can be themselves in them. That was the problem with the change of policy at AA IMO, the place went all PG13, but in the wrong way, and the mods either went for ...or were encouraged to go for, the wrong things and the wrong people. It killed the community, and I don't see AA getting it back anytime soon....but then, could they give a toss?

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Just because all the talk has peaked my curiosity, anyone want to sum up the AACC debacle? I've heard this mentioned so many times in the past but it all happened before my time. Here is what I understand:

Tim B. ran the first AA Forum and started the AACC club. Members paid $35.00 to get into the club and get cool freebies. (Who got the money, Tim B. or AA?)

Tim B. "hired" volunteer moderators to run the forum, many of whom joined the club. These mods included: MisterPL, Gardi, Ady, and Brandon.

The cool freebies never got distributed to the members. Tim B. reduces involvement to almost nothing. AA claims it sent him "thousands" of dollars in swag to be distributed that never made it out to people.

Brandon takes over as defacto leader. Second forum launched. Brandon and the other mods try to make amends for the AACC club debacle. AA helps out, apologizes for the problems through Brandon. (Office supplies sent out with money returned?)

Brandon promises the mods goodies for their hard work on the second forum. Goodies never sent. Power goes to his head and Brandon enforces his own rules. Claims he is acting on behalf of AA. People are banned. Blood in the streets as the mods fight amongst themselves.

Second forum collapses. AA hires a new group to manage the website and forum. Minimate fans move to MMMV during the downtimes and stay.

That is the story I have. It's everything I've picked up from what has been published on the various boards. How off am I? Somethings I'm reading between the lines so I don't mean to offend Brandon or anyone. This is just the story as I've seen it develop or heard it recounted on the public boards.

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Caution: Geek Soap Opera ahead

I can only speak from a non-mod point of view. So someone else will have to fill in the insider details.

Back in the good ole days (when Minimates were three inches tall), the AA boards were a nice place to hang out. AA employees read and responded frequently. Donna, Adam, and Manny posted often. Even Digger was around a bit. But as the boards grew, AA involvement diminished. Trolling increased and many members were biting. So somehow (at AA's request or Tim's, I don't know) Tim became a moderator. Prior to this AA did all the mod work. Things seemed happy again, trolls were being smited, offensive images were being deleted. But AAs involvement never went back to the earlier levels.

Somewhere prior to the 2003 convention season Tim(Picard) and Greg (Ulan Aruk) form the AACC as a way for people that can't go to the conventions a chance to get the exclusives. For your $30 annual fee you got your choice of a Yellow Shirt Kirk, Peter Parker/Mary Jane, or Ultimate Spidey/Gray Hulk and a couple blank Minimates. (Details via The Wayback Machine) The response was more than the AACC was expecting. I don't remember the time frame, but the kits were seriously delayed. In that link it mentions you might get a grab bag that "could contain any number of items found at the Asylum." This implied people could receive prototypes or test shots or something cool, but instead people got paper clips and rubber bands. He was trying to be funny, but making jokes around upset people only makes them more upset. The only thing I remember people getting in the 'grab bag' that wasn't office supplies was a Darth Maul watch. Not a popular item. :)

After a while there were complaints about info being withheld so that it could be put in the newsletter, and other assorted grumblings. Things really started to decline when they started taking orders for various exclusives. I think you could buy the Yellow Kirk, the Minimates, and the C3 Stealth Batwing. This was the time Tim's daughter had pregnancy complications and he disappeared (understandably) from the board. In his absence, nobody stepped up to handle the problems. Orders went unfilled, questions unanswered. Eventually new mods were brought in, and there was this whole AAOL thing that I never fully understood.

Also around this time Tim started his Quixotic quest to save Enterprise. It appeared that he was abandoning the club in order to make a name for himself. There was some bad blood between Tim and Greg, and Greg stepped down from his involvement in the AACC. FatHeadCookies (Mark?) took up the load of filling all the orders and unshipped membership kits. Brandon was working on the newsletter. Greg posted a way for disgruntled members to file complaints against the AACC through PayPal and USPS (citing mail fraud). Tempers flared.

Eventually the AACC was closed down, but the AA boards went on. Either the board software or the hosting couldn't handle the load and 'Service Unavailable' became ubiquitous. (This might have been occuring while the AACC was in its death throws, I'm not sure.) Tim came back and tried to fix it... by deleting 70% of the posts on the board! He claimed there was a back-up, but the posts were never restored. So that board was brought down and Tim started hosting another one on his server (70.85.44.56) Things are little fuzzy for me here (I ducked out for a while in protest of the lost data), I think this was where Brandon was controlling the show.

Geek Soap Opera indeed. Anyway, that's how I remember things going down, but I have a memory like sieve. So if anyone has any corrections, please post them. :)

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Yay for Ivan and his memory! Cheers thats a pretty comprehensive write up.

I think this was where Brandon was controlling the show.

Tim & Brandon, who both (when they graced us with their presence) told us different things to do "from AA" hence the place going to hell, I somehow ended up as almost the public face of the board, tried to make changes where i could to make the place nice and scoured the web for news as I got none (although others did, it just didnt get posted) while trying to obey two differening sets of orders and with a complete inability to make any changes or actually do anything.

It was fun. I quit, Tim (probably realising he might have to do something now I'd gone) pulled the server with all of half a days notice and that board died.

All the time the IP address board was in existence there were mentions from Brandon on some all powerful new board that was coming (mainly when I bitched about the board address) as you know that turned up a while after the IP one died and for reasons still unknown none of the staff except Brandon were carried over, and the board is now staffed by people who work on AAs web portfolio, namely aa.com and speedracerlives.com

There is probably some more behind the scenes stuff I could go into, but Im not going to, as invaribly lurkers call me on it and get annoyed.

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