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5MV Update History

maintained by Zeke

MARCH 2006

5MSV

March 5

I have bad news, good news, bad news, good news, bad news, and good news. In that order.

The bad news is that this past week I've slid back into my old habit of going silent when things start to go wrong in the middle of an event. Actually, the whole week has been pretty much a write-off for me. I've had a minor meltdown, for reasons which are complicated.

Zeke's Better Judgment: Complicated... or stupid?

There are elements of both.* The good news is, I'm back now. The bad news is, I can't promise that I'm BACK back. 5M.net isn't the only thing I've neglected lately; I've got to get back on top of my Master's program, and that has to come first. This doesn't necessarily mean anything will change here, but if I do have to slow down, that's the reason.

The good news is, I do have content today. The bad news is, it's not Day 5 of the ST event. That's almost done, but I wanted to post something today since we're building up a major backlog. Thus the good news is you finally get Derek's latest Smallville fiver: "Cyborg," the introduction of another classic DC character (if not one as longstanding as the Flash or Aquaman).

This week has cost us a lot of momentum, so from now on I'm going to try harder to keep the updates daily. This doesn't contradict what I said above -- I didn't promise anything, nor did I talk about daily content. I'll use link days and other small stuff when I need to. But daily updates, even if they're small, keep things active around here. Forum participation plummets when I just go silent like this past week.

Finally, speaking of the forums, I intend to roll out at least one of the ideas under discussion in the Fivers on Commission thread this week (because, frankly, I can really use the money), so be sure to read it and contribute any ideas you have.

* Apologies to That 70's Show -- which, like Veronica Mars and the new Battlestar Galactica, is a show I'm very glad Kira got me into. Which is not to say her taste in entertainment matters is impeccable. I mean, Rat Race?

[Comments]

5M

March 8

Wow... I don't think I've ever let the News page get that big before. I was trying to nudge myself to PHP-code this section, but I think that turned into an excuse for lazy archiving. I've now created the October 2005 to February 2006 pages and filed the newsposts accordingly.

Since that's not much of an update, allow me to introduce you to KittenWar.

[Comments]

5M

March 16

Blast! I had a terrific idea for Pi Day this year (as people who read my LJ know), but I was too busy on the day itself to prepare it. It's too good an idea to waste on a late update, so I'll have to save it for next year.

As a substitute, I'll re-link you to what I did last year, The Top 10 Pi Day Activities of Enterprise Characters. (5MV π/π Years Ago?) In addition, here are two "seasonal" links: last week's cartoon at Bob the Angry Flower (a frequent source of good math jokes, but I digress) and A Steep Price For Pie, a subcomic of Team Special Olympics.

[Comments]

5M

March 17

Happy St. Patrick's Day! I couldn't really do an update this time, but that's okay, because last year we did enough St. Patrick's Day for about three years. Instead, I'm going to listen to The Corrs' latest album, Home, which is almost entirely traditional Irish stuff. You should too.

I hope to resume nontrivial updates this weekend. (Tomorrow, after all, is a good chance to hit the hangover demographic.) Meanwhile, if you're desperate for something Irish, you could always read the Fair Haven scene (with surprise guest star) in "Light Unseen," one of my VS9 episodes. I'm rather proud of it.

5MF

March 25

Man... right now in the staff forum we're discussing ideas for something special to celebrate the upcoming sixth anniversary, and I'm just waiting for one of the guys to say "We could try updating."

All I can say is it's been a lousy couple of months. I'll keep working on it. And I guess it's not like anyone familiar with 5M.net finds these dry periods unusual or surprising. All of this has happened before, and all of it will happen again. (So say we all.)

Anyway, two items today. First, since it's been such a long wait, here's something special: our first Farscape fiver in three years! It's "Mental As Anything" by 5MF newcomer Derek Dean. (He's determined to get something in every subsite, I think.) This one comes with an unusual spoiler warning -- there are mild spoilers for the first season of Veronica Mars. So if you don't want to find out it was actually Backup who killed Lilly, don't read it.

Second, I've finally made a page for the 5MTV category, thus restoring access to some fivers which were previously listed on the defunct Sci-Fivers page. (Stay tuned for next week when I finally make the site Y2K-compliant!)

[Comments]

5M

March 28

I don't usually talk about the forums in newsposts, but I felt it was necessary today. Almost without exception, the 5M.net forums are civilized and orderly. Lots of good chatting goes on. But today the rules were broken in a truly flagrant manner.

In this thread, a longstanding member -- one "Zeke" -- decided to abuse the trust he had earned from the community. He made a post which seemed perfectly innocuous, containing a link which seemed equally so. But that link led, with no warning whatsoever, to a hardcore porn image. Literally billions of innocent minds were destroyed.

"Zeke," if that is his real name, claims that it was an accident. But that's easy to say after the fact. All I know for certain is that this user, who has protested "screamers" and the like many times, today outdid them all. I have no choice. Other forumgoers will vouch for the fact that I've always come down hard on --

Let me rephrase that. I've severly punished and disciplined the....

I've, um, sent my disapproval gushing over....

The point is it's not allowed. So as of this moment, "Zeke" is banned from the forums. Let this be a lesson to all of you. No one who flouts the laws of the community will be spared, whether friend, enemy, or me.

[Comments]

5MB5

March 30

It's interesting. Being banned has such a powerful grip on the mind. It's almost like a python. It can squeeze out all other thought, suffocate all other emotion until everything is dead except for the rage. I'm not talking about anger. I'm talking about rage.

Zeke's Better Judgment: You're aware that this is completely idiotic, right?

Perhaps. The point is that being on the outside for a while is giving me a new perspective on things. I'm starting to think it's time to make some changes in the way I run this site. For instance, maybe I'm too personally invested in the staff and community. As we've now seen, that leads to conflicts of interest between --

Zeke's Better Judgment: Oh, I get it. You're publishing Sa'ar's "Conflicts of Interest" fiver today and decided to do a stupid intro.

Oh no, I'm quite serious. I think what I need to do is fire everyone currently involved with the site and replace them with random people off the street, or maybe robots.

Zeke's Better Judgment: I hate you so much.

[Comments]

5MSV

March 31

You know, I'm starting to see things differently. Maybe being banned like this was something I needed. The mistake I caught myself making was just the latest in a long line. Maybe I had this coming. Sooner or later, the day comes when you can't hide from the things that you've done anymore.

Zeke's Better Judgment: What are you leading up to this time? The movie Payback? Maybe something with "hide" in the title?

I mean it. I'm going to take action. It's time to take this thing in a whole new direction -- burn it to the ground and rebuild fresh!

Zeke's Better Judgment: You're out of your mind.

And so is Clark in today's Smallville fiver, "Hypnotic."

Zeke's Better Judgment: Gah! You made me do it this time! The nerve!

You ain't seen nothing yet, my dear neurosis. But you're about to. See, sometimes you have to roll the hard six....

[Comments]

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