June 19th - Summary: NCSF Contribution Update

 $4.49 - Current NCSF Kitty
$37.50 - Current Pending Payout ($25 threshold)
$12.50 - Amount that will be added to the Kitty.

Yes! Thanks to some generous Abbot's Place and Savvie and Lacey supporters, we have broken through our $25.00 payout threshold. The NCSF is now guaranteed a contribution of at least $16.99 from us this year. PLEASE NOTE that, from now until the check is generated, every penny of any additional income I would normally get from the store will go directly to the NCSF. If you'd like to snag some swag AND make a contribution to a worthy cause at the same time, now's your chance!

As a refresher, here's the deal: We currently have $4.49 in the NCSF donation kitty. For all of 2004, I will donate every cent of each Café Press check exceeding the minimum to the NCSF. What does that mean? My minimum payout is $25.00. If I receive a check for $35.00 from Café Press each quarter, I'll send the NCSF a check for $10 + $10 + $10 + $10 + $4.49 = $44.49. If each quarter brings a $50 check, they'll get over $100.

So, won't you please stop by Abbot's Shop and see if there's something you'd like to own? You can get a goody of your choice AND make a donation to a worthy cause that protects your sexual rights at the same time!

Thanks for your continued support,

May 10th - Summary: NCSF Contribution Update

 $4.49 - Current NCSF Kitty
$36.00 - Current Pending Payout ($25 threshold)
$11.00 - Amount that will be added to the Kitty.

Yes! Thanks to some generous Abbot's Place and Savvie and Lacey supporters, we have broken through our $25.00 payout threshold. The NCSF is now guaranteed a contribution of at least $15.49 from us this year. PLEASE NOTE that, from now until the check is generated, every penny of any additional income I would normally get from the store will go directly to the NCSF. If you'd like to snag some swag AND make a contribution to a worthy cause at the same time, now's your chance!

As a refresher, here's the deal: We currently have $4.49 in the NCSF donation kitty. For all of 2004, I will donate every cent of each Café Press check exceeding the minimum to the NCSF. What does that mean? My minimum payout is $25.00. If I receive a check for $35.00 from Café Press each quarter, I'll send the NCSF a check for $10 + $10 + $10 + $10 + $4.49 = $44.49. If each quarter brings a $50 check, they'll get over $100.

So, won't you please stop by Abbot's Shop and see if there's something you'd like to own? You can get a goody of your choice AND make a donation to a worthy cause that protects your sexual rights at the same time!

Thanks for your continued support,

February 29th - Summary: NCSF contributions

 $4.49 - Current NCSF Kitty
$23.50 - Current Pending Payout ($25 threshold)
 $1.50 - Amount needed to "Pet the Kitty"

We're making progress!

As a refresher, here's the deal: We currently have $4.49 in the NCSF donation kitty. For all of 2004, I will donate every cent of each Café Press check exceeding the minimum to the NCSF. What does that mean? My minimum payout is $25.00. If I receive a check for $35.00 from Café Press each quarter, I'll send the NCSF a check for $10 + $10 + $10 + $10 + $4.49 = $44.49. If each quarter brings a $50 check, they'll get over $100.

So, won't you please stop by Abbot's Shop and see if there's something you'd like to own? You can get a goody of your choice AND make a donation to a worthy cause that protects your sexual rights at the same time!

Thanks for your continued support,

January 5th - Summary: NCSF contribution; Site update; S&L changes

Hello, folks. Welcome to 2004!

Around the middle of last year I asked for your help. Café Press was going to ding me for a $25 maintenance fee if I didn't break my minimum payout by the end of the month. I asked if you would consider buying a trinket or two to push me over the minimum. In return, I pledged to donate everything over the minimum to the National Coalition for Sexual Freedom -- an organization that fights for our right to do what we want to do in our dungeons.

And you didn't hear from me again for the rest of the year.

No, I didn't pull down a bajillion bucks and run off to an Aruba retirement. Life conspired to keep me from doing much of anything here at Abbot's place. But on top of that, thanks to your help, I did avoid the service charge by exceeding the minimum payout.

By four dollars and forty-nine cents.

Now, I'm sorry; I know I promised to send the overage to the NCSF. But I wasn't ABOUT to send them a check for $4.49! So I decided to wait, thinking that perhaps the minimum would be broken again during the remainder of the year, and I could add THAT amount to the donation. But, no such luck. At the start of 2004 I was about ten dollars below the payout minimum.

But I'm still loathe to send a sub-five-dollar check to the NCSF; they deserve better. So here's what I'm going to do. The $4.49 is the start of a donation pool. For all of 2004, I will donate every cent of each Café Press check exceeding the minimum to the NCSF. What does that mean? My minimum payout is $25.00. If I receive a check for $35.00 from Café Press each quarter, I'll send the NCSF a check for $10 + $10 + $10 + $10 + $4.49 = $44.49. If each quarter brings a $50 check, they'll get over $100.

And so this doesn't go on "forever," even if I don't receive a single check this year, I'll put the $4.49 with some of my own money and make sure the NCSF gets a donation.

So, won't you please stop by Abbot's Shop and see if there's something you'd like to own? You can get a goody of your choice AND make a donation to a worthy cause that protects your sexual rights at the same time. And I'll keep you posted on where we are, like this:

 $4.49 - Current NCSF Kitty
$15.50 - Current Pending Payout ($25 threshold)
 $9.51 - Amount needed to "Pet the Kitty"

As I mentioned above, I didn't have much time to work on this site during the second half of last year. So to start 2004 off, I've converted and uploaded Make Your Own Locking Bondage Cuffs. It's not much, but let's hope its a sign of things to come.

Things have been more active over at Savvie and Lacey's site. I've managed to keep to my twice-monthly publication schedule for well over a year now (yay, me!) In addition, I am seriously considering a "digital comic book" that would tell the girls' backstory. If you haven't discovered the girls yet, stop by and say hello. And if you'd like to learn how they got together, please post in their forum and let me know; you'll find information over at their place.

Thanks for your continued support, and here's wishing everyone a great 2004!

June 7th - Summary: Help me save $25, and contribute to the NCSF too!

Hello, folks. I need your help to avoid getting hit with a $25 fee for, well, nothing. Here's the deal...

You of course know about "Abbot's Shop," my little Café Press store. I've in fact never sold anything from it, but after I set the store up, I purchased a couple of items as chat contest giveaways and to check the quality before offering them for sale. I bought at retail to verify the billing and payment procedures and to make sure everything was set up correctly, which means there's a few dollars (of my own money) sitting in my Café Press account, waiting to get up to the minimum required for them to mail a check (and give me my money back).

Okay, now here's the problem. I recently received an email from Café Press which said, in part:

According to our Member Agreement, we will only hold balances for 180 days before a monthly account maintenance fee of $25 is imposed on an account. This email is to notify you that your account will be charged the $25 monthly maintenance fee beginning July 1, 2003.

Understand, this is perfectly reasonable; it's consistent with the terms of the store I opened, and I don't have a problem with it in principle. I would simply rather not pay for spending my own money on my own products for quality control purposes!

I can avoid this fee IF my account balance goes high enough that they can cut me a check by the end of the month. And that's where I need your help. I'm going to buy a Leather Pride Flag license plate holder, but since there's only a few dollars profit on each item, it'll still be a long way from the payment minimum.

So, won't you please stop by Abbot's Shop and see if there's something you'd like to own? If several of you purchase only ONE item each, there's a good chance I'll be able to hit the minimum and avoid the maintenance fee.

And I'll tell you what I'll do to make it worth everyone's while: For the month of June, if I make enough money to avoid this $25 maintenance fee, I'll donate EVERY CENT over $25 to the National Coalition for Sexual Freedom -- an organization that fights for our right to do what we want to do in our dungeons. So my sole benefit will be to avoid the maintenance fee, while you can get a goody of your choice AND a donation to a worthy cause that protects your sexual rights at the same time.

Thanks for considering it,

January 20th - Summary: New Products in Abbot's Shop!

Just a quick note to let everyone know I've just added a number of new products to Abbot's Shop. Drop by and take a look at the new Leather Pride Flag t-shirts (including female-cut and baby doll styles), thong and camisole (woo hoo!), jewelry box, bumper and other stickers. We even have a "BDSM Country" sticker for your car and, for a limited time, a cute white teddy bear sporting a red ribbon and a Leather Pride t-shirt... perfect for your cuddly one on Valentine's Day.

By the way... if you have any ideas for BDSM/fetish designs you think should be on mugs, mousepads, t-shirts, whatever... let me know. I'm always open to suggestions.

Enjoy your shopping,

January 1st - Summary: Welcome to 2003!

Yes it's amazing, but somehow I managed to stick to a weekly update schedule for Savvie and Lacey during the entire month of December -- including a couple of special bonus strips! What with the holidays it was hectic... but it was also fun. I hope everyone else enjoyed it as much as I did. "We now return you to your regular scedule."

For the second month in a row, chat room activity did not come up to the level required to support the contest, so no winner once again. Because of this, I'm going to shelve our monthly contests until things pick up again.

Here's wishing everyone a fantastic year!

December 1st - Summary: Savvie and Lacey go weekly for December!

As a Christmas present to their loyal readers, Savvie and Lacey will be going weekly for the entire month of December. That's right: Barring unforseen difficulties, the strip will be updating every Sunday! Plus, keep your eyes open for a bonus or two.

Happy Holidays to everyone!

November 9th - Summary: New chat address; callista wins October; redened forfeits; single-sided mug dropped; new S&L up.

Probably the most important thing to pass along in this update is that we're changing chat hosts. Our current host, Earthlights, has been great to us. It grew out of Mellorien, the former network we were on for a few months. Then, for various reasons, the network split in two, and we decided to go with Earthlights. Good decision as it turns out: Mellorien floundered and died not long thereafter.

Well, a similar thing is happening again. Early, early this morning, Earthlights will split and a new network -- Ascends -- will come to life. The Ascends network will be composed of most of the same great Administrators, IRCOps, and servers you already know, and will adhere to high standards just like Earthlights. The move should be transparent for those of you using the Java applet on our Web pages. For those who use dedicated IRC clients like mIRC, pIRCh, IRCle, etc., simply change your server name from irc.earthlights.net to irc.ascends.net. (If you use a specific server -- for example, eutopia.sg.sa.earthlights.net -- simply change the "earthlights" part to "ascends" and it will probably work.)

I hope we'll all find the move to Ascends a smooth one, and I also hope you'll find the service to be better than ever. For the few folks we leave behind at Earthlights (most are coming to Ascends), I would like to say "Thank You!" for your welcoming us so long ago, and for your unceasing support. May Earthlights become what you want it to be.

Speaking of chatting: Congratulations to callista, October's contest winner. callista is one of those special rare few who managed a PERFECT score! For her efforts she wins her choice of Savvie and Lacey merchandise, and she has chosen the "Morning People" coffee mug. The mug has been ordered and will soon be on its way to you, callista. Congrats!

Our August winner, redend, never followed through to claim his prize. He therefore forfeits, and runner-up tightrubber is eligible to win. tightrubber, please get in touch with me as soon as possible so I can arrange shipment of your winnings.

Last update, I said I was going to keep both the single- and double-sided Abbot's Place Logo mugs. Since then, I've received a shipment of both and, quite frankly, I don't like the way the larger logo looks on the mug; the smaller ones on the double-sided mug are much more "balanced." So I'm going to drop the single-sided logo mug. If you want one, grab it NOW; it'll be disappearing from the catalog soon. (You could have an almost-one-of-a-kind mug! Woo!)

Finally: The new issue of Savvie and Lacey went up on the first. Yes, on schedule again. No, I don't know what's wrong with me lately. My wife is concerned too. Hopefully I'll be back to my slacker ways soon. Please be patient with me in the meantime.

October 5th - Summary: Double-sided mug ready; no backgrounds on mousepads for now.

Rather than replace the Abbot's Place Logo mug, I've added a double-sided version. Why? Because I had to make the logo smaller to get two copies on the mug, and some of you might think the larger logo looks better. So now you have a choice: a 3" tall Abbot's Place logo on the "outer" side of a mug (if you're a right-handed coffee drinker), or a mug with two smaller logos, one on either side.

I was also going to color the mousepads, but after flooding in color around the edges, I wasn't sure I liked it. The comic itself still had to be on a white background of course, and in addition I realized that every other Savvie and Lacey product was on white. So I think I'll leave the mousepads as they are for now. Comments welcome.

October 3rd - Summary: September's winner: Gallahad; Abbot's Shop merchandise arrived and looks good; win your favorite S&L cartoon in October; new Savvie and Lacey posted!

Well, the points are tallied and the results are in: Gallahad scored a perfect 30 points in September and therefore scores a prize as well! Due to having to repeat the same contest for months on end thanks to site problems, I'm going to give Gallahad (and all other post-June winners) the option of choosing a different prize of the same approximate value, if they wish.

September's "drinkware" sale has come and gone, but in its place, you can get free shipping on orders of $40 or more during October. A mug and a mousepad and a t-shirt will get you there, and you'll save more than you would have buying a mug in September.

Speaking of Savvie and Lacey: For October's chat contest, we're giving away a mug or mousepad imprinted with your favorite S&L comic... even if it's not in Abbot's Shop. That's right: If you win, you get to choose your all-time favorite strip, and we'll put it on a mug or mousepad (based on size) just for you! Read all the details and then get chatting!

Still speaking of our lovely D/s ladies, the first strip of my supposed semimonthly schedule is in place. Have a read and enjoy (but be warned, this comic is over 100KB in size due to all the shading involved).

September 23rd - Summary: June's winner (by forfeit): Bizz-UK; July's winner: also Bizz-UK!; August winner: redend.

We're rapidly catching up on the contests. June's contest was won by peridot, but after waiting over two weeks for confirmation, I had no choice but to disqualify and move on. Runner-up Bizz-UK did confirm, and became the winner. As fate would have it, Bizz-UK also won July's contest fair and square. Normally this wouldn't be a problem, as we switch prizes every month. But due to the site probems that prevented proper updates, the same contest ran again in July. As I doubt Bizz-UK wants two copies of Jay Wiseman's book, I will work with him to see if we can arrange a substitute prize of equivalent value for his second win.

August's contest fell to redend, who needs only confirm to receive his prize. As before, to be fair (due to the delay in closing these contests) I will wait at least two weeks for a reply. So redend, if you're reading this, get in touch!

I got confirmation over the weekend that the samples from Abbot's Shop had been printed and processed, and are on the way. I should have information on the quality for you soon.

September 22nd - Summary: Oops!

No significant change in this update, folks... I simply noticed that I'd misspelled "Savvie" in yesterday's headline. Eep!

September 21st - Summary: Thank you for your support; Savvie and Lacey goes semimonthly; our store is now open!

On September 11th I put up a special memorial Savvie and Lacey, and asked everyone to take a few moments to remember what happened a year ago. I now want to take a moment myself, to thank everyone for doing so. The site's unique visitors doubled on 9/11, and our bandwidth tripled. On the twelfth, things went straight back to normal.

This tells me a lot of people believe that we should honor the victims and heroes of 9/11/2001. These visitors didn't come to check out a new-to-them site, or the numbers would have stayed up... at least a little. No, they came to look at the memorial cartoon -- hence the tripling of bandwidth usage on that one day -- and then they went on their way.

So, thank you to all our site regulars and occasional visitors who are keeping September 11th in their hearts and minds. And though they'll probably never see this, thanks also to those who read my post here and in several other locations, and came by to share a few moments of silence.

Speaking of Savvie and Lacey: I didn't want the tribute to be the only thing posted for September, so I rushed through a regular monthly strip, which I posted a few days before. As September also marks the comic's one-year anniversary, this seems like a good time to celebrate. After all, S&L started out as a one-off joke; I never intended to do more than the initial strip... and here we are, a year later! So in celebration I'm doing two things:

Since I've already posted two strips this month, I'm going to try to take S&L semimonthly, posting on or around the 1st and 15th of each month. Note I said I'll try. Drawing the strip has gotten a little easier with practice, and I think I can pull it off -- but it depends on my schedule. Consider this a hope, not a promise... but keep your eyes open.

In celebration, I am also happy to announce the opening of our online store, featuring S&L merchandise. If you have a favorite strip, you can now own it on a coffee mug or mouse pad! (Not all strips are listed in the store, but if your favorite isn't there, drop me a note and we'll talk about my doing a special order for you.) The store also has Leather Pride mugs in various sizes, a BDSM/Leather Pride license plate frame, and more. Heck, there's even an Abbot's Place logo coffee mug (the bot made me do it!)

Folks, you know I've never run click-through ad revenue banners for this site. (The banner that pops up when you're using the Forum supports Vestris, our bulletin board host; the banner I ran for Earthlights was of my own doing and was purely as a "thank you" to them for their generosity.) Nor do you see any "Donate" buttons scattered about, nor is there a membership fee of any kind. I have always believed I should bring you what resources I can at no additional cost to you.

Some of you have helped out along the way by donating prizes for our monthly chat contests, and for that I sincerely thank you! Now, here is another way you can help... and you can get something out of it beyond just Abbot's Place. Looking for a Christmas present for your favorite Dom/me? How about a Leather Pride mug! Dom/mes, do you have a sharp sub who knows the frustration of your not quite getting it every now and then (oh come on, admit it... we tops are all dense at some point in time!) Buy him or her a Savvie and Lacey "Palindrome" mouse pad, and they'll relate. Or, just buy a mug and have morning coffee with the girls. Any profits from the store will be dumped right back into the site, chat contest prizes, and so on.

NOTE: I've opened this store in conjunction with CaféPress based on their long-standing excellent reputation. I have ordered a couple of the products I've set up but they haven't arrived yet, so I have not yet had a look at product quality. If the mugs and mouse pads come in and they don't surpass my minimum standards, the store will be closing again... and quickly! You might want to just browse at this point, and wait on ordering until I can report further... it shouldn't be long now.

Also keep in mind that Abbot's Shop is very new, which probably means "buggy." It'll take a while to work all the kinks out, so thanks in advance for your patience, and for reporting anything that doesn't seem quite right to you.

"New" also means lightly stocked. I didn't want to load the store up until I was convinced that CaféPress will do a good job for us Abbotonians (as one chatter calls us). As time goes on expect to see more products. I'll also be porting over Escape's old Amazon.com bookstore when I have the time so, as always, stay tuned.

And, as always, thank you!

September 11th - Summary: One Year Later

I realize that this site has a lot of members and visitors from outside the U.S. But I hope that everyone, everywhere understands how horrible the events of September 11th, 2001 were. Regardless of nationality, regardless of affiliations, regardless of political or religious outlook, everyone knows that many, many lives ended because of that fateful day.

And so, I'm going to beg your indulgence as I get a little U.S.-centric today. And, I'm going to ask you to grant a moment of silence for those who lost their lives that day. Please join Savvie and Lacey in memory, in love, and in the hope that nothing like this will ever happen again.

September 4th - Summary: I'm Baaaaack -- Again!

Whee, more fun than humans should be allowed to have! Not all problems this time though; Renee and I just got back in from a very nice holiday out of the country. The "decompression" time really helped, and I'm ready to rock!

The first order of business is to straighten out the chat room contests. You may recall we had technical problems that prevented me from updating the contest pages, so I couldn't properly notify the winners and runners-up. The problems ran on and compounded for a while, the upshot being there have been no contest updates since June.

To be as fair as possible, here is what I'm going to do:

• Because the June contest announcement (for Jay Wiseman's book, Switch) stayed up through the start of September, I will honor that contest for all four months.
   
  
• Instead of the usual seven days, I will give the winners of each contest at least two weeks to respond.
   
  
• Names for all potential winners will be posted simultaneously, giving those in second and latter places more notice that they may have won.

Because each contest's winner may depend on the previous month (once you've won you're out of the running for the remainder of the year), the contest winners will need to be resolved in order, starting with June. As soon as I can determine the winner of each month (and that depends on how long it takes people to respond), I'll post the possible winners for the following month. I'm hopeful that everyone will follow through promptly and we can get caught up quickly, so I can ship you folks your prizes!

The potential winners for June are (in alphabetical order): Bizz-UK, Covelo, daizey, Decker, peridot, rubberm2002, Seaspirit, and SirWoof. If your nickname is on this list, please email me at escape@usa.net as soon as possible. You don't need to follow through on all the contest requirements yet; just drop me an email and tell me which nick is yours. I'll let you know what -- if anything -- you need to do after that.

That's all for now... except, keep your eyes open for two S&L comic strips this month.

July 14th - Summary: I'm Baaaaack!

Just a quick note for now, folks. Nasty lightning storms took out a lot of our equipment, including our router and NT-1, which made it impossible for any of the computers on our network to get onto the Internet. If you've been wondering why there haven't been any site updates, contest winner announcements, or email from me -- now you know the reason.

We're working on getting the replacement equipment installed and set up. I've just done a quick update of the comics pages to make sure things are functioning again... and found some problems. Once I get those resolved I'll be back with information on our contests and so on.

In the meantime, enjoy two simultaneous updates to Savvie and Lacey (I couldn't post June's strip until just now, so to atone I've uploaded July's strip as well).

Back soon,

May 3rd - Summary: March contest forfeited; Our first tie in April; May contest off and running.

In March, chatter bbubbles took the lead to win a BDSM Emblem necklace donated by TieMeUp. Unforunately, bubbles did not follow through to secure her win, as required by the contest rules. After her opportunity expired, first runner-up Journey was contacted. Journey did follow through and thus became the recipient of the March prize.

But that's not all. Journey stayed busy, fighting for April's prize as well. When all was said and done, she and Balan had tied for first place. (Since bbubbles was the actual winner of the March contest, it is she -- not Journey -- who may not win again for the remainder of this year.) This is our first tie ever and, true to the contest rules, two copies of The Master's Manual will be sent out. Congratulations to both Balan and Journey!

This month, we're once again giving away a BDSM Emblem T-shirt donated by Designs by Francene. You may recall that they also sponsored our February contest. Please stop by their site to see if there isn't some way you can support our generous sponsor. To learn more about the contest, visit the contest page... and then get chatting!

April 1st - Summary: February and March winners announced; April contest up and running; IAR joins us on Earthlights, crossover agreement made; Earthlights attacked; Abbot's Place back after being offline for a week.

Well, this month has been an interesting mix of good and bad.

On the good side, our chat room host justine swept the February contest for a BDSM Emblem T-Shirt, donated by Designs by Francene. justine managed an amazing 28 points, a perfect score for a February with 28 days. Please congratulate her when you see her, and stop by Designs by Francene to see if there isn't some way you can support our generous sponsor.

Our March contest for a BDSM Emblem necklace just closed at midnight last night, with the winner being bbubbles. Congratulations, bbubbles! This contest was sponsored by the folks at TieMeUp. They have an excellent range of BDSM and alternative-lifestyle jewelry, and at fair prices, too. I urge you to drop by and browse. Find something you like and show them you appreciate their sponsorship of Abbot's Place!

Our April contest is up and running. This month we're giving away a copy of Jack Rinella's "The Master's Manual," a book on the art of erotic domination. To learn more about this book and the contest, visit the contest page... and then get chatting!

Now a bad thing that had a good result. The International Association of Rubberists (IAR), a group of adults who enjoy looking at and/or wearing latex (rubber) clothing, has been around for years and has over 2,000 members. They used to chat using MultiCity, a proprietary system with a Web-based Java client. This worked well for them and had some nifty features like an online translator -- handy, because the IAR has members from around the world.

Unfortunately, they were told about a month ago that MultiCity was going commercial. IAR had the choice of buying (at a fairly exorbitant rate) the service they had previously gotten for free, or having their chat system disconnected after February.

I've known the IAR's founder, Ataraxia, for many years and have always admired his tireless dedication to his site and to rubberists around the world. (And, I make no secret of the fact that latex is a fetish of my own.) When I heard about MultiCity shutting down, I of course offered to do what I could.

It turns out that what I could do was to help IAR get set up on Earthlights. Ataraxia went with the jIRC chat applet, the same one we use here, and I gave him a hand configuring that as well.

Because of the crossover between BDSMers and fetishists (folks in the IAR chat room regularly have playful dungeon scenes, and many of our chatters are also into latex), Ataraxia and I have an informal crossover agreement. The IAR chat room has been added to the Abbot's Place chat applet room menu, and both of our rooms are on the IAR's menu. We've already seen a fair number of visitors crossing between the rooms, and new friendships are being forged. If you have time, please drop by the IAR chat room and say hello. Just select #rubberist.net from the "Go To..." menu at the bottom of the applet or, if you use a dedicated IRC client like mIRC or Pirch, come in as you normally do and then /join #rubberist.net.

Now, for the bad stuff. Over the last month or so, we've seen an increased number of "netsplits" (where the chat network is momentarily disrupted and splits into two or more smaller networks). The staff of Earthlights (the IRC network that hosts our chat) has also seen brief floods of fake users: malicious bots that join the network with random nicknames or other information, to try to clog things to the point that real users can't get on.

Sometime around midnight on Thursday, March 21st, it became evident that these earlier incidents were just probes as a massive wave of false users swept onto Earthlights. I awoke about 5:00 AM to find a battle raging... one that had already been going on for hours. I of course immediately dove in to lend a hand at repelling the invaders.

Over the following week and then some, we have gained ground, lost ground, and gained it again. At some points targeted servers were so overloaded it was impossible for real users to connect to chat. At other times -- like now -- virtually all of the flood bots are contained and everything is quiet and working well.

Unfortunately, during the attacks some users are affected. Sometimes the lag time gets bad, other times innocent users are accidentally killed or banned. We correct these problems as soon as we discover them, and they're an unavoidable side-effect of "war," but we know they are annoying nonetheless.

I honestly have no idea how much longer this "cyber-terrorist" action will go on. The attacks are coming from compromised and incorrectly-configured computers around the world, but we do know who is controlling them, and we believe it is a personal "grudge" (Earthlights is far too small to attract attacks like this -- hackers almost always go after larger networks like Dalnet or Efnet). Measures are being taken, some of which I can't talk about, others which haven't been shared with me. Rest assured of two things, though: We have been doing and will continue to do everything in our power to keep you chatting, and we greatly appreciate your patience as we work through the inevitable problems.

And then on top of that, early last week the Abbot's Place site simply disappeared off the face of the Internet. We've had brief problems before, but after a day it became painfully obvious this wasn't a transient problem. I joined my ISP's Technical Support chat to report the problem and was told, "Others are having this problem. I'll put in a problem ticket." So others had the same problem, it wasn't something I'd done wrong, and with the weight of more people behind it, it should get fixed quickly. I wasn't concerned.

I should have been.

Another day passed; no change. When I got home from work that night, I emailed Support to ask what was going on and why it wasn't fixed yet. The next morning I awoke to a reply from a technician who basically stated it was all my fault.

"It appears that you started to set up... but did not complete the process," he wrote. "The only amazing thing here, would be if it *ever* worked, without taking these steps."

"Well prepare to be amazed," I wrote back, "as the site has been up and functional and working exactly this way for well over a year now." In addition, when I first tried this setup (to activate our no.place.like.home URL), I checked in with Support to make sure I'd done it correctly. "If it's working, then you're golden," they'd told me over a year ago.

But never mind that; he had given me the instructions I needed to get the site back on line. I followed them, finishing my alleged incomplete job.

Nothing. No difference at all. So, I wrote Support again, copying the instructions, questioning if I had followed them correctly (they were a copy/paste from an email he'd written to someone else, and he'd made several mistakes in changing URLs and names from the other email to mine). I also stated that, since Abbot's automated FTP process had failed about the same time that my site disappeared, I was pretty sure something had changed on THEIR end, and not some fault of mine.

Guess what? The next day I got an email from a different technician. He confirmed that they had changed something (nice of them to let the users know), and that this had broken certain sites that were configured a particular way. He never said anything about my having an incomplete setup, and in fact stated that some of their techs weren't up to speed on the change yet. I was given a totally different solution to the problem, which immediately cleared the problem.

The conversion broke a few links and caused some minor problems on the site. I think I've found and fixed most of them, and will correct any others as I find them or they're reported to me. Let me know if you see anything that doesn't look right.

To everyone who hasn't been able to get in over the past week, my apologies. Believe me, it was every bit as frustrating for me as it was for you! I'm going to make some adjustments in our contests and so on to compensate for the week when people using the Java applet couldn't get to chat. Stay tuned for details.

February 3rd - Summary: January winner: CodeWarrior; February's prize: a BDSM Emblem T-Shirt; March prize: a BDSM Emblem Necklace; Mummification series and other articles now available.

Well, work kept me far too busy last month, but I still managed to get some long-needed site updates done. Before getting into that, though, congratulations to CodeWarrior, first contest winner of 2002. CW walks away with a copy of Robert Dante's Bullwhip: Art of the Single-Tail Whip video!

For February, Designs by Francene has graciously agreed to donate a BDSM Emblem T-shirt. The winner will have choice of design/color and size, limited only by stock on hand (no special orders). What a cool thing to wear to your next Munch or group meeting! Anyone familiar with the Emblem will know you're into BDSM, but to everyone else it just looks like a vaguely oriental design. Pop by the contest page to take a look at some samples, then get chatting!

We also have something lined up for March, and there's an interesting connection with February. One of the tees from Designs by Francene has a nice roses-and-thorns rendition of the Emblem. That design is licensed from BDSM jewelry maker and merchant TieMeUp, who has agreed to contribute a BDSM Emblem necklace for March. These folks have a great selection of truly cool jewelry, and their prices are quite reasonable; stop by their site and check out their offerings. (If you see something you simply must have, tell them Abbot sent you!) To see the necklace we're giving away in March, visit the March contest page. And remember, what you do in February will set the stage for you to win in March, so if you want that necklace, start chatting!

Speaking of January's sponsor Robert Dante, we had a great formal chat with him mid-month. He spent quite a while answering questions about bullwhip style and technique. If you were there, you know we had a great crowd and a great time. If you missed it, you can at least read the transcript.

A number of old About.com articles are newly available here now. My five-part mummification series is online again, as well as a mummification "DOs and DON'Ts" article by Speerhead. And because those articles included links to other articles on BDSM symbology and Halloween, I converted and uploaded those as well. Check the article index for the complete list.

Last (and least!), there's a new Savvie and Lacey cartoon up. Enjoy!

January 1st - Summary: December winner: cozmichic; January's prize: "Bullwhip: Art of the Single Tail Whip" video; single-tail artist Robert Dante our chat guest on January 11th.

Happy New Year!

Our December chat contest was... well, interesting is the only word that comes to mind.

As the month started out, chatter extraordinaire CodeWarrior had the number one position in both #Abbot's_Place and #The_Dungeon. This disqualified him for those days. The number two positions were held by justine and hisbadgirl respectively, but as they had both won previously this year they were ineligible. Left to rack up points were [Bmbas]MsKiti and cozmichic in the number three positions.

This situation continued until the 16th, when CodeWarrior fell out of the number one position in #The_Dungeon. Since he still held the first position in #Abbot's_Place, he started garnering a point a day instead of [Bmbas]MsKiti. Because he fell out so quickly in #The_Dungeon, however, cozmichic continued to rack up her score. On the 27th she finally lost her position to GothicGeisha, but by that point she had more than enough points to sew up a win. Congratulations to cozmichic, who is one of our newest chatters! Just goes to prove that everyone has a chance to win.

That's doubly so now, because at midnight on December 31st all the past wins were forgotten, and once again every chatter is eligible to grab January's prize. That's a copy of Robert Dante's Bullwhip: Art of the Single Tail. This is a tutorial video that demonstrates how to use a singe-tail whip like a signal whip or bullwhip within the scene. Read about the video and the contest, and then get chatting! (And "Thank you!" to Robert Dante, who generously contributed the video.)

Another way to learn about bullwhips is to join us starting at 9:00 PM Eastern time on Friday, January 11th. That's when bullwhip master Robert Dante will be our featured guest in chat. Come learn about the art of the single-tail or ask Mr. Dante about his experiences. Thanks to Mr. Dante for agreeing to chat with us, and thanks to SheBytch{B} for arranging it!

December 1st - Summary: November winner: Umberto; December's prize: a "kneeling submissive" statue; Flogger Tutorial now online; Forum now membership-based; another Savvie and Lacey cartoon is up.

All things considered, this was a pretty darned good month. Umberto pulled cleanly ahead of the second-placer to win our November contest and a copy of John Warren's The Loving Dominant. Congratulations, Umberto!

This month, thanks to regular chatter and room Helper SheBytch{B}, we are offering a very nice statuette that she thinks of as a kneeling submissive. It really is a pretty thing, standing just under six inches tall. It would make a lovely gift to your Dom/me, submissive partner, or slave... or, for that matter, a vanilla friend or family member. Keep in mind, December is the best chance you will ever have to win the contest, since all the prior winners throughout the year are out of the running. Be sure to take a look at the photos of our great prize this month, and then get chatting! (And thank you, SheBytch{B}!)

Despite being out of town and offline for over a week, I found time to do some more site updates in November. Those of you who go back to the About.com days may remember that I had written a multi-page introduction to floggers and flogging. I am delighted to say that I have secured permission to reprint this series here at Abbot's Place, and it is now on line. You'll find it indexed on the Articles page.

Our Forum is now tied to a membership database. Before you can post, you must apply for a user account (it's easy; just fill out the form, or drop me an email with the desired username and password). Once you've logged in to the Forum, your username will be automatically attached to any posts you make. That means you can be sure that no one else is posting under your name (as long as you guard your password), and likewise that other posts are written by who they say they're written by. It also means the end of "anonymous" and "fly-by" posters, and since spiders can't crawl the Forum, it might even mean a few less pieces of spam in your email "in" box.

Finally, the silliness continues: I carved out enough time to whip up a third Savvie and Lacey comic strip. Enjoy!

November 3rd - Summary: October winner: Striderrrrr; November's prize: The Loving Dominant; New DIY Flogger links, cartoon available

Striderrrrr took the October lead -- just barely -- and landed a copy of Flogging by Joseph W. Bean. Congratulations, Striderrrrr!

This month we're offering John Warren's The Loving Dominant. John is known by many as "Mentor," and has worked with a lot of newcomers to the scene. His book is valuable to old hands as well, and also for submissives as well as domininants. This book has been out of print for a couple of years, but is now back as an updated, expanded second edition. We have it... and you can win it! Read all about it and then get chatting!

Believe it or not, I been able to spend a little time on the site this past month. I've started working on the Resources section, and have one page -- for Do It Yourself Floggers -- up and ready to go. I even managed to find time to chat once or twice. (Don't believe me? Check the stats!) And I took another slice of "relax time" and created a second Web comic... does that mean we have a "series" now?

October 1st - Summary: Congratulations to Hisbadgirl, our September winner!

Congratulations to our very own helper Hisbadgirl, who barely managed to take the lead in September's sweepstakes for a copy of Michael Manning's Lumenagerie.

This was almost "the secret contest." I've continued to be insanely busy, with not even enough time to update the room topic with the leader on most days...

Wait a minute, why does this sound like a repeat from last month's entry?

Well, congratulations to Hisbadgirl nonetheless! And things have started to change. My schedule has been slowly getting better, and I've actually been spotted in the chat room from time to time (pretty scary, huh). In fact, I even took some "relax time" to create our first Web comic. I hope you'll continue to see more of me here and more changes to the site, because that'll mean the insanity that has been my life for the last half-year or so is finally calming down!

This month we're returning to "how-to" books and offering Joseph W. Bean's Flogging. This is an excellent introduction to the art or, if you already know which end of a flogger to hold, a resource to help you fine-tune your style. Read all about it and then get chatting!

September 8th - Summary: Congratulations to justine, our August winner!

Congratulations to our very own hostess justine, who barely managed to take the lead in August's sweepstakes for a copy of Michael Manning's Hydrophidian.

This was almost "the secret contest." Due to problems with Abbot's Internet connection, he was often prevented from uploading the day's statistics. And I've continued to be insanely busy, with not even enough time to update the room topic with the leader on most days. The result? Those who enjoy following various contestants' progress were left wondering who and by how much!

During the first part of the month (which did have stats available consistently), it looked like Foxykiti would have things sewn up. But on the 7th, justine took the top position in Abbot's Place and never gave it up for the remainder of the month. Hisbadgirl did nearly the same in The Dungeon starting on the 4th, but a short stretch with lyrin as The Dungeon's leader assured justine's win. For those of you who haven't won yet, you have another shot: This month we're giving away Lumenagerie, Manning's artistic showcase. Come chat and win!

Please accept my apologies for my absence over the last month or two. Things have been amazingly hectic here, with no time available for chatting or even maintaining the site. It looks like things will be calming down in about two more weeks, so I'm hopeful I'll once again be seeing you in Abbot's Place after that!

August 2nd - Summary: Congratulations to Balan, our July winner!

Congratulations to long-time regular Balan, who managed to win July's contest and thus a copy of Michael Manning's The Spider Garden.

This was a wild, heated contest throughout the entire month. The results from the very first day set the tone: FoxyKiti had top position in both Abbot's Place and The Dungeon, which disqualified her for that day and caused me to look at the second most verbose chatter in each room. That was wolf{FK} in The Dungeon, and as he had just won June's contest, he was ineligible. That dropped me to the #3 position in The Dungeon, held by justine. But justine was also the runner-up to FoxyKiti in Abbot's Place, so even though she wasn't in the same chat rank in both rooms, technically she was in the #2 spot in both, disqualifying here as well. The #3 spot in Abbot's Place and the #4 spot in The Dungeon were both occupied by Hisbadgirl, so she too was disqualified, leaving one point each to go to the holders of chat positions #4 and #5 in the two rooms, respectively!

After a couple of days things started settling down, but it wasn't long before FoxyKiti and Balan were locked in a struggle for the lead; her ahead of him by one point for a good part of the month, then Balan ahead of her by a mere one point for the remainder. This is the first month when we really didn't know who would win right up to the last day!

Congratulations, Balan! For those of you who didn't win, take heart: This month we're giving away Hydrophidian, Manning's follow-on graphic novel. Come chat and win!

July 29th - Summary: Virus Alerts sidebar added

As I've been and continue to be insanely busy, this will just be a quick update.

If you're lucky, you've heard about "SirCam," the new worm that's making its way around the world. If you're unlucky, you know about it because of personal experience. At least three people I know -- good folks who are suspicious of unexpected email attachments -- have been infected by this one. It's nasty, and it's spreading fast.

I'll leave it to the anti-virus sites to fill you in on the details; they'll do a much better job than I could. But given how much we all use email to stay in touch -- combined with how quickly SirCam is spreading and the major damage it's doing -- I thought it might be a good idea to try and help out the cause... even if it is a bit "off topic" for Abbot's Place.

So, to the right of this update column you should now see a sidebar with links for the most active and most threatening viruses, along with some related information. This is provided by Trend Micro, makers of numerous virus protection products including PC-cillin, which is the one I happen to use.

Now, I'm not saying Trend's products are any better than anyone else's; in fact, I encourage you to check out the major virus scanners and pick the one that's right for you. But just please do pick one, install it, and keep it updated. These days, that's just a matter of common sense.

I'll be back in a few days with information on the winner of our current chat room contest. Stay tuned!

June 3rd - Summary: Congratulations to LadyShadow, our first contest winner; new contest in progress!

The first-ever Abbot's Place contest wrapped up at midnight on May 31st. Our winner is LadyShadow, who out-chatted everyone else by quite a fair margin -- congratulations! She has selected The Topping Book as her prize, and it will (presuming cooperation from the Postal Service) soon be in her BDSM library. Check May's contest page for final scores on everyone who made the grade.

Thanks to all who participated. Didn't win? Take heart: We started the entire contest over again on June 1st. Since May's winner is ineligible, that means everyone else has a better shot at taking first place. Hey, as long as you're going to be chatting anyway, why not take a shot? Read June's contest page for details on how to win The Topping Book or The Bottoming Book.

April 27th - Summary: Our old room is dead and gone; Straight Women's Erotica has a new Guide; The Park closes down and Abbot's Place opens its doors to Hidden Chamber "refugees"; our first contest begins in May: win The Topping Book or The Bottoming Book!

Wow, what a month April has been. Let's see if I can recap some of the high and low points...

On the About.com front, our old #bdsm chat room was locked down earlier this month: the programmers finally got around to closing the "back door" some folks were using to access the room without Adult Check. Not long after that the room switched over to a new chat system, and all the BDSM chat links on About.com now take people to that new room.

About's Straight Women's Erotica site -- which you will recall went "Guideless" well before the Adult Check saga began -- got new leadership from Tina C. early in the month. If you have Adult Check, please stop by and welcome her. I find it interesting that About.com is staffing its adult sites even though it's been publicly stated that they are to be sold off (no further news on that front, by the way).

About.com's adult chatters aren't the only folks to have lost their home. The Park, a site that hosted several adult chat areas, is shutting down, leaving regulars of "The Hidden Chamber" and other rooms as lost and homeless as we were when Adult Check rolled out. (Even moreso actually, since at least we could slip into our room "under the radar" for several months.)

If you're an Abbot's Place chatter, you know at least two great folks from The Park; they've been regulars with us as well for months (I'll let them decide if they want to reveal themselves). One asked if it would be alright to invite some of the folks from The Hidden Chamber over to Abbot's Place. I think you can guess my answer; after all, we're always ready to welcome new friends. So, keep your eyes open for a few new faces over the next month or so.

I understand that The Hidden Chamber was geared more for play and roleplaying than discussion. To try and make our new visitors feel more at home, I've set up our second chat room: The Dungeon. I'd planned a "scening room" for some time, and this was a good reason to bring it online. You'll find you can access either room from our chat applet. IRCle/mIRC/Pirch/etc. users can get to the new room with /join #The_Dungeon. (Separate stats are available for the new room; you'll find a link on the Chat index page, or just type !stats in The Dungeon.)

I had planned on having a contest every month this year, but the early-January surprise of Adult Check put a kink (heh) in those plans. Well, better late than never: In May we'll be running our first-ever Abbot's Place contest, the Tops and bottoms Sweepstakes. You'll find information about it on the Chat index page, or just type !contest in the chat room. Come take your shot at winning a copy of The Topping Book or The Bottoming Book.

April 2nd - Summary: Rumors of a BDSM/Fetish merger; fixed problem with the Forum; navigation menu propagating; Leather and Hyde articles going up; I'm Earthlights' ersatz coder."

There's not a lot to pass along to you, but since it's been a month since the last update I thought I'd post nonetheless.

I've heard very little on the About.com front. There is a rumor floating around that the BDSM site will be merged with the Fetishism site, but so far it's just that: a rumor. If the sites are truly going to be sold off, I don't see much point in About doing anything with them, really. I'll let you know more when I know more.

Here at Abbot's Place, progress has been slow and steady. There was a problem with the Forum that was causing problems for Netscape Navigator/Communicator users; I think I've fixed that now. (Please let me know if you have any problems with it.)

I finally restructured things so that Abbot's Place is accessible from the domain's "front door" instead of having to type all the /abbot/index.htm stuff. Now you can just surf to http://no.place.like.home.mindspring.com/ and find your way here. Just remember the famous phrase from The Wizard of Oz and our Web host, Mindspring.

I've also begun slowly deplying the new navigation menu across the site, since no one has reported any problems with it. (Please let me know if anything odd happens when trying to use it.) One of the first places you'll find it is the new "Articles" section, which I've recently enabled. I'm in the process of updating and posting Debra Hyde's "Leather and Hyde" series now; at present there are seven articles up with more coming every day. Sometimes you need to be able to read big words to get through Debra's stuff, but it's worth the effort: She makes very insightful observations about the lifestyle. Articles currently posted include ones about playing when you're under the weather, how we come to enjoy that which we do, one person's view of switching, and more. If you didn't read Debra's excellent articles when they were hosted on About.com, please consider doing so now. She was against the idea of her material being behind closed doors, and has given permission for her works to be hosted here. Enjoy!

I wish I was farther along on site development, but I've had less time to work here than I'd prefer. Part of that has been due to my day job, but more significant has been my involvement with Earthlights, the network that hosts our chat room. They recently switched to a new IRC program and "services" (the programs that keep your nicknames safe and our room registered). I volunteered (okay, so maybe I'm part masochist) to convert the services databases from the old format to a new one so they could retain all the existing nickname and room data. They are currently running under the new software and things are doing much better; in fact, this month Abbot broke his record for in-room time, and that's directly related to the stability of the IRC software.

As it turns out, Earthlights has no dedicated "coder" (programmer), so I have offered to help them with ongoing projects. I just finished making a modification to a "bot" that runs in a Scrabble chat room supporting hundreds if not thousands of online Scrabble games every day. (If you're a Scrabble fan, would like to play online, and are using a standalone IRC client, join #ScrabbleOn at carina.earthlights.net. Tell 'em James sent you.)

Yes, this will take some time that I could be devoting to Abbot's Place. But Earthlights (formerly Mellorien) has gone far above and beyond the call of duty in welcoming our chatters and making changes for us; I feel this is simply repaying their friendship. In addition, it gives me a chance to make changes that benefit us; for example, I have an idea for a way to tie Abbot and NickServ together so that one login will identify you to both. No promises, but stay tuned!

Oh, and for those of you who are wondering: No, there hasn't been an issue of Off the Cuffs for a while. If the last issue you received was V3N3, emailed on February 19th, you're up to date. I'll try to get another issue out soonest.

February 25th - Summary: Applicants queued for About's BDSM site? Also: New chat server much more stable; rolling out experimental navigation menu.

I mentioned just the other day that my About.com photo had been replaced by a blank gray square and the words "Apply Now." Well, it didn't take long for someone to follow those directions. Our trusty host justine just alerted me that BDSM was no longer on the "available sites" list. I checked and, sure enough, it's gone! That means one of three things: Either About slipped up and reloaded an earlier version of the page, or they've decided to dump the BDSM site, or one or more people have applied to be the site's Guide and are entering the training and evaluation phase.

If it's the last in that list -- and I presume it is -- don't expect immediate changes. It takes quite some time to get through the evaluation phase, select one or more potential Guides, and take them through "boot camp." It'll be several weeks before we get even a hint as to who the new Guide might be or the direction in which the site will be headed.

As for here: We've only been on Hurricane -- our new chat server -- for a couple of days, but I've already seen a tremendous improvement in stability. There have been no total failures (India, our former server, continues to struggle), and Abbot has only been disconnected a couple of times. In fact, he's almost broken his previous connect record of just over one day and fifteen hours, set when we started with Mellorien. So, it looks like the change was a productive one.

Now that I have a general idea of how this site will be structured, I'm going to start rolling out a new navigation menu. This should keep you from having to set multiple bookmarks here or having to hit your "back" button repeatedly. You can see it at the top of this page; over time it will be installed on other pages. As always, please let me know of any thoughts you might have or problems you might encounter.

February 22nd - Summary: Chat server issued resolved; About's BDSM site marked "Apply Now!"

The "rough ride" we've been having in chat for the last week or so should be behind us now. Just a bit ago, I reconfigured Abbot and our Java chat applet to use Hurricane, which is currently Earthlights' US hub server (meaning all the other servers connect to it, directly or indirectly). In addition, Abbot has also been given access to another Earthlights server, Carina, as an additional backup. If you're using a dedicated IRC client like mIRC, Pirch, IRCle, etc., you will probably want to change your server to hurricane.earthlights.net.

FLASH: Literally as I was typing the above paragraph, Abbot lost his connection to Hurricane and is now trying to connect. Can't win for losing! Oh well... time will tell, but I do expect this server to work much better for us. I'll keep you posted or, better yet, come hang out in chat and decide for yourself!

On the About front, I've been stopping by the Forum pretty much every day. Today when I arrived, I was greeted by a blank gray square where my Guide photo used to be, and the words Apply Now. Checking the available sites list revealed that "Bondage/Discipline/S&M" is indeed listed. If you've always wanted to run About's BDSM site, now's your chance: Put in your application! However, I don't think a resource site will do well (if even survive) behind Adult Check, so you'd best be interested in running it as "BDSM Erotica."

February 19th - Summary: More 'bot functions restored; minor problems with chat server.

"Real life" continues to get in the way, but I've managed to restore a few more of Abbot's functions. For those into statistics and profiles, I'm happy to say that !quoteme and !set are working again. For information on other commands that are now available, just ask Abbot for !help.

Two of the servers on Earthlights -- the network we are now using for chat -- have had some problems lately. One of those servers is "India," our default server and the one that Abbot logs into. A couple of nights and mornings recently, the room has been "down" or Abbot couldn't get in. These problems should get better as the network settles in; also, The Powers That Be are working on setting up another server for Abbot so that he can still get into the room when one server has problems.

Thanks to everyone for hanging in there during the rough part of the ride!

February 13th - Summary: Chat room moves to new network; update archives restructured.

Before I turned in I posted an update that advised of changes at Mellorien, the IRC network we were using for chat. I warned you that, for a while at least, full "host addresses" would be revealed to anyone using an IRC client, which might put your anonymity somewhat at risk and expose you to more risk from troublemakers (e.g., hackers). This morning, I discovered that abbot.mellorien.net was out of service... meaning Abbot was unable to connect to the network.

Fortunately, there was another option. About a week ago, a good part of the Mellorien network split off and started a new IRC network named "Earthlights." They are still masking host addresses, are still functional, and had maintained all the information regarding our chat space and registered nicks. I spoke with some of the server administrators this morning, and they went out of their way to get us set up on their new network. So, at least for the time being, we are on Earthlights.net instead of Mellorien.net.

If you use the Java applet to chat (reached by clicking the chat room link above), you don't have to do anything differently to use the new room. Just make sure the banner above the chat applet now says "Earthlights" instead of "Mellorien"; if it does, you're all set. You'll notice only very minor differences in the way the room operates.

If you're using mIRC/IRCle/ircii/etc. to join in, you'll need to change your server setting from abbot.mellorien.net to india.earthlights.net (no, it's not in India, but Ohio). You can also use the generic irc.earthlights.net, which will select a random server each time you connect.

Also: This page was getting quite long and taking longer and longer to load, so I split off the older information. You'll now find the most recent update(s) here. For previous updates, click one of the links below. I've divided them into information specific to this site, and information regarding About.com and the Adult Check situation. I'm hopeful this will make it a little easier for everyone, but do let me know your thoughts. Remember you can use our new bulletin board to share your ideas and comments!

February 13th - Summary: Discussion forum now open for testing; IMPORTANT chat server changes.

I've just brought an experimental discussion forum on line. Please drop by, try it out, and let me know of any problems you have or ways you see that it can be improved. At the moment it's configured very minimally; I wanted to make sure it will suit our needs before spending a lot of time "fine-tuning" it.

IMPORTANT: Mellorien, the network that hosts our chat, has run into some difficulties. I don't have all the details at this point, but they announced at 8:11 PM ET tonight that there had been a "security breach." The Mellorien administrators are at this moment switching the entire network over to new, more secure server software to avoid any further problems.

The security upgrade is the good news. The bad news is that, at least at first, the new software will not be "masking" user's host addresses. What does that mean? Right now, if someone using an IRC client checks my address when I'm in the chat room, they'll see something like mell-1247.uu.net. The "mell-1247" part is the "mask" -- it's a fake bit of information that replaces much of my "address," and all you can tell for sure is that I connect via uu.net.

Without masking, however, an IRC user would see something like 1cust43.tnt3.richmond.va.da.uu.net. Not only does this (in my case) reveal that I'm connecting via Richmond, but it gives my actual host address -- a handy tidbit for troublemakers who run "nukes" and other harassment programs via IRC.

Since Mellorien is very serious about security and keeping troublemakers off their network, I doubt this situation will exist for long, or that it will cause any problems in the interim. However, the potential for trouble still exits. And, if you're connecting from work or school, your host address might be something like jsmith.staff.ucla.edu -- in other words, it might make you very traceable.

If you have any concerns about this situation, please don't hesitate to email me; I can check Abbot's logs and give you an idea of how much information someone could glean from your host address. If in doubt, you might want to steer clear of the chat room until the situation is rectified. I will of course be passing word along here as I find out more.

February 9th - Summary: More 'bot functions restored; I'll be out of town for a few days

Several more of Abbot's original functions have been adapted to our new network and brought back on line. Perhaps the most useful of them is the "notepad," which allows you to leave messages for your chat friends, or pick up messages they've left for you. Be sure to check the !help command every now and then to see what else has been brought back. (And for those of you new to Abbot, I will be putting his "user manual" on these Web pages in the next couple of weeks.)

Also, I will be away from the Internet for the next few days, due to being in a location with no "connectivity." Have a great time and play nicely, and I'll see you when I get back.

February 4th - Summary: Internet problems cause chat difficulties for some

Yesterday evening, some folks had problems getting into -- or staying in -- the chat room... and Abbot was one of them. I found that I could get into any Mellorien server (even the ones in Norway and Australia), except for the three in Virginia. This was quite odd, since I'm in Virginia too; in fact, Son of Costello -- the computer Abbot runs on -- is only about 100 miles away from his IRC server! This, and the fact that many people had no trouble and were chatting away, hinted to me that it was some sort of Internet problem. (I've seen cases before where I could get to Web sites anywhere other than, for example, Florida.)

The problem cleared up around 11:30 PM last night, and everything has been stable since. Other than falsely depressing the stats for the day and messing up !seen for anyone who most recently visited yesterday evening, though, no harm was done.

I checked with bran, Server Administrator for the machine on which both our server and Omega run. He confirmed my theory that the problem was with the Internet and not Mellorien:

The problem with connecting to VA servers was due to some router problems. It seemed that anyone West of Virginia could connect to [abbot.mellorien.net] without problems, but anyone on the East Coast/Europe could not... this was not a Mellorien problem.

Things seem to be back to normal today. Let me know if you have any problems.

January 29th - Summary: Abbot's commands slowly being restored.

Just a quick update to let everyone know that a few more of Abbot's commands are back on line. !profile and !stats have been modified so that they will pop up the appropriate information in a new browser window, just like they did under ParaChat. !version is now functional again and includes a FULL option. !seen has also been expanded with a FULL option. These additions and modifications join !password, !login, and !register, which were enabled earlier.

You can check to see what's available at any time with the !help command, which has also been restored. As I bring each command back into service, I'll add it to !help.

January 28th - Summary: Chat now up and running on Mellorien.

This morning at about 8:00 AM, I switched our chat applet over from EsperNet -- which we had been using as an interim network -- to Mellorien. The folks at Mellorien have bent over backwards to accommodate us, and have even set up a dedicated server for Abbot.

For now, you won't notice too many changes (except for the flurry of information you get when starting up -- which you can mostly ignore). But Mellorien offers us a lot more flexibility and we will be taking advantage of it.

January 22nd - Summary: Bot alterations proceeding slowly but smoothly; chat index page minimally in place; meeting with new chat network went well.

Nothing of major importance to share, so I'm just checking in with a general update. I spent the weekend working on adjusting Abbot to the new chat room. His login/registration/password system has now been adapted to support people changing nicknames on the fly (possible now) and switching between multiple rooms (coming soon).

I also started working on an index page for chat. It will eventually have links for chat, statistics, profiles, FAQs, rules, command lists, and so on... everything to do with chat both here and at About. Some of those links are in place now, so feel free to take a look. The chat link at the top of this page now leads there, as well.

I electronically "met" today with the fine folks who will be permanently hosting our chat. They have set up a special server just for our needs, and are welcoming us with open arms. Switching to the new network should ultimately mean better service for everyone. If you're already used to what we have now, you won't notice much difference... except that you'll have more options than the sometimes-troublesome Java chat applet.

There's nothing new with the About.com Adult Check situation, but expect an "interesting" announcement in the next week or so.

January 16th - Summary: Chat statistics and profiles starting to come on line.

Due to work commitments, I only had one day to work on About.com, Abbot's Place, and email this weekend (despite the fact that it was suppposed to be a long holiday weekend). Nonetheless, I did make significant progress on getting everyone's favorite RoboTop, Abbot, back on line. He is still ignoring all commands except for !seen, but a lot of the background work has been done. Expect a lot of his features to suddenly spring into place at some point in the near future.

Chat statistics have been active, but they reflected only About.com's BDSM chat room (which absolutely died when Adult Check went into effect), and the index was behind locked doors. Profiles were also functional but, again, you had to go through Adult Check to get to them. Both have now been adjusted. The statistics are now reflecting the state of the new chat room. Plus, you'll find that profiles load like lightning, now that they're not looping through About.com. There is still a lot to be done, but for now at least you can see when people are most likely to be around in chat.

No changes to report inside About... or at least I'm not aware of any, being several days behind on my email. My apologies to those of you who have written and haven't gotten a response yet, and my thanks for your patience. I'll get to you, I promise.

January 8th - Summary: New chat room taking off; BDSM Forum link; some adult-content Guides resigning.

Well, we've survived the weekend and, I think, come out stronger than before. The new chat room is rapidly becoming our new home, rather than a place to discuss Adult Check and changes at About.com. At this moment, there are fifteen people chatting away there, while About's BDSM chat room is empty. I guess that says something; people are voting with their feet (fingers?) as well as their wallets.

I had to put the chat room in on very short notice, so it needs a lot of effort still. But I managed to get some work done on it over the weekend. The room is now easier to get into and to use than its original test configuration (and it will continue to get better). I added a whole raft of graphics (emoticons and other symbols) to the few we originally tested with. And several chatters bemoaned the loss of the little "ploink" sound you could get when someone entered the old chat room -- apparently, a lot of us log in and then go about our business until we hear someone else come in. With Abbot's help, the chat room now plays a doorbell chime whenever someone enters. (Unfortunately, I made the mistake of adding a large number of user-playable sounds, and the bigger mistake of telling everyone about them! It was like an out-of-control party when I left...)

Seeing that this may be more permanent than just a space to discuss Adult Check and what's happening at About, I've been in touch with a couple of networks about hosting our chat. One in particular has been extremely supportive, welcoming us with open arms and offering to do whatever they can to make us feel at home. Stay tuned for further developments.

On the 6th, I told you about a way you can still get into the BDSM chat room for a while. I forgot to mention, though, that the Forum is also still available, as long as you go directly to it and not through About.com. http://forums.about.com/ab-bdsm/start/ works... for now. Keep in mind that both this and the About chat room link are offered so you can make last-minute arrangements with friends or close out ongoing conversations. Don't count on them continuing to work.

I received word today that one of our adult-content Guides has tendered a resignation over this situation. In response to the farewell email, another Guide promised to be around "at least through Wednesday." Yet another Guide has "given it a month" and plans to resign if About.com doesn't reverse its decision by the end of January.

It seems things are going to get quite interesting.

January 6th - Summary: Try this if you're locked out of About.com's BDSM chat; our new chat room is up and running, if just barely.

From SheWolfBitch, one of our alert chatters:

"Someone sent me this and I thought I would pass it along to you."

Locked out of About.com's BDSM chat due to Adult Check? Click Here!

[Edited and updated 8:38 PM]

Please note that this is an interim maneuver. I imagine some folks would frown on us using a "back door," and I doubt it will keep working very long at any rate. But it gives us a way to get together and talk through the "kinks" of the new chat room (and talking kink is what we're all good at, right?) As soon as we have figured out all the peculiarities of the new room, I'll pull down the link to About's chat room.

I spent the day setting up the basic configuration of the new chat room, and opened the doors at about 5:30 PM Eastern time. As of this update about two dozen people have tried it out. Many had absolutely no problems whatsoever. Some had problems with certain aspects of the chat (the clickable smiley faces, for example) but were still able to use the room. And a few had to make browser configuration changes before they could get in. All things considered, I'd say it went fairly well for a new room with which we're all unfamiliar.

The room is available now for you to try or to use. Just keep in mind that it is "bare bones" right now. Don't pout because your favorite smiley icon isn't there; I have plenty more waiting to be added. Same for the sounds, instructions, and a whole mess of cool features. And while Abbot is in the room, he's had a temporary lobotomy and won't respond to any commands until I can reconfigure him for the new room. (He is, however, logging everything so we can stay up to date with our chat room stats.)

If you have problems getting in or getting connected, see if the minimal hints below the chat applet help. If not, try to catch someone in the About.com room who has used the new chat and ask them for help. Most of the HOSTs and HELPERs have gotten in, as well as a number of our most enthusiastic chatters. I'll be adding instructions and help pages as soon as humanly possible.

Here's the link to the new chat room; just fill in your nickname and optionally your real name, then click "Connect Now!"

Stay tuned for further updates!

P.S. This page will soon be more than just a "holding page," and thus really needed a name. The one I chose for it and the chat room -- "Abbot's Place" -- is the name one of the chatters gave our old room's private photo album. I thought it was fitting to use it for the new room as a tribute to both our hard-working 'bot and the memories we all created in About's room, where the album was created.

January 5th - Summary: Adult Check AVS rolled out around 6:15 PM tonight; some still able to get into About's adult sites; first tests on replacement chat here look very promising; chat expected to be available to the public some time tomorrow.

True to their prediction, About.com today rolled out Adult Check across all their adult-content sites. The first indication of it happening was in our chat room at about 6:15 PM. For the next few hours, some people were blocked, while others were able to get in. I presume this was because they were actually installing and working on the software during that time. There may also be some loopholes which might exist for a while until all the bugs are ironed out. At this very moment -- just before midnight -- there are ten people chatting, with people popping in and out pretty much normally. So, at least for the moment, folks can still get into About's BDSM chat room if they're persistent.

I would not, however, count on this being the case for very long. So, we are taking steps to ensure everyone can still gather and discuss the Adult Check situation and BDSM in real time.

The barriers went up as Renee and I were driving home from work. As soon as I got in I reviewed the day's chat log and learned that the roll-out had begun. Fortunately, I've been researching alternative chat solutions since Wednesday morning and had already selected several possibilities. I quickly set up the most likely candidate on another page of this site so I could check browser capability.

The results so far look good. Internet Explorer 5.5 on a PC and IE 4.5 on an iMac were able to access chat with no problems and after a minor change to the Java settings, respectively. PC versions of Netscape Communicator 5.5 and 6.0, as well as AOL 6.0, all worked fine. So far, only Netscape Communicator 4.7 on an iMac had real problems, reporting a Java error and refusing to load the applet. (I have heard from other sites using this chat system that some versions of Netscape Navigator and Communicator have problems with it.)

The test chat room is extremely crude and limited -- it had to be, to be installed quickly for testing -- so it wasn't appropriate to open it to the public. However, first thing Saturday morning I'm going to dive back into chat preparations. I expect to have at least a minimally functional chat room up before the end of the day. It will be linked from this page, and I invite all of you to drop in and try it out. Just keep in mind that all functions won't be available right away, and things might be a little "rough around the edges" for a while.

Let me take a moment to thank my two brave alpha testers, justine and deffie{CW}. They struggled through configuration and connection issues to reach a totally unfamiliar chat system that was very limited in functionality, only to go through the process again and again trying different browsers... and they did it with a positive attitude and managed to have fun in the bargain. Thanks also to the many folks in About's BDSM chat room who were willing to deal with the same frustrations and who offered to help out if needed... and thanks as well to those who experimented and poked and prodded until they found ways to slip into About's chat space "under the radar."

And, equally importantly, thanks to everyone for hanging in there during a trying time. We will pull this off.

January 4th - Summary: Adult Check AVS coming to About.com soon; non-users will be locked out of About's BDSM site; this page will serve to keep you informed and in contact; ways you can stay in touch with your friends.

There isn't much here at the moment. At the moment. But that will change.

If you arrived here from About's BDSM site, it is very important that you bookmark this page. After About's adult-content sites institute Adult Check, you'll be able to come back here and find out what's happening with About's BDSM site, and what you can do about it.

You can reach me at escape@usa.net if needed. For general information about what is happening, however, please subscribe to Off the Cuffs. To subscribe, just send me an email with SUBSCRIBE: OFF THE CUFFS as the subject. (Most email clients will fill in the subject automatically when you click the link above). NOTE: You must email the request from the account where you want the newsletter to be delivered or your request will be ignored.

Thank you one and all for your support over the years, and your patience as we work through what will surely be a rocky time. Knowing you all as I do, I think I can safely say we will survive. In fact, in some very important ways, we will win.