- Welcome to Calamity Refuge.
Osmium Density
Recent posts
#11
Roleplay / Re: Fanciful Tales and Another...
Last post by Kitran - December 20, 2024, 09:54:34 PMHe spilled out of an old rickety transport vehicle and onto the sandy shores of the forested island rather ungracefully. He was exhausted from bailing water out of the leaky boat during the whole trip, but he had managed to make it in one piece. Standing up and dusting off, he glanced up and down the beach. It was trees and sand for as far as he could see. "Man... I really hope there's more to it than this. I'm sick of camping outside."
Despite his grumblings, though, the natural state of the island was comforting. Not wanting to tip off any possible security algorithms that might be watching, he had simply searched for "refuge". This place had been buried twenty odd pages deep – Or was it forty? He hadn't actually counted. – which was preferable in his mind. The further it was from the public eye, the easier it would be for him to keep out of sight.
A single path led him deeper into the canopy until he came to a locked door boasting a large screen. He could navigate through the flickering interface to look at what this place had to offer – They had food AND beds! – but if he wanted to take advantage of the amenities, he had to sign up first. The choice stood before him. Did he register himself as a user or just camp in the outskirts forever? Or at least until he starved.
Part of him had hoped he wouldn't need to name himself, but it looked like everything he could want for was just behind the door. He squinted his eyes at the screen with a huff before reaching up to click the button. "I'm doing it for the bed."
—
Kitran wandered through the Refuge proper with a frown. The buildings and grounds seemed to be in a bit of disrepair. "Not exactly what was advertised," he huffed, but it was to be expected. No place had gone untouched by The Fall.
At least it looked like there was still some place to eat if the swinging sign above one door was to be believed. He walked closer, noting there was no indication the place was open, but when he gave the door a push it wasn't locked. Kitran let himself in and gave a low whistle. It was like walking into an old western movie set boasting a large wrap around bar with plenty of tables and chairs. As far as he could tell, he was the only patron unless there was someone upstairs.
Unfortunately, there was no one behind the bar, either. "Hello?" he gave a tentative call. "Anyone in here?" He sat down at the bar hoping they were just on a trip to the lou. A bowl of peanuts was set out, so he started snacking while pondering his lot aloud. "Just need to lay low for a while, let everything back home blow over – or blow up and burn down while I'm a safe distance away." His stomach grumbled, being reminded how empty it was by the addition of the peanuts.
Grabbing his coin purse, he counted out a mere 15 coppers. Barely enough to feed himself for a week – or more likely with inflation – one day, if that. "Bah, gonna need a job, too. Especially if I want a bed." Kitran held out little hope that he'd be able to find anything above menial labor. His brand of 'skills' weren't exactly in high demand these days. He'd made it all the way to the bottom of the bowl before his thirst kicked in but there still wasn't any sign of someone working the bar. Looking left and right, he shook his head at the whole thing. "I'm just gonna get something myself."
Leaving his backpack on the bar, he stood and walked around, grabbing a random bottle off the back shelf. But he froze with a cringe when he heard the front door creak open and slam shut. "Oh, ninth hell..." he swore under his breath. Of course someone would come in now. They'd kick him out for thieving before he'd even spent one night!
Rather than the berating he expected, though, the voice that greeted him was rather relieved. "Oh, good! Someone's here. Could I get some service?"
Kitran gripped the bottle in his hand in indecision. Once he turned around, they'd see his face. Once he turned around, they'd know he was a stranger. But what could he do? Try to run and hope they didn't recognize him outside the bar? Then he remembered his pack was still sitting behind him right next to the stool the new patron had just sat down on and there was no chance he was going to leave it behind.
Last option then... pretend he was exactly where he was supposed to be.
Kitran threw on a winning smile and turned around with a bottle in one hand and a glass in the other. "Yes, of course! How can I help you today?" He hoped that his confidence and good manners could win this person over, because – if he was truly honest with himself – more than food or a bed or a job, what Kitran really needed right now was a friend.
Despite his grumblings, though, the natural state of the island was comforting. Not wanting to tip off any possible security algorithms that might be watching, he had simply searched for "refuge". This place had been buried twenty odd pages deep – Or was it forty? He hadn't actually counted. – which was preferable in his mind. The further it was from the public eye, the easier it would be for him to keep out of sight.
A single path led him deeper into the canopy until he came to a locked door boasting a large screen. He could navigate through the flickering interface to look at what this place had to offer – They had food AND beds! – but if he wanted to take advantage of the amenities, he had to sign up first. The choice stood before him. Did he register himself as a user or just camp in the outskirts forever? Or at least until he starved.
Part of him had hoped he wouldn't need to name himself, but it looked like everything he could want for was just behind the door. He squinted his eyes at the screen with a huff before reaching up to click the button. "I'm doing it for the bed."
—
Kitran wandered through the Refuge proper with a frown. The buildings and grounds seemed to be in a bit of disrepair. "Not exactly what was advertised," he huffed, but it was to be expected. No place had gone untouched by The Fall.
At least it looked like there was still some place to eat if the swinging sign above one door was to be believed. He walked closer, noting there was no indication the place was open, but when he gave the door a push it wasn't locked. Kitran let himself in and gave a low whistle. It was like walking into an old western movie set boasting a large wrap around bar with plenty of tables and chairs. As far as he could tell, he was the only patron unless there was someone upstairs.
Unfortunately, there was no one behind the bar, either. "Hello?" he gave a tentative call. "Anyone in here?" He sat down at the bar hoping they were just on a trip to the lou. A bowl of peanuts was set out, so he started snacking while pondering his lot aloud. "Just need to lay low for a while, let everything back home blow over – or blow up and burn down while I'm a safe distance away." His stomach grumbled, being reminded how empty it was by the addition of the peanuts.
Grabbing his coin purse, he counted out a mere 15 coppers. Barely enough to feed himself for a week – or more likely with inflation – one day, if that. "Bah, gonna need a job, too. Especially if I want a bed." Kitran held out little hope that he'd be able to find anything above menial labor. His brand of 'skills' weren't exactly in high demand these days. He'd made it all the way to the bottom of the bowl before his thirst kicked in but there still wasn't any sign of someone working the bar. Looking left and right, he shook his head at the whole thing. "I'm just gonna get something myself."
Leaving his backpack on the bar, he stood and walked around, grabbing a random bottle off the back shelf. But he froze with a cringe when he heard the front door creak open and slam shut. "Oh, ninth hell..." he swore under his breath. Of course someone would come in now. They'd kick him out for thieving before he'd even spent one night!
Rather than the berating he expected, though, the voice that greeted him was rather relieved. "Oh, good! Someone's here. Could I get some service?"
Kitran gripped the bottle in his hand in indecision. Once he turned around, they'd see his face. Once he turned around, they'd know he was a stranger. But what could he do? Try to run and hope they didn't recognize him outside the bar? Then he remembered his pack was still sitting behind him right next to the stool the new patron had just sat down on and there was no chance he was going to leave it behind.
Last option then... pretend he was exactly where he was supposed to be.
Kitran threw on a winning smile and turned around with a bottle in one hand and a glass in the other. "Yes, of course! How can I help you today?" He hoped that his confidence and good manners could win this person over, because – if he was truly honest with himself – more than food or a bed or a job, what Kitran really needed right now was a friend.
#12
General Discussion / Re: The CalRef Recipe Book
Last post by Kitran - December 19, 2024, 10:34:32 PMAward winning "Three Meat Spicy Shire" Chili. - Came in first place at the last ECW Chili Cookoff out of roughly 25 entries with it's "rustic" flavors.
I'm not going to include measurements since the size of the pot is a big factor and I cook with my heart rather than my measuring cup.
Fill your pot ~1/4th up with water then add:
Spicy V8
Goat cheese
Bacon braunschweiger
Turkey burger
Venison burger
Corn or onion, whichever you like better (or both)
A random hot sauce that's been sitting in the fridge for ages (bonus if it was a leftover from a restaurant you can't identify)
A variety of beans - precooked from jars preferred, though I do enjoy adding a can of Bush's now and again.
Lotsa chili powder, few shakes of white pepper, salt and pepper to taste.
If it's too spicy add honey, not spicy enough, more white pepper or hot sauce.
Simmer on med-low heat for 4ish hours. Refrigerate overnight and simmer again for another 4ish hours.
Enjoy!
I'm not going to include measurements since the size of the pot is a big factor and I cook with my heart rather than my measuring cup.
Fill your pot ~1/4th up with water then add:
Spicy V8
Goat cheese
Bacon braunschweiger
Turkey burger
Venison burger
Corn or onion, whichever you like better (or both)
A random hot sauce that's been sitting in the fridge for ages (bonus if it was a leftover from a restaurant you can't identify)
A variety of beans - precooked from jars preferred, though I do enjoy adding a can of Bush's now and again.
Lotsa chili powder, few shakes of white pepper, salt and pepper to taste.
If it's too spicy add honey, not spicy enough, more white pepper or hot sauce.
Simmer on med-low heat for 4ish hours. Refrigerate overnight and simmer again for another 4ish hours.
Enjoy!
#13
General Discussion / Re: The Welcoming Committee
Last post by Kitran - December 19, 2024, 10:12:06 PM*waves*
Just popping in to say hi. Cuz that's what we're supposed to do, right?
What can I say about myself? Don't let the avatar fool you. I'm a wanderer with an old soul - and old bones. (They creak!) Not exactly a noob, but I know enough to know I'll never know everything, and I'm okay with that.
And as a not exactly noob, I'm gonna go ahead and say: "Welcome to the Refuge Eveline! It's great to have you!"
Can't say this place will be hoppin', but maybe I'll see you around.
Just popping in to say hi. Cuz that's what we're supposed to do, right?
What can I say about myself? Don't let the avatar fool you. I'm a wanderer with an old soul - and old bones. (They creak!) Not exactly a noob, but I know enough to know I'll never know everything, and I'm okay with that.
And as a not exactly noob, I'm gonna go ahead and say: "Welcome to the Refuge Eveline! It's great to have you!"
Can't say this place will be hoppin', but maybe I'll see you around.
#14
Refugia / [draft] The Culture of the Rom...
Last post by Luca - December 16, 2024, 04:18:57 PMThe Culture of the Romans II: Carthaginians
PREAMBLE. The Culture of the Romans is a reform arc based on the idea that the RRS must be made more digestible and cultured. In reality, the only real culture the Romans had, when not killing smaller tribes, was killing their own emperor.
The Region regards the legal section on Resident ejection (RRS 3) to be misplaced and eliminates it, decrementing the RRS by 1 thereafter.
The Region reincarnates this statutes within Government Accountability by revising that section to the following content:
Government Accountability:
8. The reasoning for all ejections of Residents must be publicly reported by the responsible party.
- If a nation becomes barred from the Region, that nation may appeal to the Regional Council.
- Any nation may be unbarred if fewer than two Councillors object.
9. All Residents within the region have the right to solicit the Regional Council for a ruling on the legality of the actions of a Resident, including Councillors and their staff.
- If the action is found to be illegal by a majority of Councillors, the action is reversed.
10. All Member States can charge a Regional Councillor of neglect or mismanagement. The petition listing the grievances against the accused must be delivered to the Arch-Administrator and carry the approval of a Second.
- The Arch-Administrator will initiate a vote of no confidence among Member States, lasting five days.
- If a majority is in favour, the vote is passed, the Councillor is removed from office, and a new election will be called immediately for the seat. If the vote fails, the Member State will be unable to submit another for two weeks.
11. In the event that a Councillor or a Councillor's staff operates in contradiction to the RRS, the Arch-Administrator may suspend the powers of that Councillor or staff member until such time as it may be reviewed under a RRS 9 ruling, which is automatically invoked upon suspension.
Authored by: Refuge Isle
Seconded by:
#15
General Discussion / Re: Catly has direct ties to A...
Last post by Natalie - December 15, 2024, 11:15:49 PMPeople continue to debate whether the trailer itself is AI-generated or assisted. I'm still not an expert in generative video and still not inclined to take a side on it, but if I had to make a wild guess, I'd say they created AI concept art and hired a team to flesh it out. But who knows? If someone shows examples and explains their claim, I could believe that the trailer uses generative AI in some capacity.
I appreciate the kind words. This sort of writing and research is fun, and it's rewarding when people get something out of it. My goal with this was to see if I could influence the discourse around Catly by doing the research that mainstream outlets weren't willing to, and tonight the gaming website 80 Level published an article based on my findings so I'm feeling pretty satisfied.
I appreciate the kind words. This sort of writing and research is fun, and it's rewarding when people get something out of it. My goal with this was to see if I could influence the discourse around Catly by doing the research that mainstream outlets weren't willing to, and tonight the gaming website 80 Level published an article based on my findings so I'm feeling pretty satisfied.
#16
General Discussion / Re: Catly has direct ties to A...
Last post by Eveline Gwen T. Allison Fate Hepburn (Valentine Z) - December 15, 2024, 10:36:34 PMOh hey, I have just been thinking about this and saw it in another server. I like your write-up, well-researched and all. 
Also yeahhhh I know you are not talking about the trailers, so nothing against that. From my personal perspective, I looked at the trailer, went "Aww this looks so cute" to "Okayyyyy why does this look a little AI-esque?" AI pictures have that kind of look that you can just tell from get-go. Not that the ability to detect is a bad thing, I'm fascinated that we can catch it so quick.
I kind of feel a little bad at first like "Hey, maybe it's actual art but just looks like it?" But most of the time, it just turns to be AI generated.
Also yeahhhh I know you are not talking about the trailers, so nothing against that. From my personal perspective, I looked at the trailer, went "Aww this looks so cute" to "Okayyyyy why does this look a little AI-esque?" AI pictures have that kind of look that you can just tell from get-go. Not that the ability to detect is a bad thing, I'm fascinated that we can catch it so quick.
I kind of feel a little bad at first like "Hey, maybe it's actual art but just looks like it?" But most of the time, it just turns to be AI generated.
#17
General Discussion / Catly has direct ties to AI/NF...
Last post by Natalie - December 13, 2024, 02:58:36 PMI know this is sort of a different thing than normal here, but I just spent time researching this and I wanted to have someplace to save and share it in case it doesn't end up fitting anywhere else. Context for anyone who's confused: this is about Catly, a game which received a bizarre trailer at last night's The Game Awards.
---
There's been a lot of talk about Catly, the fever dream of a trailer revealed last night at The Game Awards. Rumours are swirling about the project's origins and intent, and claims have been made about the use of AI and other Web3 technologies. This post collates various sources and evidence that have come to light, some of which I've not seen anybody else talk about anywhere, which demonstrate that the game and its developer have strong ties to the use of generative AI and NFT/blockchain implementation.
Right off the bat, I want to make clear that I'm not going to be talking about the trailer. I'm not an expert in generative video, I have no way of knowing whether that tech is at this point yet. Lots of dissent is flying around. The trailer is not relevant to my findings.
First, the game's site: playcatly.com. The elements from the trailer, again, I'm not commenting on, but several of the assets throughout the site, such as the purple visor, the macaron bag, and the very strange vest-wearing cat for the gold sunglasses image under the Chic collection, have very strong indications of the type of poor physical logic and conceptual bleeding that's common in generative images. Not a smoking gun, but a point of interest.
On Catly's Steam page, there's a testimonial from League of Legends and Arcane producer Thomas Vu:
Vu is a prominent angel investor in the "GameFi" space, a term which is commonly associated with Web3, cryptocurrency, NFTs, blockchain, and other such technologies. Again, not a smoking gun, but we're building a pattern of associations here.
Information about the company, SuperAuthenti Co. Ltd., is very scarce, but we do know Kevin Yeung is their co-founder. Yeung previously co-founded TenthPlanet, a studio reported in 2022 to be working on multiple "metaverse" blockchain games. One of these was Alien Mews, a game described as a "digital cat life simulation metaverse." An archive of the company's github page from May 17, 2024 confirms their intent to use NFTs as a centerpiece of their other title Mech Angel.
We do, however, know that prior to adopting the name SuperAuthenti Co., they published another game: an app called Plantly: Mindful Gardening. Official info about Plantly has been scrubbed from the web pretty thoroughly, including its official app page, so I can only refer to this secondary source about it. (This site links to the URL https://www.authentigame.com/ for more info, but I can't find a trace of that site anywhere.) We know from this page that Plantly used these assorted GameFi technologies, from the description:
But we can go further. Note that Plantly uses the exact same font in its logo as Catly, but that's obviously incidental. But Plantly is listed here as being developed by Shanghai Binmao Technology Co., Ltd. It happens that we can find a resume for developer Yingzi Kong that lists three months of work experience for Binmao Technology working on "a metaverse game about cats" which is explicitly specified to be Catly. (Please don't bother Kong about this; I've not made contact and do not intend to.)
I suspect we could more conclusively tie these corporate entities together through this webpage which I believe contains business filing details for the Chinese company. I was able to briefly scroll through it once and did see SuperAuthenti Co. listed, but the site kicked me out for not being in mainland China and I'm unable to access it. If anybody is able to confirm this, it would help put a bow on the whole thing.
Conclusion (tl;dr)
Between the use of likely generative AI in assets used to market Catly, the co-founder's well documented history pursuing GameFi development, the attention of known Web3 investors and publications, and direct documented ties to previous blockchain app Plantly: Mindful Gardening, it is exceedingly likely that Catly, in whatever form it may eventually take, is aiming directly for a share of the AI/NFT/Web3 marketplace and will make extensive use of those methodologies. I hope this helps to clarify the coverage of this project going forward and confirms that this is not merely an unsubstantiated rumour.
I want to acknowledge a couple sources that were instrumental in this research: /u/retronomad_, who first made me aware of Plantly in this post, and Bluesky user @bleakvision.info, who identified the investing habits of Thomas Vu. Your work is very much appreciated.
---
Edit (2024/12/14)
Because of the attention this got on reddit (some of which was even positive!), I want to shout out a couple additional pieces of info people contributed that I found interesting.
I wanted to give some props to /u/Invertex for coming up with even more original research into both the game and Yeung's background and collaborators, including these unpublished webpages on the *Catly* website that show much less refined generative images:
https://www.playcatly.com/p2/detail/1 (Backup: https://archive.is/NxvrX)
https://www.playcatly.com/p2/detail/2 (Backup: (https://archive.is/Ikcou/image)
https://www.playcatly.com/p2/detail/3 (Backup: (https://archive.is/Cvrcj)
https://www.playcatly.com/p2/detail/4 (Backup: (https://archive.is/Rpqqn)
Please check out their full comment here if you find this rabbit hole interesting.
Also thanks to folks for reminding me about the Griffin Gaming Partners venture capital aspect - this comment from /u/happyhumorist and this one from /u/ikkir sourcing the Felicia Day connection are both great additions.
---
There's been a lot of talk about Catly, the fever dream of a trailer revealed last night at The Game Awards. Rumours are swirling about the project's origins and intent, and claims have been made about the use of AI and other Web3 technologies. This post collates various sources and evidence that have come to light, some of which I've not seen anybody else talk about anywhere, which demonstrate that the game and its developer have strong ties to the use of generative AI and NFT/blockchain implementation.
Right off the bat, I want to make clear that I'm not going to be talking about the trailer. I'm not an expert in generative video, I have no way of knowing whether that tech is at this point yet. Lots of dissent is flying around. The trailer is not relevant to my findings.
First, the game's site: playcatly.com. The elements from the trailer, again, I'm not commenting on, but several of the assets throughout the site, such as the purple visor, the macaron bag, and the very strange vest-wearing cat for the gold sunglasses image under the Chic collection, have very strong indications of the type of poor physical logic and conceptual bleeding that's common in generative images. Not a smoking gun, but a point of interest.
On Catly's Steam page, there's a testimonial from League of Legends and Arcane producer Thomas Vu:
Quote"This cat MMO is a triumph of innovation and heart, delivering an enchanting world that stands as a testament to the brilliance of its creators."
- THOMAS VU, Producer of League of Legends, Producer of Arcane, 2022 Emmy Awards Winner.
Vu is a prominent angel investor in the "GameFi" space, a term which is commonly associated with Web3, cryptocurrency, NFTs, blockchain, and other such technologies. Again, not a smoking gun, but we're building a pattern of associations here.
Information about the company, SuperAuthenti Co. Ltd., is very scarce, but we do know Kevin Yeung is their co-founder. Yeung previously co-founded TenthPlanet, a studio reported in 2022 to be working on multiple "metaverse" blockchain games. One of these was Alien Mews, a game described as a "digital cat life simulation metaverse." An archive of the company's github page from May 17, 2024 confirms their intent to use NFTs as a centerpiece of their other title Mech Angel.
We do, however, know that prior to adopting the name SuperAuthenti Co., they published another game: an app called Plantly: Mindful Gardening. Official info about Plantly has been scrubbed from the web pretty thoroughly, including its official app page, so I can only refer to this secondary source about it. (This site links to the URL https://www.authentigame.com/ for more info, but I can't find a trace of that site anywhere.) We know from this page that Plantly used these assorted GameFi technologies, from the description:
QuoteYour plants are not just digital tokens but emotional mementos
But we can go further. Note that Plantly uses the exact same font in its logo as Catly, but that's obviously incidental. But Plantly is listed here as being developed by Shanghai Binmao Technology Co., Ltd. It happens that we can find a resume for developer Yingzi Kong that lists three months of work experience for Binmao Technology working on "a metaverse game about cats" which is explicitly specified to be Catly. (Please don't bother Kong about this; I've not made contact and do not intend to.)
I suspect we could more conclusively tie these corporate entities together through this webpage which I believe contains business filing details for the Chinese company. I was able to briefly scroll through it once and did see SuperAuthenti Co. listed, but the site kicked me out for not being in mainland China and I'm unable to access it. If anybody is able to confirm this, it would help put a bow on the whole thing.
Conclusion (tl;dr)
Between the use of likely generative AI in assets used to market Catly, the co-founder's well documented history pursuing GameFi development, the attention of known Web3 investors and publications, and direct documented ties to previous blockchain app Plantly: Mindful Gardening, it is exceedingly likely that Catly, in whatever form it may eventually take, is aiming directly for a share of the AI/NFT/Web3 marketplace and will make extensive use of those methodologies. I hope this helps to clarify the coverage of this project going forward and confirms that this is not merely an unsubstantiated rumour.
I want to acknowledge a couple sources that were instrumental in this research: /u/retronomad_, who first made me aware of Plantly in this post, and Bluesky user @bleakvision.info, who identified the investing habits of Thomas Vu. Your work is very much appreciated.
---
Edit (2024/12/14)
Because of the attention this got on reddit (some of which was even positive!), I want to shout out a couple additional pieces of info people contributed that I found interesting.
I wanted to give some props to /u/Invertex for coming up with even more original research into both the game and Yeung's background and collaborators, including these unpublished webpages on the *Catly* website that show much less refined generative images:
https://www.playcatly.com/p2/detail/1 (Backup: https://archive.is/NxvrX)
https://www.playcatly.com/p2/detail/2 (Backup: (https://archive.is/Ikcou/image)
https://www.playcatly.com/p2/detail/3 (Backup: (https://archive.is/Cvrcj)
https://www.playcatly.com/p2/detail/4 (Backup: (https://archive.is/Rpqqn)
Please check out their full comment here if you find this rabbit hole interesting.
Also thanks to folks for reminding me about the Griffin Gaming Partners venture capital aspect - this comment from /u/happyhumorist and this one from /u/ikkir sourcing the Felicia Day connection are both great additions.
#18
General Discussion / Re: The Welcoming Committee
Last post by Eveline Gwen T. Allison Fate Hepburn (Valentine Z) - December 13, 2024, 02:20:20 AMAhhh, hello and good day! Apologies in advance if this place has been not used for long, just created an account.
Typically known as Valentine Z on NS circles, along with names such as Clarissa, Samantha, and now Eveline in many other non-NS places.
While my pronouns do go by he/him, I'm practically okay with everything and truth be told, I often get mistaken for a woman. Completely and genuinely fine by me. For clarity sake, it's not some malicious catfishing attempt or whatever. Ever since I got onto NationStates in Nov 2015, I gave off feminine vibes and I often got mistook. Again, all good. The feminine names represent me better a little bit more, I feel.
Rambling aside, I also love to do photography (I might search around for a thread here, might ask in Discord), along with writing and then running/jogging/hiking on a not too regular basis.
From Burma, but now living in Singapore. In fact, have been living in SG far longer now.
Typically known as Valentine Z on NS circles, along with names such as Clarissa, Samantha, and now Eveline in many other non-NS places.
While my pronouns do go by he/him, I'm practically okay with everything and truth be told, I often get mistaken for a woman. Completely and genuinely fine by me.
For clarity sake, it's not some malicious catfishing attempt or whatever. Ever since I got onto NationStates in Nov 2015, I gave off feminine vibes and I often got mistook. Again, all good. The feminine names represent me better a little bit more, I feel.Rambling aside, I also love to do photography (I might search around for a thread here, might ask in Discord), along with writing and then running/jogging/hiking on a not too regular basis.
From Burma, but now living in Singapore. In fact, have been living in SG far longer now.
#19
The Admin Tower / The Liberalisation of Email
Last post by Luca - December 11, 2024, 01:30:46 AM
Greetings sweet people reading this message, as well as AI page scrapers I haven't banned yet. Time for an "exciting" policy update.
What Happened?
I received a bug report last month in another forum I run saying that someone couldn't make an account because their confirmation email never arrived. If I worked in IT, I would have select the "Have you checked your junk mail" option from the club penguin chat wheel and called it a day. Thankfully my experience is in housekeeping, so I know this is never the problem. Or more specifically, since our email provider (Gandi) shut down my emails twice before, arbitrarily, Arabic proverbs told me it was bound to happen again.
Turns out that Gandi changed their policy so that you could not send emails from domains you were not signing in with. In my case I was, so I felt like this error was a red herring -- hiding the real problem of sending emails through an alias. My best guess is that email usage increased dramatically during COVID and after a few years of heightened traffic, Gandi saw an opportunity to increase their pricing on everything by at least three hundred per cent. Aliases were likely a workaround, so we got hit despite our setup predating the change.
I created a support ticket which I decided not to wait for to act on because, spoilers, it took them thirty days to respond anyway. Reviewing the proposed prices for the coming year, I elected not to drop two hundred fifty dollars on the same service which previously asked twenty eight. Therefore we have migrated providers and I'm pleased to say things are now much better. I put in a refund request for my remaining time with Gandi and look forward to being told "no" thirty days from now.
Do We Have Freaky New Powers?
Sure do.
Since I'm no longer paying sixty of Donald Trump's dollars for each individual email address, I am pleased to say that I can now realistically expand them beyond our traditional "staff only" limit. Therefore, if you have been lamenting that gmail has a growing monopoly on emails, while allowing you no privacy whatsoever, wishing that you could return to a simpler age when smaller sites had their own, that time has arrived.
You can now request an email address @calref.ca if you:
- Have been a Refuge member for more than six months (Discord time is fine)
- Have been reasonably active over that time, and
- Have a forum account
With it, you can log in through the email portal at mail.calref.ca (linked on CalRef.ca), and/or connect your favourite email client, like Thunderbird or Bluemail with the following specifications:
| Service | Server | Port | Security | Authentication |
| IMAP | imap.migadu.com | 993 | TLS | Plain password |
| POP | pop.migadu.com | 995 | TLS | Plain password |
| SMTP | smtp.migadu.com | 465 | TLS | Plain password |
What's Your Level of Oversight? What are the quirks?
A good question and best to know beforehand. I can reset your password if you are locked out. I cannot read your emails. I can see how much space you're using. I can also provide extra help if you are ever being harassed to an extent that your junk mail filter insufficient or will not help. There are no hard storage limits, since we have a collective storage cap that I feel like we're unlikely to hit, but if you're using like ten gigabytes of space, I will probably ask that you trim down a bit, which I cannot do on your behalf.
If you want to save all your old emails, simply put them in a folder. Don't use your trash as a folder because the junk mail and trash are automatically pruned after 30 and 60 days, respectively. Any password change you do or major change that I do will take six minutes to take effect. So if you change your password and immediately try to log in, it will probably not work before that propagation time.
If these things sound agreeable, shoot me a message either here on the forums or on Discord and I will set you up with an account. In the future, I'd like to have an automated system to do this, but for now I'll be doing it by hand.
#20
Refugia / Re: [draft] Bureaucracy Waits ...
Last post by Aav - December 06, 2024, 01:57:55 AMThis is at vote: https://www.nationstates.net/page=rmb/postid=57811468