When writing fanfiction, like the current Comics Retcon Universe stuff, it's polite and considerate to acknowledge the current copyright and/or trademark holders, when known. Especially if using artwork or logos.

Just a line near the top or bottom of a story, or on the Title page is enough. And it isn't required here, it's just a nice thing to do for the original owners of the stuff.

I may not be on much today, there's thunderstorms and flashfloods predicted for this area from now till the early morning. We're pretty safe from flashfloods, there are arroyos either side of me to channel the rainwater away but lightning, winds or floods may take out the power. I'll be staying off line, mostly, till this blows over, using my laptop or phone to access the site.

Hugs,
Erin

Bob had to turn off the PDF module because of too many users, apparently. It slows things down and things were backing up. Going to investigate and it may be turned back on.

Hugs,
Erin

Don't bring an attack on a BC author from another site over here and expect to be allowed to rant on my time. And especially don't do it as visitor. This will get your IP address banned from the site and just did, so you ain't the one seeing this unless you login using a different computer. There can't be a clearer signal that one intends to act as a troll.

No trolls allowed except as characters in stories. This meant you, but you don't know it, trollass.

Hugs to everyone else,
Erin

There's a sketch page up on Quillian of Quentin's mom. :)

No story page today, sorry. I went to the con and Daniel took a half week off to earn money.

Hugs,
Joyce (aka Erin)

I'm off to the San Diego Comic-Con International! See you there!

Thanks, everyone!

One person did not believe me that I would take action. They have been banned for forging someone else's name on a post. This is more egregious than simply making snarky comments. I'm debating as to whether the ban is permanent.

I'm very sorry that it came to this.

- Erin

The posts this morning about Stan and the comments on those posts have been moved off of the front page but they were not deleted nor unpubbed. They can be found by anyone who looks for them but I'd prefer that the matter be dropped since it seems to have blown out with a few appropriate apologies.

I'm actually impressed that such a hot topic came up and got openly discussed and no one lost their temper.

Bob has added a new capability to BC. Near the bottom of each story, in the mass of links down there, you should find one labelled, |PDF Version|

This will produce a PDF file saved on your hard drive of most of the stories on BC. Some stories with poor or wrong HTML will not be properly converted, but if you need a PDF version for some reason, this may be handy.

Thanks, Bob.

Hugs,
Erin

Update - Apr 7 4:51 PM PDT - The site is back, in most of it's glory. The problem turned out to be the voting module not being compatible with the latest release of the database software. So, no voting on stories until I figure out a replacement module or they update their code. And no reporting on old votes, either. Sorry.

Most everything else has been turned back on (or will be) except: reporting comments to moderator (flag for administrator) - that module conflicted with the one that makes Random 5olos possible so it had to be taken up into the mountains and sacrificed to an angry god, sorry. Also, the little clock at the top of the right column that showed what time the server thought it was had a problem when the updates to the search index was run, don't ask me how but the clock interfered and until someone writes better code than my own jackleg module (I wrote that one) we'll have to do without the clock. Isaac says hi.

Many thanks to Bob who did the major work on this debug. We should buy him a bag of chocolate or something, he likes chocolate. :)

Hugs,
- Erin

While 80 stories were posted during the last week here on BCTS, another 94 older stories were edited and reposted by the authors or one of our volunteer editors or commented one by some reader. Now in some cases, that was just us opening up the story to file it into one of the new author pages but still, I don't think any other TG fiction site has so much activity going on with older stories. :)

There's a new feature here at BC, at the end of all stories entered as Fiction or Wysiwyg that are rated General or Mature, there are a row of buttons for passing a link to that story on to various social media sites. It's been there since Monday. :)

I don't know if anyone has used it yet but no one has commented on it, so I thought I ought to blog about it to draw some attention.

Tell me what you think.

If you want to post a story Without the Social Media Buttons, rate it Restricted or higher or use the Story input type instead of Fiction.

Hugs,
Erin

See Bob's blog on Stardust: New Sci-Fi/Magic Site?.

Hugs,
Erin

Dick Francis, author of dozens of popular mystery novels has died. He was 89. Most of his stories were set in the world of racing, where he had once been a champion jockey.

I have on the table beside my computer, two Dick Francis novels I found in a used bookstore that I have never read. His latest book, co-cuthored by his son, Felix, (I think it is called Silks), I also have not read. I may have missed a few more, here and there over the years but will doubless find, read and enjoy them as I have all of his work.

Asthma and bronchitis brought on from my usual sinusitis. May have to go to the doctor today or tomorrow. Will try to keep an eye out on site but I'm short of air. Sorry.

Hugs,
Erin

We got about 5 inches of snow last night. My little dog wants to go outside and bark at it. :)

Hugs,
Erin

Somebody talk me into keeping the site up and running.

Joyce

On December 15, 2009, Fictionmania author Tommy Davis died as a result of a heart attack. His name has been added to the Memoriam board here at BigCloset. Let us all spare a moment to think of his friends and family in this holiday season.

Hugs,
Erin