BigCloset TopShelf
TopShelf TG Fiction in the BigCloset!
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A Previous Comment...
...(by Catherine Linda Michel, on May 30) reported that it had been down for "several days now".
I don't know Sapphire or have any information. In both 2014 and 2016, she put up blog entries here saying that the domain registration had expired and there was a delay after she renewed it. Not sure whether there's any conclusion to be drawn from that.
Eric
sapphire.com is still owned by someone
Get your domain name for $4.95
Sorry sapphire.com is not available
Please search again for another domain name.
I could dig deeper and find who it's registered to and who is paying for the domain name. Not always the same thing.
Oklahoma born and raised cowgirl
sapphire
sapphire.com resolves (this time: it may be part of a server farm) to 69.64.147.244 which in turn resolves to:
OrgName: Rightside Group LTD
OrgId: RGL-63
Address: 10500 NE 8th Street
City: Bellevue
StateProv: WA
PostalCode: 98004
Country: US
RegDate: 2014-10-13
Updated: 2020-04-09
Comment: https://www.donuts.co
Yes, donuts! All the contact addresses also resolve to [email protected] or donuts.email.
I'm wondering if the domain has been squatted.
That would be a heartbreaker
A mis step on renewing one's domain and yes the claim jumpers will pounce to get it. Don't know if every domain register will hold a domain for the original owner but mine did. I missed a renewal. They notified me it had to be left open for thirty days since I didn't renew on time but they wouldn't release it to anyone else. (some law at the time?)
Hope Sapphire didn't lose her domain.
Hugs Penny, nice work
Barb
Oklahoma born and raised cowgirl
Squatting is unlikely
Any squatter will usually immediately put up some content to generate revenue from advertising as long as the old content is still indexed in search engines. Any delay will waste money and this is trivial to automate.
The WHOIS data states record creation in 1994 and last update in 2020, so it seems to still be the original registration. IIRC a new registration after a domain expired (not a transfer of ownership) would result in a new record be created.
So there is still hope (and I dimly remember someone (Piper?) stating that the content will be moved to a new server but that it has low priority - but I can well be mistaken about the domain in question).
donuts.com
Is listed as a high security risk. All the warnings that popped up on my computer makes me think it's a viper's pit. If true and they own Sapphire's Place then they took it over.
Security threat If you visit this site, attackers could try to steal information like your passwords, emails, or credit card details.
Barb
Oklahoma born and raised cowgirl
Ping
I just tried to ping sapphire.com and it timed out no response so the server might be down.
Gumby - I'm flexible
"Imagination is more important, than knowledge" - Albert Einstein
“The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds
new discoveries, is not ‘Eureka!’, but ‘that’s funny…’” - Isaac Asimov
For her benefit?
This is a decision that should be left entirely to her. On the archive site Wayback. her site is archived through late 2019, but it seems shaky. In the few moments it took to write this, the connection was dropped altogether. Maybe she can have more success than I did. If she can somehow manage to connect to an archived link, she can at least retrieve the content, if not the format. But the domain owner may be purging any archives? I've seen authors purge not only their present content but also archived material as well, so it is possible for someone to delete her site past as well as present.
I read my first story way back when on Sapphire's site. Melanie Brown's The Reluctant Girlfriend.
Love, Andrea Lena
What years were you searching?
everything is there except 2019 and 2020 is empty
Starts on 1997 and finishes with a few additions in 2017
after that like I said, empty spots
Registering a domain is almost free. Yes it costs a few dollars but still.
Getting a domain hosted is the expensive part. The more bytes traveling back and forth from the host raises the cost. She might be hanging onto the domain and parked the site for now. Remember the economic shutdown has killed a lot of businesses and yes, people too.
hugs
Barb
Oklahoma born and raised cowgirl
Hosting their own domain
I "had" friends who hosted their own domain on their own computers back during dial up. How that would work now I have no idea. My computer has its tongue hanging out trying to keep up with Photoshop. Thinking it would need to be uploading, downloading megabytes of data every minute boggles the mind and never happen. Wonder if I could borrow a few dedicated servers from Hillary? Provided she didn't burn all of them up.
always
Barb
Oklahoma born and raised cowgirl
A few
in 2018 suddenly disappeared as I was trying to link. The only two in 2019 I clicked started to look like they were vibrating, so after three attempts I gave up.
Love, Andrea Lena
Sapphire's Place is being scrubbed from the wayback machine
The links that were there this morning in 2017 now have a page notifying "privacy data" and nothing else. They are working at the last entry and working backwards. I'm wondering if they are going to scrub the whole site from history?
Oklahoma born and raised cowgirl
Hosting your own domain
As long as you have a static IP address (which most home ISP accounts don't) and you have sufficient bandwidth and your ISP doesn't forbid it in their terms of service you should be able to host your own web site. Whether you would want to is quite another matter.
I've been paying an extra $4 per month for a static IP address for a decade or so because we were thinking of doing this. These days, I think I would pay for a solution on a server farm instead.
Might be wise to take a snapshot
If one wanted to remember Sapphire's Place and it is being taken down. One might want to take a snapshot of the homepage to remember it by. I remember Genderfleck had a very beautiful home page and when they went off the net they were gone. Sad to think all that is left are memories of them.
I pray BCTS never comes to an end but while I'm thinking of it. I'm going to snapshot them too. I'll carry the love of this site to my grave and pray generations who come after find as much of a home here as I have.
Hugs People
Barb
Life is meant to be lived, not worn until it's worn out.
Oklahoma born and raised cowgirl
A couple of things I've learned
No website is forever and authors can pull their works from them at any time. For those reasons any time I like or think I will like a story I download it. I have over 5000 of them downloaded. Some are still around, some are now on Amazon and some have disappeared forever. In any case I have a text file saved.
Commentator
Visit my Caption Blog: Dawn's Girly Site
Visit my Amazon Page: D R Jehs
Downloading my favorite stories
I really need to get into the habit of doing this. There are so many stories on BCTS that I would miss if they disappeared.
Short answer, no
Possible rescue of Sapphire's Place getting underway, probably tomorrow. Give us a week?
Hugs,
Erin
= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.
Contacted Sapphire earlier.
This is a thing and as an FYI it's not a rogue effort. I have been in contact with Sapphire directly (we met after Bob's passing when I went up to help take care of Bob's tech).
-Piper