So what happened?? - Printable Version

So what happened?? - Printable Version

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So what happened?? - admin - 04-21-2022

Seems like that's the question that everyone has been asking here lately -- "What the heck happened to the old forums? Why did everything disappear on us?"

I've been a little busy setting up the new forums and migrating the wiki over for us, bot now that those things are more or less complete, I wanted to take time to do into details and try and explain what's happened over the last week or so, so everyone can understand how we got to be where we currently are.

Things first started to change back in QB64 World back sometime in January. Fellippe suddenly made an announcement to the community that someone new was popping up in the community and taking over as CEO for the project. An unexpected move -- why the heck did a hobbyist language need a CEO to manage things, anyway?? -- but one which ultimately changed almost nothing at the time. RC Cola was introduced to the project, he barely spoke to anyone or got involved with anything, and life moved on with him just more or less existing in the background.

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Time flows, as time will, and suddenly we find ourselves at around a week ago. Fellippe suddenly decides to just pack up and walk away from the project. He goes from being a member of the forums to just becoming a "guest". The Inform channels in the Discord are closed. He makes no real announcement about anything, and just walks. People who reach out to him via personal messages and such, get told that he's "Left the project for good and won't be back, for his mental health." Fellippe did a lot of different things, and he put up with a lot, and it seemed like he'd more or less hit his breaking point and just said waltzed off into the sunset like any good Old Western hero would.

This left RC Cola as suddenly holding the reigns to the project. At that point, much like at the point where we're at now, people became a little nervous about the state of the project. RC Cola was asked, "What's the future of QB64? What do you think QB64 is??" His response to anything like that was more elusive than a politician two days before election day -- "I'm not going to get into that. I'm not going to say..."

He's not going to answer any questions about the plans for the project? Not even going to try and say what he thinks the project is about??

And then, someone brought up the rules of conduct which we were all operating under -- and if you guys are like me, you didn't have a single clue about them!!

post image

Now, if you guys notice there's a line in there right above the page break that REALLY bothered me. "Any media uploaded to QB64 sites, are the property of the QB64 Project."

For me, that meant that if I kept working on my little QB64 Bible, and sharing it for the members of the forums to make use, comment, and help point out things that might need editing, that once it was finished, I wouldn't be able to sell a hard copy of it anywhere!! After all, the QB64 Team would OWN my work!! If I did publish it, they could sue me for stealing THEIR property!!

And *this* glaring problem was brought up to RC Cola. His response was just as lackluster as when asked about his plans for QB64. His response was, "It's better for us to have too much control over stuff posted, than not having enough."

He didn't think that type of rule was over the top at all!!

So, at this point, people *really* started to complain and act up in the Discord channel. You could almost taste the displeasure in the air, the feeling was so palpable. Folks were getting quite upset at everything that was going down and was being said.

Rather than try and diffuse the situation, RC Cola decided to drop the mighty Hammer of Justice on people. Folks were getting silenced for almost nothing in the Discord channel. People were being banned from Discord. At this point, one could almost take bets on who was going to be the next person to get kicked from the Discord channels.

It was at this point that RC decided he was basically the one true ruler of QB64 World:

It was also around this same time when I found myself in RC Cola's crosshairs.

Quote:RCcola1987 — 04/15/2022

@SMcNeill you have done a lot for the project and this is the only reason i didnt just ban you right now. Neo Nazi content is not allowed ANYWAEAR on this discords nor is it allowed on discord as a whole. I fyou remove the posts and stop this i will not ban. most of my family died fighting againt Hitler in ww2 and i will not stand for that. most things i will let slide in teh off topic but this is just astounding and not expected from someone like you.

He... didn't?? Did he?? Just called me a Neo-Nazi supporter and threatened to ban me?? Needless to say, I wasn't very happy... And the conversation we had after that made me even less happy.

Quote:

RC... You know what... I've tried being a nice guy and ignore all the crap that's been going on, but I just can't do it anymore. At no point have I shared any neo-nazi content, nor do I stand for anything Nazi related. I'm certain I can hop in the car and head to the cemetery and point to just as many graves from my family who fought against the war, as you ever could. From our last genealogical study (my father was an amateur genealogist), we can count 106 members who died in WWI and WWI from both my mother's and father's side. All I posted was links to a lyrics.com collection of SONG LYRICS... in a topic which was tagged "off-topic" and flagged NSFW. There's nothing objectionable about what I posted, but what [b]IS[/b] objectionable is you thinking you're some sort of second rate dictator for the project just because Fellippe left.\

[7:56 PM]
Here, let me play dictator for a while: [b]I was the [i]only[/i] person who Galleon ever officially welcomed into the QB64 Team, before he stepped down.[/b] My code contributions to the project go all the way to version 0.5 or so, and were in the code well before Fellippe or anyone else branched off Galleon's github account and started pushing their own version of QB64. At no point have I ever given up on my intellectual property rights for the code which I added into the project. Galleon had NO license on QB64 back in the day, and the code anyone committed to the project always retained the property of the coder. Fellippe and them may have pushed to add a MIT license to [i]their[/i] github and QB64 project, but I never gave up the rights to my intellectual property.
So here's my little asshole dictator demand: Take ALL my work out of the repo. I no longer feel that the project as it exists supports the spirit of BASIC with which I wrote my code and inserted itself into the project, and I refuse to give any rights to keep my code active and inside the source any longer. Failure to remove all my contributions from the language will result in my pursuing legal recourses against copyright infringement.

If the man is going to be an asshole and kick me from what I've always considered to be part of my home, then to hell with him! If I'm not welcome, then I don't feel like any of my code should be welcomed either. I'll damn leave, start over somewhere else, and he can do whatever the shit he wants without anything from me being involved with whatever his project was becoming. It certainly wasn't the QB64 project which I'd grown up and loved working with a being a part of the community with, for all these many years!!

His response??

Yep! I get kicked from the QB64 Team, and silenced from the Discord.

Which leads me to getting irked and going to bed not long after that... Needless to say, I said more than a few BLEEPING BLEEPS before I drifted off to sleep that night..

When I woke up, I logged into Discord completely uncertain what the heck to do next, and I find this little gem in my personal message box:

Yep! Apparently things had continued on during the night while I was sleeping, and in the end, our other developer -- flukiluke -- had decided that he'd had enough of all the drama. He'd transferred the Discord which he'd owned over to me, and then walked away. Honestly, it was kind of fitting in a way: The last post that was ever posted over at QB64.rip was luke's Goodbye post.

RC Cola, is apparently a very spiteful man. Once he realized that he could no longer control the Discord, since Luke had passed ownership of the channel over to me, he....

...simply went nuts, is about the only way I know to describe things.

First he kicks out all the editors of the wiki -- even people who don't even have Discord accounts, and who weren't caught up in the internal bruhaha at all!

Then the next thing you know, the forums are down. The wiki is completely down. Youtube videos are gone. The password for the Twitter account is changed. Everything is taken down and destroyed, with the exception of one thing in particular: QB64 Team is creating QB64 at QB64.org | Patreon

Yep!! That's right! He kept the Patreon up so he could keep collecting money from all the people donating to the QB64 team!

After all, that's all that RC Cola was after, when all is said and done. He wanted money. Money! $$$$$$!!

According to him, the team only pulled in $400 a year or so, and they were going to have to raise Patreon teirs soon to start bringing in more money!!

And yet, even though I'm not the best person in the world with math, I can click on the link above and go to the QB64 Patreon site even now -- even after all that's happened, he's never taken the Patreon down!! There's *still* 24 subscribers, at the moment of this writing, and each is donating $2 per month. That's about $50 per month total, and in 12 months, that's over $600 which people are donating into the project. (Not counting individual, one-time donations, which people give, nor is it counting the sales which the QB64 team has with whatever merchandise they offered like the coffee cups.)

To give an illustration of costs, here's what it cost for me to set up the forums and the wiki here, and to register the domain name which I've chosen:

Less than $100 for a year, and the server here has "unlimited bandwidth" and "unlimited storage".

And yet, he needed to pilfer more money from the user base here, so he could keep things running??

RC Cola might not be able to say what he thinks QB64 is, but I'll happily tell you guys what I think it is:

QB64 is a community of like minded individuals who enjoy writing and coding in BASIC. Many of us grew up using the language in our youth, and most of us are stubborn, nostalgic "old skoolers". We know the rest of the world has moved on and embraced other various languages and coding styles over the years, but we like where we're at! QB64 -- and BASIC, in general -- is a community that is our home. We've got roots here. We've lived here. We've laughed here. More than once, several of us have butted heads and fought here.

BUT... At the end of the day, QB64 is the spirit of companionship which we all hold with each other!! Our forums are secondary. Discord is a baby come lately. The majority of folks around here either have memories of IRC, or else they wish they did!

RC Cola might get rid of a few videos. We might lose a few posts. The forums might go down. The wiki might end up losing a few months of updates...

At the end of the day, WHO GIVES A SHIT?!!

We're still here. We're still a community. If one home burns down, we'll simply form another. We're family...

...and that's what RC Cola couldn't understand. He simply couldn't look past the $$$ to truly understand who we are, or what we stand for. The moment he started relentlessly kicking people and destroying the community, was the moment when he truly lost control of QB64.

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And, with all of that said and done, let me finish up by saying:

WELCOME HOME, ONE AND ALL!!!

RE: So what happened?? - admin - 04-21-2022

Oh.... And let me take a moment to explain a little better about the "Nazi incident"...

The Discord Chat had a forum for it which was rated NSFW (so only people 18+ should be in it), and it was called "OFF TOPIC". Inside this off-topic, adult forum, I posted a link to some music lyrics. Just to prove what type of Nazi loving ass I am, I'm going to post it here again for everyone to see and gasp at in horror!

https://www.lyrics.com/artist/Reinhold-Heil/85662

Apparently, there's either been enough visits to the site since this all started, or else someone complained over to lyrics.com, but originally the artist here was just listed as "Heil". I posted links to "Heil", so that -- of course -- makes me a Neo-Nazi!!

Heil is the guy's name!! He's a Hollywood artist who works in movies.

Quote:Reinhold Heil (born 1954) is a German-born film and television composer based in Los Angeles. He is known for his frequent collaborations with Australian composer Johnny Klimek and director Tom Tykwer on films such as Run Lola Run and Cloud Atlas.

He's no more a Nazi than Mickey Mouse!!

Here's one of his songs, for goodness sake:

Quote:Never, Never, Never, Never Letting Go
Never giving up, Never saying No
Just Go, Go, I never stop
I never think
To do, do, do the right thing

I want to go
I want to fight
I want to rush
I want to run
I want to see you again

Under the setting sun
We will kiss
We will laugh
We will be a part
Of what is said to be
A union of the heart

Love is just the only strain
That makes me live through all my pain
I don't know if your love is true
But I can't think of anything but you

We will kiss
We will laugh
We will be a part
Of what is said to be
A union of the heart

Never, Never, Never, Never, letting go
Never giving up, Never saying no
Just go, go, I never stop
I never think
To do, do, do, the right thing

I want to go
I want to fight
I want to rush
I want to run
I want to see you again
Under the setting sun
We will kiss
We will laugh
We will be a part
Of what is said to be
A union of the heart

Love is just the only strain
That makes me live through all my pain
I don't know if your love is true
But I can't think of anything but you

Never, Never, Never, Never letting go
Never giving up, Never saying no
Just go, go, I never stop
I never think
To do, do, do the right thing

Never never never never never...

And THAT is all it takes to be called a Nazi, nowadays?? By a guy who calls himself a dictator??

Needless to say, I was just a weeeee bit annoyed by the whole thing.

RE: So what happened?? - Dimster - 04-21-2022

Thank for this Steve. Know the reason Why this has happened helps a lot to move on.

Nothing really get resolved, nor lessons learned, if the matter turns personal. Cola made it personal and any one of us would have rose to defend ourselves. He was obviously mistaken and lost the opportunity to maintain a good relationship (and learn something he didn't know) because he couldn't address the matter without placing it on such a personal level. Rule #1 in fair fighting is avoid "You" statements.

RE: So what happened?? - Pete - 04-21-2022

There's a great saying, "Hell isn't a place, it's people." So what I'm seeing here is a lot of unnecessary drama over a $400 a year lemonade stand. From what I gather, Fell became the linchpin, who, as Steve stated, was the hero who walked off into the sunset, but who left the project without a developer when Luke followed the sun in his footsteps. So the project went to someone who apparently doesn't have the skill or temperament to keep it going as it was, and elected not to involve the community to take it off his hands.

Visions of grandeur often meet this fate. In fact, this reminds me of a guy who bought the domain QBasic dot com, but who wouldn't sell it, because he thought is was worth tens of thousands of dollars! That didn't turn out well. I'd bet today he'd be happy with 10 bucks and a six pack of Bud Light. Anyway, maybe this is a similar situation with a behind the scenes type, who needs to find developers, forum managers, etc. to feel comfortable resuming the project, and who thinks it will become something more than a language for hobbyists. Who knows.

So now we find ourselves here. I love the freer feel it has, don't you? I'm sure soon the INDEX page will get designed and up, so qb64phonex.com can be indexed by search engines. Right now, we are in a Google sandbox, while a few bots have a look at us to see what we are building here. So the more QB64 related content the bots see, the sooner we will be noticed and ranked. Why is that important? Well, if you feel you're glad you found this language, and a forum community that supports it, I can assure you there are new coders searching for the same experience, and I really want them to find there way here, to QB64 so this great little hobby language of ours has a nice long future. As my old friend Mac used to say, "QBasic Forever." He passed away in 2008, but in QB64, his dream is living on.

So in conclusion, we have a language that is still supported after 31 years. The QBasic Forum has been around for most of that time, but we are now on our 4th QB64 forum with a lot of info lost on the last two. Maybe we can think ahead a bit, this time around, and change that Karma. Fingers crossed.

Pete

RE: So what happened?? - SierraKen - 04-21-2022

Thank you Steve for all that you have done and for posting this on the forum. This is another door wide-open for BASIC programmers. What I did to find this place yesterday was post on Twitter, then someone told me about the Patreon.com post with the links to archive.org and the Wiki and forum files there. So I went there but I wouldn't know anything about setting all that up on my computer. They also mentioned Discord, so I went there and became a member of Discord and found QB64 on there. Then I saw you Steve and sent you a message and here I am! This sorta reminds me of when I found the newsgroup comp.lang.basic.misc in 1995. Smile

RE: So what happened?? - admin - 04-21-2022

We also followed the links on archive.org, in the hopes of being able to restore the old forums. Unfortunately, its not just as simple as "download and import". The main problem is, we have tons of InnoDB files but no way to use them because we lack the FRM files... Apparently, there *may* be a way around this limitation -- that is if it's not beyond *our* limitations to sort things out. At the moment, I don't recommend holding your breath while waiting on us to get the old forums back up. We're trying, but ...

I guess only time will tell how all that pans out.

RE: So what happened?? - Wiggums - 04-22-2022

Glad to see the old gang is back!

RE: So what happened?? - James D Jarvis - 04-22-2022

Thank you for the information and the work to pull things together and make them available to people who want to enjoy QB on modern systems. I just got back into programming with QB64 after years away and was dismayed when the site got nuked, glad to see it in the hands of people willing to support it as they can.

RE: So what happened?? - PhilOfPerth - 04-23-2022

I'm just one of the "hangers-on" at QB64 - I don't write hieroglyphical code or anything - but it has become my go-to when I'm trying to write a bit of code that refuses to do what I want!
And that's what happened this week. So I went looking for the Forum, and all I could find was dozens of dead links to QB64.org. I spent literally hours searching, then gave up, as I thought
all that was left was the downloaded QB64 that I was using. But this arvo (sorry, I'm an Aussie) I jagged a thing called qb64phoenix. And here I am! And here it is! And here (I hope)it stays!
Well done to the guys who didn't give up!
As Martin Luther King said, "I'll be back!

RE: So what happened?? - fred - 04-23-2022

I am amazed how unprofessional Robert Ryan Carter is (alias "RC Cola 1987"). He has no integrity or respect for others' hard work. Who in their right mind would join a thriving online community only to destroy that community? I suspect his brain is haddled due to all those electric shocks he received when he was younger. Then again, he could be a product of bad parenting, his mother, allowing him to be electrocuted. Or perhaps I have just generated a load of bull shite. The one thing I do know, he is the master of bull shit. The following attatchment (S03E06_part.mp3) is an extract directly from the bulls'arshole.

The full version is found here:
https://open.spotify.com/episode/7qmtTQamdBxLVUjSGcdgep

My point, that interview generated red flags and alarm bells.