Renovation 2009, please read!

[xfrozen_lilyx]

Alright, guys. I'd say five is a good number of people wanting to get this started again, so here I open a discussion thread.

Obviously, the site is going to need some cleanup. I'll start taking care of that sometime this week, with any luck, and as soon as E returns I'll rope her into it too. It's going to take a lot of work but if we can manage it, it'll be great to have this up and running again.

SO. Ideas for renewed interest:

Story contest
Banner contest (if there's enough interest)
Poetry contest (if there's enough interest)
New RPG

Get those creative juices running! Anyone have any suggestions for any of the above, or any suggestions of your own? We'll all need to have a hand in this to get this all going again, so come on guys, put on your thinking caps!

Crossing my fingers,
Lily

[Senhin]

lol You know I am definatly always in on new RPGs. I shall try helping by making many new topics in open discussion etc and revive the main popular ones.

[Tocharian]

Not big on RPGs myself, but they seem to be the only thing that really survived the lull, whatever that sam the wookie thing is.

I think a new banner or a new skin should be the first order of buisness, nothing like redecorating to get things moving again, people who only pop in for a sec every three months might take a deeper look around is they see something has changed drastically.

After that I'm up for a new story contest or something, now that everyone is off for the summer they'd have time, plus it would get us back in the habit or writing and critiquing, generate alot of new threads.

Aside from that maybe just some random threads in the general discussion, like Senhins book cover, something besides RPGs that people can stop and comment on. I don't want to rip on the RPGs, because I know they're really popular and have kept the site alive, but I usually just log off when I see they're the only thing anyone has commented on in six weeks, you know.

[Senhin]

Well do one XD But yeah, a new skin etc sounds good.

[Mr. Happy Java Man]

I vote on a new Happy Skin. Something in hot pink I think. Or Chartreuse.

The RPG section could use some cleaning up as well. I think we need to stick to just one or two RPGs at once cause with so many going it gets confusing for those who don't know about it and they might lose interest in that section.

The story contests were interesting. Sometimes they got hard with word limits that were so low that you didn't get much to work with. Higher word limits would work so that more people can do more work.

And I miss playing around with my characters in The Chronicles of the Quill. I shall have to work on it some more soon. I don't even remember who's turn it would be, or where anyone is in the story (should really reread the whole thing)

And to get people to join I think we need to spam our Facebook peeps and see if they'll join as well. Only way to keep this site alive is to have more people so that when the key group leave for reasons out of our control (school) then we'll still have people around to keep the site going.

[ArchAngel]

Kinda glad I checked in after so long. I sort of stopped checking for a few weeks as no one had posted at all....... Although I realise it's also been a month since the last time someone posted as well... so I'm not sure if people are still around and I've missed the big comeback........ hmmmm....

Anyway, if people are still around, I'll help to get things going again. I'm going to have to hunt out some of the old passwords for various sections (ie, Admin and Mod thingies) but once found I can start cleaning up.

I might only be able to get one for a couple of evenings in a week to do stuff, but I guess that is better than nothing at all!!

So, if people are still looking to renovate this site and get it back up and running, let's do it. Even with just 5 people, we should be able to get alot done.

I see frozen_lily has suggested a few ideas/contests, so if people are interested in these we can start setting them up. Additionally, the one thing that seemed to have continued pretty much consistantly when we were active was the COTQ. And I'm more than happy to continue it (once I've refreshed my memory of what has happened..). So if there's interested in that, at least we've started something.

Anwyay, I've noticed theres been one or two posts on stories recently, so I'm going to jump right in now and try to review something. Although I may be a wee little bit rusty at this..

[Senhin]

I'm still here, jus... Couldn' find anything to post to...

[ArchAngel]

Well... the renovation is going well I guess......... lol

[Mister E]

Hey guys!

So you want a reno? Well I have a plan *gasp*

I was looking at the forum and their is almost 5 years worth of dead members, a lot of dead stories, dead topics, dead- well, a lot of dead things. It's almost too much. Overwhelming really. Not to mention the spam! Don't get me started on the spam members.

So what I've done is made a new Quill. Exactly same format as this one, same rules, same just about everything. Just shinier. I've made some miner adjustments due to our size. When we get bigger, then I'll make the adjustments again but for now I think it'll be easier this way. For example right now we have our stories separated into genre which made sense when we had like 20+ stories being posted, I doubt we'll have that many so all the stories now go into the same section. Little things like that. You'll see.

Me and Lily also came to the decision to get rid of the RPG section. It was cool to try but we want to try and focus more on the criticism part of the site. We were good at that, we were one of the best I've seen in a form. I really want to focus on that part of the forum again. This started as a writing board to help writers, I want to go back to those basics.

As for transferring of info, me and Lily are in the process of transferring rules over and any important stuff like that. It is your job to transfer anything you want over, your old stories, ex.

We are also searching for a skin...it's proving difficult. I found one...but it has no buttons and I have no time to design buttons. I've contacted the artist so I'll see what happens with that. But if you want to put in 20min or something and help look for a skin, feel free. (No hot pink Jave. My eyes will bleed.) I go to this site. So take a look around then pm the link to the one you like.

With new skin comes a new banner so I think we'll have a contest (or someone can volunteer) I'll attempt to get my old Pc working but I have my doubts and I don't have photoshop for my mac yet so if someone can make something pretty, that'd be awesome.

I'll be posting the link of the new Quill in the news feed and also in a topic in case old members feel nostalgic.

As for the Chronicle of the quill, this needs to be discussed. Luckily all member (except Silvia Rose) are here. So we have to come to a decision. I see three choices when it comes to the CotQ. 1) take up where we left off 2) recycle. Take the idea's behind the CotQ, characters, plots ex but start a new story 3) scrap it completely.

My personal opinion on this is either 2 or 3. Where the CotQ is now I feel to distant from it, I don't think I could continue to write it. Saying that, I defiantly like some of the charters and with a little more planning it could be a really engaging plot. I also really like the idea of the combined story. Anyway, that's my thoughts, what do you guys think.

Hmm...and I think that's all....

If there's anything you disagree with or want to look at more carefully feel free to say something.

And last but not least, the new link *dramatic music*

The *new* Quill

Ps. Once you all register I'll make you super mods. You've been more the loyal so why not grant some power as a reward eh?

[ArchAngel]

That sounds alot easier .

I'll start up a discussion thread or something on the new site for COTQ, just so we can start posting there. Maybe it's a good idea if we all post in the meet and greet section as well, even though we're not exactly new members, it might help attract other people if they can see that there are active people there?

[Mister E]

Good plan.

Ok, so we'll stop posting here and move on over to the new site, yes? Good. See you there!