A plea for sanity

[Nate the Great]

Since we're about six weeks away from April Fools, I thought I'd make another plea for sanity.

Please restore the site to normal this April 1st. And promise us to never again have an April Fool's Event unless you have every single piece of it written down beforehand (both in rough and html form) and have the time allotted for each day to update the site, as well as time to restore the site to normal.

Furthermore, please try to have at least a 1:1 ratio of real fivers to event fluff updates. "Real fivers" meaning "covering one episode or film, not just skimming over an entire series."

[evay]

Originally Posted by Zeke

Time for another reply roundup. First of all: evay! Always good to see you. Stick around -- if you were pleased about VOY content, wait'll you see the next update.

::bouncy bouncy bouncy:: YAY! I don't follow anime, so it's been a bit of a dry spell waiting for something I'm familiar with to come up.

As far as April Fool's, Zeke, you do whatever makes you happy, and take however long you need. It's your site. There are no deadlines. Although it would make me happy if you did at least someday read the three Classic BSG fivers I sent you, even if you never get around to posting them -- I would love to know if you think they're any good.

Nate, do you have a site of your own? Just curious.

[Nate the Great]

"There are no deadlines"? It's a zarking April Fools' event! Not a theme event, but one tied to a specific holiday which only exists one day of the year.

No, I don't have a website. I maintain userpages at h2g2.com and tvtropes.org, but that's it. One e-mail for personal use, one for professional use. No Twitter, MySpace, or FaceBook.

And by the by, what does it matter whether I have a website of my own? Are you insinuating that I can't understand how much work and time it takes to run a website? In my opinion, that's absolutely irrelevant. The basic laws of sanity and courtesy demand that an April Fools' event last no longer than the first week of April.

[evay]

Originally Posted by Nate the Great

"There are no deadlines"? It's a zarking April Fools' event! Not a theme event, but one tied to a specific holiday which only exists one day of the year.

Or maybe that's the gag, that it's going to last 365 days. Or maybe Zeke feels like switching permanently to anime. That's his prerogative.

And by the by, what does it matter whether I have a website of my own? Are you insinuating that I can't understand how much work and time it takes to run a website?

I'm not insinuating. I'm saying it outright. If you haven't done it, you don't know what it demands, personally, professionally, creatively, and emotionally. I ran two sites for over four years each, both updating twice weekly with several thousand words of unique content and heavy image processing. Yes, it takes a lot out of you, and yes, when you miss a week or an update you feel guilty that you've failed in your obligation to entertain your audience, even if that obligation is purely self-imposed. Having the peanut gallery whine about how bored they are or make demands about future content doesn't make the webmaster feel better about missing an update or screwing up an event.

Bluntly, Nate, every time you bitch that Zeke hasn't provided you with some new marvelous funny detailed researched full-of-in-jokes fiver for your personal amusement, you make it harder on him to produce said fiver. Get off his back. He's under no obligation to change the anime back to the "standard" front page. He's under no obligation to post anything ever again. He's not even under any obligation to keep this site or this forum active, in point of fact.

The basic laws of sanity and courtesy demand that an April Fools' event last no longer than the first week of April.

Sanity? If you've been driven to a therapist because Zeke hasn't gotten around to taking the kittens off the splash page, you have larger problems than a website update can address. As far as courtesy, it's his frakkin website and he can do as he bloody well pleases. He doesn't owe any of us anything.

[Nate the Great]

There is no such thing as an April Fools event that's supposed to last the entire year.

I'm not complaining about the creation or posting of anime fivers, but the front page as it stands is presenting an image that is clearly farcical. Furthermore, it's not as if the new anime fivers are coexisting with the older scifi stuff, the main page has been shunted off to a secondary page. This does not equate with Zeke choosing a new direction.

And "summarize the entire series" fivers do not count as the real thing.

If he had 52 distinct additions to the site (one a week) to stretch over a year, that'd partially explain keeping Five-Minute Anime around. But there haven't been weekly additions, there's just been a big ugly orange page.

And I just noticed the Santa hats on Pikachu and the Dragonball Z guy. It ain't Christmas anymore either, Z!

If Zeke wants to stop, he should STOP. That is, post that the site is done and we should all move on with our lives. Has he done this? No! He acts as though further updates are forthcoming, therefore I am assuming that further updates are forthcoming! What a jerk I am for thinking that!

Am I continually complaining? By my count, since this outrageous fiasco started, I think I have e-mailed Z once on this topic, one PM, and maybe a dozen forum posts. These numbers may be a little off. And remember that this is over almost a YEAR.

[evay]

Originally Posted by Nate the Great

There is no such thing as an April Fools event that's supposed to last the entire year.

Again: says you. Again again: irrelevant. It's his site. He can leave it up the rest of the decade if he feels like it.

I'm not complaining about the creation or posting of anime fivers, but the front page as it stands is presenting an image that is clearly farcical.

so what? the entire site is farcical. It's a humor site. That's the point.

That is, post that the site is done and we should all move on with our lives.

wow, maybe you really do need therapy. Is it that hard for you to enjoy what's posted and not worry about if or when the next update is? Do you honestly have that much invested in someone else's website?

Has he done this? No! He acts as though further updates are forthcoming, therefore I am assuming that further updates are forthcoming! What a jerk I am for thinking that!

And they are. And have been. Just not on your schedule. Which again: he has no obligation to follow.

Am I continually complaining? By my count, since this outrageous fiasco started, I think I have e-mailed Z once on this topic, one PM, and maybe a dozen forum posts.

Which by my count is thirteen complaints too many. Zeke does not owe you fresh fivers, a standard front page, or timely updates. It's his site, his life, and his hobby. He can post whatever he likes whenever he feels like it.

[Zeke]

First: I think I would commit seppuku if the event wasn't done by April 1. Nobody worry about that happening. (And read this LJ post if you haven't yet.)

Second: Thanks for the defense, evay. Much appreciated.

Third: Nate, I get it. I really do. I'm more frustrated with myself than you could ever be with me. (At any given time, in fact. If there's one thing we Catholics can do, it's guilt.) But what you don't get, after all these years, is how much you hurt your own case by acting so entitled. That "plea for sanity" may be the most presumptuous post you've ever made.

No, I'm not going to promise you anything. Not only did I decide years ago to stop making site-related promises (since it just adds guilt if I mess up), but it's not your place to ask me to. And as for full-series fivers, I sure don't consider them some kind of easy way out -- they take just as much effort as regular ones, and I try to make them just as funny. Anyway, do you really think now that I've finally been posting stuff again, you should complain about what stuff I'm posting? Getting back in gear takes time.

I value you as a reader, Nate -- and I resent having to fight you so much, especially "in public". If you have to be hostile, I'd rather you at least kept it in PMs. But when you make a post like this, I have to respond (and you can't expect that response to be acquiescent).

Finally, your timing sucks for a couple of reasons, one personal. So don't keep pressing -- I won't get nicer than this.

[Nate the Great]

You promised to stop making site-related promises, huh? That's news to me.

http://www.fiveminute.net/forums/sho...?t=1529&page=3

(Posted December 9th)

Zeke: TOMORROW.

Ooh, capital letters and everything, and you still couldn't keep the promise. When was the update? December 12th. Yes, two days overdue is extremely nitpicky. But a lie is a lie is a lie, and a promise is a promise is a promise. And nobody was holding a gun to your head to promise "tomorrow."

So all of you are saying that a webmaster can stop working on a site, walk away, and screw what the site looks like, what promises he made, or what the reader thinks. Talk about inconsiderate, monstrous behavior.

And apparently PMs don't work. You still haven't gotten back to me about the OOT 2.0 fiver. Apparently your schedule doesn't even allow for ten seconds to hit Respond, type out "My life is a mess, PM again about this in six months," and hit Send. I'd honor that request, and you know it.

Look, tell me to not complain for a month, and I'll honor the request. Tell me not to complain for a year, I'll mark it on my calendar and you can be sure I'll be honor it. But if you want a permanent solution, I can only think of the following:

1. Restore the site to normal and put up a big "the site is now essentially in archive mode. If you want to be put on a mailing list to be notified when we update, click HERE" sign.
2. Get some more staff. For Zarquon's sake, you used to have a handful of people who could update the site for you. Why didn't you replace Marc, Kira, Nan, etc. when they left?
3. Teach someone other than Derek how to use the reservation system. It was a good way to keep the fiver production process going smoothly.
4. Put someone else in charge of moderating the fiver by committee threads. We should be on our fifth comver by now, no joke.
5. It's clear that the site update procedure needs to be streamlined. Maybe some new software is in order. I'd be happy to chip in, and I'm sure I'm not the only one.
6. Perhaps partnering with another site could increase our traffic. We need more exposure. Have you thought about assigning someone to start a FM.net blog over at That Guy With The Glasses? Every day they could post a preexisting fiver, and attach the site address. Divert some of that traffic our way.