Is chiptalk dead? (2 Viewers)

[Cougar300]

I wonder if chip talk died this week. Or at least they lost all their data - all the threads and the galleries. I see linked pictures that were hosted on chip talk show up as broken,

For a few days the entire site was missing. Now there is a "no data" placeholder. It does remember my member name though.

Does anyone have information they can share?

DrStrange

Funny, I was a member there long ago and went there last week. Got in but saw most threads were very old...so I came here instead.

 

[ovo]

can't get to the site today

 

[hdgeno]

I didn’t realize people still went to that site. I’ve looked in from time to time but there are never really any new posts

 

[Guma]

That was where I got my collection of poker chips way back in the day. I just recently unpacked some boxes and reminded me of the forum. Went looking for it yesterday and it wasn't working, and that's when I came across this site. Remembering some good times from CT!

 

[HaRDHouSeiNC]

What's sad for me, given that I was not a chipper when it was active, is that there are some stunning photos that may get lost.

Yup, my old gallery pics are gone
Id have bought it for like $100

 

[HaRDHouSeiNC]

Unsure if whose lifetime was ever specified.
View attachment 277557

Yah, I paid him for Lifetime.
I want a refund
LOL

 

[HaRDHouSeiNC]

So Im a LONG time oldschool member of CT I guess you could say.
I feel bad for Greg in alot of ways.
The guy just got raked over the coals

Take it as you like but I really feel for the guy
I miss that place
all my pics and gallery posts are gone too
Its where I got started, on CHIPCO Mardi Gras Queens none the less.
Then moved up, and burned money like it was a pile of newspaper on the street>
LOFL





letter to ChipTalk veterans
Inbox
x

11/18/14




to bcc: me

Gang,

I am sending this private letter to many of the ChipTalk veterans that have been most vocal and active over the last few weeks. I want to ask for your help and support by opening a discussion with you and hope to give you some understanding about what's going on right now. I will not get all of you in this email, but I tried to get many of the most active recent posters. This is going to be long... I hope you find the time to read it all and absorb what I want to tell you. You are important to me, and even more important to the 19,000 chiptalk members that will continue to need your expertise for years to come.

I am BCC'ing you so that we keep emails private, but I invite you to reply for more discussion between the two of us, and I also invite you to call me on the phone if you like. We can get a lot more discussed more quickly if you call. (if you call and don't get an answer, leave a message! I am very busy at the real job and cannot answer every call)

I am also going to post an 'open letter' in the forum that has far less detail than this letter, but will include some of the salient things I am about to say to you.


Deeper explanation of Greg's inattentiveness to your needs

I know you have been upset with me for a while because I have been absent and unattentive to improving ChipTalk as a site over the last year or so. I want to tell you why that is. It's not something that I can disclose publicly and I hope you understand once I tell you.

My children (Kira, Valentin, and Jules, now 10, 9, and 5 years old) were abducted. They are currently held in a foreign country where the Hague Treaty is not accepted. Conventional law enforcement procedures are not effective and a great deal of effort on mine (and Danielle's) part to get them back home are not effective. We continue to do everything we can to get them safely home. Public discussion of our recovery efforts can hamper the them, so I do not speak of it online. I ask that you please do not either.

I hope how you understand how such a tragedy would take front seat someone's life. While my other responsibilities (including my actual 'job' job) get less attention because of it, I continue to strive to not let it affect everything too negatively. I have moved ChipTalk back to the front of priority list and am enlisting help from many members, tech support staff, consultants, and other public forums. I ask that you please help support us.


What happened these last few weeks?

The last week of October turned out to be a sever impact to you and all other member s of ChipTalk. I was sidelined by a tragedy in my family. On October 11th my father was given another patients meds in addition to his own which put him into a severe situation. I wont go into more details, but for the next few weeks I was at his bedside up until the day he passed. That ordeal, plus the tasks necessary afterwards kept me offline from my job and ChipTalk until early November.

Unfortunately as you all know, there were technical difficulties at ChipTalk at this same time. The site's data storage area filled up resulting in database corruption that caused a lot of anomalies for the whole site. Since losing our dear friend Mike DiBacco (X-FIles) to his own serious illness, the technical firm I hired for managed web hosting was supposed to catch and fix this type of issue. They dropped the ball and did not catch it. Yes I was emailed by some of the other Admins and Mods of CT, but I was not reading email during my father's ordeal.

JM, while being the backbone of ChipTalk's administration, was unaware of the seriousness of what was keeping me away. He understandably was taken aback when my only response to him was a forwarded email from me showing that the managed hosting service was now looking into why we had database issues.

I am not looking for sympathy: I am only telling you that there are unfortunate circumstances that led to the 'last straw' this month that led to an exodus you and other veteran ChipTalk members to a rival site. It's not an excuse... it's only a reason. I felt I had to tell you because the common rumour going around is that I don't care about ChipTalk, it's members, and it's sponsors. The truth is that I dropped the ball while helping my father and the rest of my family.

Are the Sponsors taken care of?

In a word: Yes. Once I was aware of the complaints I immediately rectified the situation, and contacted every sponsor. Anyone that had a feature that was affected was OVERLY compensated with extra advertising. Responses (and phone conversations) have by far been very supportive. Here are some recent quotes just so that you know how they are feeling towards ChipTalk (used with their permission).

"Greg been there since almost the beginning- got emails to leave to sponsor another site- never entered my mind. shit happens in life and family vs chiptalk is a no brainer"
"I love ChipTalk. I won't go away. I will continue to post and utilize the forum as I have been."
"ChipTalk is an invaluable resource for chip enthusiasts and industry insiders. I look forward to the improvements on the site. And like I said I will continue to be loyal to ChipTalk."
"I definitely want to keep the banner at CT ... I definitely want to retain the spot on CT ... I definitely want to still be on the forum."
"I've went ahead and prepaid for another year with CT! Our plan is to increase engagement a little more on the forum"
"Aint going nowhere and will do everything I can to strengthen the already strong bonds we have ... No worries"

What are the plans for improvements?

Explaining my reasons for inactivity is one thing... but what about where we go from here? Well first of all I want to ensure you that immediately things are already better. I'm not reporting every fix and improvement to you, but a lot of work is going on in the background (not just by me but by supportive members, managed hosting staff, and consultants) to fix issues and make things better. Major technical issues are fixed, but the site's growth and traffic is going to necessitate another major shift.

We've once again outgrown our software and hardware. While it is a major disruption to change either one, we decided in 2013 that it was going to have to happen. Even more so now in 2013, as the site is growing more unresponsive to major site functions. We've paid to have more storage added immediately, today we added more memory to the server. For Black Friday weekend we are having a burstable amount of CPU and Memory added.

In 2013 we began laying the groundwork to move to a new platform. This will take a lot of planning and effort, and we already have a small team together with eagerness to take on the challenge. We have not yet decided what platform to choose. Whatever it is, we will need your help choosing between one thing or another because all site features can translate over. (Do you really hate the blue color? We'll vote on it!)

In addition, we are talking to sponsors about exciting ideas for engagement with you and all the members of ChipTalk. We all want to see you excited about ChipTalk again, and we are going to find fun ways to get old members active, active members excited, and to get new members to the site.

As for forum administration, I want to thank abby99 for moving into JM's role as a backup admin for me (TenPercenter). I have implored JM to remain an active member of ChipTalk because the entire chip community needs him as an expert and fellow enthusiast. No one can replace JM, and we should all continue to express our appreciation for his dedication to the our hobby and to ChipTalk.

For more technical assistance, I will continue to drive the host to improve the monitoring and alerting of major issues and performance degradations. In addition, I have had two members reach out with offers to be technical administrators. One is eager to work with us on the major site upgrades, and I hope to form a relationship that will ensure that there is someone in place that can at least come close to X-files' and my passion for ChipTalk's well being.

We are also open to discussion about policy changes that may be wanted and needed. It's clear that some members are not happy with the extra perks that site Supporters receive. Let's talk about it! There's no reason why the free tier cannot have some pressure relieved for extremely important things to them (more PM's? avatars?). While we should continue to reward those that choose to support the site financially, we can figure out ways to give more to those that choose not to. All members are welcome and appreciated, and we want an open dialog to figure out how to make all members as happy as we can.


Can I ask for your help?

ChipTalk is important to the chip community. I hope that you will not let the recent mishaps sour you on it forever. As a group we have spent the last decade building the pinnacle of the custom and home game chip expert community and I hope you'll join the ChipTalk support team in helping it not only remain the pinnacle, but build on top of it and drive the next million helpful posts.

There are a few members (and non members) that have felt that ChipTalk became a lost cause. A rival site owner is emailing all the ChipTalk sponsors asking them to leave ChipTalk and become his customers. Some members orchestrated a campaign to email and PM ChipTalk members to abandon the site and come to the rival site. Uninformed and sometimes false things are said privately to members, and worse... publicly on both forums.

We all know how online forums can be. Rumours start and hard to reign back. Passions flare and messages get lost in the flame wars. As a veteran of ChipTalk and of the Chip community, I hope that you'll forgive me as a person, and help dispel falsehoods as they come up. ChipTalk is not gone, not going anywhere, and will only get better from here. This site was created by me, a person...and the people who make up the CT community. It is not a nameless faceless company. And as we all know, sometimes life happens to real people. Everyone has their ups and downs. I made mistakes and I am sorry. ChipTalk should not be destroyed as a result of my actions or inactions. I ask for your forgiveness and and ask that you give me a chance to work hard to make things right for you.

I would never ask you not to frequent another site, even one that is actively striving for the demise of ChipTalk. You have the right hang out anywhere you like. I hope you will come back to ChipTalk and start posting again. In the meantime, I hope you'll consider a few things, if not for me then for the thousands of people that will continue to come to ChipTalk for advice and the company of fellow chip enthusiasts.

Please post at ChipTalk again, not just read posts. The site stats show no decrease in pageviews and threadviews, but has certainly shown a decrease in posting. Please consider being active again. I don't feel it's necessary to choose a single site to post on.

Please do not encourage the migration of ideas and functions built at ChipTalk to a rival site. People worked very hard to make ChipTalk a unique place.

We have a strong sponsorship, we have improved technical administration, and we have not 'gone down' and we are not going away. We have plans for improvements and exciting new things. You are a valued member. For the sake of the Chiptalk community, please give it a chance.


Regards,


Greg K Cagle

-- REDACTED


- http://www.ChipTalk.net

Quote Reply

 

[hdgeno]

So Im a LONG time oldschool member of CT I guess you could say.
I feel bad for Greg in alot of ways.
The guy just got raked over the coals

Take it as you like but I really feel for the guy
I miss that place
all my pics and gallery posts are gone too
Its where I got started, on CHIPCO Mardi Gras Queens none the less.
Then moved up, and burned money like it was a pile of newspaper on the street>
LOFL





letter to ChipTalk veterans
Inbox
x

11/18/14




to bcc: me

Gang,

I am sending this private letter to many of the ChipTalk veterans that have been most vocal and active over the last few weeks. I want to ask for your help and support by opening a discussion with you and hope to give you some understanding about what's going on right now. I will not get all of you in this email, but I tried to get many of the most active recent posters. This is going to be long... I hope you find the time to read it all and absorb what I want to tell you. You are important to me, and even more important to the 19,000 chiptalk members that will continue to need your expertise for years to come.

I am BCC'ing you so that we keep emails private, but I invite you to reply for more discussion between the two of us, and I also invite you to call me on the phone if you like. We can get a lot more discussed more quickly if you call. (if you call and don't get an answer, leave a message! I am very busy at the real job and cannot answer every call)

I am also going to post an 'open letter' in the forum that has far less detail than this letter, but will include some of the salient things I am about to say to you.


Deeper explanation of Greg's inattentiveness to your needs

I know you have been upset with me for a while because I have been absent and unattentive to improving ChipTalk as a site over the last year or so. I want to tell you why that is. It's not something that I can disclose publicly and I hope you understand once I tell you.

My children (Kira, Valentin, and Jules, now 10, 9, and 5 years old) were abducted. They are currently held in a foreign country where the Hague Treaty is not accepted. Conventional law enforcement procedures are not effective and a great deal of effort on mine (and Danielle's) part to get them back home are not effective. We continue to do everything we can to get them safely home. Public discussion of our recovery efforts can hamper the them, so I do not speak of it online. I ask that you please do not either.

I hope how you understand how such a tragedy would take front seat someone's life. While my other responsibilities (including my actual 'job' job) get less attention because of it, I continue to strive to not let it affect everything too negatively. I have moved ChipTalk back to the front of priority list and am enlisting help from many members, tech support staff, consultants, and other public forums. I ask that you please help support us.


What happened these last few weeks?

The last week of October turned out to be a sever impact to you and all other member s of ChipTalk. I was sidelined by a tragedy in my family. On October 11th my father was given another patients meds in addition to his own which put him into a severe situation. I wont go into more details, but for the next few weeks I was at his bedside up until the day he passed. That ordeal, plus the tasks necessary afterwards kept me offline from my job and ChipTalk until early November.

Unfortunately as you all know, there were technical difficulties at ChipTalk at this same time. The site's data storage area filled up resulting in database corruption that caused a lot of anomalies for the whole site. Since losing our dear friend Mike DiBacco (X-FIles) to his own serious illness, the technical firm I hired for managed web hosting was supposed to catch and fix this type of issue. They dropped the ball and did not catch it. Yes I was emailed by some of the other Admins and Mods of CT, but I was not reading email during my father's ordeal.

JM, while being the backbone of ChipTalk's administration, was unaware of the seriousness of what was keeping me away. He understandably was taken aback when my only response to him was a forwarded email from me showing that the managed hosting service was now looking into why we had database issues.

I am not looking for sympathy: I am only telling you that there are unfortunate circumstances that led to the 'last straw' this month that led to an exodus you and other veteran ChipTalk members to a rival site. It's not an excuse... it's only a reason. I felt I had to tell you because the common rumour going around is that I don't care about ChipTalk, it's members, and it's sponsors. The truth is that I dropped the ball while helping my father and the rest of my family.

Are the Sponsors taken care of?

In a word: Yes. Once I was aware of the complaints I immediately rectified the situation, and contacted every sponsor. Anyone that had a feature that was affected was OVERLY compensated with extra advertising. Responses (and phone conversations) have by far been very supportive. Here are some recent quotes just so that you know how they are feeling towards ChipTalk (used with their permission).

"Greg been there since almost the beginning- got emails to leave to sponsor another site- never entered my mind. shit happens in life and family vs chiptalk is a no brainer"
"I love ChipTalk. I won't go away. I will continue to post and utilize the forum as I have been."
"ChipTalk is an invaluable resource for chip enthusiasts and industry insiders. I look forward to the improvements on the site. And like I said I will continue to be loyal to ChipTalk."
"I definitely want to keep the banner at CT ... I definitely want to retain the spot on CT ... I definitely want to still be on the forum."
"I've went ahead and prepaid for another year with CT! Our plan is to increase engagement a little more on the forum"
"Aint going nowhere and will do everything I can to strengthen the already strong bonds we have ... No worries"

What are the plans for improvements?

Explaining my reasons for inactivity is one thing... but what about where we go from here? Well first of all I want to ensure you that immediately things are already better. I'm not reporting every fix and improvement to you, but a lot of work is going on in the background (not just by me but by supportive members, managed hosting staff, and consultants) to fix issues and make things better. Major technical issues are fixed, but the site's growth and traffic is going to necessitate another major shift.

We've once again outgrown our software and hardware. While it is a major disruption to change either one, we decided in 2013 that it was going to have to happen. Even more so now in 2013, as the site is growing more unresponsive to major site functions. We've paid to have more storage added immediately, today we added more memory to the server. For Black Friday weekend we are having a burstable amount of CPU and Memory added.

In 2013 we began laying the groundwork to move to a new platform. This will take a lot of planning and effort, and we already have a small team together with eagerness to take on the challenge. We have not yet decided what platform to choose. Whatever it is, we will need your help choosing between one thing or another because all site features can translate over. (Do you really hate the blue color? We'll vote on it!)

In addition, we are talking to sponsors about exciting ideas for engagement with you and all the members of ChipTalk. We all want to see you excited about ChipTalk again, and we are going to find fun ways to get old members active, active members excited, and to get new members to the site.

As for forum administration, I want to thank abby99 for moving into JM's role as a backup admin for me (TenPercenter). I have implored JM to remain an active member of ChipTalk because the entire chip community needs him as an expert and fellow enthusiast. No one can replace JM, and we should all continue to express our appreciation for his dedication to the our hobby and to ChipTalk.

For more technical assistance, I will continue to drive the host to improve the monitoring and alerting of major issues and performance degradations. In addition, I have had two members reach out with offers to be technical administrators. One is eager to work with us on the major site upgrades, and I hope to form a relationship that will ensure that there is someone in place that can at least come close to X-files' and my passion for ChipTalk's well being.

We are also open to discussion about policy changes that may be wanted and needed. It's clear that some members are not happy with the extra perks that site Supporters receive. Let's talk about it! There's no reason why the free tier cannot have some pressure relieved for extremely important things to them (more PM's? avatars?). While we should continue to reward those that choose to support the site financially, we can figure out ways to give more to those that choose not to. All members are welcome and appreciated, and we want an open dialog to figure out how to make all members as happy as we can.


Can I ask for your help?

ChipTalk is important to the chip community. I hope that you will not let the recent mishaps sour you on it forever. As a group we have spent the last decade building the pinnacle of the custom and home game chip expert community and I hope you'll join the ChipTalk support team in helping it not only remain the pinnacle, but build on top of it and drive the next million helpful posts.

There are a few members (and non members) that have felt that ChipTalk became a lost cause. A rival site owner is emailing all the ChipTalk sponsors asking them to leave ChipTalk and become his customers. Some members orchestrated a campaign to email and PM ChipTalk members to abandon the site and come to the rival site. Uninformed and sometimes false things are said privately to members, and worse... publicly on both forums.

We all know how online forums can be. Rumours start and hard to reign back. Passions flare and messages get lost in the flame wars. As a veteran of ChipTalk and of the Chip community, I hope that you'll forgive me as a person, and help dispel falsehoods as they come up. ChipTalk is not gone, not going anywhere, and will only get better from here. This site was created by me, a person...and the people who make up the CT community. It is not a nameless faceless company. And as we all know, sometimes life happens to real people. Everyone has their ups and downs. I made mistakes and I am sorry. ChipTalk should not be destroyed as a result of my actions or inactions. I ask for your forgiveness and and ask that you give me a chance to work hard to make things right for you.

I would never ask you not to frequent another site, even one that is actively striving for the demise of ChipTalk. You have the right hang out anywhere you like. I hope you will come back to ChipTalk and start posting again. In the meantime, I hope you'll consider a few things, if not for me then for the thousands of people that will continue to come to ChipTalk for advice and the company of fellow chip enthusiasts.

Please post at ChipTalk again, not just read posts. The site stats show no decrease in pageviews and threadviews, but has certainly shown a decrease in posting. Please consider being active again. I don't feel it's necessary to choose a single site to post on.

Please do not encourage the migration of ideas and functions built at ChipTalk to a rival site. People worked very hard to make ChipTalk a unique place.

We have a strong sponsorship, we have improved technical administration, and we have not 'gone down' and we are not going away. We have plans for improvements and exciting new things. You are a valued member. For the sake of the Chiptalk community, please give it a chance.


Regards,


Greg K Cagle

-- REDACTED


- http://www.ChipTalk.net

Quote Reply

I don’t think you should have posted that in a public forum. Greg asked us then not to, and I don’t feel it’s any more right to do it now.

 

[FDLmold]

The abduction was public knowledge, because I knew and was never any sort of insider. I never got that message.

 

[HaRDHouSeiNC]

6 years ago......
I never got an update but hope he got his kids back
Also I signed up for a LIFETIME membership.
Im watching for something, Ima check back in 2 years and see
if it opens up.

 

[MrWitti]

I think everyone felt bad for him when these news/rumors spread. What people couldn’t understand is that he didn‘t show any willingness to hand over the site to us members or the people/mods who tried to steer this thing through difficult waters.

 

[MrWitti]

Lots if us started there, the CT tabletopper is still laying around here and we all miss the good old times. But I‘m also thankful that someone had the guts to start something new

 

[toynoob]

Just curious was Tommy ever a member of CT?

 

[MrWitti]

if my memory is not off. Yes.

 

[justsomedude]

Bummer... there were a lot of good historical links/info/stories/etc. over there. Sucks that it's all gone.

 

[timinater]

Holy shit, what ever happened with his kids? That's awful!

 

[rimmerryan]

Holy shit, what ever happened with his kids? That's awful!

To my knowledge... and it has been a couple of years since I have seen him or spoken to him...
They are still gone and out of the country.
Been hoping and praying that some day they will find their way back here to find him and he will be able to restore his relationship with them. The whole thing was a mess and truly messed up story!

 

[Anthony Ferguson]

Take it as you like but I really feel for the guy

When I first read Greg's email, the combination of events set out are so improbable that I thought it must be BS. If true, it's difficult not to feel for him.

 

[nitzilla]

Every time this thread comes up, I think of that email he sent...(I still have it in my old email account too...) oh well, it's a dead horse issue at this point....

 

[Geremie]

That definitely is messed up.

If I was in that position, any hobbies would be abandoned...just crazy to imagine...

 

[1A25R]

Mother abduction or Cartel-like abduction ?

 

[Mojo1312]

Mother abduction or Cartel-like abduction ?

Mother iirc.

 

[BarrieJ3]

Holy shit, what ever happened with his kids? That's awful!

Yeah uh, if my kids get taken in any way, you can pretty much write me off from responding, following through on months old commitments to group buys or whatever, and any meetups I had scheduled.

Hopefully I’d pop in to say sorry and give someone access to my chips to sell some off to people who were interested or could use em, but yeah, I’d be peace’d out for a bit.

 

[rimmerryan]

When I first read Greg's email, the combination of events set out are so improbable that I thought it must be BS. If true, it's difficult not to feel for him.

Not BS... I can attest to what he went through was laid out in that message. And then some!

Mother abduction or Cartel-like abduction ?

Mother iirc.

Mother... and she went somewhere that was so far off-the-grid that it literally was impossible to get them back.

 

[toynoob]

Yeah uh, if my kids get taken in any way, you can pretty much write me off from responding, following through on months old commitments to group buys or whatever, and any meetups I had scheduled.

Hopefully I’d pop in to say sorry and give someone access to my chips to sell some off to people who were interested or could use em, but yeah, I’d be peace’d out for a bit.

Ya kids gone... poker chips back seat for sure. My question I can't shake is why not hand over the site to veteran chippers? Instead you hold onto a piece of paper that's burning until it burns out, or you could hand it over and someone else drops it in water and keeps it alive. Just blows my mind...

 

[toynoob]

Not BS... I can attest to what he went through was laid out in that message. And then some!




Mother... and she went somewhere that was so far off-the-grid that it literally was impossible to get them back.

This eases my mind some... At least it's not the cartel using the kids as sex slaves.. it still is impossible to imagine how hard this would be....

 

[1A25R]

on the old days, there was easy to use an "internet vacuum". You give an URL and the tool download all the files that you configure (i.e. Pictures)
The tool goes thru every page and "clicks" every link and retrieve the content.

Next time that CT is up think about-it. Let it run all night and you'll get almost a full copy of the web site.

 

[TheBigTater]

This is really not the place and is horribly unfair to discuss Ten's (Greg's) personal issues openly in a public forum. I would hope the mod's would consider killing some of this content. Even though most of this was well known to most of the CT membership, posting personal/private convo's is never a good thing (even if many years have past).

 

[Mojo1312]

Yeah uh, if my kids get taken in any way, you can pretty much write me off from responding, following through on months old commitments to group buys or whatever, and any meetups I had scheduled.

Hopefully I’d pop in to say sorry and give someone access to my chips to sell some off to people who were interested or could use em, but yeah, I’d be peace’d out for a bit.

There were a number of long standing issues that lifetime members had with the site. There is more to the backstory then what is written in Greg's e-mail.

This is really not the place and is horribly unfair to discuss Ten's (Greg's) personal issues openly in a public forum. I would hope the mod's would consider killing some of this content. Even though most of this was well known to most of the CT membership, posting personal/private convo's is never a good thing (even if many years have past).

I agree. No good is being served by rehashing the past here.

 

[CdnBeerLover]

Just curious was Tommy ever a member of CT?

Yes. I first heard of PCF via his posts there.