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Twilight Sparkle ✨

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Everything posted by Twilight Sparkle ✨

  1. Hey @Dreamstar Moonlight - this is an incredibly good, detailed post that comes at a fantastic time for the G5 hype ramping up. Thank you for making the effort to put all this information together! Could I please ask that you repost it as a new thread on the G5 forum and @mention me please? You should be able to do this by copy-pasting the contents of this blog post into a new forum thread, and I'll pin it as soon as I see it. I want to bring visibility to this by making it into a pinned thread there and by featuring it on our homepage - it'll have a lot more staying power than a blog entry that way since that forum is our hub for all things G5, so everyone who comes to MLPF looking for G5 information is likely to see it. I expect you'll see a lot more responses and discussion in that format and I'd love to signal-boost future posts like this one over there too since it has so much discussion value. *squee* P.S.: GIFs should work. I'm gonna poke around on our end and see if I can find any clues for why uploading them might not have worked. I'm happy to help you get them added to the post to make it complete since it appears that was your intent.
  2. Big pipes indeed, yes - measured in terabits. Earth will have bigger problems than MLP Forums being spotty if someone manages to knock our host offline... Thanks for sharing your experience with Cloudflare. It's nice to hear a success story about it! Out of curiosity, has all your experience with Cloudflare been on their paid plans? They advertised layer 7 protection as a "Business and up" (>$200 USD/mo) feature last time I looked into this, and the free tier's main option for mitigating such attacks meant placing the site behind irritating interstitial pages with sometimes-barely-working captchas. I hope it would work fairly smoothly, and transparently to a customer site's users, when one pays good money for it. *** On motivations for DDoS attacks - some general commentary (not specific to this attack): Usually people DDoS a site for lolz. Little more than personal amusement from the power rush that comes with sending a shadowy anon some Monero and feeling like they get to play god by then pointing a botnet at any site they'd like to disrupt. Less commonly, they're in it for profit and try to extort a ransom out of a website "in return" for "allowing" it to be online. And sometimes, they're in it as haters trying to enact some sort of "cleansing" agenda, where the intent may be to damage the reputation of their target and drive users away from it, often by making users get frustrated with trying to use the site and making them resent its staff for being apathetic or incompetent.* *Note: While I dislike drawing attention to attacks and attackers on principle, and we usually don't, the community has a certain right-to-know when one causes visible disruptions so we can rightfully direct our collective ire toward the malicious actors and even band together to defend our corner of the ponynet. So that y'all know it's not a matter of MLPF "dying," staff giving up on it, or anything along those lines. We as a staff team aren't always great at communicating this since the sysadmins are usually more preoccupied with fighting problems than announcing them. But it never hurts to tell us or ask questions when something's not working right! The "worst" that'll happen is that your "X is broken for me" report will receive an explanation once the proverbial fire's been put out. Regardless, DDoS attacks are fundamentally antisocial, they're jail-worthy crimes, and they're inevitable in this day and age when one does anything of note on the internet. In fact, they're almost a testament to a site's notability - that someone thinks a site is a big enough deal that it's worth spending money and risking a criminal record to try and, if not totally take a site down, annoy its users and staff. Receiving one is like a compliment that your site matters.
  3. Nope; not even close. MLP Forums has been DDoS-attacked so many times over the years that we long ago stopped keeping count. Due to the defences we have in place, the vast majority of such attacks come and go with no impact other than the attackers' wallets lightening up and those of the criminals who run their botnets becoming a little heavier.
  4. I appreciate your intent of looking out for your fellow MLPF users. Without commenting on any particular account, including the one you're referring to, I want to say that the connection issue you experienced was almost certainly the result of the DDoS attack itself and not anything specific to any one account. Coincidental random fluke. Unless you happened to try accessing several profiles repeatedly and consistently observed the connection drop on just one - I really, really want to hear about it if that's what you observed.
  5. We don't use Cloudflare's "protection" for several reasons but, above all, because it has historically caused us more downtime than it ever prevented - it's been tried a few times here over the years. I know their marketing is slick and many other sites use them but I've found their free product creates a false sense of security, makes promises it can't keep, and generally creates more problems than it solves. Almost like security theatre. Our "real IPs" are public but this doesn't worry us because our datacenter is effective at stopping the kinds of attacks that knowledge of a site's "real IP" normally enables. Attack traffic that gets through that, Cloudflare is ineffective against as well - at least on their free tier (I can't comment on their paid tiers as we never had the budget to try them) - so our sysops team would be actively working, as @tinker explained, to mitigate such attacks either way.
  6. Thanks for sharing your perspective. Conversations are the lifeblood of forum communities and, while blogs and statuses are "just" other ways to have conversations, it's good intel to have that as a user, they kinda disappear from your world. This isn't great when you're looking for more conversations to participate in! It is also not-great if you're the one writing up a blog entry in particular and hope to expose it to as many interested people as possible. I'm still happy to hear other perspectives on this too like @WWolf's and anyone else's. If you ask me, there exists opportunity to revisit how we treat these "status-y/blog-y" topics as forum communities are ostensibly about encouraging good conversations and it sounds like the current approach might actually be discouraging them.
  7. Can you please share more about this? I know MLP Forums didn't always have blogs and I'm curious what your experience with this encouragement of moving certain topics into them has been like from your perspective. In particular, I wonder if it ever feels like it stifles your or others' efforts at conversation at all.
  8. The ponies that founded MLP Forums were veterans in the community management game and found many of the behaviours you described to be problematic in nurturing and maintaining an inviting, pleasant community. Human Pony attention span is finite so even if users don't "give in" to the psychological temptation to increment that counter next to their posts, it'll still constantly pull attention away from it and make one notice it a little. I'd rather that attention be directed toward the contents of the thread and personalities of its participants. It's no coincidence as well that post counters are not incremented by "spammy threads" and that they have a dedicated place to live in in the form of the Forum Lounge area. I second @Jeric on the species ranks being here to stay. They add a lot to the site's theme and are designed to function more like milestone or seniority markers than as quick dopamine hits, and so they serve more as recognition of ongoing activity than as a direct incentive to get addicted to spammy posting. Correct! That's unintended and will be "fixed". Thanks for the heads-up! Enjoy it while it lasts.
  9. Derp; I just encountered said thread - I found this blog post first. Sounds like you already thought of this and I'm preaching to the choir. Share it forth! Bring it all here. May our Glorious Solar Goddess watch benevolently over us all.
  10. Welcome back, Harmonic! It's as heartwarming to see old users returning as it is to have newponies joining MLPF for the first time. You had excellent taste in Celestia art that I look forward to being graced by again. 7 years is a really long time, wow - you, I, and this site are all so.... old now! Long enough for people to change and for bygones to be bygones, I say; I'm glad to see you getting a chance to enjoy MLP Forums again as I know this place meant a lot to you and you have a lot of good to offer it. Although you aren't exactly "new," may I suggest starting a Welcoming Plaza thread? I'm sure you'll find - and be recognized by - a number of "the ancients" but I believe your situation more than justifies a fresh self-intro should you want one. Consider it a way to mingle with our newer users and form a new "first impression" just the way you'd like it as the pony you are today, free of the past's baggage.
  11. The "rank badge" under your avatar (that starts at Blank Flank, then progresses through Muffin > Cupcake > etc.) is meant as a fun replacement for in-thread post counters that rewards you with a progression of new badges as you make more posts over time but without emphasizing the specific number as an important piece of information for all the world to know while reading your content. The FAQ page that contains the list is sadly broken at the moment (there's lots to still fix up that broke during the upgrade) but here's a partial screenshot of the list from the admin panel: These badges fulfil the "fun" aspects of post counts but differ spirit by reinforcing MLPF's pony theme (everyone starts as a Blank Flank, just like newborn foals!) and feel more like long-term rewards for ongoing contributions to the community; watching a generic number count up with every post, in comparison, is more like the short-term dopamine jolts from getting a like on a Facebook post. Yes yes, I know we have a brohoof/reactions system but there are no "rewards" for it beyond the software's "won the day" thing and a somewhat hidden "leaderboard"). Being motivated to earn the next badge is more fun and creates a friendlier community atmosphere in my opinion than being motivated to increment a counter over and over again. Most forums show post counters because that's what most forum software does out of the box but I've observed it subtly breeding elitism over time on many sites, creating a sense of classism between longtime users and new ones. This has torn apart more forums I've been on in the past than I can count; de-emphasizing the counters helps make the site more welcoming to newer as well as less active users by not constantly intimidating them with higher numbers than their own that we humans reflexively compare and generate feelings about - and making MLPF fun for new users is just as important as keeping it fun for everyone who's already here. Please give the new look without these counters a chance and pay attention to your feelings about posts and their authors as you read various threads and write your posts. The difference is psychological and might be pretty subtle but I expect you'll feel a friendlier vibe to the site after an adjustment period.
  12. This is an interesting datapoint! It contradicts various posts I found on PayPal's own forums that state you can't use PayPal without providing a phone number. I'd appreciate if you could answer some or all of the following questions in the hope of generating communal wisdom: When did you sign up for PayPal? Which country is your PayPal account based in? Do you recall PayPal ever asking you for a phone number (or demanding it) during signup, verification, login, payments, or at any other point? If yes, how did you bypass the request?
  13. @Treeglow Flicker I'm one of the ponies who does "money things" around here and I sympathize with your disdain for cellphones. I was unaware until your post that PayPal required a mobile number and would love to have a detailed conversation with you to explore alternatives to it. I'm not the greatest fan of PayPal myself but we use it due to popular demand and because it's "easy" (it issues payments "to" email addresses and tends to cost less than wire transfers). I agree that in principle, a bank account should suffice for handling one's financial affairs and that it's silly to require a phone number (a mobile one at that!) as a precondition for getting paid. I don't want that to be a requirement for doing business on MLP Forums even if we're not the party asking for the number. What a weird world we live in. To determine our options, I'll need to learn more about your personal banking situation (most importantly, the country your bank is in) so I'll continue this conversation in a PM thread with you and Pathfinder. I can't promise we'll be successful in finding a good PayPal alternative but I want to try. Feel free to skip the rest of this post; I wrote up my initial thoughts on "huh, how else other than PayPal could we pay artists?" in case you (or anyone else who encounters this thread) are curious but it's merely idle musings. BTW: If you're not Treeglow Flicker but you're reading this as an artist, and don't want to or can't use PayPal to get paid, please reply to this thread, too! It's helpful to know how much interest exists in having alternatives. ------- Here are some thoughts we can dig into - and for anyone else who may come across this thread and wonder what's possible: Poniverse maintains bank accounts in Canada and the USA. USD is our "primary" currency but we're capable of handling CAD as well. Wire transfers are the usual way of transferring money internationally between different banking systems but tend to be too expensive for smallish payments. PayPal works by performing "local" bank transfers through their own bank accounts in every jurisdiction they operate in. They make this convenient for registered users but are not the only service that does such things, and won't let you receive money to a bank account without registering. The cheapest way for Poniverse to issue a bank payment to someone is via mailed cheque in US Dollars to a US address. This is because our American bank has an online feature that lets us dispatch a number of cheques to US addresses every month free of charge. If you're comfortable accepting a USD-denominated cheque and have a US address to receive it at, this is likely the easiest non-PayPal method. Some other other pay-to-bank-account options off the top of my head: CAD payment to Canadian bank account via Interac Estimated cost: $2-5 CAD in fees per payment USD wire transfer to any bank account Estimated cost: ~$30 USD in fees per payment - probably a ripoff for our purposes. CAD wire transfer to any bank account Estimated cost: Looks like $15-135 CAD - probably an even bigger ripoff than USD wire transfer. Hoofwritten USD or CAD check, mailed internationally. Estimated cost: $1-5 USD (cost of preparing a physical check + postage) USD or CAD money order, mailed internationally Estimated cost: $1-5 USD (cost of preparing a money order + postage) Some other potential options in this space: Payoneer looks like a PayPal competitor also appears to offer ability to send payments directly to bank accounts unsure of what fees would look like but I heard that it can be cheaper than PayPal Stripe Connect a service designed for companies to pay users (like Lyft paying its drivers). sends money to the user's bank account. unsure of what fees would look like Payment to non-US/non-Canadian bank account through a foreign exchange service like TransferWise, OFX, CurrencyFair, etc. Poniverse uses one internally but I haven't looked into what paying a different party with one of these would look like. ACH payment to US or Canadian bank account unsure if this is possible at all for us; this is the mechanism by which PayPal, Stripe, and other services interact with US and CA bank accounts Cryptocurrencies low fees! potentially high "fun factor" (YMMV) may have taxation rules requiring special attention depending on your jurisdiction Western Union best known as a method by which low-income workers working abroad send money to their home countries has extensive international footprint
  14. MLP Forums was a FiM-exclusive community at launch by design due to the founders' vision of a gathering space that was predominantly focused on the G4 TV show and fan labor surrounding it, to the exclusion of virtually everything else (gaming, politics, other shows, movies, "general discussion" were all underemphasized discussion areas here as well). Though other FiM- and MLP-themed forums existed at the time, a laser focus on the G4 TV show itself was surprisingly rare in the world of pony forums at the time. A 'previous generations' section wasn't "missed"; it was deliberately omitted as MLPF was not specifically intended to attract their fans (fans of G4 who also happened to be fans of previous generations fell into this target audience, of course). Having a clear, specific focus area is extremely important for small fledgling communities as, for users to stick around, they need a critical mass of other users and content that are interesting to them. If you're only gonna have 200 users in your first month, it's easier to achieve this when they're all interested in celebrating the FiM TV show than when 50 of them are into FiM, 50 are into fan art but not the FiM show, 50 like the previous gens but don't care for G4, and 50 don't care about ponies at all but wanna talk politics and video games with people who wear pony avatars. Threads about previous generations that were relevant to G4 in some way (ex. comparing G4 art style to prior gens, tracing the history of the MLP franchise, comparing similarities and differences across generations, etc.) had a home in Sugarcube Corner or Show Discussion before 2016 and arguably still do. As MLPF stepped on its hooves and secured a robust identity as a FiM fan forum, it had enough strength in that core competency to begin "allowing" other lines of discussion.
  15. Title: The Last Problem US Air Date: October 12th, 2019 Written by: Josh Haber Synopsis: Years from now, Princess Twilight is visited by a student with a friendship problem. As she attempts to solve it, she looks back on the times she and the Mane Six spent together. ----------- This is it. The end of the line. The end of season nine. The end of Friendship is Magic (at least the moving-picture part of it - the comics have a few issues left yet; please don't riot, IDW fans). Show's over, fandom's dead, nothing to see here anymore. Everycreature, shoo and go home already; the apocalypse has come and gone. What are you still waiting for? ... Wait, right. Episode 24+25's title was a lie. THIS is the End of the End of the End...... of the End? Join our adorkable purple equine for the last time as she shows us the grand outcome of Former Sun God Celestia's decade-long personal training program to weaponize friendship in defending Equestria and infecting the entire world with her harmony propaganda. There's just one teeeeny tiiiiny wrinkle: Equestria's last friendship problem went unsolved. Watch the glorious Twilight Sparkle find out she missed something in taking over the world commemorate a lifelong tour-de-force of unforgettable memories to fix it. Will she finally fail at something? Will we get one last round of Twilighting? Did she even survive the battle from E24+25? ----------- If you're looking for something fun and special to do to pay your respects to Friendship is Magic, try writing a friendship lesson letter to Princess Twilight Sparkle about what her adventures have shown you, what you learned, and how the show affected your life. She'll be pleased to read all about it now that her own world's problems are all over. You can adapt the following template to get started! Dear Princess Twilight Sparkle, Thank you for <something - or many somethings - positive you took away from the show>. Before I discovered that Friendship is Magic, <a peek into your life before ponies>. Now that it's over, <what changed in your life since your journey as a ponyfan began>. Your faithful student, ~<NAME> Maybe she'll even compile another Friendship Journal if she gets enough of them. One final, personal note: All good things come to an end. Don't be sad that the show is over. Be happy that you were along for the ride!
  16. I can neither confirm nor deny that. I can only confirm that alicorns have many unusual and powerful abilities. ;P
  17. > implying Poniverse is a professional operation I'm a student, too. I only said that I was a professional developer myself; this organization is a scrappy volunteer effort. Please do get in touch if you see something at some point and think "sweet Luna, even I can do this better!"
  18. reCAPTCHA has historically been awful in practice and, as a professional developer, I wouldn't recommend it to anyone. Because it's so widely touted as the solution to spambots, it's also by far the most heavily targeted by spammers. In particular, it does nothing to stop business-savvy spammers who employ kids in Bangladesh for $0.10/hour to click pictures of traffic signs. There's also the philosophical issue of Google using reCAPTCHA to extract untold hours of labour from the unknowing masses, which gives them an incentive to not go too far in thwarting this particular kind of spammer. The list of issues goes on... Any custom captcha that is specific to a given site is better than reCAPTCHA or other third-party captchas. They'll confuse human spammers who barely understand English and no bots will exist that understand them. MLPF had this in the form of a Q&A captcha that asked (easy) trivia questions from FiM's first season between its launch in 2011 and the introduction of Poniverse logins in 2013. It worked, and unexpectedly even hampered an attempted raid from a car forum at one point by trolls who didn't know anything about ponies. For reasons I'm not going to delve into, having a similar captcha on Poniverse.net never made it to the top of the priority pile until recently, and we're short-staffed on developers the task can be given to. Yes, this is a low-key call for help.
  19. There first needs to be an active staff developer to give such tasks to. It would be an understatement to say that there's been turnover since I started MLPF in high school in that regard which hamstrung MLPF's or Poniverse.net's abilities to get technical updates at all. Are you volunteering to help? We could use it.
  20. I donate to Poniverse every month (you should, too, if you like this place!). This is my favourite nonprofit. I used to give to the local riding associations of political parties I supported as well, but recently cut down on those. I've given a reasonable amount of money to BC Children's Hospital and charity:water in the past as well, largely through MLPF's annual Christmastime fundraisers.
  21. Nope. We only did that for forum posts.
  22. That's not quite right. The reasoning for attachments in PM's being a subscriber feature is mainly because PM's are hidden away from the public. We're happier to foot the bill (read: spend subscriber money subsidizing a feature for everypony) for attachments in public content because great public content helps attract new users to the site. This property does not hold for personal conversations, so getting a subscription pays for the resources your attachments there will use.
  23. I'm so very happy to see the progress on this. Your persistence and attention to detail with this will soon pay off, DDR! One thing I wanted to comment on was the following: Some versions of MySQL set the innodb_file_per_table setting in my.cnf to false by default. If this is set to false, then all InnoDB tables will write their data into a single "ibdata" file in your MySQL data directory which will forever grow and never shrink. MySQL tries to reclaim space from "deleted" tables but it's not perfect. If this setting is disabled, and you previously imported a database and deleted it, it's possible that you lost some disk space to that pesky ibdata file.
  24. Thanks for making a fun movie banner. :) 

  25. I went to a Wednesday screening at a VIP theatre (an adults-only theatre with a bar/lounge and restaurant-style service). This particular screening was organized by Cineplex, BronyCAN, and Entertainment One for the local pony community and sold out. It kinda turned into a meetup, too, with lots of people showing up early and hanging out in the lounge afterward. It was a ton of fun but also admittedly a very unusual screening.
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