LionsLair: and even if they are in the pond, they cannot play. It will not let them bid in the pond. If the pond is just starting, their bid will be zero. If they became a pawn in the middle of a pond going on, their last bid will be their bid until it causes them to fall in.

Bernice: Well again, if it's that bothersome to you, the simplest solution is to leave the fellowship.

I agree, it's all very childish. It's too bad some people have no clue what is inappropriate and what isn't. Seriously, the places these immature polls have come from, are not even the smallest surprise.

heavenlyemma: This is really pretty off topic, but I don't share my personal life on a game site.(Except with the few people who I consider friends) So, I'm really not even slightly worried about it.

The polls are only advertised on your Main page if you are a member of the fellowship.

Personally, I like seeing the fellowship polls I am eligible to vote in, there. If you don't like the polls that are being generated by a certain fellowship, why be in it? Just leave the fellowship. Very simple.

chenshap: According to that link, it says YOU won.

ScarletRose: You can't, unless you are the big boss or little boss of a fellowship.

Fencer: Maybe it could be broken up like other pages of the same sort. A section for Polls needing your vote, and a section for polls that you voted in? That way it is easy to go back to the page and click on the poll and look at the results.

Or maybe 3 sections. Open polls needing your vote, Open polls you voted in, and Closed Polls.

MissDelish: Welcome to Brainking! I hope you like it here. For future reference, this board : General Chat is better for this sort of message.

ruby2shoes: If you click it, it takes you to Brainking's "Bug Tracker".

Fencer added it to all pages, so that if there is a bug, and you click the "bug" on that page, bug tracker will "take note" of the page where you discovered the bug. (For example if you click it from a game, the URL of that game will be in bug tracker, so that you don't have to remember to specify which game you have spotted a bug in.)

joshi tm: Read this blog entry http://brainking.info/archives/441-A-proposal-of-Jungle-variant.html and you will see what it is about.

It is only in testing mode, and isn't intended to be played yet. That's why it's not completely "public"

rod03801: I just went and had a look. The "User Self Registration" is the part that CAN be confused as the log in area. It isn't. The correct log in area, is just below the area that lists recent "comments". (On the right hand side of the page.) You will see "User Self Registration".. then "Comments", (with a list of.. um.. about 15 recent comments to different blog entries), then "Powered by Serendipity", then "Author Log in"

beach: No, there is obviously something not being done correctly. (Not surprising, as it can be a bit confusing). I just posted a comment on the blog just fine. To reply to a post, scroll further down on the page to the log in. (There is an area that at a quick glance looks like the log in, but it isn't. I recommend scrolling ALL the way down, and gradually scrolling up. You will then see the appropriate log in area.) Once you log in, you will then see the "reply" links. When the blog first came about, I had a hard time, and found I was trying to log in to the wrong area. Give it a try.

Bernice: But regardless of all that, I think the main point is that no one here HAS to give a confirmed address. If everyone knew that anyone outside the EU didn't have to pay the extra, everyone could just say they lived in any country outside the EU.

So, even if it was true that Americans (or whoever) don't have to pay the "VAT" tax, there is no way currently to prove that you are or are not American (or whoever)

Jason: When Gordon Shumway first posted, he explained something about the time out.. I don't remember exactly, but here is a link to the post: BrainKing.com (Gordon Shumway, 2008-01-07 01:55:59)

Yes, the more recent posts are definitely more appropriate on a "chat" discussion board, please.

Rose: If it is not a Brainking problem, what is supposed to be done about it??? (And if it IS a Brainking problem, I'd still like to know why it doesn't affect everyone. other than a little minor slowness at times, the site is working ok for me, and I'm on THIS side of the pond too)

MadMonkey: I noticed something similar with Alquerque and Jarmo boards as well. Every so often the site has been a bit slower, but not very much.

I wish someone knew the answer why it is only a problem for some people. I think knowing that answer would help a lot of people.

It makes sense that it isn't specifically a brainking problem, since not everyone is experiencing the same thing. To me, if it were, everyone would be having the exact same problems. (Or it makes sense to ME anyways.. lol)

I WOULD say that over the last couple of days, it is probably the more graphic intensive pages that have been a bit slower.

Andersp: Blocking someone stops them from sending you private messages, from being able to invite you to a game or fellowship, stops you from being able to see their game messages.

Hiding them on a discussion board keeps you from seeing their posts on that board. The red numbers still show up.

Andersp: This board is not for personal conversations of this sort. Further off topic posts, will be deleted.

Bernice: Then you have someone hidden. Please, this is off topic.

MadMonkey: Well, wouldn't the compromise be manually adding the little boss as a moderator of the board? Nothing is stopping you from doing that.

nodnarbo: LOL, yeah, I can't disagree with you. Now that you mention it, I think it would make more sense too. Never really thought about it before.

nodnarbo: Do you mean the boxes on the main message list, to put a tick mark in, to delete or save or whatever? Because mine have always been over on the right hand side of it.

Jim Dandy: But as has been mentioned, when Fencer ended site holidays, he added 5 vacation days to the standard amount that rooks receive. Seems fair enough to me. We really are given plenty of vacation, in my eyes.

tinksbell: Well, you could send Fencer a private message about it. I think you could either ask him to switch it so that you go through your rook membership first, then have the rest of your Knight kick in at the end of it. OR, he might convert the Knight membership time down to how long it would be if it were a rook membership.

I'm pretty sure he would do one of the two, for you.

rod03801: LOL.. yes there is an echo..

Binabik: click on the time left column.

TexasToest: It's still on your profile page. At the very top. Next to My Profile. After that is Edit, and after that is Change Password

Fencer: Hmm.. I just moved on one. Before the move it said I had negative 2 or 3 days. After the move, it says I have 1 day and 15 hours. So, maybe it won't be much of an issue?

I am curious how this affects Fischer Clock games? Obviously, they have not timed out right now. However, any of them that were my turn when the site went down, now have a negative amount of hours in the "bank". (Though they had PLENTY when the site went down, as I am really good at keeping up with those now that I have DSL!!! ) When the time outs are turned back on, will these instantly time out when they come back to me?

Brainking is back!!!

And unless I'm missing something it doesn't look like any data was lost?

coan.net: Unfair?? People aren't chained to a team once they join it. If they want to go to another one, when there are more, they can easily do it. I think it would be a big pain in the neck to have them all deleted, to be started over. And needless. (And possibly difficult to re-get those people, especially since there wouldn't be any record of who already (willingly) joined.)

So, I hope that DOESN'T happen! You may as well say "Stop it! Don't be doing this now!" When there really is no good reason to do that.

If anything, it should be an option, and not just taken away. I, personally, like the red numbers there.

The only images not working for me right now, are the graphs. Fencer, you are probably aware of this, but I thought it couldn't hurt to mention, just in case you aren't.

joshi tm: It appears timeouts are already suspended. I have a ton of opponents with negative time left

Hrqls: I believe the site was just inaccessible for a couple minutes. I got booted for a minute or 2.

LOL, and one more thing, I personally found that Rich text Editor slowed things down a bit too.

Oh, and to repeat, going to Javascript and de-activating smilies there DID NOT help.(That was the first thing I tried) I had to do it the way I described.

tonyh: Above the text boxes. (Next to "Change message area size")

Click it and it takes you to a Settings page. Scroll down. Near the bottom you will need to put a check mark in "Activate User Smilies"

I only have about 10 smilies now that load each time a text box shows up. (You know? When you click on the "Smiley" above the text box, the ones that show up that you can just click on to have them appear in the text box)

I have DSL. When the newer batches of smilies were added a couple months ago, any page with a text box started taking 15-20 seconds to load! (As opposed to 2-3 seconds for most other Brainking pages)

After I emptied it, I added back in my most frequently used smilies. The ones that I found that slowed things down most significantly were the tip-toeing smiley, and the newer blue smiley that bounces back and forth. (I didn't go much further than that in my experimentation)

Rose: If your main problems are on discussion board pages, or pages where it is time to submit your move, (Basically any page where the text box shows up), I highly reccomend going to "Change Smileys" and emptying them out. I found that the more recent smiley additions must have "huge" smileys. (I'm talking about when the batch including the smiley was added). After I emptied it out completely, all pages where the text box shows up loaded at their normal speed of 3 to 4 seconds! I then gradually started adding smilies, and sort of found out which ones were slowing things down.

Shutting off smilies in Settings was NOT enough.

I was so frustrated for weeks. MOST brainking pages were loading in 2-4 seconds, EXCEPT any page that included the text box. Those were taking 15-20 seconds! (And I have DSL)

It's worth a try anyways! It worked for me! (I now only have about 10 smilies in my "change smiley" area.)

Vikings: Too late.. I already packed up that old box.. lol... It wasn't on the log in page I had, though. (Though, on webtv I have the friends page saved as a favorite.. so that's where I was entering through.) I doubt it would have been anywhere. Some things you can't switch with WebTV, don't even show up as choices.

Bubbles Pbarb2: I dunno, Barb... I am on my old webtv right now and I don't have the castle. But I also don't have the choices to switch styles, here or on my Settings page.

I switched to computer just in time! I don't know how ya deal with the new look on the TV screen. It's SO squished. Everything looks so much better on the computer screen. And I forgot how S L O W this is.. LOL..

Sorry, Barb. You might want to PM Fencer and see if he made some change. My only suggestion right now is to Power off completely and come back and see what happens.

Like I said, on webtv, I'm NOT seeing the castle theme right now. But that could be affected too, by how I have my settings. (Which I can't change all of them right now because with WebTV some settings don't show up since you can't use them)

Time to go back over to the computer! Sorry, I wasn't much help.

Vikings: It may not show up on WebTV like that. Give me a few minutes to finish my coffee Barb, and I will hook up my old webtv and see.

Did someone slay the dragon? I haven't seen him flying across my log in screen today.

tippyc: There's a couple ways. Go to your profile, and click the "Stairs" link near the top of the page. Or, go to the Stairs link on the Main menu, and click "Show my stairs only"

basplund: That must be the case. I just bought some Brains yesterday, and have not received them yet, either. I was hoping it was "instant" like memberships, because there was a Brain tournament that I wanted to enter. But it's too late now.

Family Man: Easy enough to download IE by going to their website.

Family Man: Renew your membership?

LOL

Well, your other choice would be to use AdBLock Plus, if you use Firefox.

MadMonkey: I had many problems this morning before work (around 6:30AM Eastern US) but I visited the site a few times through the day during breaks at work and had no problems, and haven't had any problems all evening.