News

Email Problems

I've recently realized that, due to a change in the email system, quite a number of emails sent to Area 52 have gone unread and therefore unanswered for several months.

My sincere apologies for this. If you have emailed and still need a response please send your query again.

Firefox and long stories

There is a known bug in newer versions of Firefox.

Symptom: Part way down a long story the page turns black.

Solution 1: Use a different browser.

Solution 2: The text is actually there although you can't see it. Press CTRL+A, CTRL+C and paste the story into a text editor or, for example, Word and read it there.

Spammers strike again!

After a period of calm, another spam storm hit today.

Unfortunately, because the spammers use different email and IP addresses, it is very difficult to detect it automatically.

The feedback form has been temporarily disabled again.

Spammers using the Feedback form

For a considerable period of time we have had spammers using the feedback form to send their nonsense to authors. This has been small scale of up to maybe 20 messages usually coming from the same IP address which has immediately been banned from the site.

This morning over a period of several hours spammers/hackers have sent a considerable numbers of nonsense emails to authors. There seems to be no easy way to stop this as they are using different IP addresses and email addresses.

Therefore the feedback form has been disabled.

Hopefully this will be temporary while we put measures in place to prevent this happening again.

Support Area 52

Hello,

Rauhnee here. I'm the one who pays for the server that hosts Area 52.

I've been unemployed for over a year and a half now, and I could really use some help covering the server costs until I get a job. It's not that expensive, $40/month, so a few dollars a month would go a long way to offsetting the cost.

The paypal for server support is mckensey@mckensey.com

It has been a truly amazing 11 years so far, and heartening to see the baby I started in 1998 for a handful of stories grow into what it is today, and the thriving fandom it serves so well.

Thanks.

Rauhnee Ranshanka

11,000 Stories!

The 11,000th story was archived today.

For those of you who like numbers here are some more:

8812 are SG1 stories
2095 are Atlantis stories
102 are crossovers

1592 are F/F
8564 are M/M
853 are a combination

We have 931 authors and on average 15 new stories are added to the archive each week. Sadly this is a slow down on previous rates.

Happy Birthday to us

Today is the 10th anniversary of the opening of this site.

Guestbook

Spammers continue to visit and attempt to post their cr*p

I've resorted to CAPTCHA - where you have to enter the words you see in an image to prove that you're a human.

Hopefully this won't cause genuine posters any problems but if it does please let me know.

Guestbook

Despite our best efforts, spammers are still coming here to post their nonsense on the guestbook.

And when I say nonsense, that's exactly what most of it looks like to me. Links to other websites are not allowed so it's just a series of phrases that make no sense.

What these people get out of it is beyond me. And don't they notice that as soon as we see it, it's gone?

The net result of all this is that from now on the guestbook will be moderated. Genuine entries will appear as soon as possible. And the junk will disappear into the virtual void :)

Full Authors List

The loss of the full authors list has caused a lot of consternation amongst readers. The reason it has disappeared is that it's huge - over 400kb. (As a comparison, when a story has to be split into parts we make them less than 300kb each)

Here is a list of suggestions I posted on the guestbook:

If you're looking for a particular author begin typing the name at the bottom of the box on the right and it will show the list of matching names to choose from.
If you're just browsing for authors that haven't updated recently, do it alphabetically by choosing a letter in the 'beginning with' box on the right.
There is a list of author names here, but it is just the names - no info.

New Look

Area 52 goes live with redesigned pages!

A cleaner, fresher look with easier to use navigation and options, and less reliance on javascript.

Let us know what you think! The guestbook has re-opened for comments or email us.

10,000 Stories!

The 10,000th story was archived today.

For those of you who like numbers here are some more:

8052 are SG1 stories
1857 are Atlantis stories
94 are crossovers

1401 are F/F
7824 are M/M
778 are a combination

We have 911 authors and on average 25 new stories are added to the archive each week.

Geonn Cannon, author of almost 200 Stargate SG-1/Atlantis stories on Area 52, has made the leap to the world of published authors! His first novel, On the Air, is available now from Amazon.com or StarCrossed Productions!

New Search Page
The search page has been updated to allow more selections - including all pairing options.

900th Author Added

The 9000th story archived.

New Feature for Authors
Ability to change a story by re-uploading

New Feature for Authors
Ability to add a new series and to change an existing series

Extra Option on the Recent Stories page
Option to select stories by the pairing type (F/F or M/M) has been added.

8000 Stories

The 8000th story has just been archived at Area 52. Here's a little breakdown:

6832 SG1 stories
1123 Atlantis stories
45 crossovers

We have 837 authors and on average 5 new stories are added to the archive each day.

New Chat List Want to chat to fellow slashers about Area 52 and the stories here? Here's a new email group for you: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Area52_Chat/ Or send an email here to join.

New Feature: RSS Feeds
3 RSS feeds have been added - 1 each for Atlantis and SG-1 and 1 for both. By subscribing to a feed you'll get a list of the latest stories to be added delivered to you without you having to visit the site. More info

New Feature: Author's Note
Authors can have a note displayed at the end of all their stories/series for example to request feedback. Log in and go to the amend author's details page to enter a note

New Page: Authors' Quick List
List of author's names - enables quick navigation to any author's page

New Feature
Authors can now amend their own details and archive their own stories.
This feature has been a long time in development and we'd like thank the authors who helped with testing.
It's currently for existing authors only. So if you already have some stories here, get yourself a password and add some more!

New Authors List allows authors to be selected depending on what stories they write. Default is to show only those authors who have new stories within the last 3 months.
Icons for each author indicate they have written F/F and/or M/M, and SG-1 and/or Atlantis stories.
User selections are 'remembered' using cookies

Area 52 is 6 years old today - Happy Birthday to us!

New features recently added to accommodate stories from shows other than SG-1:

Recent Stories - option at top of page to select either SG-1 or Atlantis stories.
Pairings - an extra selection box for Atlantis pairings
Search - pairings for Atlantis added
All story pages - icons to indicate the show for each story

A new page has been added showing all the email lists we collect from - find it from the submission page