Hello again TamaTalkers!I wanted to write everyone to let you know some of what has been going on here behind the scenes... We made the move to a new server setup in hopes of getting some much needed elbow room to grow and expand the site. We now have that space. Unfortunately, we are also growing so much that the current server setups aren't able to handle the load anymore. We have always been working with L2 Ventures to stay online. The costs of staying online continue to grow. The monthly cost of a server to host this site is now having to be bumped up to $100 each month... They are telling us that the load might need a bump up even further to a stronger dedicated server (which usually start out costing about $200 each month). Pretty high if you ask me but we don't have a choice. We have been experimenting with more advertising to help offset some costs. We might need to do even more. I am thinking of adding a banner advertisement spot at the top of the screen (to the right of the TamaTalk logo) which people/companies can "rent" out and help sponsor us and keep costs down. I hate advertising as much as the next web surfer... But that's the only way we can stay free for everyone. This will be worked out soon... Hope everyone udnerstands!
Related to all this growth related problems... TamaChat is currently closed for repairs. The chat system did not survive the move to our new server. I have been trying to get things working again but have hit a number of frustrating walls. To add on to the problems, the growth of the site is also leading to much slowness overall as our database is trying to cope. The chat system adds to the database load a great deal. So until the database slowness can be resolved, chat will remain closed. I am hoping this will not last too long...
Thanks everyone for your patience and understanding through our growing pains...
-Admin-
