What's Happening to Fic Hosting?

[Cyber_Skaarj]

I've noticed a disturbing trend recently. One where fic archives or hosts seem to be disappearing off the web. And I'm finding this very annoying, since I now I'm unable to find a lot of the fics I used to read and have no answers as to why.

The disappearances I am refering to are anifics and ranmafics. For some reason, the person running anifics has spontainiously decided not to host fanfiction anymore, meaning I no longer have access to authors such as Chilord, Nighthawk, or Jonathon Ford (as their sites were hosted on anifics). Also, ranmafics.com (a.k.a. Ranchan & Co. Crossing Bridges) suddenly no longer exists (if anyone else can actually access it without getting the "cannot find this page" message, please tell me), so there goes a hell of a lot of good crossover fiction.

Does anyone know the reason for either of these events? Because it's bugging the hell out of me not being able to find some of my favourite fics anymore for no apparent reason.

[Lioconvoy]

Well I know with Ranmafics, they haven't had anyone who actaully knew what he/she was doing running it for a bit, it's was over a year since they last updated. My stuff was there as well as Fanfiction.net and there were some stories I sent in to get updated but never did.

[Battlekrome]

whats even worse is i find certain authors on some hosting seem never to reappear once the page goes offline

Fire at least has a fanfiction.net page but some...

Heck its like trying to find fics from ELL...

Whats even worse is when the author themselves takes their old work offline never to be seen again...

[Sailor Sedai (Ellf)]

I've noticed a disturbing trend recently. One where fic archives or hosts seem to be disappearing off the web. And I'm finding this very annoying, since I now I'm unable to find a lot of the fics I used to read and have no answers as to why.

The disappearances I am refering to are anifics and ranmafics. For some reason, the person running anifics has spontainiously decided not to host fanfiction anymore, meaning I no longer have access to authors such as Chilord, Nighthawk, or Jonathon Ford (as their sites were hosted on anifics). Also, ranmafics.com (a.k.a. Ranchan & Co. Crossing Bridges) suddenly no longer exists (if anyone else can actually access it without getting the "cannot find this page" message, please tell me), so there goes a hell of a lot of good crossover fiction.

Does anyone know the reason for either of these events? Because it's bugging the hell out of me not being able to find some of my favourite fics anymore for no apparent reason.

Actually, what happened with anifics was that the person who owned the servers died. Sol was trying to get things back online, but it seems he managed to only get the forum back up.

[Togashi Gaijin]

Heck its like trying to find fics from ELL...

Umm ... Lurker's stuff has been where it always has been - on his own site at http://www.lurkerdrome.com. That's been around for a long time.

[Battlekrome]

Umm ... Lurker's stuff has been where it always has been - on his own site at http://www.lurkerdrome.com. That's been around for a long time.

Hrmm lets see....

Fuku fic

Nibun no Senshi Sailor Moon by ELL , good luck finding it on ELL's page...

[camk4evr]

Check the Penultimate Fanfic Achive. Unfortunately, I believe Lurker has abandoned that fic and removed it from his site, as well as the others that he's decided to trash.

[Togashi Gaijin]

Hrmm lets see....
Fuku fic
Nibun no Senshi Sailor Moon by ELL , good luck finding it on ELL's page...

Well geez, if you wanted a specific story you should have said so in the first place. Took me all of 30 seconds to find Nibun no Senshi Sailor Moon, and ... while I agree that this particular one isn't on the Lurkerdrome page ... it certainly isn't hidden very hard either. Just pull up Rakhal's list, go to the 'N's, look for listing (found), click link (works), unzip the GZIP archive to local hard disc, and start reading.

[Togashi Gaijin]

Also, ranmafics.com (a.k.a. Ranchan & Co. Crossing Bridges) suddenly no longer exists (if anyone else can actually access it without getting the "cannot find this page" message, please tell me), ...

The WaybackMachine has a complete archive of the June06 update.

Web archives are your friend.

[Cyber_Skaarj]

The WaybackMachine has a complete archive of the June06 update.

Web archives are your friend.

Thanks, this was a big help (wish I'd known about that archive sooner )

Now I can find most of the crossover fics again

[lwf58]

Yes, Anifics was on a private server, and the owner passed away.

However, Sol just posted this update:

I should have the hosted restored via a back up tuesday the 17th. It will be at www.anifics.com/hosted/sitename the subdomains will be longer in coming if ever... For now it's jsut a static backup while I test out some software to allow people to do stuff via the browser instead of ftp

Restored sites:
http://www.anifics.com/hosted/yasuhei/
http://www.anifics.com/hosted/ladycosmos/

[Ninsaneja]

@lwf58: Ack, but the links and stuff are all messed up on ladycosmos, you have to type it in manually... IT all points to the subdomain type rather than the new format...

[lwf58]

He did say that he planned to have it done on the 17th. So it's a little early for me to talk to him yet. We'll see if there are still problems after tomorrow.

[yasuhei]

My understanding is that subdomains may also eventually return.

However, in the mean time, tough biccies everyone. Sol is dealing with this on his own, amidst his work and his personal life. He also actually knew the server owner on some level or another. Those of us with anifics sites have been getting free hosting for years now. We don't deserve our sites, we are lucky to have them.

I'm overjoyed that sol's done all this work, and I figure we should all be sitting and waiting patiently. We aren't owed, we are being given something wonderful, and we should all shut up and be patient.

[lwf58]

Sol is making progress. He only works on it on Tuesdays, though. That's his day off.

As it stands, he'll have the backups running soon enough, and may get anifics hosting back online in the near future. I'm certain that it'll be before the code is written that I need to start doing some serious hosting in the Lost Library.

If you are an anifics hosted author and have a better version of your site stored on your own computer, it's quite likely that he will upload it for you when he has a chance. You just need to get hold of him and ask. The anime forum at anifics is where you can keep tabs on what he's doing. Look in the Forum News and Help folder for the topic Hosted Sites.