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I briefly debated just re-posting last year's CoN birthday message. I'm awful lazy. After nine years I'm allowed to be, right? Caves of Narshe has now been a part of me for over a third of my life. I think I've earned it.

But really, the reason behind it is more that the results of this year are not dissimilar from those of last year. Some good stuff, some rough stuff, all the same stuff. Of course, I like talking about the good stuff. So, since I'm posting this in the news forum, let's start with our news coverage. Since last birthday, we've had three and a half pages of news posted here in the default forum view. That's somewhere on the order of 100+ threads started by our news staff in the last year, an average of one every three days or so. That gives you guys a lot of great information to learn and discuss, and it's all thanks to our great news team (all added in the last year!) - Silverfork, Karasuman, Laszlow, and Zero_Hawk.

We've increased our rate of fan media on the site as well, again thanks to some new staff, in this case Mimic, Kappa, and Del. Now you needn't see new art on the site only once a year, but more like twice. Or three times. Hey, you want more, you submit more! Really, though, we're as pleased as can be with the submissions we're getting both in terms of quantity and quality, so definitely keep it up and we'll do the same.

Chat recently has been pretty explosive, we're starting to turn around the numbers for that part of the site as well. If you've never chatted before with CoN or even anyone, it's actually worth your time. We've got people online most all the time now; I and the Britons of the site tend to anchor down the American morningtime (it's the best way for me to avoid work), and then a large collection of staff, members, and thoroughly random people stop by all hours of the day to join in. And after I take my old, decrepit self to bed, I assume it's some sort of scary after-hours sort of get-together. Climhazzard won't tell me what all goes on. It seems that what happens in CoNChat stays in CoNChat - unless it ends up in our collection of #narshe humor, CoNQMS. We're not all Final Fantasy all the time, and a visit to chat will definitely confirm that for you.

Now the site, the site. Well, as most of you probably know, we crossed the one-hundred-thousand post mark here at the forums since our last birthday, and we're rapidly closing in on 125k as I write this. We also have just crossed the barrier of 2700 members signed up. And now due to some upgrades to the signup process, we're pretty sure the new folks aren't spambots, either! So you new folks, maybe you might want to consider making your first post right here in this thread to give your congrats, and then head off to the Greetings forum to tell us a bit more about yourself.

The content areas of the site, where we still give you the best Final Fantasy coverage you can find for the classics, are still getting better. Of course, I don't have quite as much great stuff to say as in the last message about our content because frankly we've slowed down a bit from our torrid - as if - pace of adding Final Fantasy and Final Fantasy VII in 2005. We did, very recently, though, upgrade most of our Final Fantasy V data, improving by leaps and bounds what might have been our weakest content section. We have more to come for FFV, so stay tuned. Also, it's a thinly veiled secret that we're also doing some work on upgrading other content, notably Final Fantasy and Final Fantasy IV. And Djibriel has been hard at work behind the scenes with some Final Fantasy VI tweaks, too. You'll know more as we finish, of course. We do like to trumpet such things from the minarets and all.

And, of course, you'll actually be able to see all this great stuff as it finishes, because we've had six months of nearly rock solid server performance, too. That's a far cry from where we were 365 days ago, isn't it? Since we moved in late January, our downtime has been virtually nil - we've been, on average, up 98.5% of the time, and we've had 99.5% or higher for the last two months. You don't have to worry about not coming here due to downtime, or not telling your friends about us because they won't be able to get here anyway, because it just won't happen now. Reap the fruits of my out-of-pocket expenses.

I've decided to bury the boring stats bits a bit lower this year just in case I'm the only person who cared. But thanks to our increased forum traffic and reliable server, we're having a massive year so far in terms of traffic. July's numbers won't be final until about 24 hours after I've posted this message, but I've extrapolated the numbers a bit to find that July of 2006 will finish at about 80% higher than January '06 (the month in which the server was worst-behaved this year) in terms of pages viewed, and 44% higher for both unique visitors and bandwidth pushed out. Now, when you consider a more normal month, this time last year, we're up a more standard number, roughly 20%. While that may not sound like much compared to January, imagine a corporation that grows 20% a year, as we have done the last two years running. You'd be looking at one amazingly successful and wealthy business, let me tell you.

So that's where we're at after nine complete years of being both a site and a group of individuals brought together under one banner. We'll make ten years. After that, who knows? Fifteen? Twenty? Will we be here, from nursing homes, with our brainscan PCs, thinking out horrible topics about why Sephiroth could, like, totally crush Kuja even if, OMG, they switched outfits and Seph was in a hot bishie thong? Lord, I hope not. Let's, instead, just take each year as it comes and enjoy the things that make us different, and maybe even a little bit better than other sites out there in the ether? My staff and I are turning the corner and getting motivated again after a year of general downtime, so definitely stick around and watch what we've got coming up. We'll thank you for it then just like we're thanking you right now (thanks, by the way).

Enjoy the site in the way that we enjoy presenting it to you.

This post has been edited by Rangers51 on 8th September 2006 11:10

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"To create something great, you need the means to make a lot of really bad crap." - Kevin Kelly

Why aren't you shopping AmaCoN?

Now this is a birthday thread nobody should refuse to reply in.

Happy 9th birthday CoN!

How wonderful! Otanjobi omedetto gozaimashita, CoN!

Seriously, this now makes me realize that this place is a bit older than I thought. I'm glad to be a part of it, if not for such a long time.

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OSonic Rave
/ \Last Arcanum
[ ]Strike Raid
XRagnarok

No kidding. Happy 9th Birthday, CoN. And I thought I'd never stay around long enough to see it. Great job, Josh, we're rooting for you guys.

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Nine-hundred ninety-nine billion nine-hundered ninety-nine million nine-hundred ninety-nine thousand nine-hundred ninety-nine bottles of beer on the wall...

It was alright to take a break, we all know the staff really pushed itself to work on the game coverage, and frankly, I doubt I would have been able to do that much.

Although There are some things that I dislike (Like a forum that I won't mention) and a very few numbers of members, CoN has definitely the best to date classic FF coverage and community either on the forum and the chat.

Hurrayz for CoN's 9th Birthday! (Birthday, so theoretically Climhazzard is the mother and R51 the father, right? )

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Sayonara

HAPPY BIRFDAY CoN!!!

great content, great people(except those that aren't), great staff, GREAT SITE!

CoN turns nine only 3 days after my little brother. and i gotta say, i think you could take him. watch out for his left hook.

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moé in the streets, senpai in the sheets

9 years and still kicking. Happy Birthday CoN, and may it not be the last.

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Dead Winter. A nice comic.

Quote (footbigmike @ 31st July 2006 06:36)

Now this is a birthday thread nobody should refuse to reply in.

I refuse to reply in this... aw dammit.

Happy Birthday, CoN!

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this is a blog mostly about comics and videogames
END SPOILER

For some reason, your post made me sad Josh.

I got to thinking about 20, 30 years down the road. Will a core group of us still be here? Will the site still be up?

Sounds sentimental and cheesy, I know, but I really like it here. It'd be hard to imagine not having a CoN to go to... or worse, a CoN with none of the folks that I know now in it.

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Join the Army, see the world, meet interesting people - and kill them.

~Pacifist Badge, 1978

A happy German for No'th birthday, Caves of Narshe!

Luckily, 9 candles don't need us to dial 999 to call the fire brigade to put out a burning cake...



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"Only the dead have seen the end of their quotes being misattributed to Plato."
-George Santayana

"The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here..."
-Abraham Lincoln, prior to the discovery of Irony.

Well I figured I'd pop in the forums to give a hearty congratulations to Josh and company for the excellent work.


Here's hoping I get more internet access in days to come!

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If you've been mod-o-fied,
It's an illusion, and you're in-between.
Don't you be tarot-fied,
It's just alot of nothing, so what can it mean?
~Frank Zappa

Sins exist only for people who are on the Way or approaching the Way

Happy 9th, Caves Of Narshe. It seems like the last year flew right by.
Still, we've got some fun new faces (and some not-so-fun ones) and it makes me glad that I've stuck around as long as I have. Congrats on making it this far, CoNstaff. Here's to a hopeful many more.

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Okay, but there was a goat!

Quote (Rangers51 @ 31st July 2006 05:49)

Will we be here, from nursing homes, with our brainscan PCs, thinking out horrible topics about why Sephiroth could, like, totally crush Kuja even if, OMG, they switched outfits and Seph was in a hot bishie thong? Lord, I hope not.

Happy birthday CoN. We're gonna have to do something really spectacularnext year, it's not very often a fansite stays around a whole decade. The Planning begins!

This post has been edited by Sherick on 31st July 2006 17:11

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I fear my heart and fear my soul
Life goes on, it surely will,
Without me and I wonder:
Will I ever see light again?

Life goes on...

Hmmm it seems everyone that has been here for awile only posted.
I've only been here for a few months now but Happy 9th BDay CoNUhoh Sephiroth switched outfits with Kuja......WHAT HAS THE WORLD COME TOO!?


This post has been edited by Dragon King on 31st July 2006 18:18

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Kel'Thuzad: She is persistent. Reminds me of you, death knight.

Arthas:Shut up you damned ghost.

-Warcraft III Kel'thuzad comparing Arthas and Sylvanas Windrunner.

OMG Happy Bday CoN! Hopefully this will be around for a few more years when I finally begin my FFV SCC's again so I have somewhere to brag...I don't know anybody IRL that actually plays that game.

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Is PJ

The party hat is officially broken out. 9 years is pretty darn impressive.

Happy B-Day

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"It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it." - Aristotle

Happy birthday CoN! I really love being here, and hope the site continues to prosper.

Wow, I just realized that I've been here for over a year. Heh, it was worth it.

PS: Hail lord Tiddles, he is the true leader.

9 years and I wasn't even here the whole last year. At least I've made some miniscule mark on the site with my fanart, right ?

Happy birthday, CoN .

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Console RPG Cliches

Oh my god oh my god I got mentioned in the post I am an internet celebrity now.

Happy Birthday CoN.

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This one time I punched a bear in the forehead TO DEATH! I still have the scars on my chest. I am the manliest man that ever did man.

League: Z3roHawk
Steam: Zero_Hawk
Wii U: Zero_Hawk
FF14 - Goblin - Zero Hawk <Fiend>

Quote (Zero_Hawk @ 31st July 2006 20:09)

Oh my god oh my god I got mentioned in the post I am an internet celebrity now.

Crapola, I'm not mentioned in the post... not even my new job and celebrity status as sole french playa' at CoN...

Meh, don't bother none. A very good and heartful thank you for Josh, staff, and significant other members for allowing a frog to remain still in a english-based forum.

Joyeux anniversaire aux Caves de Narshe.

This post has been edited by Mr Thou on 31st July 2006 20:01

Happy 9th Birthday to CoN! Where would I be w/o you CoN

*will probably be here for the torrid Seph/Kuja fashion week

Ahh, another year in the life of CoN. Nine is an acceptable age to start drinking, right?

This shot is for you, CoN!

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"My impersonation of an ordinary person was flawless." - Neal

"Don't cry because it's over. Smile because it happened." - Dr. Seuss

Happy ninth birthday! Thanks to the staff for deliverin' the goods once again, 'cause you surely did all around. Just sit back and enjoy this year, because when CoN hits ten, it'll start wanting expensive presents and to start driving lessons...



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It's gonna be a glorious day
I feel my luck can change

Happy 9th Birthday and tomorrow i be 17...

Happy Birthday Caves of Narshe indeed.
While we're being all nice and reflective, I want to say thanks. All joking aside, I really am happy and thankful to have been a part of the last two of these 9 years. It means a lot to be accepted (some might say respected, even feared) both as a part of a great site and into a community based around the discussion of videogames. I can only hope this'll continue for many more years. Congratulations.

Happy birthday, CoN.

Those clothes look supprisingly fitting on Sephiroth...

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I shall now return to my cave

A happy ninth to CoN!

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SPEKKIO: "GRRR...That was most embarrassing!"

Nine years is an eternity to any internet service, particularly one that depends on
user-generated content. An impressive accolade to the staff, no doubt. It's Web2.0
thinking with a Web0.0 origins. I've definitely been glad since I switched from merely
appreciating the Jobs info on the FFT portion, to participating in the forums. Thank
you, CoN.

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Putting the A's in W lm rt: A11smart, Jobclass: Retailer.

It's hard to believe it's been a year, since i last read the other thread.
nine years. The caves are over half my age, and last year it was half my age. Time flies.
It's been a good year.
broncos won the AFC west
Colts didn't have an undefeated season
Steelers won the superbowl to tie for most wins
I won over $400 at texas hold 'em (when we bet nickels and dimes)
won $200 from a friend on the world cup
Made some good money in my World Cup betting pool
Read some good books (Moonraker by ian Flemming was the best, good read)
Finally people stop giving me the finger when i drive my truck (hand-me-down from older brother. I don't think there is a car in my town that he didn't cut-off or tailgate).

good year.
Happy Birthday CoN

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"Have you ever seen a baby do that before?"