A certain "Chaotic" warez site is closing down after 2 years

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ShadowOne333

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Today, the announcement was made in a certain "Chaotic" warez site notifying the users of the close down of the site after 2 years of service.
Here's the full quote of the announcement with all of the references to the site name and/or direct mails and web addresses removed:

It's been a good run! A lovely community, an escape from pressure of the real world, and a good place to gather and discuss our favorite hobby (Video games!). But alas, it won't be forever.

Details of what's gonna happen
We launched the site with the goal of having it as much as user friendly as it possibly can. One of top goals that we have succeeded in implementing on this site, is to:

1) Prevent ads on site for registered users.
2) Prevent adfly links and ones that are similar to it, and allow only direct-linking.

While we have successfully been able to do that, it came at a cost:

1) While ads were only enabled for non-registered users/logged out users, those ads didn't bring enough to cover the site and server bills.
2) Allowing only direct-linking did not give much of an incentive to uploaders to join the site and upload their collection.

The uploaders you see on the site, do it for the love of the game sharing community. We thank them for that. This struggle is not new. We tried several ways to keep this site alive for more than a year now, ranging from a donator status, to finding sponsors for this site. Unfortunately, our efforts didn't work out the way we intended it to. The site grew larger with time, just like we hoped. As we grew, we needed more server power and cost went higher. Since this site was never about making any profit, we many times had to resort to paying for it out of our own pockets.

So it is with heavy heart that we have to announce. that our server, along with the site, will shutdown on Nov 26th (I'd really say the 25th at midnight.)

Message from Webby

Hey guys, Webby here. I'm gonna sit back in my rocking chair with my coffee and tell you some history behind **** for a spell.

I've been with this baby for quite some time, since we had two sites and before even that. Worked along side with Cha0s to make the VB sites possible. Not too long after we made those, perhaps a few months, I suggested we move to Xenforo to remove the security risk I saw in Vbullitin (which later caused the leak of 100s of thousands of users from another site I'm sure you're aware of). It was a good decision and made tit possible to run a bigger community on lower spec servers. As I'm sure our pioneer users remember, we had issues after we started growing larger. We are simply running on an OpenVZ shared VPS. lol that was fun!

We continued to hit the CPU load limit, experienced downtime like really bad, and the support wasn't helpful hardly at all!

We ran into bottlenecks with that setup, so we moved to a dedicated server which really made things nice and speedy!

But before we moved, we held a vote and wanted to merge the two sites into one. It would really help pave the way to expanding the speed and security of the website. Try watching for someone coming into your home from both the front and the back door at the same time. It's not easy and having split attention wasn't beneficial. We got the domain agreed on and merged the two sites! Painless really. Back to the server, Nothing was wrong with this new server other than the fact their support wasn't the best either. But no complaints since I knew my way around and hardly needed them other than a network latency issue

During all this time, **** was busy reaching out to his connections and expanding the user base, making this site more of a community centered environment, and not a simple "stop by, get what you want a leave" hassle. Superman also was working along side him too and they both really help build the community base we have. I was mainly in the background making sure the server didn't get hiccups, we were online, and that the users were safe. Hence the term webmaster

It was fun and I enjoy working on stuff like that.

Shortly later, both Cha0s and Superman would retire their coats, enjoy the real life, and be able to focus more on what they wanted.

Some time later, I focused on making the site more design friendly and found some themes/styles I liked. This task would be a hard one for me. Not so much with coding, but with design Aesthetics. I was no expert on this field and that was very clear.So I recruited my new staff team and appointed moderators. Rohul, Madridi, and Lycanroc became staff to help me both with the style and to help manage the site when I was away. Later on I would promote Rohul to be a fellow admin to help manage more advanced issues in the event I couldn't. We had to move to a new server within the last few months, and that would cost more than expected or more than we ever previously had to invest.
Which leads us to the present, that I'm not able to keep this us as the webmaster and time to hang up the coat as well. Time has been costly, as well as money out of pocket for the server and investments made into the site. I really love this community... It hurts to do this.

I hope everyone had a good time here, and I'm sorry it has to be this way.

Goodbye **** Team; enjoy this last month as we know it.

Details for DMCA notices being sent in
Since we are closing our doors within a month we ask you to understand that any content will be removed anyways far as we know with the current timeline. If ownership is transferred or changed, you will see a notice on the front in such an event. At that point, you should still have a clear path to send in your DMCA notices as always. However, If that isn't the case, then you'll see the forum and site go offline at the date mentioned.

To shoot down any rumors or speculation
* We aren't in any trouble, and that's not the reason of this shutdown. We've always complied with DMCA notices and worked alongside agencies who needed our help to remove content.
* We haven't been hacked or anything that would compromise the security of our users.
* We haven't been asked to shut down our website / forum. This is a choice I'm making based on circumstances and the shoes I'm having to fill. Read above if you want to understand better.
* We won't be accepting any offers from THAT ISO SITE for a possible merge, buy-out, or domain transfer.
 
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ShadowOne333

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Well that sucks. Ugh.
Yeah sucks :(
I wasn't expecting one of the warez sites to close down, but then again they have most of their revenue from ads and shit like that, so it was only a matter of time until one of those had to get chopped off.

There's still plenty of options though, the ISO and Umbra sites are still up, and there are other not-as-known sites to get stuff from as well.

--------------------- MERGED ---------------------------

Yeah I know, check my comment there xD
 
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Not accepting money from that iso site? Money is money,I would take it in a heartbeat.
 

Madridi

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Not accepting money from that iso site? Money is money,I would take it in a heartbeat.
The site was never about making money. It could've easily made money if needed. There is a set of principles followed on the site, and ISO goes against everything Chaos stands for.
 
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The site was never about making money. It could've easily made money if needed. There is a set of principles followed on the site, and ISO goes against everything Chaos stands for.

Like what? They both do the same thing.
 
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just got this email
Hey guys,

Webby here to give some very sad news. We will be closing the forum of [chaos site] on Nov 26th.

I recommend you come read the letter I wrote here -> [chaos site]

Hope you have enjoyed using the community, and best wishes from TEAM CHAOS!

Feel free to reply to this email with your thoughts, concerns, or questions. Most of the questions can be answered with the letter though so be sure to read that first.
 

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Like what? They both do the same thing.
They are significantly different. The purpose of chaos is to share games, period. Adfly links are forbidden. Ads don't exist for registered users. The ISO site is filled with ads, asking for donation for monetary gain rather to cover cost. The site turned over the years became a cash cow for them, and they tried to attack and shut down chaos from the start because they wanted no competition.

I'm not going to go into previous drama, nor am I going to shun their actions. They are free to do what they want. As for chaos, they had a set of principles they followed purely for better user experience, which came at an expense.

Chaos is a game sharing site, not a business.

If the site gets a transfer ownership at some point, the primary reason would be that the owner agrees with the new owners vision to the site. If not, then it will die. It's not for sale just because people want to buy it.
 

zoogie

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They are significantly different. The purpose of chaos is to share games, period. Adfly links are forbidden. Ads don't exist for registered users. The ISO site is filled with ads, asking for donation for monetary gain rather to cover cost. The site turned over the years became a cash cow for them, and they tried to attack and shut down chaos from the start because they wanted no competition.

I'm not going to go into previous drama, nor am I going to shun their actions. They are free to do what they want. As for chaos, they had a set of principles they followed purely for better user experience, which came at an expense.

Chaos is a game sharing site, not a business.

If the site gets a transfer ownership at some point, the primary reason would be that the owner agrees with the new owners vision to the site. If not, then it will die. It's not for sale just because people want to buy it.
The fact that they actively refused to monetize is why they died. Even .orgs have to make some money to stay afloat.

Yet another reason placing ideology over pragmatism is never a good idea.
 
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The fact that they actively refused to monetize is why they died. Even .orgs have to make some money to stay afloat.

Yet another reason placing ideology over pragmatism is never a good idea.
2 things:
- The site is closing for multitude of reasons. Server costs is just one of them.
- Sure, I'm not saying monetizing the site wasn't (one) of the reasons it dies, but it all goes back to why the site exist. It's plain and simple, if chaos used the site as a cash cow, then chaos is just another piracy site. Owner and staff rather see it die than becoming just another site. There is no reason keeping a site that's similar to any other piracy site alive.

That being said, I can 100% guarantee you that if other issues did not exist and it was purely a financial issue, the site would've stayed alive.
 
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