[EnergyUnlimited]

Cid was one of more prominent doomers on this side but for half a year or so he does not have any news.
Not that I was often agreeing with him but certain topics he was bringing are interesting.
What have happened to him?

[Newfie]

Don’t know. Maybe he will respond here. I hope so.

[asg70]

I tried to contact him through his blog (from his sig) a while back but the email bounced. Sometimes people just fall off the grid. After all, even PStarr is gone.

[Cog]

Cid put a lot of stock in the Mueller investigation would show Russian collusion. It didnt. Perhaps he doesn't want to face the music or my "I told you so"

[jedrider]

I don't know why Cid would have left? He seemed to be having such a good time showing us how smart he was

[careinke]

I don't know why Cid would have left? He seemed to be having such a good time showing us how smart he was

With his rather direct insults, I thought he was trying to show us how stupid we were.

But hey, after you got through that, he was a pretty entertaining and informative read. I hope all is well.

[Tanada]

Cid last posted within 90 days, a little early to declare him lost forever folks.

We have a number of members that only check in every year or so to see if the place is still up and running. I wish they were more active but we each make our own choices about how much to participate.

[Outcast_Searcher]

I tried to contact him through his blog (from his sig) a while back but the email bounced. Sometimes people just fall off the grid. After all, even PStarr is gone.

Speaking of Pstarr, is there a banning limit, like say, ten times banned and you're banned forever? Because it sure seems like there were a LOT of sudden lasting posting vacations for pstarr.

[asg70]

I was told that PStarr wasn't banned but that his user data was damaged in a system crash. Why his and no other active poster is beyond me. Karma? Anyway, if that's the case he could have started a new account. It could be that he decided that enough was enough or he would have been too crushed to have a new user with a reset post-counter. Anyway you slice it, this place is better off without him and his broken-record of "corn liquor", "eau de bakken", "demand-dearth", "peak oil caused the credit crisis" kool-aid, suburbanite haterade, and mild climate change denialism.

[Outcast_Searcher]

I was told that PStarr wasn't banned but that his user data was damaged in a system crash. Why his and no other active poster is beyond me. Karma? Anyway, if that's the case he could have started a new account. It could be that he decided that enough was enough or he would have been too crushed to have a new user with a reset post-counter. Anyway you slice it, this place is better off without him and his broken-record of "corn liquor", "eau de bakken", "demand-dearth", "peak oil caused the credit crisis" kool-aid, suburbanite haterade, and mild climate change denialism.

Thanks for the insight.

Well, I was a mainframe DB2 system programmer at IBM for 17 years (who built and maintained and fixed/recovered the database systems, helped DBA's with problems, etc), so I have some clue about SQL driven databases, which this site uses.

(We had to rebuild 1 test system over that time (of hundreds my team was responsible for), because a DBA we entrusted to back up the core system databases in a system we inherited from an internal IBM shop, did his job improperly (and we promptly took over that responsibility after that). However, we lost little or no customer data, because we just rebuilt the system, and had the DBA's reload all the data, and checked things out. It was inconvenient and a few minor short term test files might have been lost, but nothing existing for over a few days or so. Aside from that fiasco, we never lost a single bit of customer data, even with all the DASD crashes that occurred before RAID systems became standard.)

1). Assuming the posting data from pstarr were being backed up periodically like via unloads, image copies, etc, it's hard for me to understand how ALL of his data was lost due to a crash unless there were some VERY iffy things going on with data backups (perhaps caused by funding issues and lack of staff, etc -- NOT assigning blame, just making an observation. I saw a local IBM credit union lose ALL its computer data to the hard drive crashing in the 80's because they weren't backing up their only hard drive -- where the data WAS their entire business and had legal repercussions, etc. It took WEEKS for them to recover from that one, using manual backup records).

2). It's also surprising to me that his old user id would be completely nonviable for use, even if they had to wipe it, re-establish it, and load his old posts. Now, maybe they couldn't or wouldn't manually reset his post counter to a big number, and that was the issue, as you say.

3). And, not knowing the specifics of the database system driving the SQL for this site, maybe things are COMPLETELY different than mainframe DB2. (I remember thinking poorly of various aspects of Oracle, and of aspects of small system relational database systems over the years).

...

I just find it surprising that such a data catastrophe would happen to only ONE user's data, unless their only backup scheme is separate files for each user or something, and why would a data administrator do that?

But yeah, such a thing would certainly explain why a long term active member might be peeved and leave.

[Newfie]

Allow me to suggest, with no sarcasm or malicious intent, that those posters here who have some interest and background start their own forum. ASG you seem to think PO has seen its day and have called for its demise, yet you continue to post here. So clearly you see some benefit to POs existence.

So maybe a couple of folks with appropriate skills get together and start a new forum with a different slant, more topical of today’s issues.

Some of you may recall the old forum “Malthusia”. That was a pretty interesting place and it hosted a lot of edgy conversation. It was a good place to discuss ideas not readily accepted in a “normal” population. As it turns out Malthusia was hosted by a single person. Eventually her life intervened and managing the site became a low priority. She eventually stopped maintaining the site and it died from lack of maintenance. I bring this up because it’s the only forum where I know something of how it was run, how it lived, and how it died. The other two forums I frequent are both commercial operations, in one case it is only one of the many forums operated by the parent organization. Clearly they have a professional staff and it’s run to make money. The other is also commercial and exists to feed an online store.

Running a board is well outside my area of specialization and my life is way too full to admit such an undertaking. Apparently it can be done by a single person who finds it a fulfilling endeavor.

[SeaGypsy]

My recollection of Cid is the world was gunna end by 2020. Climate change wasn't it? 3 months & 12 days to go folks!

[asg70]

1). Assuming the posting data from pstarr were being backed up periodically...

I agree that it doesn't make much sense but remember that the technical performance of this site has been historically poor and there have been numerous outages, some lasting days. I don't know who runs it but based on that track-record their technical acumen seems, um, limited (not a bash, just an observation).

Also note how ancient the version of this forum software is. I would think that a board software refresh would bring in more users just by virtue of it looking more modern rather than it being a ghost-town time-capsule. For instance, I wince every time I see the 10-15 year old "peak oil is us" gallery and note how many of these faces that pop up represents the dead (like Matt Simmons and Al Bartlett).

Really, there's little in the way of bragging rights to whoever intends to be the last active poster standing (an honor PStarr looked like he was gunning for) as such a person will have an audience of nothing but tumbleweeds.

[Ibon]

A wise prophet once stated that love and hate, the passion, comes from the same source.

ASG, I sense that you miss Pstarr.

[asg70]

Odds are he'll eventually be back in some shape or form as long as the guy can still rake his fingers over a keyboard. I just have a hard time believing he would get discouraged enough to quit of his own volition. I've never come across anyone more stubborn in my whole life.

[Outcast_Searcher]

1). Assuming the posting data from pstarr were being backed up periodically...

I agree that it doesn't make much sense but remember that the technical performance of this site has been historically poor and there have been numerous outages, some lasting days. I don't know who runs it but based on that track-record their technical acumen seems, um, limited (not a bash, just an observation).

Re the issues with reliability, that's clearly on point.

Re the competence, that might well be a cheap shot. Financial resources have a HUGE impact on technical quality -- that doesn't mean the technician in charge is either ignorant or at fault.

The times I got most aggravated with my management team in my years at IBM in database systems were when they wanted to "save time and money" by forbidding us to make backups of the system before we performed upgrades or major maintenance (including production systems for major commercial corporate customers).

This happened over and over, as management changed. (I was tempted to quit sometimes over stupidity like this, but why throw away a career and early retirement just because IBM management in my division had become rife with GALACTIC level stupidity?)

So, in each case, I stated for the record that I wanted their bosses and the director in the call before that was decided. And I reminded them that I wanted in writing with their boss and their director CCed, that they were insisting on that. Because I was absolutely 100% against it. And because when something bad happened and we couldn't back off the work promptly -- I wanted THEIR head in the noose, not mine.

In each case I won rather quickly, with my whole team behind me, but it's just utter MADNESS that in a major corporation which specialized in mainframe computers and had the leading large system relational database product (DB2), bringing in very serious revenue and profits -- that this kind of thing was even BROACHED, especially repeatedly.

...

Now, compared to the decision making / expertise that IBM should have had over time, with the resources available, seriously, what should be expected re this site given the realities of financial resources?

[Outcast_Searcher]

My recollection of Cid is the world was gunna end by 2020. Climate change wasn't it? 3 months & 12 days to go folks!

My recollections of Cid were wild statements like all the starving people in the US, etc. Just completely over the top stuff.

Of course, much of that stuff is roughly comparable re credibility, to what we get from the fast crash doomers on places like the ETP MAP discussion, the "Stock Market Crash" (which didn't happen, so now we get the endless game of change the date and forecast), etc. currently.

So it's not like he was so unique in his antics, just the direction of the claims.

[asg70]

Cid did try to make the scientific case for things like the methane bomb. It's just that he only represents the extreme end of the scientific projections. But since he disappeared the projections continue to shift closer and closer to his apocalyptic territory and I don't see a lot of contrary info emerging to stop that constant shift. This only lends his fatalism more and more credence as time goes on. I do wonder whether he may have committed suicide over all this (ala Mike Ruppert) but that might just be the myopia that comes from thinking that if someone isn't participating online that they're dead.

[dolanbaker]

I suppose the most obvious answer is that he simply died of old age, I got the impression that he was quite elderly by the way he posted.
Could be wrong of course and he has simply stopped posting.

[Plantagenet]

Pstarr was having some kind of health issue. In one of his last posts he said he had stopped smoking marijuana for health reasons. Whatever it was, it must have been pretty serious to make Pstarr give up pot. I hope he's OK.....

Cid Yama went through several stages. Initially he posted about Hitler a great deal....every discussion with Cid seemed to devolve into him going off on extended Hitler rants, complete with Hitler quotes. He was a living embodiment of Godwin's law.

In his next stage he started claiming he was very wealthy and lived in a mansion with a security fence and a continent of attack dogs to protect him. Cid announced he was a descendent of the Founding Fathers and so he had personal knowledge of just how evil the US is.

The climate posts marked the latest change of direction for Cid.

IMHO Its entirely possible Cid will come back. He has left for extended periods of time in the past and then come back. But he may be a different cat when he comes back for the fourth time. There is no way to predict whether Cid will come back and continue posting about climate or whether he will have moved on to some entirely different mania subject.

Cheers!