CHERUBPLAY

[cherubplay]

If Cherp was continuing Cherubplay’s new year trend then it would be 2008 this year. So not only is it the wrong year, it’s the wrong wrong year.

[cherubplay]

The end

Cherubplay is now read-only. The read only archive will remain online for a while - at least until the end of the year, probably longer - so you'll still be able to export your chats until then.

Whilst I was the only official staff member, there are various other people I'd like to mention and thank:

Nadia, for her guidance and general moral support.

Raleigh, for their help with the category rules.

Dmitri, Nepeat and the rest of the old Parp crew, for their support on the technical side of things.

Alex. You know why.

Everyone who gave feature requests, suggestions and bug reports. Though I didn't get around to implementing them all, the ones that did make it in were incredibly useful.

And finally, you. I've received loads of messages of support and thanks from the community. There's too many to respond to individually, but know that I'm grateful for them all <3

Over the last 5 years, 9 months and 18 days, 51,036 users have taken part in 1,210,968 chats and sent 56,984,301 messages. Starting with Homestuck and encompassing too many fandoms to list, Cherubplay was a hub of creativity. It brought people together, allowed them to create new worlds and let them bond through shared fiction. Though the site is over I hope the friendships and memories created here will last for years to come. After all, the real Cherubplay was the friends we made along the way.

[cherubplay]

So what was "Coming soon.", anyhow?

Rich text support with markdown. I released that alongside account exporting (and some other features that had been sitting around for a while), and you can enable it on the Account page.

[cherubplay]

when exporting chats, will it export/allow viewing of ooc messages as well or is it purely just in character messages?

The export includes both in-character and out-of-chracter messages.

[cherubplay]

im having a problem? i exported my whole thing, and when i open the chats folder, it shows the index and it works, but i cant actually open and look at any of the CHATS

I’ve had a few reports about this. I’m not sure why but Windows seems to have problems extracting the files. Using an alternative extraction tool such as WinRar should work.

[quaintattraction]

At least I know I won’t lose all of my Cherubplay stuff thanks to this exporting feature. I only have to wait until… Sunday, July 7th at 7:00 pm to use it…

[cherubplay]

Sorry, this should be fixed now.

[cherubplay]

Your newest update has now made all new messages blank. Not sure if I could fix that on my end honestly.

Sorry, I updated some of the JavaScript. You might need to clear your cache.

[cherubplay]

The schedule

I'm currently working on an enhanced exporter, which will allow you to download all of your chats, prompts and directory requests in a single bundle. During the month of July this functionality will gradually be rolled out to users. You'll be able to find the exporter in the Account section, and if it's not available to you yet then it'll show the date when it will become available.

On the 1st of September, the front page will be taken offline, and your prompts, the directory and user connections will become read only. At this point it won't be possible to create any new chats, but your existing chats will function as they do now.

On the 1st of October, all of your chats will become read-only. At this point all you'll be able to do on Cherubplay is export and download your account data.

At some point after that the site will be taken offline. I’m not sure exactly when yet. Stay tuned to this blog for further updates.

[cherubplay]

https://www.cherp.chat/directory/24/

this should probably have more tags, right

Maybe it should, but this is the wrong submission box.

[cherubplay]

Do you know that someone took all your code and made a clone site? How do you feel about the site?

I’m not sure who’s running it so I can’t judge them personally, but Cherubplay is open source software so anyone is free to use the code to start their own site. My only request is that your site’s branding should be sufficiently different that it can’t be mistaken for the original.

[cherubplay]

is there any chance cherubplay will get passed onto someone else to run it, or is it just Donezo? also, any idea as to when itll be shut down?

Transferring ownership of the site onto someone else is an issue of trust. Over the past five years thousands of people have trusted me with their private conversations. I know that several people have offered to take over the site, but I don't know who they are and it would be irresponsible to just hand all of that data over to a complete stranger. So I think it's best that any successor sites have a fresh start.

I’ll publish the full shutdown schedule later this week, but I can promise that Cherubplay will remain online for at least 2 months.

[cherubplay]

Cherubplay isn’t getting shut down, is it?

Unfortunately it is. I’ve been meaning to shut Cherubplay down for like a year and a half, and now seems like as good a time as any to get on with it.

Registration is now closed. Next week I’ll post a timeline for the rest of the process, which will include bulk export functionality and a way to download your prompts and directory requests.

[cherubplay]

Is the year saying 2009 part of the "sleuthplay" update thing, or is it a mistake? And how long is the Sleuthing going to last?

It’s part of the joke. Cherubplay always puts the wrong year in its new year messages - 2013 in 2015, 2012 in 2016 etc. This year it’s 2009, and the site has become a Problem Sleuth website because Homestuck didn’t begin until April 2009.

I’ll change it back to Cherubplay in a couple of days.

[cherubplay]

Hey, me and I few people found that by simply searching for Cherubplay chats in google, they pop up. They are usually ended chats, but is this a glitch? A break in privacy? We know that chats can be shared through links, but this is simply googling it and not through the site.

Chats are normally only accessible to people who have the link, but if you post the link somewhere public (eg. on Tumblr, Twitter etc.) then it can be discovered and indexed by search engines.

[cherubplay]

Five years

Yesterday marked the fifth anniversary of Cherubplay’s public opening.

I planned a significant update to the site, but there’s still some important bug fixing to do and due to computer issues I probably won’t be able to finish it until I’m back on my desktop computer in a couple of weeks.

So until then, I’ll leave you with two words:

[cherubplay]

I was wondering, I can’t tell if anyone’s online or not, but I’m not sure if it’s just a me problem, a mobile problem, or what. It started yesterday.

I’m not sure. I’ve had several messages about this, but I haven’t changed anything recently and it seems fine on my computer. What browser/OS are you using?

[cherubplay]

My ability to answer directory requests just broke, is that just a thing that sort of happens? I tried on two separate accounts and both of them came to a 404 (of sorts) page and answered the request w/o actually opening a chat. It's cool if it's a side effect of some code going jank, I was just a little disheartened because I really wanted to answer that request.

Yeah, that’s a bug. Was this a normal request or a group request?