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FantasySquare Articles Fleeting Dreams [ Author: Webmaster ] Memories. Sometimes far, sometimes near. Most of the time, it's unreachable. It's been two and a half years since FantasySquare had started. Someway or another, we've managed to conquer the barriers that come against us. Although I don't recall the exact date, my first memories of it begun 25th May 1999. Back in those days, we were known as Personaworld (PW), and not FS. PW meant 'your deep inner self, in a world'. It started because there were no proper websites on the Japanese version of FF8 at that point of time. In a sense, you could say that we are the pioneers of that. So how did that name, FantasySquare, came about? I remember the times I was sitting on my desk, thinking of a name for the new site when the word 'Final Fantasy' and 'Squaresoft' came to my mind. The name 'FantasySquare' is probably one of the few, if not the only FF site(s) that doesn't have 2 words in them. The last two and half years have brought numerous memories for me. I've seen so many FF sites come and go. A few examples are FF8world, FFDownloads, Next Final Fantasy. I remember we used to host Next Final Fantasy and they were a very popular site around one and a half years back. Sites rise and fall. So what actually causes such a fall? The most common reasons that I've encountered as a webmaster are basically three things. Money, Time and People. Money is by far the most common reason. Almost all webmasters get their income from banner advertisements. Maybe they'll get $0.05 per click. The ugly fact is that most banner companies are actually hoaxes. How would I know, you may ask. Simple. Because I was a victim of it as well. An example of two companies are Eads.com and Dimeclicks.com. They are no longer on the net now if you try accessing their webpage. It all boils down to the point that any site without integrity is heading straight towards failure. Time consumption is another factor. Many people think that the job of a webmaster is pretty easy. All we need to do is to update. That is so wrong. Why? Because not only do we have to update the site, we'll need to scout for resources, answer emails, re-design the site every now and then, and not to mention the most feared, debugging of scripts. If you think setting up a forum is nothing more than installing a program, then you are really wrong. Colour selecting and debugging is a major pain. Sometimes, the people visiting the site could cause the site to go down. Simple examples include people who don't give support to the site and it's staff, diss at the site. This is found especially common in guestbooks. I remember the first time I received an insult through email and I didn't really know how to handle it. It's very common for new webmasters to blow their top back directly at the insulter. After time, I grew to realise that it isn't very professional, and neither is it a good way to solve the problem. It only makes you feel more sad and angry at the same time. Let's get back to FantasySquare again. When we started version 1.0, there was this site called FantasyNet that stole our website's layout and claim it as theirs. After a confrontation, the webmaster teared down the entire site. It was a good move alright, since FantasySquare is a registered business entity in Singapore. If you're local, you can check out the Registry of Business. You'll see our name in the records. Next came version 2.0. It was a tough work, but I got the inspiration from a hardcopy bulletin. For a screenshot of version 2.0, click here. If you've looked at the screenshot, you would have noticed that we did hosting previously. But that was a long time ago. We don't do site hosting now. We used to have a troublemaker on our staff who got upset whenever a new staff member joins. This was because he felt that he wanted to the be 'pioneer' of FS, because it gave him 'power'. Later after he was dismissed from the staff, he went to other sites spreading bad propaganda about FS. I recall him saying things such as 'the webmaster sends nude pictures to his staff'. It's pretty amazing how slanderous people can get. There was also a guy at that point of time who promised that he'll be writing a FS RPG, most probably in Flash. I accepted him into the staff and waited. More waiting was done, and it never came. We came and confronted him. He apologised, and then said he would show me the game via his FTP. I went into his FTP and I found nothing except for a shooting game by Tribes. He's been removed from the staff ever since. Till now, I still don't know his purpose of joining us. Was it for fame? I don't think so. FS wasn't such a popular site at that point of time. I guess it'll only remain as a mystery. Version 3.0 was a breakthrough for us. I remember when Titus, one of our ex-designers show me the images, it was totally breathtaking and completely different from version 2.0. It's like we moved on to a higher level. At that point of time, we were still using banner ads to generate our income. After accumulating around $30.00, a check was supposed to be coming from eads.com, but never did. They deleted our account, saying that we broke the rule: "Your entire site must be in English". That's what I call totally absurb. Isn't that the same as cheating? Later we changed an advertising company to dimeclicks.com. The same thing happened. We accumulated about $30-40, and then their company went burst. I guess people can get really unlucky at times. Like Forest Gump says, "Life is like a box of chocolates. You'll never know what you're going to get." Version 4.0 was supposed to be on work. A few staff members and myself have actually managed to take a look at the screenshots and PSD files. Version 4.0 was scrapped as Titus felt that it wasn't really up to standard and was not good enough to be released. Many people thought that we were lazing around and not doing anything. It's weird how people blindly assume things sometimes. But I've learnt that as webmaster, there are bound to be people that I cannot please. It's a sad but undeniable fact. So, instead of releasing 4.0, we decided to upgrade to version 3.5 instead. Click here for a screenshot. Version 3.5 was when the FS Big Bang occured. So what is the FS big bang? You might ask. It was a time when some people in the community started a 'rebellion', insulting me and a few others on the forum board. Eventually they got banned. Although some of them said that they won't return, they keep constantly coming back, re-registering, posting critical remarks, coming in to our chat rooms and say things like 'FS will die....' as well as insults to me. It was a tough time for myself. At that point of time, I was really discouraged. I remember asking myself what caused them to react in such a way. Do people really enjoy hurting one another? Back when I was at my lowest moments, I remember people like my sweetheart, Ling and one of my online buddies, Chris (Archangel) on my phone/chat room, constantly encouraging me to hold on. I nearly let go of FS, but after some thought, I realised that it'll be much better if I held on to it. Chris told me that the reason why he left FS previously was because of people like them who played elitist in the forums. People like you may wonder why I would get so upset over such a matter. It's simply because, the staff really work hard to providing a service for FF fans and crude remarks are what we get back in return. We don't even charge a fee for using our service. Notice that there are no banner advertisements on our site at all? But for our efforts seem to be not appreciated. We are students as well, we need to study to as well. Our entire life don't resolve around the site itself. Why are people trying to carry our responsibility on their shoulders? Gathering all my years I lived, I began thinking about many things. Many a time, people disappoint us. They do things that we least expect them to do. It destroys the ideal image we have in our minds. People flare up, trying to cover their hurt inside. I do know that those people whom we've banned off from FS during the Big Bang are probably pretty sad people now. They constantly come back, even though they said they were leaving. Why are people back for? I believe it's because they are hurt deep down inside, and they want to channel it elsewhere, wanting people to experience the pain with them. Finally version 5.0 is out, after a long wait for slightly more than one year. We have finally moved from stage to stage, glory to glory throughout these years. Sure, there are many ups and downs, but the good definitely outweights the bad. Wow, I've written quite a lot. I never wrote an article before. This is my first time. It's really long, but those were my heartfelt feelings. Throughout the past two and a half years, there were many memories. Good and bad ones. I've made many friends as well. I've lost some of them, but there are still who are some of my best buddies around. But the most important lesson that I've learnt is... The most miserable people are not those who have no money or time, but rather those people who refuse to let go of their hurts, constantly holding on to the pain, hoping some day to return it. That day will never come. That's why version 5.0 is here. |
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