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Calamity Refuge is a small online community, featuring a chat, forum, wiki, and a variety web application services to its members. Calamity Refuge was founded in 2008 and, up to 2014, was funded solely by member donations. In 2014, Calamity Refuge was consolidated into the legal entity Calamity Refuge, LLC which owns Cloudsoarer Hosting and Design. Since 2013, CalRef stands as the longest living social community to originate from the Spiderweb Software membership, surpassing Shadowvale, The Lyceum, and Desperance (among others) by years. CalRef has seen over one hundred and eighty members, more than twenty five thousand posts, and upwards of six hundred fifty thousand words to its RPs. The organization's headquarters are currently located in Denver, Colorado.
History (2008)
Keira Aro originally created Calamity Refuge Forums in early 2008 for school friends at Whitehall High school to a moderately low level of success. Over the next several months, the site was rebranded and marketed to Spiderweb Software's forums and Shadowvale publically, citing instability in Spiderweb's UBB and the recent death of the previous satellite, Polaris. Slowly, members did register due, in part, to a private campaign to recruit members that received less than desirable treatment due to poor online etiquette. Consequently, the platform for joining Calamity Refuge Forums was that it was a community of deregulation in the face of Spiderweb elitism.
One unintended consequence of this strategy was, through all of its estranged Spiderweb members, CalRef was reinforced to carry the impression of a rowdy bunch of vulgar unmannered kids. In the golden age of SW membership being composed of academics in science and engineering, new registration was hindered greatly. Calamity Refuge, itself, was a website which served as a BoA and BoE repository for graphics and scenarios. By August 2009, the first Calamity Refuge Census was launched, which centered around the question of the main site's use. Ultimately, it was removed and Calamity Refuge Forums became Calamity Refuge and served as the front page for the address.
Although members chose to enjoy the relatively lax rules via posting games in the Spam Board, the primary activity at CalRef was participation in the RPs. Created by Keira, Fanciful Tales and Wild Stories of the Refuge was the first RP and initially inspired by the events that took place on the forums themselves. Players would create a character in their own name and occasionally additional characters for plot support. OOC topics and the chat would be used to generate plot ideas well into early hours, and the RP Wiki would serve as a knowledge base for people, places, and items.
Fanciful tales would grow to become the most successful RP and CalRef and the only one that reached its full conclusion. The combined word counts of FT and its sequel, Rebirth, add to four thousand words more than the entire Lord of the Rings trilogy. When posting began to slow in FT, Luca created the RP A New World Opens, designed to be welcoming to players who arrived too late to feel properly at home in the FTaWSotR setting. It is regarded as the second most successful RP, matching with FT in monthly word additions during its peak at thirty thousand, and occasionally outnumbering it in posts.
History (2009)
The following year was, by far, the most active to date. In a sense, it was a year of extremes in terms of both peace and strife. More than a third of all topics and half of all posts in CalRef's history occurred in 2009 and the size of the RPs grew by 450%. The first administrator and moderator firings occurred in this time, as well as the Conflict with Shadowvale, the unofficial death of ANWO, and the creation of the AJAX Chat.
Following the founding, staff positions were assigned to prominent SW members who expressed an interest in the responsibility. Coupled with the expectation of a uncontrollable spike in membership, CalRef saw a hire rate markedly disproportionate to the non-staff rate of membership. By January, the number of staff members reached twelve with a relatively equal number of active non-staff members. This state drew further criticism that a number of the mods were inactive or unqualified for the work. However, the first change made to the authority roster in 2009 was the unexpected removal of Vergil as an administrator. Vergil was the most active member and exhibited the most energy in expanding Calamity Refuge's presence and preserving its continuity. Consequently, Vergil was the first moderator to be raised to administrator, with Jewels following closely. Privately, however, relations between Vergil and Keira were tense. The two had different ideas of ideal behavior and visions for where CalRef was going.
Following a series of bannings at SW and heated debates in private, Vergil publically announced that he had stepped down as an admin in April. This was a move to save face also appeared in FTaWSotR, with an underlying tone to match the reality of the events. Following his removal, Vergil maintained the rather rebellious attitude towards establishment that had characterized his administration. This, however, conflicted with the consensus of where to draw the line in the chat at the time. As a result, Vergil found himself frequently banned from the chat, occasionally without cause. In response, Keira sent a warning to all moderators not to abuse their power "Because, so help me god, I will make Vergil a mod.". Vergil was reinstated as a moderator in early May. Although not to much note, CalRef maintained its three admin tradition during this time, as Nioca was raised to the position to assist with theming issues on the forums and wiki in late May. This position was considered temporary, but with the sometimes implicitly stated offer that it remain permanent if Nioca was so interested.
By this time, the question over too many staff members was becoming pressing and represented a similar power class divide between the average member and a staff member. The imbalance of power and equal treatment of members, per CR's founding platform, were beginning to be connected to the current situation. The prominent suggestion was to collect resignations from inactive and disinterested staff members and consolidate the rest to a few number of global mods with more scope and responsibilities. However, the conversation came to a close the next day as attention shifted to the first Vergil incident.
The Vergil Crisis
Early in the day on May 23rd, Vergil had been silently removed from the staff and issued a permanent ban from Keira for tampered with the wiki in a manner that was considered vandalism. This has been the only time where an active staff member has been banned. Several member of the lower staff protested Vergil's treatment, Jewels also did so via backchannel politics. Nalyd had himself banned for similar activity to display civil disobedience on the matter. Following negotiations over the next day, Luca arranged Vergil's unban provided he would be monitored closely. Little additional information on the matter is publicly available.
Following the incident, Keira made the decision in June to cut the number of staff to eight, with two admins, three local mods, and three global mods (including Nioca, who indicated a desire returning to mod work, and stepped down the following month). The decision was received positively, although some questioned whether it went far enough to separate the patrician/plebeian issues between members and staff. Following the staff cut decision, Nioca's return to mod work marked the creation of the eighth staff, which lasted almost a year and a half - the second longest to date.
The Conflict with Shadowvale
On July 12th 2009, Ackrovan, who was also a prominent global mod at CalRef at the time, made a basic rubric outline for grading Spiderweb's Blades scenarios and posted it to Shadowvale. The next day, following no replies, the topic was locked with the message "No one cares. Get off my forum." by the moderator, Andraste. On Shadowvale, Nikki created a topic celebrating Andraste's remark with following comments about how it was unfortunate she could not ban Ackrovan as well. The response in CalRef was a topic by Ackrovan that directly criticized poor treatment of new members, essentially stating that Shadowvale was deregulated form of Spiderweb for established members, as CalRef was a deregulated form of Spiderweb for new members; consequently, a boycott was in order.
The actions after this point were specifically intended to elicit a hostile response on the grounds of offense Ackrovan never personally felt, he would later say. Nevertheless, the effect was tangible. At least five member resigned their accounts at Shadowvale and a deep conversation about where the two forums stood in the world began. A host of Shadowvale members registered at CalRef to discuss the issue and give testimony on their experiences in the various Spiderweb satellite communities up to that point. Ultimately, the conflict paved the way for the rapid abandonment and death of Shadowvale as well as laid the foundation for the SW member revival in 2012 and 2013.
History (2010)
2010 saw a significant drop off in activity as interest in the posting games waned, ANWO made it's final post, and creativity for FT dwindled. Despite the poor numbers in the forums, the chat was arguably more active than ever before, as members began drugding through the most difficult times of their lives. Depression affected the majority of members as the became more aware of who they were in the world. This can be indicated by the 2010 census, which reported that 42.1% of members were not straight, with an additional 15.8% uncertain. This report was disputed immediately as being conceivably impossible and, therefore, rigged or the product of fads and teenage inhibitions. Although many members kept their answers to themselves - both on the forums and in real life - the realization had begun and colored a good deal of some member's high school experience.
Occasionally, it has been stated that the falloff in interest in RP writing could be attributed to an online web browser game that Keira introduced to CalRef in late February, known as Astro Empires. While featuring little to no graphics, the logistics of the game made it remarkably addictive and time consuming. Zoe served as the posterchild of someone consumed completely by its strategy and politics. Both Zoe and Jewels would, in a relatively short period of time, find themselves in positions of leadership among the members of the MMO. Their following inspired private boards at CalRef in posting attack locations and political discussion privately. Mainstream activity in the game would fade out by September, but Zoe would maintain her leadership position across a host of servers well into 2011.
The Second Vergil Crisis
In March, Vergil became the target of another ban, primarily due to an altercation with Erin and Johnny, real life friends of Keira who were at the same physical location at the time of the incident. This event, and the citation of a progression of unruly behavior was cited when the ban came to a vote to ban him permanently. The argument for the ban included his history of rowdy behavior and how this will continue for as long as the staff allowed it, that Luca had failed in her requirement to keep Vergil in check from the previous ban the year before, and that Vergil's aggression was a threat to the wellbeing of CalRef as a whole. The argument against stated that the altercation was reported out of proportion, Vergil's actions (while against the rule) were consistent with administration's similar actions, and that Vergil was a pillar of the community and friend to more people than foe. The motion was defeated 2-5 and a three month ban was instituted instead.
This decision largely influenced current policy at the Refuge. Like the members, themselves, who were becoming more self aware, CalRef was also becoming self aware and determining its position and function. The platform of freedom from Spiderweb elitism was no longer particularly applicable, as direct affiliation there had dwindled and interest in the company in general had been reduced. Officially, rules did not change in 2010, nor did staff change, beyond Ackrovan's resignation due to inactivity. But the movement started to build that members were to be treated more personally than at larger forums because bannings had serious life consequences and might separate members from the only friends they had. This position would generate great controversy in later years. The primary change this year brought was the rise of Facebook. Although Facebook existed earlier than this, 2010 marked a change to where most CalRef member combined their social circles. Never before had members connected as personally as they had before this time, which built upon the moment of the end of the previous year.
History (2011)
2011 can be characterized as being the most stable. The amount of posts and topics reached a consistent rate and a level that is appropriate for the size of the community. By this year, Calamity Refuge was on its sixth hosting server. Having made it through Freewebs, smf4u, FSH, ProfuseHost, and Zymic, CalRef was now being hosted on FatCow under personal support from Jewels. Jewels, herself, was beginning to become scarce. Without a doubt, Jewels was the most popular admin to date,
functioning as a loving mother figure with a kind word and piece of wisdom for everyone. However, the revelations that came with the 2010 census on orientation and the subsequent changes within the FT universe brought a different and more same-sex friendly atmosphere to CalRef which collided with Jewels' personal religious beliefs.
CalRef saw a resurgence of RP threads such as GnG, PS, and UtSS which were created as a call back to the glory days of intense writing in the RP board of previous years. But FTaWSotR was officially dead with the last post being made in 2010, there would not be another. Jewels was the primary writer for FT and the RP resurgence, itself, was to be short lived due in part to people's busy lives and a steady exodus of prominent contributors from years passed. The idea of FT was not dead, however, and in June, Jewels created Rebirth, which functioned effectively as a sequel to FT. But this time, the story had little to nothing to do with events that occurred in the community itself. Rebirth, then, existed as a way to continue and eventually conclude the story. No other writers contributed to this RP.
Keira created RadioRefuge this year. It would turn out to be the most successful activity since the RP days. Members would request songs that they wanted to hear in advance and live commentary by Keira would take place between tracks. Keira would also place calls to volunteers' phone numbers and air conversations and impromptu interviews. Despite being unscripted and riddled with technical difficulties, never before had members been able to hear one another's voices. The result was a popular program with the slogan "Unprofessionalism at its finest."
Following Jewels' decreasing activity, Zoe was appointed to administrator in November to fill the long-empty third admin position, which had been vacant since Nioca abdicated in June. This was an unexpected change that brought relatively few changes. Zoe was generally popular with members due to her good looks and casual attitude. Keira stated that her position in administration would be to serve as a backup in case anything were to happen to the other two admins, but some (Namely, Luca) questioned whether this appointment was solely because of Keira's romantic interests in Zoe. Although Keira would later acknowledge that this was true, it formed a rift between Luca and Keira that would not be bridged for another two years.
History (2012)
Without question, 2012 was the year marred by the most conflict, controversy, and significant staff changes. This was the year that the CR Moderator Elections took place, it was also the year in which Zoe brought My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic into the cultural mainstream. The popularity and associated activity would take off with brute force in the following months to a polarized reception. In February, Keira relocated the hosting to a paid server powered by Rackspace, marking the first time that the arch-administrator had sole control over the hosting of CalRef, leading to a notable increase in uptime and technical stability. 2012 was also the year of the first CalRef Minecraft server, the popularity of which would surpass all expectations.
Following their second break up in 2010, tensions between Sudanna and Luca had reached almost memeical levels by early 2012. Open fights and conflicts were common, which placed Administration in an awkward position, as both members were prominent moderators. Sudanna's use of the Ligrev bot to override ignore settings in the chat was cited for his removal from the staff, as well as why /ligrev commands were restricted to admins in AJAX. Since the disagreements continued, subsequent to the staff change, the next growing concern was over whether or not Luca posed a threat to Sudanna when it came to the potential to abuse mod power, similarly to the same issues Vergil experienced in mid 2009. Ultimately, the opposition to Sudanna's removal and the question of whether it was right for Luca to continue being a moderator led to the Calamity Refuge Moderator Elections.
CR Moderator Elections
With both Luca and Sudanna having fallen out of favour with Keira, and the feeling that the staff needed to recover from a 4:3 moderator-administrator ratio, Keira launched the election poll on April 12th. Any suggestion of a candidate would be accepted, provided they "Have logged in in the last ten days, have at least ten posts, and didn't have any major infractions on record.". All current staff were automatically candidates and Rowen and Actaeon were granted acceptance by administration. The availability included two global positions and five local positions, with top ranking candidates free to choose their roles, with administration ruling in case of conflict.
Votes slowly started to come in throughout that day. The first platforms poked fun at Keira's arbitrary distribution of icons and coloured names to members in the chat. Vergil entered the conversation, noncommittally registering, but his candidacy was vetoed by Keira on the grounds of "not having any major infractions on record." As Actaeon created a satirical Luca/Sudanna 2012 poster, he had discovered that he was actually in the lead with eighteen percent of the vote and first out of a field of thirteen candidates. He would respond by affirming in the debate topic that he was unqualified for the position, although he wouldn't turn it down if offered.
Luca held the staunch position that the elections should be cancelled, as popular vote for moderation was a slippery slope to corrupt psudo-candidates, with kickbacks being given out to the people who put the potential mods in power. A backlash followed, indicating that Luca was threatened by the democratic process removing her from the position she conned and manipulated his way into. In a show of civil disobedience, Luca struck her name from the poll, removing her from contention in the elections. Critics within staff ranks and outside viewed this as a confirmation of corruption, and that vote tallies could have been tampered with during the striking. Keira responded by removing all moderators from their positions during the remainder of the elections.
Despite the political backlash from the edit, the conversation on the merits of the election continued, which evolved to concern three major pros and three major cons to the idea of CalRef moderator elections at large. These would form the points used for supporters on the respective sides of the issue.
The Arguments Against:
A popular vote for moderators was a slippery slope to corrupt candidates.
Spiderweb and Shadowvale members who registered accounts from the Conflict with Shadowvale, and hadn't been seen since, were registering votes in the elections on grounds of private personal connections with the candidates, without knowledge of day-to-day events life or events at CalRef.
The combination of seven moderators and three administrators would revive the 2008 staff/non-staff social divide
The Arguments For:
Keira is the arch-administrator and, as such, has the authority to create staff appointments in whatever manner she deems appropriate.
Moderators hold a purely symbolic role, and rarely need to use their powers, if ever.
Democracy is fair, by definition.
Testimonies on both sides followed in tones ranging between deeply frustrated and rage. Later in the day, Keira cancelled the elections and forwarded the question of staff positions to the administration.
Fallout
The resulting appointments abolished the global moderator position. Following the poll edit, Luca carried a stigma of corruption and instability. Internally, questions were raised about whether she had any place on the staff. Primary moderation was to be taken over by Nioca and Sudanna, Azuma would remain over Spam and the Ligrev's Lounge. Following the same dilemma over the conflict between Luca and Sudanna, fearing now Luca would be unfairly treated since now Sudanna was a mod, Luca was given a symbolic mod position over the chat board. Tensions would remain high between between all members as real life stress intensified. Following a series of confrontations, Sudanna became temporarily banned from the chat, arguing that rules on conduct in the chat were a form of control and wouldn't be bent to anyone's will. They were removed as a moderator in early May. As a result, of their time in April and May not counting for a majority of either month, it was insufficient to quality on the Refuge Staff Records.
In August, a confrontation between Luca and Slarty broke out, which resulted in Slarty being kicked from the chat. Slarty lobbied for Luca's removal from the staff, citing that no reason for the kick or warning had been given. Following the fallout of the moderator election, it did not take a great deal of convincing and Luca was suspended from the staff for the next two months, later reduced In Absentia.
The Next Era
2012 continued and the changes it brought almost rivalled 2009 in scope. In June, Luca moved to Colorado and, shortly after, Zoe and Luca became the first members to meet another member in person. Later that month, another meeting would occur between Zoe, Luca, and Vergil.
In October, Keira changed the platform for the forums from SMF 2 to phpBB 3, citing general griefs SMF was causing with regards to permissions settings, code support, and character set handling. This change had a mixed reception, as the phpBB system files were easier to manage and alter, but didn't carry as many features for its members. One notable effect of this change was permissions for moderators, which were identical to global moderator positions in SMF. The time investment estimated to restore the old system was deemed too costly for its benefits, and all local moderator positions were promoted to global moderators. Local moderator positions would not be seen again.
Although it's unclear if this was affected by recent events this year, Actaeon became active during this time, becoming the first consistent member to join in two years. His presence marked the beginning of the SW member revival, preceding the arrival of Dintiradan, Arancaytar, Tyranicus, Nikki, Dikiyoba, and others. As many people registered or returned in this time as those who had joined CalRef in its founding. Some, who had previously only registered to participate in the Shadowvale conflict. These members did not participate in the forums at large, but had a large impact on the chat and came to be the core members of the Calamity Refuge Minecraft server, which became most popular activity since the RPs.
Minecraft
Minecraft, itself, was run by a series of operators, primarily Keira and Luca, who oversaw regulations, server features, an file management. The first iteration of the servers is referred to as 'Vanilla' and did not featuring any major client mods. This server lasted officially from August 2012 to May of 2013, although its use would diminish well before that end date. The structures that were created during this time were some of the most magnificent of the Minecraft era itself. Following an erroneous command to reformat the map viewer data, the entire contents of the world was deleted. The operators requested Arancaytar's help in restoring the server, based on his extensive experience with programming and the Linux OS. After days of intensive work, Aran restored approximately 98% of the world data and was directly made the third CalRef Minecraft operator. Because of the lack of client mods, this server was the only one to be replaced due to inactivity instead of instability and, as such, was available to be downloaded as a personal copy until Minecraft, itself, changed the way it generated seeds, years later, and did not allow the map to be generated beyond its original bounds.
In the rest of the site, radio shows became less frequent, although they retained their listenership. As call-ins from members became more technically challenging to maintain, local interviews with college dormmates took their place. In early December, a radio broadcast featured the surprise guest Luca, which revealed that in the last couple of days Keira had moved in with her across the country, and the two had been in a private relationship for months.
The final event to occur in 2012, was the unexpected resignation of Jewels as administrator. Citing no longer feeling connected to her members, Jewels submitted her resignation to Keira privately at the end of December. She is the second longest serving admin to date.
History (2013)
2013 can be defined as the sleepiest year at CalRef, with the majority of activity taking place on the chat, and various Minecraft servers. Statistical data on forum activity during this time is not available, as it was a feature lost during the transition to phpBB 3. In May, Arancayar replaced Nioca as a global moderator, due to inactivity. Rebirth also took off during this time, as Jewels surpassed the word count for the entire ANWO RP, single handedly. Following the success the previous year, the Minecraft Board was created in May. Although twenty private or temporary boards were created in the meantime, the Minecraft Board became the first major, permanent, and public board to be created since the Ligrev's Lounge board was created four years earlier.
Tekkit
The replacement server to Vanilla known as Refugia and was the first to use the Technic launcher to manage client mods adding a great deal of new content, however it became unstable almost immediately and was discontinued before many players knew it existed. The following server was known as Tekkit, after its modpack. The mods in Tekkit were much more oriented to advanced technology, such as advanced personal armor suits with increased abilities and mobility, electricity, advanced lighting, and alternate dimensions. Overall reception was positive, primarily because this style of Minecraft play was new and untested. However, one of the main drawbacks to this server was that technological advancement was hyperbolic and players who did not spend a great deal of time on the server would find themselves technologically obsolete to players who did. Additionally, player didn't have a great deal of time to create a great deal of architectural constructs since the same amount of time that an impressive building took to build would be spent on constructing a single solar array block. Eventually, Tekkit would become unplayable due to the instability between its high number of mods.
Sopris
The replacement was called Sopris, and is likely the most successful of the servers. It lasted officially from June of 2013 to May of 2014 and featured weekly or biweekly updates on new features and bug fixes from the operators. Sopris was a custom mod pack created by the operators to combine the best of the flexibility in the new features from Tekkit, without including the time-sink technology mod so that player could focus on more aesthetic personal projects again. However, as with Tekkit, the multitude of mods became unstable and the server could no longer run itself. This would be the last server in which Arancaytar was an operator.
History (2014)
2014 saw the largest shift at CalRef since it was created. Immediately in January, an unexpected update was released which had been in development for several months prior. This was called CalRef II and contained large, simultaneous updates for all systems, including the forums returning to SMF, revamps for files.calref and l.calref, as well as a completely new chat system made from scratch by Arancaytar. Sy, Aran, and Luca released frequent updates and bugfixes over the next several months that improved functionality and visual appeal. This year marked the return of the greatest period of conflict-free interaction, activity spiked on the chat, and even spread to the forums as the quote collection game returned from 2008.
Based on previous work and dedication to the site, Luca was made an administrator in June.
Minecraft
The Eleren Minecraft server was launched in May and featured a slightly different take on the age-old system, by making small confined city-worlds where players would build up and develop, with rotating resource worlds available through portals. The two cities were expected to be in competition with one another, with diplomatic matters handled through their elected leadership. This was a relatively popular system at first, as it allowed players to work more closely with one another and create more advanced methods of building. However, it was prone to creating conflict outside the game when conspiracy and factional warfare become too intense. Ultimately, this type of server seemed to require consistent group activity. Therefore, when interest began to fade with one member, the effect spread rapidly to everyone else.
Minecraft had finally come to an end with all activity dropping below a level sustainable for the traditionally well-maintained servers. To accommodate members still interested in Minecraft, Spade was launched in August. It was launched as Vanilla and was intended to remain running with minimal maintenance and intervention required by administration. This service is still running.
Elsewhere
Replacing the energy previously devoted to Minecraft, the forum's RP board saw the largest amount of activity since 2009. At the end of 2013 Zoe launched From the Ashes, a new original Fantasy RP, which quickly rose to become the third most successful RP if FT and Rebirth are considered one in the same.
Following with activity trends, CalRef's Facebook page was closed and switched to a Steam group as games such as TF2 and Warframe gained prominent status as Refuge pass-times.