On the guestbook I’ve noticed a couple (not many) comments on “stuff disappearing” from this board, expressing the inevitable worries that it may have been “removed by moderators” for whatever reason.

A few weeks ago a server upgrade unfortunately led to other technical problems; meant that many had to spend an entire weekend re-installing the board and recreating the databases where your messages are held. This was done using backup files; sadly, some data was lost.

The bulk of the messages were from the middle of October, but I’ve since noticed that quite a few other bits and pieces got trashed, including earlier posts, guestbook entries and even alterations to users profiles (like your sig or avatar). This is through no fault of Dr Bunsen and his mate who worked through an entire weekend to get PV back up and running again – but like any computer system crashes and bugs can happen.

Several of my own posts disappeared; including the part review of the 2004-10-16 Reading rave and the press coverage and my comments; plus a bunch of other stuff. I was quite gutted as it was a good party as well and I was gonna do a full review on it…Worse still, this happened around the time when traffic and discussions were really picking up 🙁

Although it’s already been explained in another thread and in the guestbook exactly what went on, I realise that those who may just lurk here, post occasionally or who have perhaps registered and perhaps found your profile or posts mysteriously gone may be thinking “WTF are they playing at here?”

You may even being be worried about posting here in case this board is flakey, or stuff is being arbitrarily deleted. Fear not – if any moderators find it necessary to alter or remove anything posted by someone else for security or other reasons, we will add a note saying why it happened and/or warn the user if applicable – as is the practice on all other boards, including the more “unmoderated” ones!

This doesn’t happen very often though, and when it does its normally to protect people themselves – we do after all sometimes tread a fine line…

PS: A Partyvibe pipe and slippers (or for the ladies, a fake Burberry shopping trolley) to anyone who recognises the lyrics reference in the subject line 😀