Yes, it is official.  We are moving our support group to its new home, which will be hosted at Yuku.  It turned out to be the best and most easily adapted format of all the ones available to us.  And, even though it seems to be totally different from what we know here, it truly is very similar and easy to navigage.  We are grateful to the members who joined us there to take the place for a test run these past few weeks, and I really believe that you will like all the new features that it offers to us.

 

Following is the letter that I am sending to our current members via the contact option here.  I will be following that message with another from our Yahoo! account to anyone who does not respond to this one. 

 

I do have to warn you that we are sure to lose some of our members during this change.  Some will not want to move with us, we will be unable to contact some of them and some will feel that they no longer need the information and support of our group.  That mirrors the changes that take place in our own, very personal and unique lives and we will honor the choices that our dear and beloved friends make.

 

Here is the letter:

 

Dear Sompeople Members!

 

Hello!!

 

This is probably the most important message that we have sent to you, and I hope that you

take the time to read it, because we do not want to lose contact with you.

 

For the past two and a half years, I have been aware that MSN was in the process of

closing their Groups service, which is where our website is currently hosted.  Since the loss

of our first couple of sites, we have maintained minimally constructed web presenses where

we could regroup in the event that our main site suddenly disappeared, making us well

prepared for what is happening now.

 

A month ago the closing was made official.  MSN Groups will cease exist in February,

2009.  You should have received an e-mail directly from MSN regarding this.  We are

grateful to MSN for giving us the luxury of such a generous amount of time to make new

arrangements for our support group.

 

During the past month I have rebuilt our site, after much experimentation, at one of our other online presenses, Yuku.

 

We discussed this move in this thread, which you may or may not find interesting:

 

 

It is a forum format and is a bit different from what we have here, but the members who

agreed to help us test its capabilities and kick the tires seem to agree that whilst it is

different from what we find familiar, it is fairly easy to navigate and use.  All of our pages

are there, but without the left-hand menu column. All of our past threads and messages are

being archived and will also be availble by next February.

 

One excellent feature there is that the basic site is viewable to anyone who wanders by, but

all member sharing, all personal information and most of our formal links are available only

to registered members.

 

So, this is your official invitation to join us there.  Even though most of our members have

not participated in our group for along time, I know that many of you still visit because I

can see that on our activity meter.

 

As of this date, I will be directing new applicants there, as well.

 

To join there, please go to this link:

 

 

Go to any board thread and click on Reply.  You will then be taken to Yuku's registration forms. 

If you are already a member of EZBoards (the previous incarnation of Yuku) you can use

that membership to apply to our new site.  I want to assure you that our new site will be

just as safe as our current one and that Jeanie and I will continue to screen new applicants

to keep our support group as secure and friendly as it has always been.

 

about yourself that I will know and, most importantly, your current e-mail address.  Many

of our members (including me!) have used throw-away e-mail accounts to join and no

longer use those.  Additionally, several of us have moved to different ISP (internet service

providers) and no longer have those associated accounts. 

 

Please join us at our new home.  It is more colourful than what we now have; there are

some truly cool options for members, which includes your own page and blog, a real-time

chat function and lots more.

 

Just so that you don't get lost, here again is the link to our new site:

 

 

I may follow-up with personal e-mails to those from whom we do not hear back.  If you

are no longer interested in being a member of our group, you may post so on our MSN site

or you may contact me at our Yahoo! account.  If you have lost track of that address, it

can be found on our MSN site in our Documents.

 

Wishing you well on your SOM journey,
Juds