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.
When you create your Yuku membership, you may choose any new nickname that you like,
but when you make application to our actual site, please reference your nickname from our MSN
site in your message to us, a bit of information 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