TC.net Archive

We all need the old site back at least as an archive. I've just emailed Southo to see what I can do to get the old site back after having a difficult fucking time researching info for my X73 and 1UZ swap. I'm very motivated to get an archive going at least, but I will need help. Would any of you be willing to help out? I've got skills building and running websites, but they're pretty rusty. I can also front $$$ to get the domain and content back, but I'm only a poor college student with so much available. This could be a good project if you guys can help.

Let me know.

Mike

I'd be interested depending on what all is needed. Report back when you hear from him

Thanks Boxy! Will do.

I'm new around here, but if I can help out just let me know!

I've spoken with Southo via email. He has had offers in the $500 to $1500 range, but he isn't holding out for anybody in particular, which is good. However, his most recent correspondence stated that offers must be made by 5pm Friday, June 15th (Sydney time btw)... in less than a week.

That means either I or a group of us would need to come up with a decent amount of money very quickly. I can't do that myself, and I'm not sure we have the amount of people needed to come up with that dough. Plus, there's all that legal ownership crap if that did happen.

Is anyone on here one of the people that have made genuine offers? I would certainly like to help out in some way. That might be the only way with such sort notice of a deadline.

So is the goal to transplant everything over to this site or re-open tc.net actively or only as a archive? Either which way I would love to help out, I don't have the $1500 to spare but definitely $20 to help out.

Personally, I would love to have tc.net re-open. I'm passionate enough about these old grandma cars that I can settle just for an archive as well. Southo is selling the .com and .net domains as well, so re-opening is a possibility.

What's at stake is about $1500 Southo has put in to the tc.net website over the course of its lifetime. He's merely looking to recoup as much of that as possible. If the current two offers fall through, then he will wait till he gets some sort of reasonable compensation. I say we start a "fundraiser" or something here to get the funds up to help him out. Maybe Kickstarter?

I really want this to happen, because these are really great cars, a lot of fun, and we aren't like the sports car crowds with 135135 different forums to choose from.

any way i can help ill do it how bout we bet some meets and cruises happening use as a fund raiser

Hard for me to meet up being half the world away, and I don't think there's too many Cressida guys near me in Connecticut haha. I support that idea though.

It looks like there WILL be interest, just not for a while. It sucks too that JZXProject is not a friendly place to be for info. I will see what I can do this fall about getting the domain names and data, but unless we get a lot of people together ASAP, it's going to be a while before I can get the funds up to buy the stuff.

But, KEEP POSTING HERE IF YOU ARE INTERESTED IN DONATING MONEY TO A KICKSTARTER! Once I get ten people on board, I'll take a look at what's involved in a Kickstarter fundraiser. If I can extend the deadline long enough, and you guys can advertise hard enough, we can make things happen.

Sorry about being so late to the party. Has there been any movement or updates to this? I would definitely be interested in at least an archive set-up. I know that there was some talk over a celicasupra.com about wanting tc.net as an archive as well. I would be willing to donate to a kick start campaign as well.

Here's some more details copied from an email by Jason (Southo) the owner:

At the time the forums were closed, they were hosted on a Dreamhost.com.au server at approx $120.00 per year
(That server is now lapsed as it was due around the start of May and I didn't renew it)
Domains are anywhere from $10-$15 a year depending on where you host them - TC.net and TC.com were both at Go-Daddy at $11.99 a year each.
There were 3 fully paid-up sponsors at $50 each. At the time of closing, they were offered a pro-rata refund - 2 from memory took it up, one said don't worry as it was only about $20 ( renewal for sponsors was July)
The VBul forum licence was a one off payment from many years ago when I first set it up from memory it was $200-$250, but it could do with an upgrade to the latest version (V5) which is $249.00 (one off) or you can run the free trial version (or Version 4 etc) There are also many other free forum programs available - I am not sure how easy they would be to merge the old data from, so my suggestion would be to use a V-Bul version.

At the moment - I just have a folder on my hard drive with all the files that Dreamhost gave me from the server when it was closed. They are not stand-alone files, (from what I can see) so if you want to get the data from them - then you would need to merge these files with the new software.

Basically, the forums paid for themselves on an ongoing basis - income of $150 and actual costs of about $144.00. for the last 2 years. Prior to that, it was all funded by me out of my own pocket.
It was never set up to be a profit making venture.

He spent roughly $1450 of his own money running the site. Jason would like to recoup as much as possible, but he won't give it away for some ridiculous amount. Someone mentioned selling bumper stickers in another post to raise funds. I'm thinking that maybe a Kickstarter fund would work. I personally don't think we have the membership here.... yet. However, we need to keep getting people interested and committed with their $$$. Keep advertising.

At some point this next year, I may just buy it all myself if fundraising doesn't work. I'd rather not have to do that though.

Would you like or mind if I tried to get some "bring back tc.net" stickers to sell to make money for the cause? My best friends dad owns a shop that does signs, banners, and full auto body wraps. I'm sure stickers are child's play for him! If its something your interested in just let me know

What kind of costs and prices would we be looking at?

I took a look at Kickstarter, and they don't allow fundraising for a cause such as restarting TC.net. There's other crowsourcing/crowdfunding sites I'll look into. Do any of you have recommendations for sites other than Kickstarter?

i would love to at least see the old info. priceless ton of stuff on that site. helped me alot

Sorry... I just saw this. I'm in. Where are we with this and what needs to be done now?

What needs to be done is getting a lot more people on board. We need 70 people to donate $20 to buy the site off Southo/Jason. Advertisement is best!

I'm also speaking to another gentleman in Australia who was interested in teaming up to get this done. I will report back when I hear from him.

That sounds doable. Whatever is decided, I will pitch in.

So the "owner" of the site is holding the info hostage til someone pays him?
That sounds pretty cheesy and immature to me. How old is this guy?

Someone PM me when this is actually going to happen and i'll pitch in.

alltracman78 wrote:So the "owner" of the site is holding the info hostage til someone pays him?
That sounds pretty cheesy and immature to me. How old is this guy?

It's not age, I just think he as a few loose gears.
He went kind of crazy durring the last year of TC, started kicking people off for little to no reason.
Had said he wanted to sell it back then, at some stupid high price.

My business slowed down, and I pretty much stopped importing anything for a Cressida, so I didn't renew my sponsorship. He got all bent out of shape, and kicked me off.

All I can say, is be careful, he's not the most stable guy to deal with.

I would like access to a bunch of my old stuff, but froock-it, I can rewrite most of it.
And most likely most of the other stuff could be recovered by talking/e-mailing people.
Aaron Rue over on the cressida hell forum is almost done with his X7-1UZ build, and he was never on TC,
so the info is floating around, it will just take members to do some work, find good tech info, and post it up.
I'm trying to do my part with the Toyota part number reference,
and as time allows, I will post in both member inquiries, and my own build thread.

I have a ton of old write-ups I've done for customers saved, it just takes time to find it.
But remember, hand holding just goes so far, and I advise anyone/everyone to learn how to use the TSRM.
Don't say it cost too much, as it is less than one pair of crap no-name tires to go to a weekend drift event.

That is why I like the cressida hell forum so much, if some nob starts a thread on what the firing order is, so he can put his spark plug wires back on, he get's flamed.
That info is all over the net, either by using Google, or the on-line MkIII Supra TSRM.
And of course, there is ToyoDIY.
All you have to do, is DO IT !

alltracman78 wrote:So the "owner" of the site is holding the info hostage til someone pays him?
That sounds pretty cheesy and immature to me. How old is this guy?

He owns the name, the site, and everything on the site. Legally and realistically. He's put his own money into supporting it and wants that money back. Nothing cheesy or immature about it?

Not gonna say anything about his mentality except that I was a mod there, after the big reset a few years ago, I suddenly wasn't. I slowly got sick of seeing all the stupid without being able to do anything about it and logged on less and less till eventually I didn't. I hadn't been on in over a year except maybe once so I've seen nothing of his supposed decline.

If I were getting threats in real life because of a forum I can't say I wouldn't act rashly too. Not gonna say it's right or wrong especially since I wasn't there but people get crazy when they start getting IRL threats.

Smart advice Gordon! If you are smart shopper, you can find TSRMs even cheaper. I picked my 86 TSRM up for under 20$ I also find them at the 1/2 price book store some times as well. I have bought a couple for my celica(76) and even grabbed one for an AE86 all for under 10$ each at the 1/2 book store. Gotta look, listen and learn young ones!

I have learned a lot and found tons of info on TC. I am in and willing to danate good chunk of change to get this done