At first I thought it was a New Years facelift, some inconvenient downtime for major maintenance that couldn’t take place with people constantly logging in and paging about.

Then I turned to the zeforums to discover that the little voice inside was right.. the ORG is gone.

Nobody saw it coming, and speaking for myself I had done very little in the way of external linking to so many of the people that I had on my quacker / friends list. I mean, why would I? they were already all in one convenient place, and it sure didn’t seem like it was going anywhere any time soon.

What made the ORG such a great place (besides the people) was that it pulled together many different areas and formats and basically made keeping up and keeping in touch easy. I’d likely have to spend twice the time to get the same results and I would never have come across such a varied and amazing group of people without a place like the ORG to bring them together in one awesome community. Also, even if I didn’t add people to my list, seeing someone on another users friend list would get me wondering what they were all about, and off I’d go on a tangent flipping through uncharted territory to discover even more amazing people along the way.

a little notice.. one week, is that too much to ask? ~sigh~

The ORG may be gone, but those that used it on a regular basis are finding ways to stay in touch. People are talking, wheels are in motion, and while it may not be 24,000 strong, many people are pulling together to do what they can to keep projects and the community alive.The first steps are shaky, and it will require a bit more effort to get the same “big picture” we used to get in one simple location, but it will be worth it. What follows is a list of what I know of so far, and I’ll try to link to everything I can right here:

1) There are two threads on the zeforums that are discussing the next step, and you can visit them here and here.

2) there is an email address that you can send to that gets you access to a list being built of ORG survivors, and you can then add your own info as well: explodedORG@Gmail.com

3) There is the SRN – a Vimeo channel that gathers videos from quite a few people around the ORG, along with a “temporary” forum (top left) to go to and talk. This has to be the most painless registration for a site I’ve ever encountered.

4) A flickr group has been built to keep the people interested in p/d/p in touch, and you can find that here. Flickr also has a message board where p/d/p specific discussions can take place. In addition to this, the zeforums and the home of p/d/p, disabled salmon, will continue to have information regarding the project

5) there appear to be multiple efforts in the works by a number of people to create a wiki / forum / transition space that will be more centralized for discussion and collaboration on building a more permanent home (structure and location) for the homeless community formerly known as the ORG…

more information as events warrant.