Thanks to Ash for her donation!

Ash, one of RAF's oldest members has donated. Ash will now enjoy all the benefits that donors have; including that additional 50 karma.

As usual, we thank Ash for her donation, and encourage others to.

DYK 4: Did You Know?

That Richard created 'Richard's Harry Potter', and 'Unofficial Evanescence Forum' communities after RAF?

Now you do.

Richard's Animorphs Forum - The Ultimate Animorphs Forum

Thanks to Cody for his donation!

This note is to thank CODY for his donation to RAF. Of course without donations like these RAF's survival would rest solely on advertisement revenue and when that falls short; Richard's pockets.

So again, thanks to Cody. He now enjoys all these things.

RAF: Basically an alien embassy cleverly disguised as a forum...

Today's article is just for fun, folks. We'll call it a thought-prompt. ;)
We tend to joke about the different 'species' on RAF, and if someone says he or she is an alien, a star, a faerie, a seal, an Ellimist, et cetera, we go along with it, neh?
What if at least one of those was true?
Mind you, I'm a star, but I'm not going to press the issue here today. Just think on it, my dears. What if just one of these crazy-fun sci-fi enthusiasts actually is from someplace out-of-this-world? RAF would be the equivalent of a micro-embassy on behalf of open-minded Earthlings everywhere.



I bet you this hypothetical five dollar bill that this article left at least four RAFians seriously paranoid about the aliens in the boards. :)
My job here is done for the day, I think.

All my love to you, dearest RAFians.
-Estelore

Michael Grant's Book Signing tour

Hey all!

I'm not sure if you all follow Michael Grant's YA Literature blog, Stupid Blog Name, shared by many other YA writers, such as Carol Snow and Alistair Spalding, but Michael Grant was on a tour in England signing books and being interviewed. You can read about it here: Crack and Stack This, and here: London. Warning: language is kinda uncensored.

Enjoy!!

Adam

AKA Ell¡m¡st

RAF-lationships

Do you have a RAFcrush yet?

Do you know what a RAFcrush is?

Well see, a RAFcrush is a crush on someone who is a member of RAF. Sounds simple, but is actually very complex. This is because if you have a RAFcrush on someone who has a RAFcrush on you, that means that there is some RAFchemistry going on!! My next suggestion would be to start RAFdating.

RAFdating is also very complex, and should be carefully researched by asking current RAFdaters for their advice. Such RAFdaters are, for examples: Claire and Mike, or Estelore and Tyler.

After you and your RAFpartner have been dating for a while, one of you may want to move on to the next step, RAFengagement! One example of a RAFengaged couple, would be Russell and Dameg. They have been trying to move onto their next step for a while, which is to be....

RAFmarried!!! This is the biggest step in RAFcrushing, as this is the ultimate level of RAFcommitment. It's also a very big RAFcelebration that EVERYONE can have a part in (stags, stagettes, etc.). Only two RAFcouples have gotten married in the past. They would be Anna and Ken, or Touquie and Charlie. Only the latter are still together, which brings me to an optional, but sometimes unfortunate RAFcrush stage.

RAFdivorce. Just ask Ken or Anna for the explanation...

RAFchildren are very rare on RAF, seeing as how this is a children's book-forum, and must stay PG-13 or lower in the ratings. But, one RAFchild has been concieved throughout RAF's history. I'm not going to mention it's "dirty"name, but it starts with a P and ends with ootang.

Also, don't stab someone in the back, not very pleasant. Trust me, I've experienced it. And broken hearts are not fun.

So, if you are thinking of starting a RAFcrush, please, reference this topic, and find all the help you need. Just don't start too much RAFdrama.

Also, RAFipedia has a page here, which needs some updating.

Sincerely,

Adam

P.S. I would like to thank Gaz and Faerie in helping me with this post!! Thank you!!

DYK 3: Did You Know?

That Anna actually won the "Last person to post wins" game in the Bored Board on RAF Classic two years after the thread started?

Now you do.

Richard's Animorphs Forum - The Ultimate Animorphs Forum

May Approaches...

Know what that means, RAF?
Well, I'll tell you, anyway.
It means that all the high school seniors on the boards are going to be graduating, and the majority will be university-bound by autumn, if not sooner. We're looking forward to a wave of new college freshmen in RAF, which forbodes either MUCH more free time for those people... or much LESS free time, depending on their majors. I'm in architecture, so I fall into the latter category.
I really do hope that this doesn't mean a huge drop in forum attendance. :P
Let's be optimistic, though: May also means that next fall there will be grade-schoolers on the boards going to high school....

-Estelore

Russell has made a FOURTH donation!

Not to be out-done, (or maybe he just likes to ensure RAF's survival) our admin Russell (or In the recovery room..) has donated for a fourth time.

He has now got +50; firmly securing his position as #1 on the Karma List with 459 applauds. He has also moved up one spot to #2 on the Donation Leader-Board. 

So I would like to thank him for his continued monetary contributions to RAF.

Help RAF, by donating!

What Generation are YOU?

I'm compiling a list of popular members past, and present on RAF, and placing them in generations.

Currently there are 10 Generations.

See where you fall; if you're not placed: just post in the thread: don't forget to give your RAF Classic user-name (if you were on RAF Classic of course), and give a list of persons who you remember were posting when you came on RAF.

RAF GENERATIONS / READ ->
image source

Thanks to Kelly for her third donation!

Third time's the charm for long-time member Kelly who just donated. This post is to thank her and remind everyone that I alone can't foot the bill; you can help too.

Kelly now enjoys an additional 50 karma points.

To donate, and see the top 5 donors, visit RAF Donate at: http://animorphsforum.com/donate

DYK 2: Did You Know?

That the Totally Random Thoughts thread is not only the 6th thread created on new RAF, but 10% of the posts made on RAF are in that thread?

Now you do.

Richard's Animorphs Forum - The Ultimate Animorphs Forum

RAFparty #7 Day 1

If I had to describe this weekend's first RAFparty in 10 words or less, I'd say, "What RAFparty?"
This is by far, the worst RAFparty day ever. My name is Morfowt and I will be your blogger for this devastating day.

The first sign that says we have a problem this weekend, would be the lack of enthusiasm and reminder of the upcoming RAFparty. Usually, quite a few veteran members would post reminders in the RAFparty thread at least 24 hours before it started. This week there has been no such thing. I've also noticed that the RAFparty thread has been buried deep under many topics, possibly caused by the recent merging of the General Board and Life Board.
The second sign was when the party had already started for an hour, and no increase in post frequency occured in the Bored Board. In fact, about 2 hours in, I had a Skype chat with a few members and found some didn't even know today was the day.

Stats of that day also support this. On the day of the RAFparty:
6 New Topics - That is our second lowest amount this month so far, beating only 5 topics on April 8th. Previous parties made over 20 new topics a day, once reaching over 40.
492 new posts - The third lowest amount this month so far (the other two days, 473 and 413), and last out of all RAFparties by a long shot. Previous parties made well over 1000 new posts, and usually even over 4000 new posts.
48529 hits - while that day did have the most page view this month, it was only by about 4000 hits. We made about 44000 hits on April 2nd.

RAFparties are a day for everyone to come onto the forum, post, break RAF records, and have a blast. As not one of these has been accomplished in any way, I believe it's safe to say this RAFparty day was epic fail in every definition.
But, luckily, RAFparty lasts 2 days. Everyone out there, let's make up for this with the 2nd day.

As this post comes to a close, I can't help but notice the possible connection between this, the slight drop in last month's RAFparty, and the recent rise in leaving veteran RAFians...

Smileys

Hello, RAFians!
I don't know if everyone has been paying attention to the growing list of animated "smileys" that are now at our disposal, so I'm going to point them out here. I tend to use only the emoticons that I can quickly type, so I did not even notice that we had Animorphs-themed animations until I saw somebody post an Hork-Bajir in one of my threads.
Goom and DinoNothlit have been doing a brilliant job designing animated images of the main characters' primary morphs, and it sounds like the next morph on the agenda is Aximili becoming human. (If I'm wrong, please, someone, correct me.)
Anyway, folks, please do just check it out, there is some seriously fawesome stuff happening in the smiley-making thread.
Thanks, Dino and Goom, for doing such a great job on all of these!

-Estelore

TIP: Determine if there are new posts

If you ever wondered what these icons are all about (forgetting that they are the SMF logo [[note to self, change to RAF logo]]) this is the post for you.

The first icon means that there are no new posts in the board. The second icon means that there are. Take for example:

The icons are telling me that in the General Board there are new posts that I haven't read. In the Media Area, I have visited that board, and no one posted after I visited it.

Additionally to telling you if there are new posts in a board, you are able to click on the icon, and you will be shown all the unread posts in that board.

DYK 1: Did You Know?

That the current Animorphs Role-Playing board is bigger and more active than the one on RAF Classic ever was?

Now you do.

Richard's Animorphs Forum - The Ultimate Animorphs Forum

RAFChat

Hey everyone,

I know this has been touched on before in the RAFBlog, but I thought I would bring it up again. Everyone should go on RAFChat when they are on the forum. I mean, it's not that hard to open it up, sign up, and log in. It's just another window (or tab, depending on your browser) that makes a funny sound every once in a while (it might get annoying, but i got used to it!).

What really bugs the heck out of me is when I see that, for example, 24 people are online on the forum, yet only 8 people are online in chat (admit it, it happens). What the heck??

I understand that some people can't be on chat, for reasons such as your country doesn't allow it, or your cell phone doesn't support it, or your Playstation 3 doesn't open it (like me) and I'm not mad at you. Its the people who choose not to go on chat, for whatever reason, that I'm talking to.

Chat is useful because it allows you to talk to your favorite forum members in Real Time. This is neat because you are probably used to only talking to the members in the topics, where you might have to wait a whole day for the response, maybe longer! With RAFChat you ask a question, and you get an answer (if anyone wants to answer it) within seconds! Also, very notable things happen in RAFChat that, if you aren't there, might be missing out from. Examples of things like this that have happened in the past are:

1. Ken and Anna's RAFWedding
2. Pootang's Miraculous Birth
3. Various RAFParties
4. Many of the quotes in the Quotable Quotes thread
5. and many more...

If you don't know what #2 is about, then that's the exact reason why you should be in RAFChat!

And hey! I'm not the only one who thinks so! Here's a quote from a member of RAF, when asked what has happened in RAFChat that they can remember:

"Not much really... RAFchat is dieing kinda... With the more talky people leaving or lurking more, less and less is happening..."

So please people, go on RAFChat!! I'll most likely see you there!

Sincerely,

Adam
AKA Ell¡m¡st

6,000,000 Hits

So, since I normally note when RAF Forum passes a million hits, and today that happened, there is this post. 6 Million now.

Spring Break!

Hello, RAF!
Well, it's spring break over here, over a week without classes. This means more online time, in general, except on specific busy-days. The weather is simply gorgeous, and I'm leaving for awhile to visit family.
Who else here is enjoying a lovely break, and who has interesting plans for their vacation time?

Comment!!

I'll see you all on my return. Much love to all of you.
-Estelore

Today is Ash's Birthday!

LONG-time member... and by that I mean approaching 6 years, Ash is celebrating her () birthday today! To our current longest active member: hope you have a fun and stress free day!

2 Boards Removed

The Life & The General Fan-Fiction & Art Boards have been removed. Posts in these boards have been moved to the newly renamed General Board (was General v2).

Nostalgia

While looking at the Member list in order of Date Registered, I realized that only Mike (Phoenix004) and I were the ones who registered in 2003 (on RAFclassic of course), followed by two people from 2005 (Kelly and Tyler). At first, i was surprised and astounded that we had the rest register in 2008 and onward, most re-registering after the move from RAFClassic, and not asking for their original Registration date back.

This is my friendly reminder that if you registered on RAF Classic and haven't asked for your original registration date yet, please do!! Nostalgia on a forum like RAF is greatly appreciated!! It also sets up a sort-of seniority. That way, if someone has a question and are afraid to go to the Staff (they are pretty scary to newbs!), they can just ask a more senior member.

I was looking on RAFclassic for some of our oldest members, but there was no option to sort by registration date. So i looked up the Top 20 Posters, and found some members that had been very active, but didn't stay with us.

• Sarah Connor
• Xandria Nirvana
• Meanders
• Jordan
• Sarah Naeem

That's just to name a few. Also, I was wondering why so many people are leaving, and I decided to determine which of the more active members of the new RAF have left, or are very inactive.

• Anna
• Leigh
• Skye
• mrlarry
• Venomwiththelongname

If people wouldn't leave, there wouldn't be another reason for other people to leave. So please, people: End the Trend. Stay with RAF, and quit leaving.

Please leave comments.

Sincerely, Adam.

Russell's Animorphs Forum

In case you haven't noticed, RAF is now Russell's Animorphs Forum.
This change was made when Richard decided to retire just short of RAF's 6th birthday.

This will be my final post on the RAF Blog in my current capacity.

April 2 Update: Guys... if you fell for that one.... [shakes head]