Norman has agreed to allow me to make the archives available to people so I'm trying to figure out a good way of doing that... The approximate size is 121MB. At modem speeds (which is what I figure most people have) it will take approximately 14 hours to download. And, if 30 people all come at once, that will kill my server (and it will be killed for 14 hours). So, I'm trying to figure out a way to do this more effectively. I'm thinking of burning it on CDs. I'm not interested in eating the postage and CD cost, so I'd probably charge something to cover it. A few bucks. I'm not looking to make a profit.
Now, regarding the list itself. After a few days, we were only able to raise pledges from about 17 people for about half the cost of keeping it open on LSOFT. So, it looks like an LSOFT list is out of the question for now.
A number of us have opened up at Yahoo! groups under the name TheActorsList. We already have a number of people from the old list. If you set it up right, you can have all the list email sent to the same email address you used to use for Acting-Pro. From that point, it works just like it used to. And, if you do drop by the home page once in a while, there are pictures of some of us, and other goodies. So, come on over - it's easy. Just ckick on the link above.
(I've been told that it's easier if you don't have a Yahoo! id already. I did, and the sign up process was a bit cumbersome, but worth it in the end. BTW, I thought I might get spammed, so I set up a special email address to get list mail and I have received nothing except list mail. Also, (another hint) if you check "text only" (instead of html), you won't even get annoying little ads in the messages themselves. In fact, the "bottom banner" is less than what Acting-Pro had.)
If you have questions or problems, you can always email me at: stephen at mchenry dot net - just replace the "at" and "dot" with their correspoinding punctuation symbols to get my email address. Hope to see you there...
It appears that the cost of maintaining the list is approximately $1200/yr (according to John). If we can get $50-$60/year from about 20-25 folks, we can keep the current list going. I (Stephen) will check into the mechanics of transferring ownership of it tomorrow when LSOFT opens. John indicated that he could provide me with contact information. We also need to have volunteers to moderare the list...
As of 6/27/02, the two remaining founders of the list announced that the list was closing. A number of people have written wanting to keep the list open. It appears that two people have individually set up (different) groups on Yahoo Groups.
One is "act-pro". at last check, it had about 11 people signed up. The other one is reported to have been deleted, so if we're moving to Yahoo, this seems like the one to go for...
Others have stated that it would be better to keep it on lsoft (the current list server) if possible, although issues over the mecahnics of transferring ownership were raised.
Most people felt it would be valuable to keep the archives, but they appear to already be gone. The "older" ones still appear to be there at: http://www.escribe.com/art/acting-pro/index.html. The current archives are advertised to be at: http://home.ease.lsoft.com/archives/acting-pro.html but some people claim they have had trouble accessing them and think that they might be gone. For what it's worth, I have every message sent to Acting-Pro in my "ap" mailbox, so we haven't actually "lost" them even if they are gone from the server. That said, it could be a monumental task to organize them into searchable archives... An automated solution would be a great help (but right now, I'm unaware of one...)
This page will attempt to keep the status reasonably current and serve as a dissemination point for information about where the group goes.
If anyone has any questions, they are free to email me at: stephen at mchenry dot net (use that to construct my email address).
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Last modified 6/29/02