Banned from the Ranch

Wow! I went to work, to see if the site was still up, having being told yesterday the site was finished with and that all the staffers, and freelancers (myself included) were no longer required. Here's the cheery message that greets me...

vBulletin Message

You have been banned for the following reason: None Date the ban will be lifted: Never

Amongst the scattered text and broken jpeg symbols on the white screen was the option to log myself out, which led to a 404 page. I had Firefox open too, so rather than fart about deleting the GU cookie I just C&P'd the URL in there and, lo and behold, the site loaded fine.

My account isn't linked to my work one, so the "ban" isn't based on my being former staff, it shuts out anyone who is subscribed to the site. People who just happen across it can see all the reviews/previews/news, but anyone who was a regular visitor is shit out of luck. Pretty strange way to treat your clientele, really. Some people actually paid for their subscriptions to this thing (although none in the UK, that I know of) so I can't imagine they're happy.

The only thing missing is the forum (and any new content), but as the staff were the only people who used that, and we only used it then at the repeated urging of the management, to try to make the place look busy, it's no great loss.

Freelance writing is a pretty fickle existence, so it's not a huge issue for me, in fact I felt mostly a new sense of freedom when my editor sent the group email to all the staff letting us know what had happened, as I only accepted the job reluctantly anyway. I did enjoy it though, especially the Brian Blessed obsessed staff meetings. I never missed a deadline, and was never disappointed with the quality of what I wrote, even on days when I'd rushed to get done. I won't miss that shitball, cock-ended, spazz-knacker of a Content Management System though.