Accessing this forum

[Harrowby Hall]

If I try to access this forum by using Chrome or Opera I receive a message similar to this:

This site can’t be reached
The webpage at http://www.religionethics.co.uk/index.php might be temporarily down
or it may have moved permanently to a new web address.

This situation has now prevailed for some weeks. When I contacted the moderators, I received a message from NS instructing me to use a proxy site - I want to thank him for this advice. I realise that I am not the only person who now uses this method to access this forum.

It also appears to me that the traffic on this site has fallen - there are fewer new topics being discussed and fewer postings generally from fewer contributors.

Could I ask for, if possible, some kind of formal explanation for this problem and whether there is any solution? Perhaps other members may have observations they can share.

[Udayana]

It decided to let me into today - at least until I pressed post.

Usually now I can't get to the forum using Firefox (or other browser) under Windows or Linux even when I can from a phone or tablet using the same  wifi connection.

If it is due to anti-spam code - it is not working well enough.

[Aruntraveller]

Hi HH

This isn't a formal response - but my own observations which I have shared previously is that if I am trying to get onto the site from my mobile in say Wetherspoons are using some other type of access (dongle type thingie) away from home then I quite often get this message. Very seldom do I get it when I am using my PC at home. However, I am aware this varies from poster to poster so I am not sure this helps a great deal.

As to your observation about traffic generally, yes it is getting quieter. Whether that is a summer lull, or a longer term trend we will have to see. My thoughts are that it is a longer term trend for several reasons. These being; to a certain extent over familiarity, lack of new members (youngsters prefer other forms of communication), and sadly, we are mostly older - so natural wastage!

[jeremyp]

Well we don't know what is causing the problem. It seems to be DNS related, which is to say that when the browser looks up the name "www.religionethics.co.uk" to get its IP address sometimes it gets a response "that site doesn't exist". The reason that using a proxy site or a VPN often fixes the issue is that you are then using a different DNS server.

I have no idea what is causing this problem, it could be something to do with the fact that the server's time drifts away from the real time which is something we have no control over.

The only way I think we can resolve this issue (excuse the pun) would be to host the site and its DNS elsewhere.

[Nearly Sane]

Just to add we don't really have anti spam software. The most recent change was to the ease of registering but it has no affect on the IP issue. Some people may have problems accessing if their IP is a shared one that has been banned because of other people's bans but the proxy site gets round that.

The drop off in posting which has been noted and questioned by people for over 6 years now is just the stuff that Trentvoyager has laid out the causes of. See NGLreturns as an example. In addition as was mentioned last time this subject was raised, as time has passed we have a higher % of permabans vs posting members.

[SusanDoris]

Well, for selfish reasons, I hope this site continues until I become so good at crosswords IO no longer need to do them!!

I now have my new computer (Del with Windows 10)   but Synthetic Dave sounds as if he is in an echo chamber and I'm going to have to get some remote control help today to get various things fixed,, which the Tech chap couldn't do when he was here, plugging it in etc.

GThank goodness, I have my 'favourites' list there, so was able to access this site fairly quickly just now.

[Harrowby Hall]

The drop off in posting which has been noted and questioned by people for over 6 years now is just the stuff that Trentvoyager has laid out the causes of. See NGLreturns as an example. In addition as was mentioned last time this subject was raised, as time has passed we have a higher % of permabans vs posting members.

I suspect that my post was not as clear as I had intended. My point was simply that the problems of access may be preventing some regular posters from reaching the forum.

[Nearly Sane]

I suspect that my post was not as clear as I had intended. My point was simply that the problems of access may be preventing some regular posters from reaching the forum.

No, that was understood. Any long term posters who haven't posted for a while we will have in contacted by other means to check if they are ok. That doesn't mean we will get replies but there isn't any reason to think that there are any numbers not posting because of this currently