I have been a long-time Caissa member. However, with the new site and its poor acceptance, it appears that the old and new site are dying on the vine. This site is nothing without members on line with whom to play chess.
 
Am I overreacting, or is Caissa disappearing?

Caissa is a thing of the past, we are just watching the closing stages of history as it relates to Caissa.
 
Long time no post. And we used to have such insightful dialog's.
 
Cheers
IBIJ

..The unexplained long delay that "Media West" is guilty of,
in instituting the 'light-green' & white {or is it cream-colored}
board-option on the "New Caissa's Web," along with the ability
for current members to play-through all games, on "Results"..
{similar to the "classic-caissa"} reminds me of the same 'bush-
league'{a pun!} mindset that brought you some of 'GW's greatest
'pre' and post-{Iraq} invasion miscalculations, and mostly pit-
iful, immigration 'band-aids' that were 'dressed-up' to look like
"fighting terrorism," and "cleaning-up" the illegal-immigrant mess,
respectively; when all the 'horses' {read, former former disallu-
sioned members} have long since escaped/headed for Any place
to call their 'home'.. except here!
 
..In the Bible, {not sure exactly where, as of this post's entry}
there's the story/parable of the 'persistent widow' who finally
gets a recalcitrant/slow-to-act judge, to act upon a perceived
personal-injustice done to her..{not sure, exactly what?!..yuk-
yuk} in her favor, simply because he got tired of being bothered
by her Many entreaties! -- I both sense and fear that this judge,
or otherwise, person-in-authority of Scriptural mention, will be
shown to have had more 'sensitivity' to those he ruled-over, than
this present and semi-dysfunctional, Caissa's Web administration!
 
..Perhaps the moral here, is.. among other things; beware of multi-
tiered layers of administrative decision-making responsibility{!}
..ie. Caissa's Web's administration/"Media-West," as the 'parent'
company; particularly, when the former administrative-layer gives
the impression of being so beholden to the latter {largely uncaring}
'bigwigs'.. that us 'rank-and-file' members are left clueless and
mostly ignorant, when it comes to specific-projected-timelines for
long-overdue feature options{!}..including,'BB-filters', on the "New
{and dissappointing} Caissa"! ..] ;

I've been a member for about two years; I would like to provide the following humble opinion.
 
Caissa overhauled their system to attract new members, to be competitive with the Web 2.0 phenomenon. I've noticed that long-time Caissa members are serious and mature chess players, and perhaps we don't like to change!?
 
Even though I truly miss the (classic) white/blue board and (larger) white/black pieces, I enjoy giving my two cents on the BB.
 
Give it time, I'd say.

Yes, but if there is no one left for you to give your two cents worth to, then that will be kin to talking to one's self in the mirror. And considering that doesn't cost as much it is definitely much more recommended.
 
My time here is up in March, and if things stay the same I will make my departure then.
 
Cheers
IBIJ

I agree with Archangel, give it time.
 
grandpa13

I have been here for over ten years now. I'm staying. I agree with Archangel. Give it time.
Merv

Yeah, but Quill... when will you start following thru with your committments?
 
Cheers
IBIJ

I have also been here over 10 years, and I am going to stick it out. I am sad at the lack of members and wish MediaWest had kept the design of the classic caissa but used the new code, I feel there would have been less complaining about the look and feel.

It's nice of you to be willing to fork out more money for a product that is less superior than the old Caissa. Would you mind donating to my worthy cause too? I promise to do half of what you expected and charge you double for it.
 
Cheers
IBIJ

..At least there's always the option of being a "classic Caissa"
Non-member 'live-game' player {but not BB poster} free-
loader{!}
..Until, and if and when the admin. implements 2 key promised
feature-changes on the 'New Caissa', they won't be seeing any
'dough' of mine.
..Consider this a "lead-by-example" post, since I suspect that
$50 {single-member-fee, option} to "Media-West," is only nominally
more consequential, than if they never received it from any one
person.
{P.s. Having to re-register with a new email {ie. "gmail"} and
handle every two weeks, is no big deal!}

IBIJ, the cost of me staying here is small with other game sites and their fees, I could be going to. I enjoy chess, don't play much live but really enjoy correspondence.
Granted they may have struck out this attempt at creating a more user friendly site. But other than the look and feel they did what the members asked. They created a site with alternative style of chess and could possibly add other games. Now cause they did what a lot of members asked, we want them to go back to the drawing board and do it all again.
 
When I first joined caissa over 10 years ago, chat sucked, they kept making changes, kept adding more features. All I am saying is give them a chance at this site, and I am sure they will continue to make changes and modifications to improve its look and feel.
 
TheShaman

I don't mind giving people a chance, but when the want to charge me more for a lesser product... THAT is an entirely different situation and so "Amerian".
 
Cheers
IBIJ

IBIJ, you've posted/chatted 149 times. Isn't $50/year worth your while? Besides $50/365=.14 cents a day to play chess, if you ever spend time playing it
 
PS Peace!

I am not saying it isn't a inferior product right now. But they will continue to make improvements to this site. as Archangel points out, .14 cents a day is nothing.

Uhh, .14 per day to play with whom? Is there anybody actually playing chess anymore? Huh? I don't even bother looking at the games waiting list anymore.
 
Putting pre-made BB software on the site doesn't constitute improvement. You can all have a livejournal for free. Putting up a corr chess site doesn't constitute improvement. Red Hot Pawn is free.
 
Just trying to figure out where .14 a day is going, if not down the tubes. Anyone? If all this place provides is corr chess and an average BB, what's the motivation for anyone to pay for it?
 
By the way, thanks again to Admin for nuking the MIP concept, statistics, the live games and most of membership. You guys rock! :)
 

The biggest thing missing from this site is players. The site works fine for me - a few things missing still, but overall very playable.
 
We just need people to get over here and play!

I simply do not understand why Media West brought the new site on-line before having everything already in place. They knew what features were being expected/asked for by membership so why activate it prior to having those in place? That was disappointing to me. To open up an improved site and members cannot access it, no correspondence area, no chat, that makes no sense at all. When they said that they were developing a newer, snappier site to replace the old one I was ecstatic. I anticipated a smooth, fast, interface with brand new features that were not available on the old site. What did I get? No initial access, and now later I still do not see people there so that anyone could play live chess. Yesterday at one point there were only 28 members logged in, that is crazy unless it was 3AM! I cannot see that they will improve this new site quickly enough for me to give them more money to do what I can do for free at ItsYourTurn.com where I can play in Ladders and tournaments. Sorry, but see yah after February '08.
 
~JEBUS

Recently ItsYourTurn.com experienced an outage. How did they handle it?
 
1. Put an upfront message on the site stating what the problem was.
2. Updated that message even thru the middle of the night
3. Got operations back up and running before the end of the weekend.
 
What has been my personal experience with ItsYourTurn.com?
 
I've asked the admin several questions every now and then while receiving answers back relatively quickly.
 
With their system the basic membership is free, giving people the ability to make 15 moves in a day. If you want to have the full package it's 50$ a year. And they keep releasing two new games every month at least, including interesting versions of the game of chess.
 
Now, let's compare that with Caissa. On second thought, let's not. Those who want to stay with this failing system enjoy yourselves, I'll be hitting the road in March.
 
Cheers
IBIJ
 

The worst thing about Caissa are the whiney little pukes like Ibelieveinjesus, Jebus and Hestermofet who spend all their time here and do nothing but complain.