• Quick note - the problem with Youtube videos not embedding on the forum appears to have been fixed, thanks to ZiprHead. If you do still see problems let me know.

Ed This forum will cease to exist on 15 August 2021

rjh01

Gentleman of leisure
rjh01
Joined
May 6, 2005
Messages
29,928
Location
Flying around in the sky
When you log on to this forum on 15 August 2021 or in 4 days 14 hours 18 minutes from the time of this post you will find the forum is not operational. The reason is that the owners have not paid for the URL. With luck, it will be back in a day or two. Suggest you stock up with whatever this forum provides.

In case you are in a position to do something about it and make me wrong, please do so.

Ref: http://www.cqcounter.com/whois/
Enter internationalskeptics.com in the box.
 
rjh01 said:
When you log on to this forum on 15 August 2021 or in 4 days 14 hours 18 minutes from the time of this post you will find the forum is not operational. The reason is that the owners have not paid for the URL. With luck, it will be back in a day or two. Suggest you stock up with whatever this forum provides.

In case you are in a position to do something about it and make me wrong, please do so.

Ref: http://www.cqcounter.com/whois/
Enter internationalskeptics.com in the box.
Click to expand...

Nice work, mate!

If anyone was going to have that diarised, it was going to be you.

I'm not betting against you.
 
I'll be logging on anyway. Just did a tracert.

internationalskeptics.com [104.131.54.4]
 
Nitpicks!

The forum won't cease to exist. Its domain name will be dropped from the Domain Name Service (DNS) for lack of payment. The forum itself will continue to be alive and well and in full existence. You'll just have trouble finding it, since DNS is what tells your browser that "internationalskeptics.com" can be found at the address 104.131.54.4.

It's not the URL that's being paid for, it's the domain name. The Universal Resource Locator (URL) is a complete path to a web resource. It includes the protocol (http(s)), the domain name (internationalskeptics.com) and the resource being sought at that domain. For example, the URL for this thread is http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?t=353418

Also, note that simply knowing the IP address that goes with the domain name is not enough. If you send your browser to 104.131.54.4, the webserver will promptly redirect you to the domain name. You can see the change in your browser address bar when it happens. Right now, that works fine, since DNS will tell your browser where to find the domain. But once DNS stops doing that, that redirect will fail. Not only that, but all the URLs provided by the forum software start with "www.internationalskeptics.com". So even if you could get to the front page at 104.131.54.4, as soon as you clicked on a link your browser would give up.

Fortunately, your computer has a system configuration file, usually called "hosts", usually stored in a folder called "etc". In West Coast IT jargon, it's usually pronounced "etsy-hosts". You can put domain names and IP addresses in this file. Your computer will use these name-address pairs instead of DNS results, if present. If Gord adds "internationalskeptics.com 104.131.54.4" and "www.internationalskeptics.com 104.131.54.4" to his hosts file, he will indeed be able to browse the forum while the DNS record is unavailable. (This, by the way, is more than sufficient to prove that the forum has not ceased to exist.)
 
Last edited:
theprestige said:
Nitpicks!

The forum won't cease to exist. Its domain name will be dropped from the Domain Name Service (DNS) for lack of payment. The forum itself will continue to be alive and well and in full existence. You'll just have trouble finding it, since DNS is what tells your browser that "internationalskeptics.com" can be found at the address 104.131.54.4.

It's not the URL that's being paid for, it's the domain name. The Universal Resource Locator (URL) is a complete path to a web resource. It includes the protocol (http(s)), the domain name (internationalskeptics.com) and the resource being sought at that domain. For example, the URL for this thread is http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?t=353418

Also, note that simply knowing the IP address that goes with the domain name is not enough. If you send your browser to 104.131.54.4, the webserver will promptly redirect you to the domain name. You can see the change in your browser address bar when it happens. Right now, that works fine, since DNS will tell your browser where to find the domain. But once DNS stops doing that, that redirect will fail. Not only that, but all the URLs provided by the forum software start with "www.internationalskeptics.com". So even if you could get to the front page at 104.131.54.4, as soon as you clicked on a link your browser would give up.

Fortunately, your computer has a system configuration file, usually called "hosts", usually stored in a folder called "etc". In West Coast IT jargon, it's usually pronounced "etsy-hosts". You can put domain names and IP addresses in this file. Your computer will use these name-address pairs instead of DNS results, if present. If Gord adds "internationalskeptics.com 104.131.54.4" and "www.internationalskeptics.com 104.131.54.4" to his hosts file, he will indeed be able to browse the forum while the DNS record is unavailable. (This, by the way, is more than sufficient to prove that the forum has not ceased to exist.)
Click to expand...

I just bookmarked the IP address. :thumbsup:
 
theprestige said:
Fortunately, your computer has a system configuration file, usually called "hosts", usually stored in a folder called "etc". In West Coast IT jargon, it's usually pronounced "etsy-hosts". You can put domain names and IP addresses in this file. Your computer will use these name-address pairs instead of DNS results, if present. If Gord adds "internationalskeptics.com 104.131.54.4" and "www.internationalskeptics.com 104.131.54.4" to his hosts file, he will indeed be able to browse the forum while the DNS record is unavailable. (This, by the way, is more than sufficient to prove that the forum has not ceased to exist.)
Click to expand...


Usually it's the other way around. First the IP, then the domain. Each pair in one line. Like this:

104.131.54.4 internationalskeptics.com
104.131.54.4 www.internationalskeptics.com
 
Last edited:
rjh01 said:
It happens every year. Thought last year I would predict it for this year. Not hard to do.
Click to expand...
What exactly happened last year?

Was the forum unavailable for a few days because the URL renewal fee had not be paid in time? (I don't remember anything like that).

Perhaps the renewal fee is paid automatically one day before the critical expiry date.
 
arthwollipot said:
This has been raised on the ISF support page on Facebook.
Click to expand...
Yes, I see, in Community: https://www.facebook.com/internationalskeptics/community/?ref=page_internal.

John Mather
15 August 2020
DOesnt seem to be any activity on here but Ill ask:whats happened to the forum? Domain seems to be gone.

5 comments

Tommy Meehan
The domain hasn't been renewed. Scrolling down through the messages here -- and there aren't many -- indicates this also happened in 2019 and 2018. I expect it to come back, probably today. I'm sure Darat & company are notifying the site owner.

International Skeptics yeah, sorry, appears to be a yearly ritual ... fixed!
John Mather
Lol why cant they renew before this happens?
Click to expand...

Looks like it does happen so regularly that people can start making predictions.

Darat should perhaps send a message to the owner.

Forum members could also perhaps contribute financially (for both DNS and hosting).

Forum administrator Darat could perhaps ask the owner icerat whether he would welcome such a move, to help him pay the bills (to have a more stable forum ...).
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top Bottom