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So, for a long while we just had a single shared c5 demo setup that would clean itself out every hour on the hour. Crude, but an easy way to get a demo up. We started to really understand the downsides when we were seeing 900 new users in there at a time. Seeing things randomly change to Japanese under you is disconcerting as well. 
Now when you want to play around with concrete5, you can easily get your own sandbox to play in. After 15 days you can even turn it into a paid hosting account.
Grab your own demo today!
Straight to the point:
Stop wasting your time installing c5, we'll do it for you in our super sweet hosting environment for just $15/month. No hidden fees or startup costs!
http://www.getconcrete5.com/get_started/
Longer explanation:
There's a very small handful of people who are paid to support this software. As I'm sure you know, the software is free, so the only revenue we get is consulting, merchandise sales, and hosting!
I'm sure you will understand then why as CEO of c5 I have to pull the plug on having my team personally debug c5 installs on every server setup under the sun. The last few weeks we've found more and more of our time going into getting c5 running on super-budget hosts and windows boxes neither of which we ever thought was a good idea in the first place. Deep down, we love helping people get on the web and of course we want as many people using c5 as we can get.
It is because we want to help the largest majority of people with the biggest problems that we've come to the decision that we can no longer personally pay attention to the installation forum every day. There is a good group of very smart volunteers who we dearly hope will continue to give their time helping others here. If one of those folks brings an idea or change to us around the install process we can easily implement, we'll be happy to do it. Beyond that we're simply killing ourselves debugging everyone's unique server setup by hand. I hear the frustration: "Hey I want to use your software and you won't help me?!?" Actually, that's not true
We're announcing we've slashed our basic hosting plan in half, and eliminated startup fees onhttp://GetConcrete5.com. For $15/month we'll gladly setup c5 for you, give you complete access, we're even going to upgrade your site with the latest stable codebase whenever it's made available. Frankly I think that's a deal you can't beat. We'll help you, the hosting revenue will help us, everyone wins.
By all means I encourage ongoing discussion around installation issues. I know there are intranets, other web hosts, any number of very valid reasons you might not want to host with us. But if you really feel like you need to find a cheaper deal some where else, please don't give us attitude for not helping you pull that off.
Thanks for your continued passion and excitement, we're gonna go back to thinking about the big picture again.
-frz
ceo, c5.
Okay, so I'm not sure that amount of sticker glue is healthy but.. wow.. we're impressed
Got some pics of where you put your stickers? Send em in. Want some stickers? Visit concrete5.org and let us know.
Well Gang,
We're gonna go off topic a bit here, but it's my right to rant. This is the first day I have ever truly felt proud to be from the United States of America. When I was in high-school, forming my view of the world, we were in the first Iraq war which I could see even then was an Oil rush, not a moral issue. If you've read much of the philosophical rants here, you know I've got no love for authority, so I really had nothing much positive to say about my country. When I saw the stars and stripes fluttering in the wind, all I really saw was hypocrisy and a new form of corporate colonial abuse around the world. Certainly the last 8 years have been beyond embarrassing.
While 9/11 was certainly a horrible event, to have the response be a declared war on a tactic and a general closing down of the communication process is inexcusable. To let it fester for a second term was beyond depressing. I find myself in Portland, Oregon frequently only surrounded by people with a similar world view so to be part of a country that seemed to be so wholly missing the point was horrible. I wondered if our system was truly broken beyond repair. I wondered if our international reputation was broken beyond repair. I wondered if this was a place I wanted to raise my family.
Last night I became a new man. We had all heard the polls, we all had given our time and money to Barack, but still we all assumed McCain would win in some inexplicable evil way. Maybe Diebold would just hand him the vote, maybe there really were millions of closet racists as the media kept implying with the "Bradley Effect" who knew, but the seldom voiced opinion of all of my friends was "snowball's chance in hell" that a man named Barack Hussein Obama would be our President. But.. Amazingly..
He DOMINATED.. 2:1 in the electoral college!! took ALL of the battle ground states none of this waiting around for a week while the lawyers hash it out we knew while still having an after dinner drink! It was a clear and total victory and I couldn't be prouder.
I feel like we just made a stronger move in the "war on terror" with that one vote than we did in the 8 years of that cowboy dicking around. I feel like if I were to be on an international tour, I'd be PROUD to have an American Flag on my backpack because we may not be perfect (my God that's clear) but we're able to do a 180 degree switch and elect a black man with the middle name of Hussein to the most powerful job in the world. "Give us your tired, your poor" because you TRULY can make something of yourself here. This country is NOT just a good-ol-boys network and we're NOT Rome falling to chaos the best truly IS yet to come and it's going to make the WHOLE WORLD a better place.
Ya know I got truly excited about Barack almost 2 years ago now when I read a New Yorker article detailing his most enduring trait the inherent ability to be a diplomat. Take two people with completely different views on something, accept that there is no "us and them" no "good and evil", but rather help them find common ground and a new understanding about how we all can get along. Its about communication and I believe that through open communication we can solve everything and anything. Frankly, I wouldn't have chosen to give away c5 for nothing if I didn't deeply believe that. Freedom of expression is freedom.
I honestly believe Barack Obama IS empathy and communication incarnate. I don't think it's gonna be easy, and I'm sure he's gonna make us all work hard for it, but get ready for some actual thoughtful, deliberate, caring understanding and bridge building from your friends in the good old U, S of fuckin A.
PS: sorry about the last 8 years again.. uhh. mulligan?
PPS: I'd love to hear from our international friends as I know c5 is used as much out of the states as in em..
-frz
The Concrete5 community is an excellent place to go to get answers to your C5 questions.
Make sure to check out the forums for answers as well. They are all individual searchable, and can be easily monitored so you know when people respond to your posts.
We've added a lot to C5.org in the last few weeks, including bug and feature trackers, and our own forums, where you can get paid to help!
You can check them out at http://forums.concrete5.org
Well, we've been talking about our community marketplace for weeks now, and the first step is finally complete. We reorganized concrete5.org, buffed out the documentation features, added a job board, built out forums even added a bounties forum where you can get paid to help on the project.
This just the beginning of new stuff you'll be seeing on concrete5.org in the coming weeks. There will be a large theme library, a blocks and applications marketplace, and much more. Right now we need your help buffing out the content in forums and giving us any feedback you can.
We just got lucky enough to get another interview! CMSCritic.com is a good looking site that I had never run into before they linked to us. You should check them out.
Yeah that's right. C5 rocks so amazingly hard that SourceForge decided to make us Project of The Month after only being on their site for 3 months! We've always thought of source forge as the Rolling Stone of open source so we took some liberties with our photos
Check out the whole article here!
Yay, THANK YOU SourceForge