squidgestatus

This is what's posted on BSKY and Mastodon:

FYI, due to PHP vulnerabilities, all webhosting services on Squidge.org (including Squidge Images, custom domains, etc) are DOWN. They will be back ASAP once patches are released.

So we are down until PHP packages can be downloaded and patches made.

edit: This affects Squidge.org, hosted websites and archives, and Squidge Images. This does NOT affect SquidgeWorld, Discord/IRC chat, or FenRecs.com (which, I need to do an official relaunch soon!).

Before this goes any further, I would like to give my sincerest apologies to the following users: ratkingpoe, Himbonotes, cassieoh, haid3018, and the last user which was accidentally deleted and not banned so I do not have their username. Yesterday's deletion of your images was a knee-jerk reaction, and it was unjustified on my part. While I can restore that part of the database, unfortunately the software that we use for image hosting does not have an "undelete" feature. As such, I ruined the hard work that you put into logging your works onto Squidge Image Hosting. And no amount of apologies is going to do anything to restore those images that you had hosted on Images. Nor is it going to restore the weblinks that you obviously need to now replace on countless websites.

I wish I could go back in time and reverse my decision. But I cannot.

By way of explanation for what happened, we have been advised about hotlinking of our services to things that can cause our non-profit status to come into question. Specifically people using Patreon, Ko-Fi, and the like to paywall items that were located on a Squidge.org property. And so over the years, we have taken action by having these accounts removed. In all, we're talking about 20 different accounts over our 34 year history. On Sunday, September 13th, when running an audit for Patreon images, we came across the above five users with Patreon within their images, from filenames to Patreon usernames and the like. This, at the time, seemed like an immediate Terms of Service violation. And because of this, I went with my gut and deleted all images in these people's accounts and then banned them - except for the one person who was accidentally deleted instead of banned.

Again, this is my fault. My knee-jerk reaction was wrong.

Today was...something. I tried to make better clarification for the Images Terms of Service, as well as the consent screen (which, multiple versions are now floating out on the Internet; I should delete them once this is posted), but that just opened MORE cans of worms. So, in an effort to take a look at this situation from another point of view, I realized that everything could have been avoided by just modifying Image Hosting's web configuration file. And that part has been done. Our configuration for Images webhosting now has directives that will block any hotlinking to either Patreon.com, and Ko-Fi.com. Further, we have contacted Patreon's support and have asked them to institute a blacklist of the Images URL (https://images.squidge.org) from being used anywhere on their service. We have yet to hear back from them on this, but even this is overkill since we have made it so you cannot hotlink on either website. It's a safeguard, however.

This whole thing could have been handled better. I should have handled things better. But I did not. And in doing so, I have tarnished Squidge's 34 year reputation with you, our users. I can not do anything except say that I apologize and will strive to do better in the future. I know that an apology is not enough, as there are still people calling for my head on various social media accounts, as is their right. But I do sincerely apologize.

If you have questions, please ask.

The move back into our little datacenter is complete, and things seem to be stable. As always, log a ticket if you see oddities.

Our final few items seem to have come and gone, so as of now, Squidge should be just fine.

• The Squidge IRC daemon is up and running, and has been validated. Host remains the same: squidge.org or irc.squidge.org, port 6667


• Webmail is up and running just fine.


• We're in the process of dealing with older websites; those that can be moved to the Classic webserver will be over the next few days

Finally, about Squidge Images. We get no less than half a dozen tickets a day asking for access to create accounts at Squidge Images. Account creation has been down since our upgrade, but will be up once again starting on Sunday, September 13th. And like before, image hosting signups will only be available between 10am-2pm Pacific Time and 10pm-2am Pacific Time. If you want an account on Squidge Images, wait until Sunday, May 13th and signups will be available during these time periods. If you miss one time period, you can come back during the next. The address will become available only during those times, and will be https://images.squidge.org/signup

If you notice anything, please don't hesitate to let us know on one of our socials (ALL are linked at the top of the blog) or log a ticket at https://www.squidge.org/support

The Squidge.org upgrade is mostly complete. For most people, you have access to what you need, from Squidge Image, the Jinjurly Archive, and other web services.

Here's a list of what I'm still working on, and why:

• Mailing lists: There are two parts to this that need attention and they are
  
  
  
  • Mailing lists themselves: Email is being accepted by the system, but it is not being distributed to mailing list participants.
  
  
  • The web interface to the mailing lists: For some reason, the FastCGI process is not working though it seems to be configured correctly.
  
  
  
  


• IRC: The NGIRCD process and supporting files are not installed yet. This is a little bit of a lower priority and will be completed in the next few days. We'll get there soon!


• Websites needing PHP prior to our current version: We will work on getting these set up as we can. There are multiple items that can be done and we're evaluating those

If you see anything that's odd, please let us know. You cn reply to this post on the Squidge Blog, on Bluesky, Mastodon, or Tumblr. Or you can join us on the Squidge.org Discord server (which, if you need an invite to said server, let us know).

We will be underaking some big changes while we switch hardware for Squidge.org and various other homepages and such. In order to do so, the following servers will be down ALL of Sunday, September 6th, 2026.

Here's a list of what WILL be down:

• squidge.org's main webserver, including all personal homepages


• Squidge Image Hosting


• Squidge IRC (Discord, naturally, will remain up)


• The Jinjurly Audiofic Archive


• The Squidge Mailing List Service


• All Squidge email, including webmail


• Squidge Support Tickets

And here is a list of what WILL NOT be down:

• SquidgeWorld Archive


• FenRecs.com

Again, this will start approximately 6am Pacific Time on Sunday, September 6th, 2026. PLEASE SHARE!

So let's get the good and the really good news out of the way first.

Good news that should have been brought up a few months back, but because things were so crazy we didn't get a chance: FenRecs.com is back! If you were part of FenRecs.com, you'll know that we went down in mid January due to our old service provider going out of business. This was something we couldn't host ourselves (technical differences that we don't have the capabilities of handling) and have not only found a new provider, but they restored everything! So if you want to use FenRecs.com, you can again!

And if you're not familiar, FenRecs.com is a website that you can find and leave reccomendations for new media to watch, new stories to read, and new artwork to partake in. Right now we've got a good number of recommendations and communities in there, but they have hardly expanded from the original fandoms/pairings that were created. Think of it like the amazing Fancake (on Dreamwidth), but just in another format. You can feel free to join, find recs, and leave recs for others. Bonus points for whole new fandoms and pairing recs!

The even better news is an update to our Hot Fic Summer fundraiser - which we have taken in $2,846.50 so far! Fundraiser will go until the end of August, 2026, so let's see if we can push past a stretch goal and maybe hit $3,000 for the year? With our legal fees doubling ($200/year to $400/year) and other prices going up, none of us want to pay all this extra. The fact that you gave - be it $2 or $200 - you stepped up and said that Squidge is important. And that means the world to us. We literally couldn't be here without you!

Now some not great, not bad news: Our main webserver, which houses our mailing lists, main website, as well as the Jinjurly Archive and Image Hosting, has keeled over by itself a couple of times since a power outage that took us out for an hour earlier this week. We're monitoring, and are prepping in case we have to swap components or reinstall new drives and such. Think good thoughts, because that process is never fun.

Thank you for being a part of Squidge!

So let's get the good and the really good news out of the way first.

Good news that should have been brought up a few months back, but because things were so crazy we didn't get a chance: FenRecs.com is back! If you were part of FenRecs.com, you'll know that we went down in mid January due to our old service provider going out of business. This was something we couldn't host ourselves (technical differences that we don't have the capabilities of handling) and have not only found a new provider, but they restored everything! So if you want to use FenRecs.com, you can again!

And if you're not familiar, FenRecs.com is a website that you can find and leave reccomendations for new media to watch, new stories to read, and new artwork to partake in. Right now we've got a good number of recommendations and communities in there, but they have hardly expanded from the original fandoms/pairings that were created. Think of it like the amazing Fancake (on Dreamwidth), but just in another format. You can feel free to join, find recs, and leave recs for others. Bonus points for whole new fandoms and pairing recs!

The even better news is an update to our Hot Fic Summer fundraiser - which we have taken in $2,846.50 so far! Fundraiser will go until the end of August, 2026, so let's see if we can push past a stretch goal and maybe hit $3,000 for the year? With our legal fees doubling ($200/year to $400/year) and other prices going up, none of us want to pay all this extra. The fact that you gave - be it $2 or $200 - you stepped up and said that Squidge is important. And that means the world to us. We literally couldn't be here without you!

Now some not great, not bad news: Our main webserver, which houses our mailing lists, main website, as well as the Jinjurly Archive and Image Hosting, has keeled over by itself a couple of times since a power outage that took us out for an hour earlier this week. We're monitoring, and are prepping in case we have to swap components or reinstall new drives and such. Think good thoughts, because that process is never fun.

Thank you for being a part of Squidge!

Please note that Squidge Image Hosting is currently working, but there is no way to currently sign up. Do not send in requests. Do not open trouble tickets. Do not attempt to sign up. We are having performance issues and cannot guarantee your request won't get lost in the shuffle. Let us work out the performance issues, and we'll be back.

Also, it needs to be said AGAIN because people continue to violate our Terms of Service and end up with their account deleted and banned:

DO NOT USE YOUR SQUIDGE IMAGE ACCOUNT TO CHARGE FOR THINGS.
DO NOT USE YOUR SQUIDGE IMAGE ACCOUNT TO RUN A PATREON FOR WHICH YOU CHARGE PEOPLE TO SEE SAID IMAGES.
DO NOT USE YOUR SQUIDGE IMAGE ACCOUNT TO RUN AN ETSY SHOP
DO NOT USE YOUR SQUIDGE IMAGE ACCOUNT TO SELL YOUR ITEMS ON EBAY
DO NOT USE YOUR SQUIDGE IMAGE ACCOUNT FOR "PORN FOR PORN'S SAKE"

In Short:
DO NOT USE YOUR SQUIDGE IMAGE ACCOUNT IN A WAY THAT WILL JEOPARDIZE SQUIDGE.ORG's 501C3 NON-PROFIT STATUS WITH THE UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT

We don't mean to yell, but apparently some people ARE STILL NOT GETTING IT. And if they continue to misuse Squidge.org's Image hosting for for-profit purposes and destroy Squidge.org's Non-Profit status with the United States Governemtn, THERE WILL NO LONGER BE A SQUIDGE.ORG, SQUIDGE IMAGE HOSTING, FENRECS, SQUIDGEWORLD, OR ANY OTHER SQUIDGE SERVICES AVAILABLE. EVER.

 

Please note that Squidge Image Hosting is currently working, but there is no way to currently sign up. Do not send in requests. Do not open trouble tickets. Do not attempt to sign up. We are having performance issues and cannot guarantee your request won't get lost in the shuffle. Let us work out the performance issues, and we'll be back.

Also, it needs to be said AGAIN because people continue to violate our Terms of Service and end up with their account deleted and banned:

DO NOT USE YOUR SQUIDGE IMAGE ACCOUNT TO CHARGE FOR THINGS.
DO NOT USE YOUR SQUIDGE IMAGE ACCOUNT TO RUN A PATREON FOR WHICH YOU CHARGE PEOPLE TO SEE SAID IMAGES.
DO NOT USE YOUR SQUIDGE IMAGE ACCOUNT TO RUN AN ETSY SHOP
DO NOT USE YOUR SQUIDGE IMAGE ACCOUNT TO SELL YOUR ITEMS ON EBAY
DO NOT USE YOUR SQUIDGE IMAGE ACCOUNT FOR "PORN FOR PORN'S SAKE"

In Short:
DO NOT USE YOUR SQUIDGE IMAGE ACCOUNT IN A WAY THAT WILL JEOPARDIZE SQUIDGE.ORG's 501C3 NON-PROFIT STATUS WITH THE UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT

We don't mean to yell, but apparently some people ARE STILL NOT GETTING IT. And if they continue to misuse Squidge.org's Image hosting for for-profit purposes and destroy Squidge.org's Non-Profit status with the United States Governemtn, THERE WILL NO LONGER BE A SQUIDGE.ORG, SQUIDGE IMAGE HOSTING, FENRECS, SQUIDGEWORLD, OR ANY OTHER SQUIDGE SERVICES AVAILABLE. EVER.