Hi everyone.
I've already mentioned this to the existing staff (and a select few other members due to their involvement with the site or in specific projects that may be affected), but recently I've not really had that much interest in Lemmings again, and have also been quite busy with other projects and real-life stuff, so I felt it was best that I hand control over to others. At the moment, the exact details of this is still under discussion, but most likely it will be passed to existing staff members anyway.
I'll continue to fund the site's hosting, so there's no worries about anything relating to hosting costs (although donations are always appreciated; see the "staff / donations / etc" topic by ccexplore for details on how to donate). Likewise, I'll still probably still pop by fairly often. I simply won't be so actively involved in running the site, as such.
For those who are worried about a repeat of what happened towards the end of the last site's lifespan - we have multiple means in place to avoid this, including that all other staff members (except board-specific moderators) have the details on multiple means of contacting me outside of the site, and all administrators have direct access to the site's files and database (and I have asked them to re-verify that they can still access it). We're also theoretically keeping far more regular backups (which are accessible not only by the administrators, but also the global moderators), though this does get a bit behind at times - we really do need to completely automate it (currently it's semi-automated, but still ultimately involves a fair bit of manual work). Basically, there is next to no chance of a repeat of what happened last time, even if I were to completely disappear like our previous admin did.
This will of course also affect NeoLemmix; at this point I am not sure what will happen there. If anyone with experience in Delphi (or just with OOP progamming in general and willing to try to learn Delphi - it isn't that tricky if you already know the general concepts of OOP) is interested in taking over NeoLemmix, let me know. (Of course it's open source so anyone could fork it if they like, but ideally I'd also like to have it officially passed on to someone.)
We'll give further details when any decisions are made. But the most important thing is - do not worry about the site disappearing. One way or another, it will survive, and chances are you won't notice any significant changes.
Update!Simon will be considered the highest-authority admin for now; he may choose to pass this on to someone else at a later date. This includes that he gets the final say on any new admins or moderators. geoo and ccexplore, of course, remain as extra administrators.
Nepster will be maintaining NeoLemmix itself from now on, including decisions on who (if anyone) else is officially accepted as a contributor. He will also be the administrator of the NeoLemmix IRC channel. I'll continue to provide assistance with understanding NL code for as long as that's needed, but I won't be directly contributing.
Nessy will be taking over the NeoLemmix website; Nepster also has server and database access for it.
As mentioned above, I'll continue to be the primary funder of both websites (the forums and the NeoLemmix site); however, donations are always appreciated. More information on how to donate can be found
in ccexplore's forum staff / donations topic. I will also continue to provide the monetary prizes for official forum level design contests.