Following Hamish’s recent report of TOTAL INACTIVITY, I thought it might be good to fill in the gap. Apologies for both the iframe and the Javascript; ray will have my head for it.

I’m happy to consider more date submissions and corrections. This isn’t meant to be an exhaustive list of all dates Mararthon-related; its focus on Hamish’s missing period is clear, though some earlier dates were included for the benefit of perspective.

(07:45:44 PM) pfhortipfhy: Hey, do you live in the midwest?
(07:49:38 PM) pfhortipfhy: I met a friend of yours at a wedding in St. Louis.
(07:49:48 PM) pfhortipfhy: I have his email around here somewhere.
(07:49:58 PM) thermo: what, who
(07:50:20 PM) pfhortipfhy: I think he was a roommate of yours? You got him into marathon as well?
(07:53:00 PM) pfhortipfhy: j—@gmail.com
(07:53:08 PM) thermo: oh shit, really?
(07:53:22 PM) pfhortipfhy: Yeah dude. We talked about programming for a while.
(07:53:25 PM) thermo: a— and k—’s?
(07:53:33 PM) pfhortipfhy: Hell yeah! K—’s my cousin.
(07:53:39 PM) thermo: hahaha, that’s crazy
(07:53:58 PM) thermo: i went to high school with j— and a—, and i lived with j— for like four years :)
(07:53:59 PM) pfhortipfhy: Yeah, I know, right. I couldn’t believe it when he first said “Pfhorums”.
(07:54:15 PM) pfhortipfhy: Haha, yeah, he said you guys were wicked tight.
(07:54:37 PM) thermo: that’s nuts man
(07:55:14 PM) pfhortipfhy: Yeah. Small world, eh?
(07:55:27 PM) thermo: extremely, i can’t imagine the odds of that
(07:57:01 PM) pfhortipfhy: So, you know K—?
(07:57:16 PM) thermo: a little, she came over a few times to jog or to drink
(07:57:34 PM) pfhortipfhy: Nice. Yeah, I heard the whole story about the CUBE.^†
(07:58:57 PM) thermo: this is unbelievable, i need like half an hour to recuperate
(08:01:19 PM) pfhortipfhy: Hahaha. It was great, we were talking about games, and he asks me what games I like, and I talk about what I’ve been playing, and I say “But, my favorite game of all time has to be Marathon. It’s this old game by Bungie-” “You play Marathon?” “Yeah!” “Did you know that it’s gone open source? The new engine’s called-” “Aleph One, yeah, I know.” “Really? Did you ever go on the Pfhorums?”^‡ “WHOA, YOU’RE ON THE PFHORUMS?”

^† – incontrovertible proof that he did actually meet the guy
^‡ – I can hear J—’s tone here, using this question to test whether or not P-fail was a cool guy. Doesn’t sound like he passed.

Sure, the CLIQUE likes to ruin Mararthon, but have any of us managed to do this?

Stats collected so far this month:

$ grep -i survival misc.log | wc
229 4496 25219
$ grep -i emfh misc.log | wc
228 4198 21697

I know we have an OSH award for maps, but to me, this seems like an even greater accomplishment. Congratulations to Megabyte for ruining the metaserver!

Bavlok got the better of me. Here is a PM conversation between him and myself transposed into wonderful black-on-ORANGE. Note that I get trolled real bad. I feel terrible. Really the only reason I would post this at all is because I know some of the fuckwits that read JFO are the sort that relish in my repeated failures.

The conversation is entitled “For Carnage, Apply Within.”

Bavlok: I am enjoying your reactions to my presence. There is no doubt that you should indeed delete any posts which are abusive or harassing, but why have you overlooked your own?

TK: I’m not an admin, therefore how the site is managed isn’t my concern.

Bavlok: The Pfhorums wreak [sic] of favoritism. Are you so thick in it you have not noticed?

TK: You are truly the worst troll ever. If you think I’m manipulating $lave into being my puppet admin then you’re also woefully inattentive and ignorant of Pfhorums history.

Bavlok: Name calling is one of your best aspects. Your assumption of my thinking that you are manipulating $lave just goes to show your ignorance of the matter. No thinking is involved when it comes to the obvious favoritism. I am stating a fact. You take everything personal; you handle every matter as though it were a direct attack on you. This blinds you. You could respond by calling me some other creative name. Perhaps you would try and insult my intelligence. You are very good at dancing around the issue at hand.

TK: So what is the issue at hand? That I’ve made “abusive and harassing” posts? Congratulations. That there is a CLIQUE on the Pfhorums? Once again, your insightfulness [sic] astounds me.

Bavlok: It is my fault to state your ignorance of the matter. I was actually giving you the benefit of the doubt. You do see the problems. You admit to making abusive and harassing posts. You admit there is a CLIQUE on the Pfhorums. I posted my welcoming message to grab your attention. You’ve done well at responding.

Previous installments: part one, part two, part three. Now, prepare for the conclusion. It’s been great fun writing so much crap and having Bleating Lhowon disapprove of it so deeply. Let me know if you want me to keep the Essentials series going, and feel free to give me suggestions, or (if you happen to have an account here), run wild with the concept on your own.

(Try to read between the lines a little bit more)

Parts One and Two are required reading before diving in here.

(Try to read between the lines a little bit more)

If you haven’t already taken a look at the first part of this grand analysis, please do so. Now that you’re caught up…

(Try to read between the lines a little bit more)

Welcome to The Essentials, a new concept here on JFO. Our goal today is to take a look at an essential facet of the Marathon community, some well-preserved record of perseverance, conflict, creativity, brotherhood, and so on. In this case, I’ll be taking apart the infamous Pfhorums thread 2.5D Game Discussion post by post, analyzing everything that occurred in this great war of CLIQUE vs. Sweatervest (a.k.a. Mr. Cardigan). Although I don’t have the time or energy right now to go over the entire thread, I’ll take you on a journey through the first page. Won’t you please join me?

(Try to read between the lines a little bit more)

Now that MARARTHON has officially taken its own life, there are a few things I’d like to get off my chest. I mean, they’ve bothered me for something like a year. That’s a long time if you think about it. (Also, I have the gift of Bourbon, so truth is coming more naturally to me at the moment.)

(Try to read between the lines a little bit more)