Bit slower to load

[Peter Lewin]

Think you found it! Getting fast response right now (1:40 PM) in NJ.

[Peter Lewin]

Sadly, a false congratulation. Currently taking about 20sec to load each request, "users" count 130-190 on each forum.

[6x6TLL]

Back to "normal" now. 03:00am UTC May 2nd. Pages loading within a second or two at most.

[peter brooks]

The ‘number of users online’ does seem to yo-yo between 4k/5k and 15k or so. When it’s high the page loads are (not surprisingly) very slow.

Good and snappy this morning for me (in the UK) this morning, with the ‘users online’ in the low range.

If the high numbers are legitimate (or can’t be prevented) then is simply more bandwidth required? Would some sort of crowd-funding help with the cost? I’m sure that the many dedicated users of the site would step up to contribute.

[Dan Fromm]

Hmm. I just got the dread connection timed out message. I tried again, got a quick response.

[Oren Grad]

If the high numbers are legitimate (or can’t be prevented) then is simply more bandwidth required?

We're still working through the plausible hypothesis that the spikes are bot activity, and figuring out whether they can be mitigated by server settings or require some kind of supplemental defense mechanism, and if the latter which tool would be best for us.

Would some sort of crowd-funding help with the cost? I’m sure that the many dedicated users of the site would step up to contribute.

It's been very kind of you and others to propose that - much appreciated! We will let everyone know if it looks like that will be needed.

[Kino]

I have noticed something peculiar about how the page loads (or does not) for my browser.

If I have the page magnification at any level other than 100% at my native screen resolution, it balks and throws errors.

When returned to default, everything seems to load much quicker.

Might be a coincidence, might not...

[Old_Dick]

Crawling along tonight. From New Hampshire, USA.