i second this and i'm very disappointed that RDF is apparently too short-sighted to see the immense importance of giving atheists a social network in a world where atheists are at best urged to keep quiet and at worst ostracized.  yes, there are many other sites that provide this service--thankfully more and more everyday--but with the current state of the world it's impossible to have too many, imho.

i will rejoice to see the day when sites like this outlive their usefulness and become curious museum pieces.

There is so much misinformation going round about this.

Not tossed out - a new system is on the way, but due to the incredibly childish reaction of some members (including moderators) the forums were switched to read only immediately.

Yes people had their accounts deleted.  This was in response to them blocking the admins IP addresses and deleting all the server logs to hide their tracks.

Indeed sad, but that's why the forums are in read only mode.  Could the situation have been handled better?  Yes.  Was the reaction to the news WAY over the top?  Yes.

Can anybody tell me what happened without linking to a million word post?

Hi everyone. I've been a member of RDF since within weeks of its inception in 2006.

There's a lot of disinformation being bandied about, perhaps accidentally or some on purpose. From the user's POV, the functionality was OK for almost 3 years. But in mid July 2009, for no reason I can fathom, the search engine was disabled without warning. Since then I haven't been able to download page-assemblies of only my posts (any page I download has other people's posts in it as well).

It was repeatedly promised that this was a temporary glitch, & that Google would meet all our needs. But that's rubbish. It indicates the level of amateurishness or deception that pervaded the IT department at RDF. The search engine has not worked since then.

Then a few days ago the forum was shut down and several members' thousands of posts deleted without warning, & without the courtesy of allowing them to download their contributions. This is directly analogous to book-burning. To the best of my knowledge, what 'askegg' has written is not true. The quotes that Richard has brandished in his diatribe were due to livid anger AFTER the vandalism done to some members' records. Those colorful reactions were, in my opinion, well deserved for the infamy of the acts that elicited them. Furthermore, those quote are not from RDF, but from other places on the net after RDF was already closed down & records destroyed. They have been carefully gleaned by RDF to use as a disinformation exercise.

Richard Dawkins is entitled to steer his website in whatever direction he wants. But he is NOT entitled to destroy web archives, or agree to their destruction, without first having the common courtesy of allowing their owners the chance to download them. I don't care what the lawyers might have advised RD.net; it is natural justice that the contributors, who freely made RDF what it was, are the ultimate owners of the knowledge that they produced.

There are other forums/sites, far far larger, which have no problems running. Before July 2009 I didn't notice any major inconvenience. The arbitrary and capricious events, often keeping even the mods out of the loop, smack to me of some other agenda that we are not privy to. The disgust of thousands of members who have now joined other sites is not "incredibly childish" as askegg alleges. It is a rational reaction to devious behavior & abominable treatment. Askegg should pull his fingers out of his ears (his avatar), and visit this site (among several) which elucidates what has happened: http://www.rationalia.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=75

You'll be pleased to know that at rationalia.com we've also put links & encouragement to your site here: http://www.rationalia.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=75&t=9273&p=362488#p362488

There is some good in the suicide of RDF; Many atheist forums, such as this, will now grow, out from under the shadow of 1 man's forum.

 I'm a RDFugee and I must say it's great to find a site like this one. I hope to make a positive contribution to the discussions, and it is FANTASTIC to find another cool group of atheists all in one place. I'm from South Africa and there aren't many of us around at the moment. But according to some of my recent research there is a strong movement away from credulity and faith even here in the religious outback of the world.

I started a group on Facebook called 'Religion-Free Africa' and I'm going to put a link to this site on the page. I think RRS will go a long way towards assisting Africans with information and assistance. Soooo fellow thinkers and reprobate atheists - it's great to be on board.

Welcome Stevo! Hope you enjoy it here.

There's a little issue I'd like to mention to people who might come across this thread:

I've noticed several ex-members of RDF saying they don't want to come to the RRS because of the 'bad' things we've apparently done. They never specify what exactly, though. Unfortunately it appears several atheists have picked up and started to repeat rumours about the RRS which were started by haters, mostly theistic. If anyone reading this thread has similar thoughts, I would recommend checking your evidence. Did the person you hear the rumour from present solid evidence? Or was it just repeating some vague accusation? If they did provide evidence, was the source some tabloid-esque website like Encyclopedia Dramatica, or was it a real source of real evidence that can be checked for accuracy? Is the alleged 'wrong', even if true, really something unethical? Or is it a matter of misinterpretation, twisted by hater-bias.

The RRS is provocative, no doubt. Naturally, we get a lot of haters because of that. It goes with the territory. I would hope that our potential allies stay alert to this reality, and don't get sucked in by false information.

Considering that many ex-RDF members are now *themselves* experiencing rumours spread about them by such an *apparently* trustworthy source as Richard Dawkins himself, it behooves people to take a step back and think about the negative effects of rumours before they spread them around. Are we all going to take Dawkins' word that the RDFugees are vitriolic trolls or hyperbolic whiners? Or are we going to check the facts and realize that even someone like Dawkins can get the story wrong?

If you've got real evidence from a reliable source, great. But if not, be responsible for the words that come out of your mouth or through your fingertips. Double-check your sources. Get both sides of the story.

If anyone wanted proof that memes are real, just watch a rumour spread and mutate. Watch it multiply and amplify its colourfulness, adapting to the 'gossip instinct' humans have for juicy stories. What starts as a simple miscommunication or misunderstanding or a straight-out lie, can grow into a story which gets repeated not because it's true, but simply because it's evolved to be contagiously shocking.

If we take cultural evolution seriously, we must be aware that memes don't spread on their own. They require a person to repeat them. We are all carriers of some false memes; no one is perfect in that regard. Just as a critical thinker should not believe every thing that he hears, a responsible speaker/writer shouldn't repeat everything they believe. Even critical thinkers can make mistakes and let some false beliefs through their defenses. Again, Dawkins is a perfect example here. Just as it is responsible to cover you mouth when you cough, we should also check our evidence before we speak. Dawkins failed to do that, and look how far his diseased meme/rumour has spread.

Hehe - I have no doubt that whichever country you are from, your team will cremate (wallop, desecrate, pick any word) our team on the field. I'm not really a follower of sport (I'm a musician and sport doesn't really feature in my life) but one thing I do know is that our SA team is pretty pathetic by world standards.

While "most" might be pretty good at it, I think you'd be surprisingly alarmed to see how many free thinkers use their heads just as irrationally as theists do.

Hey, welcome.

I posted a few things to the RDF forums for a while, a few years back now. Seemed ok.

I will be going to see and hear Richard speaking on Thursday (March 4) -  I live in Brisbane, Australia.

I am soooo envious of people who live in First World countries like Aus. The Atheist Alliance International conference sounds brilliant, and I see it is sold out. That would be a miracle (hehe) in South Africa. If we had an AAI conference here we would get about 3 people (me and my 2 kids) ... naaa, just kidding, I know of quite a few SA atheists (maybe 10?).

I would LOVE to see/hear RD speaking - huge fan. Will you also go to see/hear Dan Barker? He wrote the Foreword for my book, and he is brilliant - highly recommend going to his talk too.

See you guys in the forum ...

Oh ... so RD is speaking in a different city? Sorry, my bad. I was wondering why Dan B was still on holiday. He told me yesterday that he would be off line for 5 days because he's going on a hike in NZ (sounds cool, "Dan said to me the other day ..." hehe). I've just been to the site and see that the Rise of Atheism 2010 Global Atheist Convention in Melbourne only starts on the 12th, so DB must be touring a bit of Aus giving talks along the way. I would also keep looking at my ticket to make sure it's real Damn - if he tried that in SA he would probably be lynched in the streets

I have 2 James Randi books (Flim Flam and Faith Healers). Had to import them from the USA about 12 years ago. They are amoungst my most prized possessions along with other books by Carl Sagan (Demon Haunted World), Joseph McCabe (Myth of the resurrection) and Robert Ingersoll (a 1927 printing of some of his essays), about 5 Ayn Rand books, Bertrand Russell, Joe Nickel. Aah books - gotta love em.

Did you see James Randi in the Penn and Teller "Bullshit" episode on Nostradamus? He is brilliant!

Sorry, but what is TAM? 

Welcome home to the new people.