We are pleased to announce that KiwiIRC now allows you to connect with Snoonet’s bouncer (BNC) service. Web BNC can be accessed at https://webbnc.snoonet.org. This change should enable more users to access our BNC service and use it on a regular basis.

Prawnsalad, creator of KiwiIRC, has been working closely with our development team in order to make this possible. We would like to thank prawnsalad for his effort and his contributions to Snoonet. It is always a pleasure to work with someone who goes the extra mile to improve the user experience for our community.

• What is a BNC?
  A BNC (or Bouncer) is a service which keeps you connected to IRC 24/7. Instead of connecting directly to Snoonet, you connect to the bouncer, which stays connected. The bouncer will play back messages which you missed while you were disconnected. This way, you can always be part of the conversation.
• How do I get one?
  Once you have a nick registered with NickServ for one month, you are eligible to request a BNC. You need to join ##bnc and type /requestbnc. Then, wait for an operator to approve your request. Usually this is done within an hour or two. When your request is approved, details on connecting to your account will be sent to your account via MemoServ. To read them, type /ms read new

Please see our BNC page for more information on Snoonet’s BNC service.

A month ago, we trialed a new service allowing users to request a custom vhost of their choosing, provided the custom host didn’t contain any slurs or violate any pre-existing network rules.

Due to consensus among network staff and preparation for potential future network updates, we have decided to end this trial service.

Users will no longer be allowed to apply for custom vhosts, but users who received custom vhosts before today will be able to keep them if they wish to do so. Those with custom vhosts who wish to revert back to a normal @user/accountname vhost should ask in #help and an oper will switch the vhost back.

Community vhosts, e.g. @xboxone/XenoBen, can still be requested for users with flags in any channel which has over 40 members. If you have flags in a snoonet community or chat channel which meets the member requirement, you can request a custom @communityname/accountname vhost by typing /vhost #channel, or asking for assistance in #help.

If you have any questions or suggestions regarding our vhost services, you can ask an oper in #snoonet (for general questions) or #help (for technical questions).

Former long-time Snoonet network operator and reddit moderator /u/edify, remembered as Jarod Coonce by his friends and family, has passed away. He was known for organizing television AMAs, and made the television community on reddit – from /r/thewalkingdead to /r/breakingbad – what it is today.

Jarod continued his role on Snoonet as a community manager, bringing countless communities to the network during its formative years. He selflessly helped in any way he could. Jarod single-handedly introduced over 300 users to Snoonet overnight by bringing attention to the #BreakingBad subreddit IRC channel, and bringing Live AMAs to the network from Breaking Bad actors. He truly was a force for change, and he will be missed.

Snoonet extends our best wishes to his family and friends. He will be remembered far after his departure not only by us, but by his fellow moderators and the many people his actions touched.

You can find a link to most of the AMAs edify organized here. One of his favorite charities was A Place Called Home, a safe haven for children and teens in Los Angeles. If you’d like to donate in his name, you can do so here.

Our official timeframe for network maintenance is Tuesday Night into Wednesday Morning between 9 PM PDT and 2 AM PDT. If needed, general network maintenance, server updates, or bug fixes will be performed during this timeframe. All users will be warned via global notice whenever major network maintenance (rebooting hubs, etc) is necessary. Users on specific servers requiring maintenance will be notified by staff via NOTICE or Private Message atleast 24 hours in advance.

In the event of a newly released IRCd update, or new major vulnerability found with our base operating system, this schedule may be extended include Saturday Night/Sunday Morning.

Snoonet operations reserve the right to set temporary and permanent channel modes on any channel or user during attacks, to protect users from harmful spam messages (containing, or not containing), malicious dox (private information), malicious software/web pages, viruses, spam, flood. This rule will not allow for censorship and will only be considered when multiple users become targets for attackers. No private channels will be affected.

Examples of modes:

Setting channels to registered users only, modifying flood-toggles for channels, making users only receive messages from others that are familiar in channels, and incorporating the network utility sysop (System Operator) in channels where attacks are popular.

Privacy

In addition to the no-dox rule. Posting of information about anybody’s private life, school, home, hobbies and interests are prohibited unless publicly shared on the network, or a verbal agreement is given by the individual on which information is shared. Sharing information about yourself is at your discretion, and we will not punish any user for information that you shared in a public chat. Punishment of this rule will result in a ban from the network ranging from one month to permanent dismissal. To sum it up, nothing that a reasonable person would deem as ‘private information’ may be shared with others. We will enforce it by looking in to how the information can be abused, or used to one’s advantage before issuing a warning or ban.