Andy's Retirement Statement
Featuring "I'm Sleepy!" Grammer(c)

I would like to announce that on August 28th, after five years, I will be retiring from my duties as head of EmulationZone.Org. There are a few reasons for my departure, so let me get right to it.

The first is the value to me to run the site. I must admit that I learned a lot from running the site. Not necessarily web design skills, but people and management skills. In the beginning, I spent my time making websites and working on projects. I denied outside offers for help merely because of the pride I took in my work. As time went on, I allowed people to help me out and I begin to slowly shirt towards becoming a manager. I managed projects and website efforts. But after five years, I've seen the full spectrum of things that an admin like myself could experience. I'm seen failure and success. I've faces legal threats. I dealt with the attacks of hackers. I had a buy-out offer. I was a mentor to many and a pillar of strength for those looking for help. I've managed to squeeze out all I can do from the site. There is just nothing left for me to do that excites me. It's simple just time for me to move on.

The second reason is schooling. In September, I will be entering grad school to begin work on a masters. Though I was able to juggle my college education and the web site before, juggling a job, a master and a website will be difficult. Even if I do have free time, it will be too few and to far apart to allow me to make effective contributions to the site. Some will object and state that some leadership is better then none, but the third reason takes away the gold.

Except for a few exceptions, this past year has been the worse years for the 'Zone on record. People have been disappearing , breaking promises and just slacking off from their tasks royally. Though this behavior is nothing new, what is new is the scale at which this is being felt. Before, it was limited to a few staff members. They were easy to isolate and deal with. But now it's worse.

It seems as if a majority of the staff just decided to follow this trend. Here's an example. On many occasions, I will forward information or suggestions to site ops on how to improve their page. In the past, people listened and took what I said to heart. Today, information never gets post, site designs and layouts never get improved and worse of all, useful information gets lost! Heck, people just ignore me and let their pages rout. Mind you, these are people who ASKED to give me a hand. In these occasions, I should have just saved my breath and just do the work myself. At least it would have been posted.

Activities like this discourage you and eat away at your soul little by little. This past year just ate a little too much more then I can handle.

So whose the blame? Perhaps it is I whom to blame? A president of a company, (which will remain nameless,) told me a good leader generates "spark" for those under him. If he or she is unable to generate that spark, it might be time to consider moving on. But God knows I tried everything this years to motivate people, and that nothing seemed to work.

Perhaps it's the staff member of whom to blame? Many told me they were very interested in doing the task they signed up for only to quit on me a few weeks , or even days later. (Record is two days.) Many made promises and broke them. Heck, some weren't even much of a help at all? Are they solely to blame? Not really. I used to tell Rocket that SSRG is maintained by a bunch of people for fun, not profit. Perhaps the "fun" just wore out. Perhaps the console emulation scene is just not as interesting this year as it was in the past few years?

Regardless of who is at fault, my role as manager and site admin is no longer fulfilling. It's time for me to more on to something more challenge and more fulfilling.

So, what will become of the site? I have given this much consideration in the past few weeks and have done the following.. First off, I have spent the last few weeks placing the site in a "zero maintenance" state. To do this, I got rid of problematic staff members and web sites and kept only those that were mature enough to be left unattended. (Yelling at people for posting pirated software is getting old.) Next, of those remaining sites, I only kept those that I felt were contributing something to the world. (And not replicating to what is already out there.) As of now, I am comfortable in stating that if the site ops of the remaining sites were to disappear tomorrow, the site as a whole would remain as a meaningful archive of files and information for the world to share.

SSRG went through as similar weed-out process and will be now be headed by Stealth. Saxman will no longer be with SSRG for he has just quit.

As for myself, I will stay aboard and run 'ZRN. I wrote a manual for those using the station that answers pretty much any question that might come up. I might add a station of my own later on. Other then that, I'm going to start a website pertaining to the thesis I wish to start. _It will be a solo effort._

In closing, I would like to thank all the fans of the 'Zone for their continued support for the past five years. I would also like to thank the contributing staff members for helping make the 'Zone what it is today. Finally, I would like to send some custom fare well messages to the following people:

2Tails - Waz-up?!?

=KaosLord= - Good luck with your software company and thanks for all your help and support with EMULinks.Com

BlazeFire - Good luck with your projects and keep BlazeFire Radio Alive! After all, it's your sanctuary!

Chaos Theorem - Thanks for all your help and support with EmuLinks.com

Cyan - I got out more often then the frequency at which you update your site! Other then that, you gave us some very interesting stuff to play with!

DarkWolf - You got something good going with Sega Forever Keep it up! I'll see ya around on 'ZRN/

Gerbil - Your Sonic HackingWiz Pro has been a very successful application of al the info on SSRG. Keep up the good work!

GreenAngel - Still alive?

Haoshiro - Thanks for all the graphics help and EmuLinks! The site looks pretty thanks to your contributions!

Jan Area - Your layout ain't pretty, but its actually not that bad. I've seen people try to make layouts that came-out worse then what you have.

Knuckles (Tim M.) - Thanks for the CDs!

NEVERMIND8 - Hey, where are you? You movie archive kicks butt!

NO CARRIER - Hi Andy! "Hi Andy!"

P.J. - Waz up?!?!?

Rlan -Fan Made Games @ SSRG rlan@emulationzone.org 38212860 rlan2

Ryogamasaki - Stay away from the Sonic porn. No one will take you site seriously until you hook yourself away from that smut.

SaxMan - Thanks for all the help with SSRG. I hope you gained a lot of practical people and managerial experience under my wing.

Sephiroth - You did what you could with WEMU. Hope you enjoy your SSRG T-shirt. And thanks for all your support for the past 3 years!

sonicblur - Thanks for all the insight about coding for the MAC. I'll see ya around on 'ZRN

Freddyg @ SonicHQ - Glad to see that SonicHQ.ORG continues to grow, but PLEASE do something cool with the layout! The site deserves it.

Sonikku - Ah yes, you. The ring leader for the "Monty Python's Flying Circus: The Next Generation." Mr. "I can tell jokes and code at the same time with one hand tied to the jaw of a rabid bull dog." Good luck with your coding career, or your acting career, or you stand-up career, or all the above.

Stealth - You have a lot of programming talent. Do yourself a favor and get a degree in CmpSci. It ain't easy (I should know, I earned one myself) but it will be your ticket to a challenging and financially rewording life.

TailsPrower - Hey, I actually got to meet a staff member in person! Cool! I'm glad to know that after 5 years I'm dealing with real people!

Thomas -Thanks for your efforts with the French Mirror.

TomSonic - You helped spark the Sonic hacking community. Keep up the good work!

Tristan - I think you have the longest running amateur video game-related audio news program on the 'net! Good luck with your future endeavors to become a newscaster. And stop complaining about your love life! Your too young to be worrying about that: you're only in high school. Wait until you get in college. People change a lot from high school to college, but not much from college to the real world.

TsengRei (Ryu) - Thanks for the Sonic 2 Eur box!

Wiseman - Thanks for all the technical tidbits you provided through-out the years! You made me hate the PS2 with a passion!

Zaiaku (Liz) - Thanks for the SSRG Level Map Archive logo!

Zac & Brahn- Without you guys, the 'Zone would have died in 1998 and never reach it's full potential! Thanks for all the help!

And finally My mom - Told ya SSRG wasn't a spy organization!

Thanks everyone. It was fun while it lasted. And remember, do what you love and you will love what you become!