[Stormdancer]

Originally Posted by BlueDragonfly

While my heart breaks over this, I understand.

Thank you for bringing so much into my life through this forum and the connections I've made, the learning and growth.

My best wishes to you in your future endeavors.

Originally Posted by Nemia

Dear Solandia, this place is your unique monument. Yes, we have all contributed to it, but you created it and were behind it all the time.

Thank you!

Originally Posted by emmsma

I thank you, Solandia for this love child you've allowed us to watch grow and care for. Your work here, these 17 years has helped us all grow.

I can't express enough, my gratitude for creating this space that has helped me so much over the years.

I wish you well in your new endeavors.

These Lovely Ladies have said all I have to say...so I'm just gonna !!! DITTO !!! x3

Best of wishes M'Dear

[tarotlova]

Thank you Solandia, this place and the people in it have taught me so much, I would never of had the confidence to read professionally if not for the practice readings I did on here oh so long ago. I wish you all the best, may the Goddess support you in letting go and starting afresh, we will all be okay, as I hope you will be too, 17 years is a long time. Much love to you, go in the peace that you have left a wonderful legacy behind where so many of us have learned and taught in so many subject matters xxx

[missy]

Dear Solandia,

Would it be possible for you to send a mass email to all forum members here so that everyone knows the news?

I only found out because a friend emailed me.

Best wishes,

missy

[Metafizzypop]

Oh boo hoo, this wonderful website is shutting down. I've ben a member for 10 years here. The place seemed like a home to me. I'm going to be miss it bad.

There's other websites out there about tarot and spirituality, and it appears that very soon there will be a lot more. But Aeclectic is a tough act to follow. I don't think that anything will ever be like this place. This was the cat's meow of tarot forums. Often imitated, never equaled.

Solandia, I wish you the best of luck whatever you do.

[Bat Chicken]

Thank you Solandia for all your hard work over the last 17 years. I haven't been around much the last few either, but I will miss this community.
Best of luck on your future endeavors!

[Ambrosia]

Such sad, sad news. AT has been a large part of my life for many years now. Thank you to Solandia for creating this space and all your hard work, likewise, thank you to the moderators over the years for all your hard work and support, and thank you to all the members and contributors who've made this such a special space.
All the very best to you all on your journey.

Peace,
Ambrosia

[isthmus nekoi]

I haven't been active on ATF for many years, but I still cherish many of the memories of this forum and felt moved to post.

First off, thank you Solandia, for providing this incredible online space for all of us. I cannot imagine the amount of time and resources it has taken for you to successfully steer this ship through all the sweeping technological and social changes we've seen in the online world and I respect your decision to dock this enterprise for good.

Thank you to all the mods I worked with. I learned so many lessons from our teamwork and from the challenges we handled, lessons I now bring to bear upon my professional life and in my volunteerism. If you are reading now, know that I still think of you from time to time and always wish you well. And a special thanks to Minderwiz for showing me the ropes here in the digital realm of moderation and of course in the skies above!

Thank you to all the ATF members for bringing your enthusiasm, curiousity, generosity and insight. I learned so much from our discussions and am thankful to have made some friends I am still in touch with today.

I have participated in so many online communities and ATF remains to date, my favourite one. It is with a mixture of shock and sadness that I post here, but mostly, with an overwhelming sense of gratitude. Thank you, all.

Sincerely,
IN

p.s. To any old members who wish to get in touch, I would love to hear from you and I'll check my inbox for the last time on July 13th 16:00 EST xo

[Maru]

Solandia, you're doing the right thing. Don't question that. If you sell the project, you'd be disowning your kids (and their very personal and private data). It's better to let an era end on the right note, then hand to some stranger who will then try to perform some kind of necromancy on it... you're basically the parent and you have to do what's right for the kids.

Personally, I think it's better if people moved on and were instead pushed to take up the torch and find other ways to grow this community. We can't be dependent forever on you (or anyone) to push on. There's much good that can come from this in my eyes.

Also, you've done this for 17 years. You deserve the break. I really appreciate you keeping this forum around for so long. I have been in one community after another and this is the only one that I have ever really "stuck" with. I was never a major poster, but I used this site for years (through Google site: primarily) when I was doing my own thing. You nurtured and raised this baby to be what it is and that allowed a lot of us a familiar (and safe) place to come to when we needed it.

Your work had an amazing impact and you can close this chapter with a smile knowing that... now it's time for other people to step in to fill the gap. Maybe create something different... whether it's in the form of one forum (or 20), youtube community, blogs, new apps, new-fangled whatsits... Your impact on this community will not be forgotten and I think will be felt, if not rippling, for a very long time.

You got us off to a great start by providing us this beautiful place to learn and grow. Now it's up to the community to take it from here.

[The Happy Squirrel]

I can only imagine how hard it is to decide that this is the natural course forward. The right thing to do. It is with great sadness that I say: I respect that. Thank you so much for creating what was my only home-base in the lonely journey that was exploring the tarot in the closet. I have not logged on here in the past 2 years or so, but have a special emotional attachment to this place. Nothing is perfect. Such as life. But, I can only remember the good memories at the moment. The flurry of conversations I had with so many here will stay with me forever. The learning (history, early decks, books). And the laughter, especially. My journey with tarot started here, within these purple pages. It was a journey of self-rebirth and letting go. It seems momentous to me personally, somehow, that as I finally ended a personal journey of letting go this year, that I must say goodbye to this place as well. Tarot reminds me of what I always known but often forget. That the cycle of life, of endings, and beginnings, must always go on. 'Tis hard....... All the best, many blessings, and with much gratitude....

[Mystica7]

Originally Posted by Maru

Solandia, you're doing the right thing. Don't question that. If you sell the project, you'd be disowning your kids (and their very personal and private data). It's better to let an era end on the right note, then hand to some stranger who will then try to perform some kind of necromancy on it... you're basically the parent and you have to do what's right for the kids.

Personally, I think it's better if people moved on and were instead pushed to take up the torch and find other ways to grow this community. We can't be dependent forever on you (or anyone) to push on. There's much good that can come from this in my eyes.

Also, you've done this for 17 years. You deserve the break. I really appreciate you keeping this forum around for so long. I have been in one community after another and this is the only one that I have ever really "stuck" with. I was never a major poster, but I used this site for years (through Google site: primarily) when I was doing my own thing. You nurtured and raised this baby to be what it is and that allowed a lot of us a familiar (and safe) place to come to when we needed it.

Your work had an amazing impact and you can close this chapter with a smile knowing that... now it's time for other people to step in to fill the gap. Maybe create something different... whether it's in the form of one forum (or 20), youtube community, blogs, new apps, new-fangled whatsits... Your impact on this community will not be forgotten and I think will be felt, if not rippling, for a very long time.

You got us off to a great start by providing us this beautiful place to learn and grow. Now it's up to the community to take it from here.

Maru, I can't help but think that you have a personal motivation shaping your thoughts -as a person who has previous experience with forums and wants to start a new venture herself maybe-, just as I do have a personal motivation in considering the idea that Aeclectic must be kept up and alive before it's exactly dead, to the contrary to what you say, i.e. already dead.

Our personal motivations also differ in that mine reflects the attitude and common sentiment of a community.

I am not questioning Solandia's decision, I am sure she has her right reasons, me and other people suggested different solutions to the problem which does not mean that we don't trust her judgement, but that we are upset as a community and there sure are people who are technically proficient to take the baton.

Just as this is very emotional for Solandia herself, I can understand she doesn't want to hand the forum over to somebody else, but that doesn't mean I support your encouragement of her for (doing) quite the opposite.

Technically speaking, this site and "we" are a valuable, precious commodity. Not only Solandia's children but a good community of adults as well.

It just felt strange to me you were not at all emotionally involved here...

Otherwise, yes I believe everything happens for the best, especially for a few members here, I do personally want them to actually leave Tarot aside to get what they truly want in life: a proper job, getting married and having a family. It is the seek for these goals that leads them to Tarot, and I may well not be an exception.

However, there is a much more serious occult side to Tarot, which involves much more than questioning rather "mundane" things that are naturally important to us, and but that which is unlike questioning the meaning of the universe and our real true place and role in it...

Aeclectic is the number one Tarot site on earth, and nothing will quite replace it. I know this and that's why I have been upset.

Otherwise, I certainly encourage peoples' growth in taking new ventures, and I respect Solandia's decision.

I however, along with some other members, felt the need to certainly state that there is and could be another solution if the personal hardships Solandia is going through outweigh, there are people who can help, and they are not "random strangers" but concerned and interested members of this community.

I hope I have made my points clear.

No matter what happens, I really want the best for everybody and so it is.