When did the site come back up?

[The Annoyed Man]

It was offline for so long I eventually gave up looking for it. When did it come back online?

[BigGuy]

Except for a stretch of a couple of days, I've been able to get in. The only thing posted were pages of spam by some bot. Almost all of the titles were in something that looks like cyrillic.

[puma guy]

It was hit or miss for quite a while. Often good for part of the day only to give errors later. Speaking for myself I try. most days to take a look see and as stated for several months it was up and down. It even happened once when I posted something and then edited it. When I resubmitted the site was down in less than a minute losing my change.

I see you on FB, though, and enjoy your replies. I answer quite a few myself; mostly firearm related like yours.
Traffic on this forum has seen a drastic reduction after permitless carry passed and the issue of reliability in accessing the forum has further reduced it.

[RHenriksen]

Funny, the only reason I popped in just now is that I received an email notification of a new post on a 2016 thread on cameras. Turns out to have been that Cyrllic spambot.

Good to see you, TAM! Glad you know you're still around & kicking.

[Ruark]

Is Chas here at all, even dropping in for a quick hello?

[Grayling813]

The forum has gone from being unusable due to can’t log in, sluggishness or just down to being useable due to allowing all bots to join and post hundreds of spam/useless posts a day.

Apparently Mr. Cotton no longer visits the site to see what his once best in Texas gun forums has become.

It would be better now if he just shut it down for new posts and users.

[BigGuy]

Better yet, let somebody who wants it have it. I remember when this was my goto site for legal advice and what was happening in government. I remember links to video of senate debate over gun legislation that help me decide who I supported in the next election.

[74novaman]

Better yet, let somebody who wants it have it. I remember when this was my goto site for legal advice and what was happening in government. I remember links to video of senate debate over gun legislation that help me decide who I supported in the next election.

yep, if he's no longer interested in maintaining it I would love to see someone take it over.

Forums are less popular than they used to be, but high quality ones like this one can still be relevant.

Being able to discuss Texas CHL issues and more importantly, organize and do some grass roots campaigning for new improvements to gun laws during Texas Legislative sessions was such a huge benefit of this place.

[Ruark]

Apparently Mr. Cotton no longer visits the site to see what his once best in Texas gun forums has become.

His last post was in April of 2025, 15 months ago. His last posts before that were in 2023 and earlier.

I have a LOT of experience managing and participating in discussion groups and the like. One thing I've learned is that they are extremely fragile.
Relatively straightforward events such as new software, loss of site files, server crashes, departure of site admins, site downtime, new URLs, a burst of spam, site reorganization, etc. - all kinds of things - can punch a drain hole in the bottom of the bucket that will drip users until the site dies.

I was cutting Cotton some slack, as he was tied up being president of the NRA and all that stuff. Now he's retired from that and from the law practice. I guess he's just not interested, but it would speak well of him to at least facilitate the transition of the site to somebody, if that's even possible. I don't know who would take it up. We're down to about one post per week.

[BigGuy]

Apparently Mr. Cotton no longer visits the site to see what his once best in Texas gun forums has become.

His last post was in April of 2025, 15 months ago. His last posts before that were in 2023 and earlier.

I have a LOT of experience managing and participating in discussion groups and the like. One thing I've learned is that they are extremely fragile.
Relatively straightforward events such as new software, loss of site files, server crashes, departure of site admins, site downtime, new URLs, a burst of spam, site reorganization, etc. - all kinds of things - can punch a drain hole in the bottom of the bucket that will drip users until the site dies.

I was cutting Cotton some slack, as he was tied up being president of the NRA and all that stuff. Now he's retired from that and from the law practice. I guess he's just not interested, but it would speak well of him to at least facilitate the transition of the site to somebody, if that's even possible. I don't know who would take it up. We're down to about one post per week.

[puma guy]

There are myriad reasons I'm sure why Mr. Cotton's active participation has waned. I still come here from time to time, but my priorities have changed drastically since August of 2025 when I was diagnosed and began surgery and ongoing treatment for melanoma cancer. Before I render any criticism of him I put it in that prospective, not knowing anything about his life situation at present.