rawTOP

Turns out I'm having to upgrade the old version of the software to the latest (dot) version. That was just done. Now I'm having to change the database to UTF-8 (a technical issue related to how it stores strings with things like accented characters). I'll be testing that soon, so there may be issue that crop up in the testing, but I can revert back if things don't look right. THEN I can start looking into upgrading to IPB4. But it's Friday afternoon and I'm getting tired and out-of-town guests are about to arrive. So we'll see. I'd like to get the test environment up today, if possible.

FYI… I'm starting to work on a site software upgrade. I'm not sure how long it will take. It's rather major. It would be lovely if everything went smoothly and I was able to get it done today. But something tells me that's not how it will go and I'll actually just start testing things today and the full migration will happen early next week. This is just a warning that if you see anything odd happening – that's probably the reason. And when I do the final migration the site will be down during the upgrade – probably for hours. Oh, and when I'm done the site will look completely different. So don't be confused by that. When I have a test environment up and running I'll suggest you login to it and try it out. Any bugs you find can get fixed before everyone is encountering them. And for those of you who are wondering about the technical details… I'm upgrading from IP.Board 3 to IP.Board 4. IPB4 is a complete ground-up rewrite, so it's a major upgrade.

The meth head who contacted me claimed to have access to money. He was a little incoherent, but it sounded like his father had made quite a bit of money illegally and put it in his name. But then again, he was so high when he'd contact me who knows what the truth is (could have been a fantasy he made up in his head while he was high). But the point is, someone with money and a knowledge of illegal activity, could probably find a hacker to hire – even if he's high on meth half the time. I also had a Russian guy contact me wanting money for the attacks to stop (he posted above), but the attacks didn't always correspond to the times he specified, and I figured, even if he was the attacker, it was cheaper in the long run to pay my host to deal with it. As soon as you know they'll pay up, they'll do it again.

That's right, getting HIV these days means you will probably live longer than your neg counterparts. Hard to believe, but true. http://www.hivequal.org/hiv-equal-online/say-what-how-an-hiv-diagnosis-can-lead-to-a-longer-life But to be fair the increase is probably due to having a closer relationship with the healthcare system due to frequent checkups. So neg guys on PrEP should do even better than poz guys. But the point is that there's no longer need to fear HIV. Yes, it's a hassle if you become poz, but it doesn't need to kill you. And of course, it only applies to guys who get into treatment in a timely manner. So getting tested regularly is critical as is getting on treatment before your t-cells drop below 350 (which usually happens about 2 years after infection). This also makes HIV criminalization rather absurd.

It's been over 24 hours since the last attack. I suspect the hacker has moved on to easier targets. Search has been re-enabled, as has member registration. Both were turned off the past few days since they're a common point of attack. I'll turn them back off if the attacks resume.

Given that the server was attacked 5 hours after this message (not 12), I can only assume it wasn't posted by the real hacker.

There was another attack this evening, but I think we've got it under control. This time it was a different type of attack that was specifically aimed at Breeding Zone.

This was far more than what a script kiddie could do. Whoever did this had access to a botnet of zombie computers. There were two attacks. One lasted about an hour. The other about 40 minutes. But everything is back to normal now.

There was a huge DDOS attack on the server earlier this evening. I usually run around 45 Mbps out and at one point apparently the UDP traffic to the server was at 12 Gbps (that's a pretty huge attack) – though as you can see in the graph, it averaged to a somewhat lower number, but it was still quite substantial. The traffic to the server is now being filtered. That should take care of it. Hopefully the filtering won't have to go on for long since it could inadvertently block "good" traffic. While the filtering was being set up there was some downtime. I apologize for that, but it was unavoidable. Whoever attacked me, I'm not really sure what the point was. Since I don't know who it was, I don't know why they did it. Hence, what was the point of doing it in the first place? It's not like the attack managed to get a point across. There was a meth head on Twitter who hit me up a week or two ago. He'd start by complimenting me but then wind up with vague threats of a lawsuit or something. But he was so incoherent I didn't take him seriously. Other than that there have been no substantive negative incidents lately, so I honestly don't have a clue why there was an attack today. I mean years ago when people really hated barebacking, I'd see the point, but now bareback is mainstream and with PrEP there are tools for neg guys to protect themselves from would be stealthers and the like. So I really don't understand the timing of the attack at all. Moving on…

In case people are wondering, this is how they t-shirts turned out. We did both designs. The bunkhouse was difficult to print, but the pig design printed pretty well. The pink on maroon worked really well with that design…

So here's another pig-based design… Personally I feel this pig is a stronger design than the first one. But the question I asked above was which would you wear in public, and I understand why most of you are saying the bunkhouse one. It raises fewer questions. Personally I like the pig for going out to gay bars, though I'm not sure I'd go to brunch wearing it. I think we'll probably go with the bunkhouse and this latest pig. Just do both since each can be good in different contexts.

Yes, cut off the sleeves. But those images are photoshopped. They're not real t-shirts (yet). Also, I have some fitted sizes that are smaller all over that have slightly smaller sleeves.

I wanted to come up with a #BBBH t-shirt. So my boyfriend did a couple designs. I need to know which you think is better. The first is pretty straightforward… I mean you guys can figure out the pig reference, right? And FYI – the pig was hand-drawn by my boyfriend. And another option would be to have an outline of a pig with #BBBH inside or below the pig. The next option comes from an alternate meaning for #BBBH. I was thinking if I did a #BBBH app for the iPhone, what could get past the censors at Apple? The solution was "Bareback Bunkhouse". On a tongue and cheek level we could tell Apple it was "an app for cowboys who like to ride bareback". And then in the app you could specify things like "prefer top bunk", "prefer bottom bunk". And of course bunkhouses come with the whole "sleeping with" connotation. So what I need to know from you guys is which you would be more likely to wear in public? Not just out to a gay bar, but to the grocery store, to dinner at a casual restaurant, etc.?

The short version of what BearBandit said is that only one of you has to be on ARVs for there to be no risk of infection. Since you're on them you needn't worry so much as to whether he's on them.

Ever since the site went up on different software last year it's been impossible for members to grant themselves permission to see the HIV Fetish and Chem Sex sections because a feature of the software running the site just didn't work properly. I just spent a couple hours trying to figure out how the settings are stored and it's not simple to access. If I put in a solution I wouldn't trust it. SO, I'm reopening those sections to all members. At some point probably this summer I'll be upgrading the site to a new version of the software. If I can get things working at that point, then I'll go back to a system where you have to self-permission yourself to see the section. If you don't want to see anything HIV Fetish or Chem Sex related – give me a week or so and I should have a self-service feature for you that will let you set that preference yourself.

wood - I agree - cost is definitely an issue. Too bad it's not generic yet. But the video brought up that Australia took 10 years to approve rapid HIV testing. So it would seem that Australia just has issues when it comes to stuff like this.

PrEP has not been approved in Australia and a really powerful video was put on YouTube with poz guys saying how important it is. Several of them said "if PrEP were available previously, I wouldn't be poz now". https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L1cM5ysQriM

Hey guys! I've just been made a co-sponsor of the SeXXXy MF dance party Sunday, June 28th – over Pride weekend here in NYC. It's being organized by Cade – the guy who runs all the CumUnion, Milk Chocolate, etc. parties here in NY. The main sponsor is GayHotMovies.com so there will be porn giveaways and plenty of porn stars in attendance. Between Cade's crowd and the porn crowd it should be a really sexually-charged event! I wasn't allowed to sponsor under the name rawTOP or Breeding Zone since the club is already paranoid about the dance party being seen as a sex party, so the best I could manage was doing a #BBBH promo. And to that end - the first 50 guys who sign up under #BBBH get free t-shirts (see below for details). Unfortunately, sex isn't allowed at the dance party due to NY's laws about alcohol and sex, but there will be a sex party immediately after where you can fuck to your heart's content. There are two package deals – one for $40 and one for $100. Just realize that when you go to the page to buy tickets the $40 one will be listed at $60 - but if you enter a promo code of #BBBH you'll get $20 off. The $100 gives you access to 4 additional sex parties including the two best sex parties over Pride weekend. Here's a rundown of all the different sex parties that are included: Thurs, June 11th - MilkChocolate @ Paddles Thurs, June 18th - MilkChocolate @ Paddles Tues, June 23rd - CumUnion / Astoria ($100 combo package only) Thurs, June 25th - CumUnion @ Paddles Fri, June 26th - CumUnion @ Paddles ($100 combo package only) Sat, June 27th - CumUnion @ Paddles ($100 combo package only) Sun, June 28th - CumUnion After Party Tues, June 30th - Latin Leche / Astoria ($100 combo package only) And as far as the t-shirts, you can have your t-shirt with one of 4 logos: rawTOP, #BBBH, Breeding Zone or Raunchy Fuckers. They'll be more or less made-to-order by yours truly. But remember, that only happens if you sign up under the #BBBH ticket option. So buy your tickets now to get the maximum number of free sex parties out of the deal!

The thing I liked about Cialis was that it lasted for a few days. So if your trick didn't show up, it would still work for another trick the next day. That, and Viagra gave me weird headaches and shit. I'll call my doc and see if he can prescribe Levitra. I haven't tried that yet. But I don't know how long in advance I should take it. Guess I could experiment before sex parties since they go on for a while.

Suddenly, a couple months ago, the price of Cialis went through the roof. It's now around $40/pill. WTF? (the screenshot below is for 10 pills @ 20mg) I can only imagine that sales must have plummeted since then. What in the hell is the manufacturer thinking pricing it so high? I mean even if you split the 20mg pill in two - that's still $20 per dose. It needs to be more like $5/dose (or less). Does anyone have recommendations on where real Cialis can be gotten at a reasonable price? Maybe a Canadian pharmacy? I don't quite trust random, online pharmacies. So I'd like to know who people use and trust.

Today is Breeding Zone's 5th birthday. So I thought I'd give a rundown of how things have gone so far… As you can see the growth of Breeding Zone has been pretty steady over the years. The spike is a reporting error that happened when the site was migrated to different software and the URL changed from BreedingZone.com to Breeding.Zone. But once Google figured out the change the growth continued as if nothing happened. And here are the overall numbers… 3.6 million guys (plus a few women) have come to Breeding Zone over the years. And the best part is that people spend time here when they come here. An average duration of nearly 10 minutes is incredible. When you do the math over 164 years of people's lives have been spent looking at this site. That's like 2 lifetimes! Anyway, you guys are the reason why this site is so great - so THANK YOU! And yes, I will be working to make the site better in the coming months. So stay tuned.

This is just incredibly sad… http://wabe.org/post/half-atlantas-newly-diagnosed-hiv-patients-have-aids-grady-testing-finds Basically 1/3rd of the people who test positive in Atlanta are catching it so late they've already progressed to AIDS. And the number goes up to half when the tests are truly random / the person didn't go looking specifically to get tested (e.g. in an emergency room when they're there for some other reason). That's HORRIBLE. HIV isn't all that scary IF you catch it quickly, but once you let it progress to AIDS your prognosis is far worse. Never ever go more than two years without an HIV test, and try to do it more frequently than that. And if you think the Republicans aren't killing people – think again. Georgia is a pretty red state. This is what happens when conservative values take over.

This is interesting… http://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/herpes-pill-might-control-hiv-n323126

A new study re-analyzed old data and debunked the widespread thinking that you're most infectious right after infected yourself… http://journals.plos.org/plosmedicine/article?id=10.1371/journal.pmed.1001803 However, the question in my mind is – don't viral loads spike right after infection? Is this saying that higher viral loads don't make you more infectious?

I'm hosting a party tonight from 9 to 10:30 in Central Harlem (near the 2/3 & A/B/C/D). Looking for more tops and vers tops. Sorry, no bottoms. If you're interested, send me an email - rawtop@breeding.zone - include pics and stats.