As you've likely noticed, there has been a relative flurry of activity around restoring links to old scenarios and modpacks recently. But this isn't something that has never happened before, one only needs to look at stickies by Plotinus and Ozymandias to see the efforts of the past. What's different now?
In addition to the re-uploads by @Virote_Considon , and the return of @KingArthur with a list of scenarios on his hard drive, the two new moderators in the Civ3 forums (myself and @Blake00 ) are both motivated to restore as many scenarios as possible. Blake00 has already done an extensive job of this in the Civ2 forums. This means that whenever new files are reuploaded, we can fairly quickly link to them in the original threads, solving the problem of far too many scenarios requiring you to search the last few pages looking to see if anyone has re-uploaded it. I've already done this for Virote_Considon's re-uploads, and it's quicker than last year when we were working with The_J and Thunderfall, who already have a lot on their plates (but who also support these efforts). If you haven't checked out the main page of civfanatics.com recently, you should, The_J has done a fantastic job of making it active and interesting again.
The other change we have is that I've been able to create a list of all the Scenarios and Modpacks threads that have broken links on their first page, grouped by the type of broken link - HTTP only (but still working - these work fine in Firefox/IE but not Chrome), AtomicGamer (these may be archived), and all other sites. This makes it much easier to identify what's missing than manually checking every single thread. It still requires work, but directed work.
And that's where this thread, and your participation, comes in. We are requesting help identifying which threads with broken links have re-uploads later and just need the link updated, and which ones do not and will require finding someone who downloaded the scenario years ago.
We plan to start with the broken links that are not to AtomicGamer. There are 87 of these for modpacks, and 77 for scenarios. Eventually we can do all these ourselves, but it will go quicker, potentially much quicker, with help.
I've started an online spreadsheet to keep track of those 87 modpacks, which should be publicly viewable. I've screenshotted a section of it below:
The Title is the CFC thread title, the URL is the link to the thread. Farther to the right, there is the label and URL of the broken link, some scenarios such as Test IV Time - The Alternative World have multiple broken URLs, perhaps a mainfile and a patch, or mainfile and optional extra artwork.
This is sorted by how many views the thread has, as a rough proxy of popularity. And the "Result" column is color-coded.
Green = False alarm, things are okay. The existing example was missing a patch from the prior version to the current, but the current version download is working, so it's all accessible.
Blue = Restored.
Yellow = Restored, but the current download isn't ideal. In the existing example, the download requires knowing which button says "Download" and which says "Cancel" when the site warns you that the file may harm your computer. All the text is in Russian, so for most users it won't necessarily be clear what to do. But the files are all there, so for now that's good enough (we'll revisit that later).
Orange = Missing, but there's an AtomicGamer link that we haven't checked yet that may contain the file.
Red = Missing, no sign of it
I propose a few additional colors
Gray = The username in the column is actively checking whether it is available (within the next couple hours).
Lavendar = Re-upload found, needs to be updated in the first post by a moderator. Please add comments to the "Result" column with relevant information!
It may sound easy, but it takes a few minutes for each one, and with 87 of them for modpacks (plus more for scenarios, plus more for AtomicGamer, etc.), it takes time. Being able to divide this up among, say, six people instead of two would speed things up.
I've also now uploaded the spreadsheet of 77 potentially missing scenarios, which hasn't been started yet.
If you are interested, respond here, and send me (via PM if you prefer) an e-mail to which I can send an edit invitation to the spreadsheet. If we get some momentum around this section, I'll post links for the scenarios too, and then the AtomicGamer ones (which require even more time for each one, but have a higher expected chance of success).
FAQ
Q: Will this extend to other categories (Maps, Unit Graphics, etc.)?
A: If this is successful, eventually, yes.
Q: What about previous restoration efforts?
A: We plan to refer to the threads from previous years' efforts as part of trying to identify missing resources once we know they're really missing. But the first task is figuring out what's really missing. I also expect we'll be bumping Virote_Considon's thread when we find missing mods/scenarios that he has locally. He deserves a lot of credit for helping motivate us with that thread, too!
Q: What is the overall vision?
A: We'd like to get to the place that every modpack/scenario has more than one source available, to prevent their disappearance if one site goes offline. Blake00 has already done a lot of this for Civ2. If we get the ball rolling on this initial effort to make sure all the modpacks/scenarios have one link, I'll be posting updates on plans to get to two or three sources for each scenario. That would let us get to the point of not being dependent on any one Great Library.
In addition to the re-uploads by @Virote_Considon , and the return of @KingArthur with a list of scenarios on his hard drive, the two new moderators in the Civ3 forums (myself and @Blake00 ) are both motivated to restore as many scenarios as possible. Blake00 has already done an extensive job of this in the Civ2 forums. This means that whenever new files are reuploaded, we can fairly quickly link to them in the original threads, solving the problem of far too many scenarios requiring you to search the last few pages looking to see if anyone has re-uploaded it. I've already done this for Virote_Considon's re-uploads, and it's quicker than last year when we were working with The_J and Thunderfall, who already have a lot on their plates (but who also support these efforts). If you haven't checked out the main page of civfanatics.com recently, you should, The_J has done a fantastic job of making it active and interesting again.
The other change we have is that I've been able to create a list of all the Scenarios and Modpacks threads that have broken links on their first page, grouped by the type of broken link - HTTP only (but still working - these work fine in Firefox/IE but not Chrome), AtomicGamer (these may be archived), and all other sites. This makes it much easier to identify what's missing than manually checking every single thread. It still requires work, but directed work.
And that's where this thread, and your participation, comes in. We are requesting help identifying which threads with broken links have re-uploads later and just need the link updated, and which ones do not and will require finding someone who downloaded the scenario years ago.
We plan to start with the broken links that are not to AtomicGamer. There are 87 of these for modpacks, and 77 for scenarios. Eventually we can do all these ourselves, but it will go quicker, potentially much quicker, with help.
I've started an online spreadsheet to keep track of those 87 modpacks, which should be publicly viewable. I've screenshotted a section of it below:
The Title is the CFC thread title, the URL is the link to the thread. Farther to the right, there is the label and URL of the broken link, some scenarios such as Test IV Time - The Alternative World have multiple broken URLs, perhaps a mainfile and a patch, or mainfile and optional extra artwork.
This is sorted by how many views the thread has, as a rough proxy of popularity. And the "Result" column is color-coded.
Green = False alarm, things are okay. The existing example was missing a patch from the prior version to the current, but the current version download is working, so it's all accessible.
Blue = Restored.
Yellow = Restored, but the current download isn't ideal. In the existing example, the download requires knowing which button says "Download" and which says "Cancel" when the site warns you that the file may harm your computer. All the text is in Russian, so for most users it won't necessarily be clear what to do. But the files are all there, so for now that's good enough (we'll revisit that later).
Orange = Missing, but there's an AtomicGamer link that we haven't checked yet that may contain the file.
Red = Missing, no sign of it
I propose a few additional colors
Gray = The username in the column is actively checking whether it is available (within the next couple hours).
Lavendar = Re-upload found, needs to be updated in the first post by a moderator. Please add comments to the "Result" column with relevant information!
It may sound easy, but it takes a few minutes for each one, and with 87 of them for modpacks (plus more for scenarios, plus more for AtomicGamer, etc.), it takes time. Being able to divide this up among, say, six people instead of two would speed things up.
I've also now uploaded the spreadsheet of 77 potentially missing scenarios, which hasn't been started yet.
If you are interested, respond here, and send me (via PM if you prefer) an e-mail to which I can send an edit invitation to the spreadsheet. If we get some momentum around this section, I'll post links for the scenarios too, and then the AtomicGamer ones (which require even more time for each one, but have a higher expected chance of success).
FAQ
Q: Will this extend to other categories (Maps, Unit Graphics, etc.)?
A: If this is successful, eventually, yes.
Q: What about previous restoration efforts?
A: We plan to refer to the threads from previous years' efforts as part of trying to identify missing resources once we know they're really missing. But the first task is figuring out what's really missing. I also expect we'll be bumping Virote_Considon's thread when we find missing mods/scenarios that he has locally. He deserves a lot of credit for helping motivate us with that thread, too!
Q: What is the overall vision?
A: We'd like to get to the place that every modpack/scenario has more than one source available, to prevent their disappearance if one site goes offline. Blake00 has already done a lot of this for Civ2. If we get the ball rolling on this initial effort to make sure all the modpacks/scenarios have one link, I'll be posting updates on plans to get to two or three sources for each scenario. That would let us get to the point of not being dependent on any one Great Library.
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Hopefully I can get back to all this again probably early next year as I really want to finish up releasing my Civ2 mods before getting back into more preservation work.
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) I truly do feel sorry for "civfanatics.ru" 
