On December 10th, 2015 FurNation announced that it will be closing its website after a string of distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks and staff's family, health, and career problems. The announcement marks the end of one of the original furry social networks.

It is a good time to reflect on what FurNation was, and what this loss means for the future of the fandom.

FurrTrax.com is making an offer to FurNation.com to host that site for free for the next six months, until it can get back on its feet and figure out its own server space or other hosting arrangements. If that becomes a problem FurrTrax is willing to extend its offer within reason, or simply continue to host FurNation for a small fee, in the range 10 or 20 dollars, just to cover the added bandwidth usage on FurrTrax's pipeline.

FurrTrax can give FurNation a VM or Segment on our VMware System, which on Thursday, December 3, will become a Dell R710 with 96GB of RAM, and 8 CPUs, the PERC H710 512MB SAS/SATA Controller, and 6 SSDs (2 x 60GB, 2 x 120GB, 2 x 500GB).

FurNation would have its choice of Operating System, all FurrTrax would need is an ISO to pump into VMware and it would allow FurNation to install it remotely, as if FurNation were at the console using the remote management FurrTrax runs.

If FurNation opted, FurrTrax would also be willing to toss in one or two of its hard disks in FurrTrax's two empty bays, and then FurNation would have its own dedicated space and Disk I/O. FurrTrax does not rent this infrastructure, FurrTrax owns it and as such can make these types of accommodations. Though FurNation and FurrTrax have had issues in the past, this is FurrTrax's olive branch to bury the hatchet, and shine together.

Legacy users of FurNation's hosting must reactivate their accounts or be removed from the list of active sites, according to site admin Reyedog.

Users can get a free account with 50Mb storage; 500Mb and domain hosting for $12/year; or "unlimited" storage and bandwidth on iPage for $42/year. [tip: EarthFurst]

Update: A prior version of this story indicated inactive sites would be closed June 1; this was part of the notice placed on inactive sites, but is apparently not occuring.

Social networking platform Ning is to withdraw free services, disappointing many non-profit educational and social groups, including furs.

Furry 4 Life, FurNation, Furry United, Colombiafur and The Furry Den are based on Ning, with F4L and FurNation already paying for ad control.

Zenon Tigerpaw, founder of Furry United, had two words in response to the news: "Oh shit." He later announced plans to move to a new host.

See also: FurNation relaunched as Ning site - Colombiafur moves to Ning - other Ning-related stories

The relaunched FurNation has restored its hosting, though their archive may be incomplete.

The index page displays 814 sites, but some seem to be just a few files or forwarding pages.

FurNation used to be a major furry hosting site. However, intermittent uptime forced many elsewhere — often to the now-defunct GeoCities.

New users looking for hosting by FurNation are currently asked to contact an administrator.

FurNation has been reborn as a Ning-based community, following the course set by social networking site Furry 4 Life.

The 14-year-old site has a long but oft-troubled history. Over the past two years, its community has faced repeated requests for server hosting funds.

The new owner, Reyedog, intends to revive FurNation's hosting on a separate server, as Ning's terms of service limit images to "tasteful nudes."

Troubled furry portal FurNation has come back online, following a campaign to save it from huge operating debts.

A statement was sent yesterday to FurNation members stating:

We have worked out an agreement that will allow FN to stay online. The service is being transfered to the Furry Community as a whole, and will be run and operated as a group effort with voting for the CEO and board of directors like any convention or small public business would be run. Basically, this will be the first web service to be fully owned and operated by the fandom! We will have more details this week as we work out all the plans and create the TOS and Charter for the new FurNation! Please stay tuned.

However, gallery sections of the website remain offline for the time being. Hosting services are due to change soon.

The Luxor pyramid on FurNation Prime, the only FurNation sim to be closed down along with the website.

FurNation, the furry web hosting and general community website, as well as the host of 14 Second Life regions, will close permanently on May 16, 2009.

In a statement posted to the front page of the FurNation website, owner and administrator Nexxus blamed the closure on a lack of funding and a debt of over $2,000 of hosting fees going back several years.

Email accounts hosted on FurNation will continue to operate, however, hosted websites will disappear on May 16 and will run on FTP only until the end of the month. All FurNation branded regions in Second Life – with the exception of FurNation Prime – are to remain open.

FurNation Magazine #10

FurNation Magazine #10 was released this May, marking the end of an eight-year run for the mature comic and story anthology.^[1][2] Issues #6-9 are also available at a reduced price.^[3]

Contributors to this issue include Kadath, Bayson, Necro Drone, Ringtail Cafe, Raziel, FuzzWolf, Obsidian Obelisk, Alex Vance and Sub-level 03 (which provided a bonus music CD).^[1]

For many years there have been several real-time communities devoted to
chatrooms, graphic chats, IRC, mucks, etc. Well, we have finally put our
plans together and have opened one of our own!

Introducing FurNation Worlds! A real-time 3D game system that lets you
become the animal of your dreams and walk around, explore, and interact with
other members in the Furry Community! And it's all FREE!

Up till now the only two distributors offering the FurNation Anthology Issue #6 were Rabbit Valley and United Publications. I decided this weekend after getting three emails in a row to go ahead and offer Issue #6 through FurPlanet.com also.

We have a stockpile ready to go and we are going to start offering same day shipping beginning this week.

Here is a direct link to the magazine:

http://furplanet.com/shop/item.asp?itemid=45

We also have several other great furry content creations on sale at FurPlanet. Please look around and see if something else catches your eye:

http://FurPlanet.com

Sincerely,

Nexxus

From Furnation on alt.fan.furry: "We are proud to announce that the FurNation Magazine Issue #3 is on sale now! You can also order Issue #1 and Issue #2 reprints online!

Please visit the following URL for order and additional information: http://www.FurNation.com/

All proceeds from preorders will go to pay for FurNation services and to cover costs of printing future magazines."

We have 2 boxes of the FurNation Magazine Issue #2 still available. For all those who would like to get a copy of Issue #2 you can order directly from www.FurNation.com. The magazine is $10 US plus a flat rate $2 US shipping anywhere. All orders ship within 24 hours via USPS. WARNING: Mature content, adults only! We will take Issue #2 offline on the 22nd and any issues left will be taken to Further Confusion for sale at our table.

Well, after a minor server glitch (hardware related) we have re-installed the new system at the new ISP.

We now have up to 100MB/s data transfer from our new location. We are connected to a 1GB/s UUNET fiber channel with a 1GB/s AT&T backup line.

The server has redundant everything so there should be no more outages. We are pre-paid up on the new location for 5 months.

Now, I have to re-install the front end modules on the entry page and re-activate the FTP server (should be finished tomorrow).

For now everyone can go to FurNation and the system works, abit with a few pages which may still not be activated yet.

Enjoy!

Webmaster@FurNation.com
http://www.FurNation.com

Well, after a week of fighting with the new server, cutting the tip of my finger on a cooling blade, a bad CD, blown hard drives, and other events I am proud to say that FurNation looks rock solid once again!