Well, with the year coming to an end and the Forum being almost 6 months old, it's time to be nostalgic and reflect upon the year.

We've come a long way. Lily's main site easily notched up 100,000 views in a few months, and another 100,000 the next month. The amount of material available is immense and the fanbase has grown drastically. We have both commited fans and staff who take the time to drop by regularly or chip in a friendly comment from time to time.

I can't stress this enough, but the success of the JCFO community is thanks to users and fans who populate the Forum as well as the TagBoard on the main site. I've said this quite often: The quality of the staff service is a reflection of the quality of the users, and for the most part you have all been an excellent bunch. Although we have had some minor altercations, Lily has ensured that she has the right personnel on-hand to deal with these disruptions (i.e.: Yea, leave to me...=P)

The Forum itself hasn't changed much after the cosmetic work I've carried out with Lily's expertise, but the content sports a diverse and enjoyable variety. We've seen the huge popularity of Centre Court as well as the growing number of fanfics. Meanwhile, the Locker Room is the home of several huge topics based around simple games, as well as providing the room for serious discussions and rants about life in general.

Furthermore, there have been noticeable innovations by the users, including the trendy Flags and Christmas Cards, which I'm sure you have all enjoyed as much as Lily has (I'd say 'we', but I have no flag and I have no Christmas cards, so I'd look like an idiot =P)

There are far too many things to address at this point, but I'm sure with your help we'll be able to bring out the good and bad parts of the JCFO site and Forum. Besides, it's 5am here, I'm still in a cranky mood and I'm supposed to be going out all day -.-

With that said, on behalf of the JCFO Staff, I wish you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

---Scott,
Administrator

Bah, humbug...

Only kidding! I agree with you 100% about everything (...that's a first)
The site is great, this forum is great, and the people are wonderful! I like how there are about 10 people that post a lot and we all talk on messenger, it's a lot of fun! I like that we're from all over the world too, it makes neat conversations and chances to practice any different languages we take.

Good luck to Lily, Scott, the forum, the website, and everyone else in the NEW YEAR!

Well I really do think that Scottie's summed up everything that I was going to say... so I won't repeat too much - especially since I will have to do a *mushy* "thank you" update for all the staff members and fans on the main site before the new year... ;)

:) ...but I will comment on the Forum:
>> A BIG THANK YOU to just about everyone who's contributed to the success of this Forum ~ whether it's one post or 800, everyone brings a unique perspective to the Forum discussions and games!
>> THANK YOU to Scott who has had to deal with far too much abuse from me throughout the entire existance of this Forum... you really wouldn't know how demanding I am until you've spoken to Scott at 2AM with me complaining! :P
>> I am really, really glad that I've had the oppurtunity to meet so many great, great people from all over the world through this Forum!
To be honest, I really feel like I can escape from everyday troubles when I log on here because all of you are so extremely supportive of anyone who has had a bad day... it's really cosy here :)

As for the Main Site...
What can I say? It all started one January afternoon with Lily thinking, "I really want to build a website...but about what?"
And to this day, I still haven't figured out why I decided on Juan Carlos Ferrero... I wasn't even a fan at the time...

...and here we are, 11 months later with:

• 12 staff members
• 6503 web files (html pages + picture files)
• 266,000+ hits

All because I was bored one January afternoon... :P ...what on earth have I done?!? :o

xx Lily xx

Have a wonderful holiday season everyone!!!

You made the site in an afternoon?

well all i can say is thank god lily got bored one day. this is my fav site on the whole net. its pure fab. oh n merry christmas 2 all!!!!!!! :D :D

Hear, hear.

:)

Lily did it take u long to build the website? like where did u get all the pics and that?

Thanks for all your kind words :) ...makes all the work seem worthwhile when I actually receive feedback from people!

The site was basically created in one afternoon! LoL ...layout wise and page wise anyhow... and there really weren't many photos to start off with since I didn't really want to flood the site with old JC photos (have POTD to take care of that for now!) ~ so even the 2002 gallery is tiny! The only photos I had when I started were from the AO and Adidas Int. which were all from the official sites!

I think I must have spent about 2 days in total with getting everything uploaded and working ~ plus doing the thumbnails for photos etc... gosh this makes me reminisce about how small the site once was!

I remember being *ecstatic* at just getting 10 hits a day...!! :D

ahh them wer d days! now u've only got like a million a day!

hi lily and everyone who are most fantastic in maintaining this most updated wonderful wonderful wonderful site.....it's most inspiring and homely warm feelings wherever visiting this site, everybody is so great and enthusiastic!!!! i miss the "about a Boy" images on the homepage though.. i think that's beautiful and cute.....i love that very much, can we have that back or somewhere in the site??

lol, i've never read this topic before and i just read scott's opening message thinking WHAT THE HELL! then i checked the date and thought OKAY! now i know what's going on! christmas now?!!! lol! :wacko:

Hi Will! :) Welcome to the Forum!
Thanks so much for your kind words regarding the site! I am really glad to hear that you're enjoying it. About the "About a boy" pics, they were actually from a magazine scan which I will add to the site in a few weeks (during my school holidays!) so be sure to check around then!

xx Lily xx