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« on: Sunday 31 December 23 21:33 GMT (UK) »
Wow.
Thank you everybody. I can't add much to Sarah's words.
This time twenty years ago, we were deliberating whether to 'launch' RootsChat, as we weren't sure if it was ready. We'd spent months posting useful links to resources, divided the forum into what we hoped were useful categories. The 'back end' of the server was ready. We really didn't know what to expect.
Once we went live, the love flooded in.
You wonderful people started posting in your droves, and equally wonderful members of the RootsChat family replied. Soon, we found the number of postings hard to manage, and some of our friends volunteered their valuable time to become moderators - for whom we are so very grateful.
We've had RootsChat Meets and had so much fun meeting some of you.
We've also had some of our friends on here sadly passing away, and thankfully had the time to pay our respects with some of them.
There have been technical challenges(*) that seemed huge at times, but thankfully we seem to have been blessed along the way.
The most important thing though is to thank all of you. Yes, all of you. You are RootsChat.
Thank you.
Trystan
(*) One of the technical challenges: At one point, the 'traffic' (busyness) of the site meant that we had to use server hardware that cost us four times the cost of our mortgage. That was a scary time, but we insisted that it would always be free.