It is amazing to consider that less than 6 weeks ago CTH was notified of the deplatforming of our corner of the internet. However, what is even more amazing is how fortunate we were to find a group of people, with a very specific set of skills, who knew exactly how to counter these efforts of Big Tech… And they pulled-off an amazingly stable website architecture in two weeks.
CTH is thankful beyond imagining. Your support in this endeavor is cherished and appreciated.
We are roughly three weeks into the stabilizing phase of the site construct and while there is a lot of work ahead, the outcome is remarkable. Here’s some updates for readers and users:
What we have created, and are continuing to build-out, is something new in the landscape of web-hosting and websites. CTH is running stable on a platform where no user data is ever captured. Not a single element of user privacy is controlled by any internal architecture. Meaning, there’s not a single element of your CTH engagement that is not controlled by you, 100%. In the modern era of websites, this is a paradigm shift.
CTH believes your data is YOUR data. Nothing on CTH is recorded, monitored or tracked to “enhance” user connection. The commenting system is constructed not to store any user information in any database; there is no registration, no cookie tracking and no data-lists of any kind. This approach was a lofty goal because essentially it is the opposite of modern tech/site development.
Most of the modern site constructs are developed to make user engagement part of the site data. Hence, some sites now ask for phone numbers or two-step authentication (email etc.) before access to content; however, at CTH this modern baseline is not accepted.
One unanticipated aspect of the anti-fragile framework is a number of websites wanting to create, or proactively move their site, and reaching out to us to understand how it is working. While CTH 2.0 is not yet in a position to explain critical details, I can envision a time in the near future with an anti-fragile “site in a box” (an assembled system that can operate without Big Tech influence/assistance) to be offered based on our format.
As an outcome of CTH need, some rebel alliance engineers and developers are learning to unmesh their reliance on interconnected interfaces. This is good stuff in an era where Big Tech is attempting to control communication and what content is presented to you. The internet should be where ‘speech’ is supported, not choked or controlled by tech oligarchs.
♦ One of the big remaining challenges is an email notification system that does not assemble user data as part of the triggering mechanism for auto-notifications of site content. How do you notify people without storing the data of people wanting to be notified? This is the current challenge and some new encryption solutions are being developed based on the old school RSS feeds that people used a long time ago.
We are still working-on rebuilding/testing the CTH theme to work and integrate better with mobile devices (phones, tablets etc). We hear all of the feedback on this issue and we are working through the process.
Also at some point next month, once we are able to review a month of server data and calculate the operational hosting costs, we will start construction of a supply-side platform (SSP/proprietary) ad system that carries the same privacy elements. Hopefully this approach will offset the higher costs associated with staying outside of Big Tech tentacles; and allows us to provide all content 24/7/365 to everyone.
The CTH rebuild has been a learning experience and I sincerely appreciate everyone’s understanding as this has progressed. Big Tech thought they had a grip on the voices within the internet; CTH is happily leading a charge to find workarounds and bring back independent voices.
Don’t forget to live your best life; it’s the only one you have.
Merry Christmas everyone,
~ Sundance
Wow, this is so impressive.
I wish you a very Merry Christmas from NZ and may this site continue to prosper into the new year and beyond.
Merry Christmas Sundance. You continue to be a true pioneer and very special patriot. My sincere gratitude for your tireless pursuit of freedom and independence reminds me of PDJT. You inspire me to keep working for same♡♡♡
As with everyone else, I want to thank you very much: your work is most admirable.
My Christmas List of improvements:
No diminution of the font in replies.
The return of the icon in the upper right-hand corner which showed one’s comments and linked them instantly to any replies with a click.
In place of the above, if that feature remains impossible for some reason, I await the arrival of e-mail notification.
Seeing the members’ names on the Like Button would be nice.
Agree. I find the different size fonts to be hard to read. I post something but have no idea how to go back to check on it. Loved the notification bell. All in due time, I am sure!
That has been my biggest complaint, as well.
There’s really no point in posting a comment, since it’s nearly impossible to see if anyone replied to it.
I might just as well scribble my thoughts on paper airplanes and toss them out car windows.
I “liked” because it’s funny and made me laugh. Otherwise, I’ll hold off on my CTH christmas request list until it is all done. Cuz maybe it won’t be needed in the end.
Kudos to you Sundance for working outside the box.
Would be wonderful to receive theobile version again
the mobile version
OMG!!
How dare you upset the establishment and how they demand everything be done their way.
Think by yourself? Be different?
No!! You will conform.
And don’t forget everything is science, so we have to have more data, more info. It’s for your own good.
Just between Sundance and the President, can you imagine how Great This Republic Could Be?
It only takes a few. One man who listened to God kept baby Jesus from Herod’s hands. But it wasn’t really one man. Thousands were praying for the consolation of Israel, and God’s angel armies were on active duty. The same is happening in several separate but overlapping theaters. A few are visible. Many are praying and God is at work. Wherever God has placed you and whatever He has called you to do, live there with the courage and audacity of the apostle Paul. Then America will be great and the rest of the world will too. A city on a hill cannot be hidden.
JM Clever:
I like what you said and so true!
Merry Christmas!
PRAYER and FASTING EVERYDAY is the key for Pres. 45 to become the 46th U.S. President on January 20, 2021!
Having hosted several sites and a moderator of online discussions, I’m acutely aware of the often delicate balance of assuring user privacy and maintaining forum integrity.
Of course the reasons for having users register and/or use 3rd party authentication services is to prevent egregious trashing of discussions. Having wide-open access to inject comments is good from the point of view of privacy but escalates demand on moderators, paid or volunteer.
As others point out when a site keeps no “record” of user contributions then they’re lost. I recall sundance making it clear that a lot of effort was made to successfully preserve the years of collected comments. Hard for me to imagine all the new comments we’re writing would be abandoned. No doubt they’re being inserted into a database and can potentially be indexed in numerous ways.
That’s not necessarily an intrusion into user privacy which depends on what’s done with the user data. Keeping minimal info and strict policies re: not selling or sharing user data except under compulsion of law favor user privacy. Of course it comes down to trust: are site owners/managers reliable, do they have a track record of sticking to their word, are they honest and above board?
To these questions about CTH we can answer in the affirmative. I fully expect whatever info is collected about users will be kept confidential. Third party providers I’m not so sure about. In any case, adding certain features to the commenting “engine” could potentially require trade-offs re: privacy. I’m sure we’ll be told about it if that’s the case. Very often there are no good solutions to thorny problems, but keeping users in the loop is necessary to maintain the vital, fragile thread of trust.
Exactly…pay attention to this post.
That’s what I was thinking, too (although I’m uneducated on site development). If such pains were taken to preserve all comments, then how could it be a privacy intrusion to allow users access to their own comments here, internally? Perhaps executing such a feature is just too big/expensive a task at this time, having never been done before.
Here’s what was said late last night
“WhiteBoard
December 25, 2020 10:41 pm
Hey Team. I have a feeling – TheLastRefuge – may become a media empire one day.”
It is and has been my only source of news for about 2 years. I check RedStateWatcher for headlines and I check WhatFinger some – plus look at Wx and Market reports. Plus sometimes I follow links from other posters.
But the best NEWS and commentary (plus, of course, reports from Sundance) is HERE. Thank you all. You have no equal
Thank you Sundance and all Santa’s little helpers at this Holy time of year.
Like Msidaho above, I rely on this wonderful site and its knowledgeable residents to keep me informed of the REAL American news.
This is vital here in the Soviet republic of Scotland where NO main stream news outlet would dare publish the truth.
One of my other essential Websites is the great WUWTcom Anthony Watts’ global warming reality blog, which I can highly recommend.
Btw Anthony gave a big mention to this site and is watching the Tree house closely. He is taking precautions as be expects to get persecuted if (God forbid) Senile Joe takes over.
Yep–first read in the morning, last read before bed and check in several times during the day! If it is truly newsworthy, Sundance and his staff will ensure our access to it. On some sites, the Uniparty loving traitors are beginning to show their true colors (not just Fox either). Just go ahead, verify your ignorance and move on. That’s exactly how I feel about them. Sundance and company have NEVER let us down! Some of the followers here are among the smartest people in the country. Sometimes I sit in awe of the intelligence level of those who post here and am grateful to be able to read not only the posts but the enlightening comments of those willing to share their wisdom!
God bless you every one!
I wholeheartedly agree with your comment, especially the part about the followers being the smartest people in the country. I, too, am always in awe. The only problem is when I check in, I can’t leave. I’m usually here reading off and on all day, and sometimes just lurking among the like-minded people here cause I sure don’t have any of those around me physically. Even when the news isn’t good, it’s like a ray of sunshine here.
This…
Another giant step for mankind. For all you do Sundance, thank you!
How about an “experimental” thread linked to from the right side for those of us learning to post pictures, testing issues, etc. so the Sages of this site can share their wisdom, work arounds, etc.?
AS a RETIRED TECHIE…Thank you Sundance and Team for the work that has been done and going the EXTRA MILE to ensure user privacy…OUTSTANDING JOB!!!
Thank you very much, Sundance and all who are working tirelessly to provide this place for us. God bless you all.
Merry Christmas to The Conservative Treehouse, Sundance, All Treepers and Supporters out there! Kudos for the supreme effort to break the shackles of tyranny. Count me in as one who will continue to support the efforts. God bless!
Thank you for the update, Sundance! I am so excited about the new platform. Congratulations to all the rebel alliance supporters on your team. This is truly exciting news and I believe it will be a life-rope to us in the very near future as Big Tech and the Democrats continue their tyrannical assault on us free humans.
I have worked in IT as a software engineer (legacy) since the 1970’s and I can tell you this is the smoothest roll-out I have ever witnessed. The email notifications is a small thing to me since I have you bookmarked and just go to check for updates a couple of times a day.
This has been awesome! Thank you all and Merry Christmas to you all and I pray for a healthy and prosperous New Year for the entire CTH community!
God Bless
Thank you, Sundance. I had to laugh when you mentioned “a specific set of skills”. It reminded me of Liam Neeson in the movie, Taken. That is what you have done!!! You have taken the power away from those who would destroy you. Well Done!!
test
Rebel alliance amazingly pulling off feats once never imagined or thought impossible since 1776, because… ‘Merica!!
Merry Christmas Sundance & Family & Company. Thank you so much???
The Treehouse team has done a truly sterling job on the new website. Congratulations to all and THANKS!!!
So far, from what I can see, you all are doing a great job with the new site–
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to Sundance and the whole CTH family! This site is without a doubt the best place to be in order to live your best life when it comes to factual information–no little boxes, no banning, no shaming, just real and substantiated information. Thanks for helping us live our best lives!!
Thank you Sundance and CTH and our family out there.
God bless every liberty person.
Thank you and may God bless your efforts within His will!
Truly appreciate all you have done to keep us informed with all that is happening in our country and the world. Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to all involved.
Merry Christmas Sundance et al. Great job with the transition ! If only the congress critters could muster up something similar.
Very needed ongoing are structural ways to organize locally & by states & regions. We’ve got the numbers to shape the nation’s destiny – but the Obama Organizer machine has formidable structure & Alinsky tactics that, unimpeded by truth or enforced laws, will doom us if we don’t swiftly morph into a well-oiled freedom machine demanding accountability and laws actually enforced on all sides – red and blue. We’ve got to help each other on this.
I often wonder if Sundance and Co. ever sleep! The scope of what they have done in the past 6 weeks is astounding. I thank God for them and their efforts to disseminate the light of truth in a world of darkness.
I am wondering what the name of the new platform is. I have searched but can’t find it. Hopefully some kind soul will reply!
Not sure if this is what you’re asking, but it’s still listed in my browser as The Last Refuge.
Thanks, Dixie. Nice to know people are reading comments! Actually I am looking for the name of the platform that replaced WordPress.
Bueller? Anybody?
Another big thank you for this safe harbor when the traditional “Chinese curse” has become a reality:
May you live in interesting times.
And may I say, I just love what you’ve done with the place! My favorite thing is the section of sweet formatting icons. Guess what – on the Mac my keyboard shortcuts for at least the most common ones (bold, italic, underline) also work! I expect those would also work on a non-Mac computer.
In addition, I just did a brief test and seems that the formatting elves have even corrected the word wrap on bulleted and numbered list items.
All in all, a remarkable achievement! Congratulations! Blessings for a fine holiday to all the CTH team!
Still no system to notify users when replies are made to their comments?
Before the comments on each page, there is a comment box. Above it, appears “Subscribe”. Click on the arrow and you have two choices. 1) receive notification to follow-up comments to an article, or 2) “new replies to my comments”. Select the one you want, provide your email address, and wait to receive a confirmation email. When received, click on subscribe and a CTH page ought to appear verifying your subscription.
Thanks for the tip! I just did it, and got the confirmation. Hope this solves it!
Just testing here to see if it triggers a notification…
Great ?
I did that last week, got the request to confirm the subscription but never got the CTH page to which you refer. Never got any emails either, but you think maybe that’s because nobody ever responded?/s 😎
This was in a confirmation email sent to me. The first entry will vary, as it pertains to an article. The second is the one to click on. It ought to bring up a CTH webpage. In the upper right-hand corner, a confirmation message ought to appear. It has a green background.
Keep pluggin’ and success will come your way …
CTH 2.0 Update
Confirm Your Subscrption
Cancel Subscription
Sundance, having worked in technology, all I can say is: Wow, just wow!
Kudos and thanks.
Sundance can you set up a subscription service like Lucianne does to allow ad free login service? Perhaps to help keep everything private those that have the ad free service would login at a different site and then be redirected to an ad free comment page. I’m sure donations at this stage are a hard way to meet your expenses. Donations worked well at the change over but I see little mention of the Donation link by the flickering candle at the top of the page now. Many users I’m sure are not aware that you can setup automatic monthly contributions to the CTH which would help the site better understand their revenue flow during the year and perhaps help in their Borrowing Power for development.
By setting up a second sign in and comment page, you would then be missing comments and information. Also, the support The Treehouse, Donate tab is still under the flickering prayer request candle. Sundance and crew have done a tremendous job with the new site. Many of the original issues have already been corrected.
Let’s give them a chance to catch their breath before adding additional requests. Help them out and donate a little if you can it the least we can do.
Thank you Sundance and team. I know what a chore the migration and maintenance can be.
Here’s to a great 2021,
Max
We appreciate your effort in a time of the cancel culture. May God bless you and your endeavors.
Thank you Sundance for all you and the Administration has done.
Yes this is the only one life we have to make the best of it.
Merry Christmas.
Merry Christmas and thank you for everything you have done with the new site.
This is my first read every day and have learned so much from the very intelligent commenters here.
I also am glad that Jack Cahill’s book is no longer featured , not because of Jack, but the picture of the person on the cover made me nauseous.?
Thanks Sundance for all the work you are doing on your site. CTH is a blessing.
Hi, Ad Rem or Sundance — I have a question… I did the subscribe button for “new replies to my comments,” (since I thought “new follow-up comments” would give me everyone’s new comments, which I don’t want bombarding my inbox), filled in my email, and got a confirmation. I thought it would just email me new replies to my own comments, which would be great. But it looks like it is emailing me all replies to anyone’s comments. Did I do it wrong, or is that how it works now? (Jane, stop this crazy thing… Help!) 🙂
Also, do we just fill out this subscribe/notify feature once for all time, or do we need to fill it out for each article we comment on? Sorry to be so confused, but I don’t recall reading here that was had this subscribe/email notification feature, and how it work. I apologize if I missed it…
“that we had this subscribe/email notification feature, and how it works.”
linderella,
When subscribing, there are two options: 1) new follow-up comments (this will generate emails for all comments for an article), or 2) new replies to my comments (this will generate emails for comments to your’s). To specify which, click on the little arrow nest to Subscribe which will show the two options.
As I understand, a subscription pertains to just the one article, so subscribing is necessary for each article.
test
Right now, all the main organs of the media, Big Tech, courts and the Democrats are opposed to Pres Trump
Pres Trump needs to wield a weapon at his disposal larger then the above three combined, and making them impotent.
I think he knows where Excalibur is. The problem is to how unsheath and wield it at the right time.
Sundance,
Miracles abound, the transfer went smooth from a user’s perspective too. I think the new site is even BETTER. We can now edit our posts which is grrrreat!
CTH is one of the only–if not the only one–that has full control without thousands of ads and popups everywhere.
Good job GREAT JOB! God is with CTH for sure!
Necessity is the mother of invention, or in this case… the inspiration for independence. CTH is blazing technical trails for other like-minded online entities to follow. That’s very cool.
mb, you remind me of one of my favorite recent Americana-country tunes, done by a young group called the Trishas (one of them is the daughter of Kevin Welch). It’s called “Mother of Invention” and it’s all about the very thing you mention – creativity forced by circumstance.
A snippet:
It’s the best of indecisions when you have to recreate
It’s the worst of any visions when there’s chances that you don’t take
Amazing progress!!
Thanks for TLR/CTH and Sundance (and BigTech) for bringing the pervasiveness of tracking smack into our face. We succumbed to it because of the convenience; we will have to sacrifice the convenience for the sake of something better, something pre-centralization and pre-BigTech.
Accept it, embrace it.
I too have moved my site from the std wordpress.org service and rented my own service space in an independent web hosting service. I have my own part of a machine and do as I want. If it gets worse I can rent my entire own machine from these people.
My site is in the “dark net”. Not in any search engines and not optimized for search engines – no meta-tags, no keywords, no link optimizations, etc. You find my site by invitation or referral.
Whenever you take out a new domain name which I did for a new site I am building, you immediately get a ton of hackers trying out your new site. They find you from the domain name record. I have two step entry to my admin areas. That means you cannot directly access the login screen to try to hack. You get blocked and have to enter a very secure ID and Password to then allow you to try to login to my admin which also has a very secure ID and password. PS. I am not using wordpress which all the hackers know all about.
For my additional security I am employing an “Iron Dome Blocking” for my site. I am hard blocking IP addresses from any part of the world and US I do not want to even get close to my site. This means hackers do not even get a chance to try to break your ID and passwords or try other access techniques on our site.
So China, China, China was the heavy early hackers. Russia us a very distant second. I get nothing from China anymore as I have blocked 90% of all of China from even getting to my site at all. 75% of Russia. I have blocked at this time 60% of all of Europe and Asia and 45% of the rest of the world.
In the US I am blocking all heavy tech areas, heavy military areas (CIA, NSA, DoD. I have blocked all of Langley area, Google plex and the google search engine completely as it was not always well behaved, Seattle, Silicon Valley, DC to Boston.
I will continue to monitor and adjust as needed. Trying to get as much done on the Iron Dome by end of December so I can get a fresh look at data in January and see how I am doing. Then build out the rest of my site and start inviting “my people” to my site.
After this is done I can offer a secure “Under Net” which would be a area hosted by my web site but not found by any link or search from my main site area. You have to know what the link is to get to this special site area that has no new domain name. It just exits for people that know about it. I can offer login and communication, blogging and social media capabilities within this under net area. This is how secret secure societies operate in an oppressive regime like we are increasingly in now.
Later, SeekerOfTruth
Belated Merry Christmas Sundance and The Conservative Treehouse. I would be totally nuts without you and Thomas Wictor.
Thank you so much Sundance. You and your amazing team are very appreciated. The fact that this site has successfully “relocated” and does not track in any way is amazing. It is also great that other independent sites are wanting to learn more about how they too can unhook from Big Tech’s control.
Great job!!!!
This website is the gift that keeps on giving.
Funny how WP and their ilk may rue the day they uprooted the Treehouse, as it has relocated stronger and is blazing a new trail that WP may find very troublesome with respect to their efforts in censoring others.
I’m embarrassed to say (really not) I do not understand most of this. However, I’m so thankful and happy that it has and is working out for Sundance and to our benefit!
I frequently donate to the CTH website and I would definitely pay a monthly or yearly subscription.. In the past (long ago) I had NY newspapers home delivered…Now, I only read conservative websites that IMO I trust to get honest and trustworthy info… just sayin
Didn’t realize this was a place for Christmas wishes for the new site or otherwise.
My Christmas wish….that you (Sundance) & team have/having a wonderful Christmas, right now in 2020!
Thank you for the website. The analysis has helped greatly.
I do have to mention that my browser plugin is blocking scripts from googletagmanager.com when I visit this site.
I have a question:
Can we eventually receive email notifications?
I would so appreciate that.
Good things happen to good people! Merry Christmas Sundance and CTH!