Haven't been here that much but I'm still on the vinyl forum and FB/insta/YouTube. I had a great time when I met some of u irl at Dolly Day in Barcelona. I'll be at this month's UK BJDCon with a couple of my vinyls. Life for the hooman is tough right now but my dollies keep me going.
I'm so sad to read this. But I understand how much of a burden it would be for two people to have to do everything, while not having legal or admin control.
My heart is aching, I can not even say how devastating this is for me, it feels like the end of the world Maybe a miracle happens and we can stay here
First, I want to thank the moderators for working so long in an environment that must have been so difficult to manage without the proper tools and support. You've done a wonderful job with so little. This is so so sad... As someone who has recently joined the hobby after many years of admiring it, I have been so thankful for the people I've met here and the wealth of knowledge everyone has shared. I really value the long form conversation and posts available on a forum rather than what's available on mainstream social media. The searchability is unrivaled. I feel like the internet has been taken over by corporations and grifters and the lovely hobby and creative spaces have dwindled. This place has been like a reservior amongst a desert of the internet where ads are integrated into websites in ways that mimic old viruses. The proliferation of AI and generalized art theft has turned me off almost every other social site. DOA was such a joy to find and join over the last year. I would be interested in joining any efforts to migrate to a new forum. I believe the "old internet" needs preserving and that community moderation (by humans, not algorithms) is invaluable.
I'm devastated. I'm the admin of Materiel Celeste, the biggest french BJD/doll forum. I'm a DoA member since 2005, and DoA is my role model and the reason I created MC, and I've always seen DoA as MC' s big brother. I really hope a new team will take over and allow DoA to keep going. (While the forums are way less active now, MC is still here and another person owns the admin rights so my forum can be safe if I can't admin it anymore.)
I only joined DoA late last year and it has been invaluable to me as a newcomer to the hobby. This news is so depressing and I really hope a solution can be found.
Thank you so much to the mods for all of your hard work, love and passion over the years. It takes a LOT to moderate communities, and it is honestly usually thankless. The outpouring of love here hopefully shows some of that gratitude! I am also absolutely devastated. I have been here 17 years and DoA has been a foundational part of my hobby experience. I treasure all of the knowledge shared and community built here. My biggest dear in all of this is that the domain/hosting itself will end up unpaid, through no one's fault, and that the site will not be accessible. This is what happened to a cherished forum my husband was on. It just... vanished. I am very interested to try and personally back up any and all important hobby history threads. Fun stories, interesting releases; anything you think may be significant to retain if the worst happened. I have created a new thread here if anyone would like to help contribute to this effort.
I'm so sad about this! I understand why it's happening, since ownership really does lock moderators out of things in so many ways on so many platforms. I know this wasn't something decided on lightly, and I'm just happy we still have a few months before the plug is pulled. I am incredibly grateful to the mods here who have been keeping things running for all of their hardwork! I hope the owner will make an appearance before then and a different solution can be reached! DoA is the best place to learn and share about bjd's around! I look forward to checking it every day after work, and I'll miss that part of my day
Time to collectively make a backup plan if the forum can’t be saved. We have to figure out something while everyone can still talk here.
I was never as active in here as I'd like to. That's my greatest regret. I've met lovely people and seen wonderful dolls here. I can’t wrap my head around the idea that we won't have DoA anymore, frankly. It's a shock. I hope for the best, but it's been a pleasure being part of this family.
Thank you, moderators, for all you have done in spite of the pressure and lack of options available to you. No time spent here has been wasted, on your end or on ours, and we appreciate it immensely. That said, it is devastating to once again lose an invaluable forum and community space. The community has become increasingly decentralized and fractured across various social media, all of which have a vested interest in becoming less useful for the sake of advertising and stakeholder profits. It has been truly wonderful to have a central location to find other hobbyists, have long-form discussions, access archived information, and more. In many ways, losing Den of Angels feels like losing the last foothold of a bygone internet era that I remember quite fondly, the era before corporatization and endless profit. It has been an honor. May we all meet and play dolls again out in the great digital yonder.
Man, it is always sad joining in on the tail end of communities. Only bought my first doll last year, so I am still very new to the hobby overall. I've always loved the simplicity of forums, and you hate to see one with this much lineage end like this. I really hope that things can, somehow, figure themselves out, but I know how these things go.
I don't really know what to say. It's such a shock. I feel numb. The burden for the current mods must be very heavy. I wish something was said sooner as then there would've been more time to figure out how to help. The least I can do is thank you for all your hard work! Two people carried the most important bjd forum all this time... That takes so much strength. Hopefully the admin can be found to resolve this. The bjd community needs this forum. It's the only place I know where the hobby actually comes first. Social media has become a hostile chaotic place with big tech breathing down your neck (sometimes even banning people for posting normal doll photos because their ai is dumb). It just doesn't compare.
I never imagined my life without Den of Angels to be perfectly honest. Since I joined (through the coveted invite system!) 15 years ago I have looked at this forum almost every single day. I have struggled with pretty extreme isolation my whole life and it was kind of a miracle for me, brought about only because of this hobby and the social oasis of of DoA and old Flickr (before it was ruined) that I made some genuine friendships as an adult, and besides those, at least had a place to practice casually socializing with peers. I wrote to friends here in messages spanning over months and years, in 15 years I bought almost all the dolls I ever had from this marketplace. I read all the time, learning the history of doll sculpts I owned, their companies, puzzling out hybrid compatibility for my collection, connecting with others and feeling inspired by observing their different creative ideas and processes. I know it's too melodramatic to say the loss of DoA will be the final death of the hobby, but I think it kills the hobby as I knew it and I'm not sure another equally good version of the hobby can await me, personally. I'm so sorry so few moderators were left in the end and I had no idea of the owner absence for this long on top ... So I am not surprised. Guess I've got nothing more to say than that. but with
My bjd buddy said DoA was closing and I thought it was an April fools joke. I've been out of the bjd loop for quite a few years now, but I still have all my dolls. I joined DoA in June 2006. So I'll have been a member on here for 20 years when it closes. It's very surreal to think about. It's hard to encompass all my memories, good and bad, in that two decade span. But I'm extremely grateful to all the friends and acquaintances I've made over the years. Thanks to everyone for putting up with my dumb kid antics back in the day. It's a sad chapter to see closing on the hobby. I understand forums have fallen by the wayside in current Internet trends, but this wealth of information is something I had hoped would be available indefinitely. Can this even be fully archived on something like the WayBackMachine? I can only hope that folks continue to love and support this hobby, and with the introduction of cheaper "entry level" BJDs (those lil mystery box guys) into the market, maybe a whole new generation will be ready and willing to carry the torch as others (like myself) fall away from the active community. I love you all, and I hope you're safe. (To quote biggaming64 on yt) Man I'm gonna miss these smilies ughhhhh
Wow. I am stunned to say the least. There is so so much information stored on this site. I've been on here a LONG time. I hope that some of the pages will be able to be archived on the way back machine. Thank you mods and admins for keeping this site and the original yahoo group going for all these years.
I’ve been on DoA since 2005, got my first doll head from the kindness of someone here on doa in 2006 and it kick started the hobby for me. I spent so many hours here. Most of my collection is second hand from the marketplace. Me and Ringo are devastated to hear these news but completely understand. If anyone remembers me and wants to reach out so we can keen in touch please do. I’ve never changed my profile pic from back then so I should be easily recognizable.
I’ve always loved den of angels, it’s been a core part of my doll collection. I hope something can be done to continue it. I would be very happy if the website didn't end. :<
