Site News: - 's Blog

This week, we take a look back at the site's fourth year of operation. In 2007, RFGen underwent some major changes including a facelift to the website's look and database structure. It was also a big year for staff hirings as well as milestones which seemed to fly by faster than we could keep track of them!

Also here for your reading pleasure following the Wikipedia entries, are a selection of the most significant events / milestones for the remainder of 2007. Thanks to the bloggers whose hard work, continues the tradition of chronicling site history, which now takes place on the front page of our site. Enjoy!

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Site History

January 8, 2007 - A weekly chat is started on Monday's where members discuss topics concerning gaming based on the poll of the week. The poll of the week and the weekly chat are both chosen and hosted by RFGen staff member Chris Vanderhoef aka Shaggy.

January 14, 2007 - As RFGeneration grows so does the need for more staff. After careful consideration by the Editors and Administrators of submitted applications by members, six new staff posiions were granted. Members Ken Allgood aka Pop Culture Portal, Clint Renfro aka Fuyukaze, Ryan Thompson aka s1lence, Josh Beard aka JWKobayashi, Keith Brown aka Tan and also Mr. Mysterious aka Shimra joined the staff of RF Gen as writers and contributors for both the website portion of RFGeneration and its database.

February 1, 2007 - A memorial was unveiled on RFGeneration.com to honor Michael Collins, webmaster and co-founder of RFGeneration who's life was tragically cut short on this day in 2006.

The memorial includes reflections from friends and colleagues as well as a picture montage with a heading that says "In memory of Michael Collins. You will not be forgotten." which is a tip of the hat to one of his personal tenets that "No one here should be forgotten.". A tenet that the staff and members of RFGeneration believe strongly and follow to this day.

February 5, 2007 - RFGeneration celebrates the addition of the 1000th member to its growing community of gamers in just 3 years.

February 24, 2007 - Due to an idea by RFGen member "Deviance", a new feature was added to the "All Collections" page. Members and guests alike can now sort through collections by hardware and software and view them separately.

March 4, 2007 - A banner generator made by David Murnan aka TraderJake was introduced which allows members to generate a signature banner that has their personal collection stats for the games database listed for use on forums.

April 1, 2007 - For April Fool's day 2007, RF Generation became "Toddler Generation". The front page became vibrant with Crayola type pastel colours and the theme reflected gamers of a younger variety. Also, special forums were made for posts relating to the theme and games from such series as Sesame Street and Fisher Price.

April 28, 2007 - RF Generation celebrates it's third anniversary and opens a contest called “Show Us You Love RF Generation!”. Members will submit entries in any form they choose that shows how much they love RF Generation. After the voting is finished the winner receives a magazine subscription and a game of their choice.

May 26, 2007 - Terry Herman aka "marriott_guy" joins the staff of RF Generation as a Hardware Contributor adding his considerable knowledge of unique and obscure video game systems to the community. Also RF Generation member "Belgarath" joins the staff as a European Contributor providing both hardware and software expertise.

June 8, 2007 - RF Generation unveils it's site re-design. A project months in planning, preparation and work, "RFGEN 2.0" as it's called opens to the public. The re-design includes new format for the game/hardware pages, a new nav bar, new site logo as well as a newspost/blog style front page and several new features. Changes and add-ons that greatly improve both the look and function of the site for it's members and visitors alike.

June 17, 2007 - Tony Bowe aka Tondog joins the RF Generation staff as a blog writer/news writer for RFGen's new front page.

July 7, 2007 - New staff members Wout De Ruyck aka Magewout, Ben Wilkinson aka Oatbob and also members "Apolloboy" and "Funk_Buddy" join the RFGen team filling positions as European Contributor, Feature Writer, Hardware Contributor and Japanese Contributor respectively.

July 8, 2007 - RF Generation's Site Director David Murnan adds a new and improved version of the system checklists to the site. These new lists can be printed or viewed both as plain lists and also filled in with member collection information (quantity, box and manual).

August 10, 2007 - The Site Director David Murnan unveils community blogs for member use. This allows RF Generation registered members to have their own customized blog for personal use and gives the Blog Editor the ability to showcase member content on the front page as well.

Database History

January 6, 2007 - The RF Generation database passes 30,000 images which includes game scans as well as screenshots, all in the span of two and a half years. That averages to approximately 1000 new images added on a monthly basis or 33 per day.

January 19, 2007 - RF Generation passes 32,000 images in its database.

January 26, 2007 - The database passes 33,000 images which includes passing the 14,000 mark for screenshots and 19,000 for scans.

February 6, 2007 - The database passes 34,000 images.

February 7, 2007 - The RF Generation collection system is switched over to a mySQL based one which added features such as sorting by hardware or software in the stats, a software/hardware drop down menu as well as being able to view one's entire collection on one page. Besides the obvious user features it is also faster and will be easier to expand and make additions to in the future.

February 15, 2007 - The number of game screenshots for the RFGeneration database passes 15,000.

March 4, 2007 - Submissions System Version 3.0 is unveiled which adds many different features and optimizations. Most notably among them are the ability to input ESRB or world-wide equivalent, streamlined Media Formats for easier choices and uniformity, adding of alternate titles and adding of countries to games that may not have had a region wide release. Also 3.0 makes searching for listing in the database easier and searchable by country as well.

March 11, 2007 - RF Generation passes 20,000 game scans.

March 27, 2007 - RF Generation reaches the 1000 mark for hardware entries which includes systems, controllers, peripherals and other gaming equipment.

April 27, 2007 - Staff members "Tynstar" and "Tan" finish merging the Atari XEGS section of the database with the newly re-named Atari 8-bit family (formerly Atari 400 Series) section.

May 1, 2007 - The RF Generation database passes the 40,000 mark for images.

July 11, 2007 - Several new game systems have been added with a total of 137 individual sections of the database. Also total scans have surpassed the 25,000 mark.

July 26, 2007 - RF Generation's game database surpassing 30,000 entries

Blogged Milestones

November 1, 2007 - Submission stats are made available to registered members. This allows a member to view database growth month by month going back to October 2006.

November 17, 2007 - The RFGen store is opened to the public. Merchandise such as hats, t-shirts etc. with the RFGen logo can be bought which helps pay for the monthly site fees.

December 10, 2007 - Staff member Den68, creates a colourful and animated Christmas theme for the front page which replaces the usual one during the holiday season.

December 18, 2007 - The blog system which was first available in a "beta" form, is upgraded with many new features and bug fixes. Some of the new features included the ability to use HTML or BBCode, customizable appearance, commenting, RSS and also the option to program a blog entry for automatic publication at a later date.

December 27, 2007 - Major improvements, fixes and features were added to both the submission scripts and the collection system in a joint effort by both of our resident programmers Dave Murnan and Eddie Herrmann.

December 31, 2007 - The RFGen forum reaches 100,000 posts thanks to member Bad Enough Dude who was the 11th person to join the forum when the site launched in 2004!