3 January 2002
Happy New Year everyone! I hope you all had a pleasant Christmas, and that the holiday season wasn't too stressful for you. December was rather hectic for us, so there is little news to report for BMS. Now that Christmas is over, hopefully things can return to normal!
1
February 2002
The good news for the month is that Pipemare is now ready to enter preliminary testing. It isn't quite at the beta stage yet, so I guess you could call this alpha testing. The game play is there - everything else that support the game just has to be added! =) If you are interested in helping to test Pipemare (and receiving a free copy of the game at the end of it for your trouble), follow this link.
2
March 2002
Pipemare has been in testing for several weeks now, and so far the reports from the beta testers have been positive. They have been making a lot of suggestions for improvements to the game, and things are really starting to come together. Everything going well, it seems likely that Pipemare will be released some time in April. Watch this space for more information!
4
April 2002
Well, it seems Yahoo have decided to go and do the dirty on everyone who is a member of their service. In case you aren't aware, they have just made a change to everyone's marketing preferences, so that all members have been signed up to their "special offers" mailing lists. In other words, Yahoo will now send you lots of spam.
I have been operating the BMS newsletter through them for the last 9 months or so, but given this latest development I have removed the subscribe boxes at the bottom of every page on this site, and will be moving the mailing list as soon as possible. If you are interested in how this is being reported in the news, you can read about it on Wired, at CNet, and see a rather scathing report in The USA Register.
10
April 2002
A new web host! If you can read this, you are looking at the new BMS site, hosted by Digital Zones. Previously the web site was hosted by a local company here in Tasmania, but Digital Zones offer a great many more features (not the least of which is the ability to host my mailing lists directly - goodbye Yahoo!) Hopefully the new host will also mean faster downloads for everyone who visits the site.
16
April 2002
Well it took a few days to filter around to all places on the internet, but the BMS site is now working happily at its new hosting location. I've also created a new mailing list for the bms-announce list. Since we now host the list ourselves, I don't have to worry about the company running the mailing list suddenly trying to make a lot of money from the email addresses they have (<cough> Yahoo <cough>). Members of the current YahooGroups list will be moved over to the new list in the next day or so.
10
May 2002
Those of you who are repeat visitors will notice that we are now offering free eBooks for download. These aren't books I have written -- they are written by a company called SiteSell.com. They are, however, amazing books (I wouldn't offer them if I didn't think so). A lot of "freebies" you find on the Internet aren't worth the disk space they take up. These books, on the other hand, are packed full of valuable and useful information.
All the books are to do with running an Internet based business (which Beyond Midnight Software is - hence my initial interest in them). If you have ever thought about doing such a thing yourself, but thought that you needed special knowledge or equipment to do so, you will be pleasantly surprised after reading the books here.
9
June 2002
A couple of new screenshots for Pipemare have been added to the Pipemare page. The graphics for Pipemare have been totally revamped, as you will notice if you saw the previous screenshots. At the moment it seems that Pipemare will be released in July - all things going well! If you would like to hear via email when Pipemare is finally released, you should subscribe to the Flickering Candle (our monthly newsletter).
Speaking of the Flickering Candle, our newsletter has been slowly evolving over the last few months. In addition to news on software under development and updates to existing software, we are offering discounts and special offers exclusive to newsletter subscribers. In the coming months we will adding even more features to the newsletter - to find out what make sure you subscribe today! And you can rest assured that we will never sell or give away your email address. Unlike some companies, we value your privacy.
12
July 2002
Pipemare has reached an important milestone - the OS X native version of Pipemare is now up and running! I had planned all along for Pipemare to be OS X native when it was released, but had been having problems getting it to work. Thankfully the final problem, while difficult to find, was remarkably simple to fix. So one more task has been crossed off on the to do list, and the release of Pipemare draws ever closer. Only 7 months after I initially thought it would be released, but there you go!
In other news, the Beyond Midnight Software web site will be making another move in the next month or so. Unfortunately the current web host (Digital Zones) just hasn't worked out as well as I had hoped. The soon-to-be new web host (Site5) come highly recommended by many people, so hopefully things will be a bit better with them. There shouldn't be any disruption to service during the move.
24
July 2002
If you're reading this, you are viewing the site hosted on our new web host - Site5. Hopefully everything will work out well with our new web host - moving hosts is such a hassle!
In other news, we have teamed up with Gypsy King Software to have the free trial version of our software included on their CD. You should check out their products - they have a lot of interesting games available for you to try!
2
September 2002
Still not a lot of news to report. Pipemare is now 5 levels and one annoying (and hard to find!) bug away from being ready for release (plus documentation, but that shouldn't be too hard) Needless to say, I will be happy when it is out!
My time is also being taken up by a new ezine that I have started - Achieve Net Profits. This ezine is for people who have an online business (and want to increase how much it is earning), or who are interested in making money online, but don't know where to begin. Each week I interview people who are making money on the Internet - many who have quit their day job.
14
November 2002
Well, Pipemare has finally made it to final candidate stage! This means that unless the beta testers find any new bugs in it, Pipemare should be out before the end of November! Only 11 months later than I originally planned, but there you go.
By the way, I should probably mention again the new ezine that I have started - Achieve Net Profits. This ezine is for people who have an online business (and want to increase how much it is earning), or who are interested in making money online, but don't know where to begin. Each week I interview people who are making money on the Internet - many who have quit their day job. All the previous issues are available online, and already there is a large amount of information there. Why don't you take a look?
4
December 2002
Yes, it's true! The impossible has finally happened! Pipemare, the game that I have been working on since August 2001 has finally been released!
I have to say that I am very happy with how it turned out. And it is all due to the beta testers, who made some superb suggestions on how the game could be improved.
As a special bonus for people who buy Pipemare before the end of December, you will also get a free copy of our other game, Flip! (a $10 value). So what are you waiting for? Take a look at Pipemare now!
22
February 2003
Not a lot of news to report. I've been taking the last couple of month easy after the rush to get Pipemare finished and out the door. I'll be starting work learning Cocoa (so I can write Mac OS X software) shortly, which should prove interesting. What programs I'll be developing next is anyone's guess!
News from other years
