Obviously the front page has changed, but there are many more new areas of the sites for new visitors, freinds and clanmates alike.

New PICZ page where you can publicly show and search others pics..

Brought back the old style gaellery with some new features for everyone.

About us Page!

Updated the Contact Us Page.

OK, now to the reason I needed you to read the rest of the blog. You see that poll at the top right of the page (yes, the page you are on, look up and to the right)? Please go vote on it. The administration of the clan believes that the fallout of our voice chat is because mumble servers are not yet easily supporting a website channel viewer. While we feel mumble to be more usable and stable, and certainly more cross platform, the lack of the ability to see who's on there before we get on has made the attendance fall of severely. Recent updates to both of the competiton voice chat servers to Mumble have mmade the quality and cross-platform issues near negateable, so the issue is up for debate again. After we get a good vote on the issue, the Council will disucss and possibly change back to ventrilo or give TS3 a try. Just remember that your vote  matters.

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Our site admins and wiki admins can add categories for anything people need. Articles can be edited by other users, if the article starter says so.

Right now, this wiki is small, and has not that much information in it, however, I foresee it becoming a place with a wealth of information a MTGO player can use.

I want you all to at least consider posting a decklist, or a list of bts you like that is cheap or trusted, or maybe a scammer list, who knows what the possibilities are.

So, go get Wiki'ing, and please post up on the forums if you are having any problems with it.

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As was discussed at the recent officers meeting, we are starting a donation drive to pay for our website. I will be keeping track of who gives how much and the person that gives the most to the site will be rewarded with a CK shirt from bubbakush. While the site is the place where we need donations the most, it was requested of me that I mention other areas where the clan can use your, the member's, help. We are needing card and ticket donations for our PRE offerings, if you would like to donate to that, please locate BMWarner, or email him at bmwarner@cerealkillaz.org. We will soon be needing donations for the mumble server, but that is most likely going to be our next donation drive, probably closer to the end of the year. So, if you want to donate to the site, just click the paypal link on the top left of almost any page at cerealkillaz.org.

The time has come for a change in our voice chat program. We have finally decided and confirmed that we will be moving from Ventrilo usage to Mumble usage. Please check the front page at www.cerealkillaz.org for the information and download links.

What? Is it over? I thought you said something about a music player for our profiles? Well, hell yeah I did. Go check it out, add a new element to your profile and select the music player. I t supports linked music files, you can upload music files to it and you can share your music with your buddies music players on their profiles, if they and you both so choose.

Exciting times in CK, yo, and they are just getting started. More updates soon.

Donation drive ends at the end of August, so get those donations in, yo!

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What is Mumble, you ask? Well, let me get right to telling you. Mumble is a more fully-featured voice chat program. It is, in functionality, very comparable to Ventrilo or to Teamspeak, but it is open source.

What does open-source mean? Open source means that the program is developed by people all around the world, and offered to everyone for free. This is unlike Ventrilo and Teamspeak, which allow their clients to be downloaded freely, but proceed to charge exorbitant licensing fees to those hosting the servers. So, in the long run, it means that Mumble is cheaper. However, it is cheaper without a loss of quality.

It uses the same speex codecs that are already on our vent server, and it uses less system resources to run than ventrilo. it alos has settings to make it more bearable on slow connections or older computers. Did i mention you can skin it?

What do I have to do to get on the CK Mumble server?

It's pretty easy. You just need to click the link : http://mumble.sourceforge.net

Once you do that, you just download the latest STABLE version for your operating system. Then, you install it. Then, you run the audio wizard, BEING SURE TO SELECT A PUSH TO TALK KEY DURING THE WIZARD. Then, you create a new server entry in the server editor, with the following information:

Servername = CerealKillaz.Org Mumble Server

Address = mumble.cerealkillaz.org

Port = 10025

Username will be your in game name, please.

Once you get all connected up, be sure to use your "Self" menu to register with the server.

Anyway, hope to see you guys over there. There is a forums thread (click the link) where this item will be open for discussion.

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New Inbox Message Features

Next time you visit your inbox you will notice a new option to compose a New Message. Creating a new message to a friend is very easy, the send message box features real time friend searching, as you type out a name you will be given a list of friends to select from, then enter your subject, message body and click send.

When you send a message to more then one person, all replies will appear in one message thread. This makes it easy to keep track of the conversation.

Timestamps are also a thing of the past, we have replaced the Timestamps with a more localized friendly time since the message was posted.

New Video Page Features

Previously the video page only supported adding videos from YouTube using a video page URL or uploading videos if you had an upgrade. In our latest changes we have opened up full support for embed codes. This should allow you to place a video from any video source, enjoy!

With this video page update, you should be aware that simply posting the YouTube links like we used to won't work anymore. Now you will have to locate the button on a youtube page that says "<embed>"  Check the picture below for help.

on other sites, you'll have to find their embed codes, but they mostly are about the same looking.

I hope you guys enjoy all the new features! there are more on the way, but I'm not going to tell you all of them.

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Member Email Notifications

We are continuing our improvements to the e-mail notifications users receive for activity related to them within the site. Users can now receive notifications to their email for updates to conversations they are a part of, when others comment on content they have added (photos, videos, etc), forum threads they have started, when their content is featured, friend requests and much more. Users can now manage what they receive notifications for from their account settings.

Simply, click on your welcome bar at the top of the page, and select "Edit Profile Settings" which you can see illustrated in the picture above (Click the picture to see a larger version). When you get there, on the left panel, you will see "Email Settings." Simply click there, and adjust your notification settings right there.

Forums

We added the option to edit signatures directly on forum posts. Now users do not need to go to a forum settings page to edit their signature, they can access the feature directly on any of their forum posts. By doing this we have also been able to make it easy for forum moderators to edit an offensive user signature as well.

We have removed the forum avatar option. The user pic shown in the forums is now the same as everywhere else on the site; the user’s profile picture.

Under the forums search box we have replaced the forum settings link with a “My Subscriptions” link. This shows all the current threads the user is subscribed to, gives them quick access to see updates and gives them an easy way to unsubscribe if they desire.

Groups

We have improved the way you approve members that are waiting to join your groups. Now the Approve/Decline option is directly on the page and easily accessible, instead of having to hover over the user pic to see the option. We have also improved group creation to give better feedback for errors when creating a group, such as already having a group by the same name.

As with any major update there is a chance for problems and issues. If you encounter issues please let us know about them by posting a comment here, or by starting a forum thread.

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So if you wanna play some tunes whilst droppin' cards and hearing your favourite CCG talked about and advertisements from well known stores click the button for WCKR

Wanna be a DJ playing your own music, send a PM to meus, he will hook you up. Me I love all things Pearl Jam, but I also have stacks of other music and even comedy and Audio Novels. So expect to hear stuff like Red Hot Chili Peppers to the Rolling Stones, Tupac to IceT, Oasis to OMC, Led Zeppelin to Live, need I go on? hehe. Whatever your music tastes, their is someone out there, who has those same tastes.

Go! Click the Radio, or if you have extra desktop space pop it out and place it beside Vent out of the way. Hey listening to the same shyte can be better than pasting YouTube links in game chat

Enjoy

First off, you can now minimize the chat room (and consequently a lot of the other apps because of the way the functionality was written). To do this, you should click the button circled in the picture below:

It's real easy. You'll still hear the chat indicator sound (unless you have clicked the mute button, also in the pic above) if you have the chat minimized, and the bar will look something like the following picture:

You'll notice the chat link is colored differently (with the new site accent color you may have noticed in the activity feed seperation). Chat is not the only window that can be minimized, and the button is in a similar location on the windows that can. Fairly soon, individual IMs will be added to that list of windows that can be minimized, but for the time being, that feature has not been implemented yet. Remember that a minimized app (like chat) will only remain active for as long as you stay on the current page. It is being worked on, however, and a fix is expected soon.

Also, smilies have been re-added to the chat room, and fairly soon, I will have all the custom smilies you know and love from the forums available there as well.

One more thing I've heard from people is that some people love the IM indicator sound, and some people don't. And some people want to be able for a sound to come when one person says something, and not play a sound when someone else talks. So, check this out, now, in an IM, highlight the person's name as in the picture below and you will have some available options:

From that menu, you can browse to the same page on the site your buddy is looking at, go to his/her profile and check out their hot pics or whatever, or turn the sound off for this individual.

Thanks for reading, hope you like the new features.

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Just so everyone knows, the thing is this: Wizards of the Coast has removed the limitations on the number of people that can be in a clan at any given time. The limit is endless now. They have yet to give us any information about further improvements (like the abilities for multiple recruiters, etc in the same clan chapter, etc.), so it is going to be a slow go. I would really like to try to get us all in the same chapter in-game. I think it would go a long way towards making us a unified group. So, we have some questions, and we should talk about them, and maybe come up with some more before we really decide to take any steps.

1. Should we keep multiple chapters?
2. Do we need to consolidate?
3. Should we wait until further information on future clan organizational tools to be released before moving forward?
4. If we consolidate into one chapter, how long should we let the process take?

Those are the ones I can think of right now. I am not sure of further ones. I am going to make a corresponding forums post for this topic. Feel free to discuss there or in the comments section on this blog. I NEED YOUR HELP! Please remember not to be pissed off later when things do not get done and noone listened to your ideas if you do not give your ideas to the group now during the planning stages of this bold move into our future.

The forums post is located here:

http://www.cerealkillaz.org/forums/?page=post&id=3B723A7E-6204-4641-946D-DAA2D587F77F&fid=350877

thanks.

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Special thanks goes out to all my General Officers for helping me on these decisions.

Firstly, our former Colonel, Xaber, has been promoted to Brigadier General (one-star, yo). He deserved this promotion, as he's been here a while, proved he ain't going anywhere else, and is also very dedicated not only to the MTGO clan, but also serves as the Guildmaster of the Cabal guild, which in itself deserves a General Officer's attention. So, congrats, homie.

Secondly, our former 1st Lieutenant, RoachE has been promoted to fill the vacated position of Colonel, left open by Xaber. This promotion is long overdue, hence the number of ranks RoachE jumped. I don't think anyone will question this cat's loyalty. So, congrats, homie.

Thirdly, our former 1st Lieutenant, dezasliver, has been promoted to Lieutenant Colonel. deza has proven himself to be a solid recruiter and a devoted clanmate to all you CKz out there. He also serves as a primary ventrilo administrator on our vent server.

Fourthly, our former Lance Corporal, Impudent1, has been promoted to Major. I know, I know, this seems like a pretty good jump, especially for a new guy around here, but we've always contended that promotions in CK are merit based, and this guy lives up to our ideals on a daily basis. I can't vouch for his long-term loyalty, as he's still kind of new around here, but I can vouch for his integrity so far as a CerealKilla. Anyway, we need some fresh faces in the Officerz Lounge, if for no other reason than to introduce new ideas to our stagnant brains now and then. Impudent1's promotion was the most difficult one for me to get behind and approve, but in the end, I decided to trust the person I put in charge of finding us some new field officers.

Big special thanks goes out to Xaber for putting together a list of candidates for those positions and making my job that much easier.

Last, but not least, sweed has retaken his former commission of General (four-star), over his civilian rank that he held a couple of weeks ago. I think it goes without saying that sweed is CK 4 life, yo (he's inked up, for christ sake). Welcome back to the officer's lounge, swizzle.

Feel free to comment on this blog and congratulate those promoted.

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So, ya'll might have heard in the past few months a bunch of rumblings about drama this and drama that, and I'm glad to inform everyone that I think we've pretty much weeded out most of the crybabies. Unfortunately, the occasional choob or quitter (or both!) creeps into the ranks, and I would like to thank the chapter captains for following up on and removing those cats from the clan as soon as the problems have been reported. We have recently simplified the rules around here. I urge everyone to go read them. Use the navigation bar at the bottom of the site, and check em out for yourself if you haven't in the past 2 months.

Fake Clan Alert!!

Please, all CerealKillaz and non-CK alike, be aware that there are unfortunately a few groups out there that just can't follow the rules we have here (so simple) and acquire a CK clan tag in a legitimate fashion. These wannabe perpetrators have resorted to creating clans on MTGO with the name CerealKillaz. They are not affiliated with this clan in any way whatsoever. The captains of these imposter clans know full well that we don't recognize them, yet they do not inform their members of that fact. If you meet some of these imposters, maybe you should ask them if they realize they are in a fake ck chapter. I have noticed a lot of these cats don't even know that their captains have lied to them.

Send them to this site, to this blog entry, even. Right here I will provide a list of the CerealKillaz Chapters that we do recognize, followed by the chapter captain's names (i will keep the list as up to date as possible).

1. CerealKillaz - reesa69
2. CerealKillaz Deathrow - AkA_Reaper
3.  CerealKillaz Oblivion - dezasliver
4. CerealKillaz Domination - WillStogs
5. CerealKillaz Ninjaz - RonNance

Clan Finances Update

Currently we have to things to pay for, yearly, as a clan, the first being this website, and the second being the ventrilo server. The website has been paid in full until January 16, 2011, and the ventrilo is paid in full until December 28, 2010. I currently have the donation box up for funds to go towards the website. I currently do not have any way for you to donate to the vent accesible for the reason that we are considering changing the ventrilo provider at the end of the current term. Pretty much, since the fiasco this week with the server, some of us in leadership positions are being persuaded to shop around for a more reliable ventrilo host. The website needs to get about 90- 100 dollars donated to it this year for it to be able to continue next year. If we decide to keep the ventrilo, I will update everyone on that as well, but at least for the rest of this year, the finances are in order.

Welcome to the new members

I just want to give a shout out to all the new CKz i've been meeting lately, it's great to have you guys around.

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