The AGA's 6th Annual Int'l Aquascaping Contest

[shieber]

Coming November 9, 2005,
the winners and all the other beautiful entries in the 6th Annual International Aquascaping Contest .

Every continent is represented -- except Antarctica. Maybe next year Antarctica, too

http://showcase.aquatic-gardeners.org

[Erik Olson]

Here is a bittorrent link that can be used to download the contest onto your own computer a day and a half ahead of time. If you do this, please help distribute the file by keeping your client running throughout the "hell week" where everyone else is bogging down the main site. Thanks!

[Edit 11/20 - Removed .torrent file as it's now out of date. See later post for explanation]

[shieber]

what do I do with the file after it downloads?

[Erik Olson]

Excellent question, Scott...

Regarding the .torrent file: You'll need to have a BitTorrent client (such as BitTornado, available at http://bittornado.com. If you've installed a BitTorrent client, then clicking on the attachment should cause it to start downloading/sharing the aga2005.zip file.

Regarding the .zip file when you're all done downloading it: Unzip the file, which should create a directory called AGA_2005 (or something of that nature). If you click into that directory, you'll get a billion files, the first or so of which will be a webpage called "00-clickme.htm" or something like that. Click.

[Roger Miller]

Erik,

My firewall (like many others) will block any attempt to connect to the computer from outside. I checked /etc/services and didn't find bittorrent or any reasonable variant thereof.

Will my firewall render the service useless and if so, then what port(s) would I need to open up to let the service work?


Roger

[Erik Olson]

Roger,

Another excellent question. You can still be of use, even behind a firewall. The BitTorrent protocol still allows your computer to connect to others who are not behind firewalls. You just can't participate with other firewalled clients.

The port that you forward/unblock depends on the bittorrent client -- some of them are set up to make up a port at random. So you'll have to check the settings on the particular program.

- Erik

[Sati]

Awesome idea providing a torrent, Erik! I'll seed it for at least a week to help out. Thanks a lot

BTW, my personal favorite for torrent clients is Azureus because you can force it to download specific files instead of the entire batch, which is very nice. But BitComet is great for ease of use too.

[Ricky Cain]

I got it DL'd with the only problem being that it took a while to respond before letting loose with the 1s and 0s.

[Phil Edwards]

Why didn't I see more AGA members participating this year?

[Ricky Cain]

I know I just didn't have anything presentable. There could also be the phenomenon occurring again of "the entries are so good I can't compete". I think you I have talked about this before.

[Phil Edwards]

That's what I was afraid of.

Did you get to bring home those rocks from the Iwagumi challenge? 2nd place at the ADA party man, we need to see more of those from you.

[tsunami]

I think the number of American entries this year was mostly the problem. There just weren't very many of them in comparison to the very large turn out of foreign entries from all over the world.

US did not get a single ribbon. Zip. None. I believe this is mostly due to the absence of the strongest scapers in the country in the AGA contest.

Luis Navarro and Erik Leung didn't enter. Jeff Senske was judging. Other prize winners from last year didn't enter like Dam Nguyen. They had new layouts, but many of them opted to enter the ADA and not the AGA. Others like Roy Deki had algae problems raging through their aquascapes so they were left out of the running even though they had been preparing something.

Maybe next year people in the US will decide to start entering again. Perhaps people are worrying too much about winning or watching their 'baby' get negative commentary from the judges, and they do not realize that aquascaping contests are meant to be mostly a showcase, a resource, of ideas.

Carlos

[Erik Olson]

Well said, Carlos!

[Larry Lampert]

I also noticed the same thing Carlos. I totally agree with you. I just don't know what we can do about it.

I am not sure I understand why someone would enter the ADA and not AGA or vice versa. The ADA has more entries and is therefore likely viewed by some as more competitive but so what. If you have it in one why not enter it in both. Especially with the dual entry promotion.

Any ideas on what to do to encourage a greater AGA member/US participation ???

Regards,

Larry

[Erik Olson]

(Who didn't enter a tank this year either...how many years can I use the "two young kids" excuse?)

Until you have two old kids, then you can use that excuse until they're out of the house.