“Vidgle has gotten out of control,” said Zaragoza in a press conference outside his Long Island office, “and the stress of managing this company has ruined my life. I need to put an end to all the madness.”

“In March 2011, we were Zkon’d and I couldn’t do anything about it. I had to reboot the server several times and it didn’t work. I just don’t know what else I could of done.”

Zaragoza went on to explain that starting March 15th of next year, users will no longer be able to access Vidgle.  That gives users a year to adjust to life without the world of Vidgle. March 15, 2012 will mark the end of Anthony’s contract he has with Jenthony Enterprises, Inc., parent company of Vidgle.com, and has the authority to shut down the website.

“After March 15th, 2012 the whole website shuts down,” said Maria O’Connell, technical adviser for Vidgle.com. “So if you ever want to see our pictures and videos again, I recommend you download them. You won’t be able to get them back after Vidgle goes out of business.”

Zaragoza said the decision to shut down Vidgle was difficult, but that he does not think people will be upset.

“I personally don’t think it’s a big deal,” he said in a private phone interview. “And to be honest, I think it’s for the better. Without Vidgle, people will have to  make it to the cons that we cover for Con Goer. We are kind of getting tired of mocking our viewers for not being at the con we are reporting at.”

Some Vidgle users were furious upon hearing the shocking news.

“What am I going to do without Vidgle?” said Andrea Garcia, a high school student from Wisconsin. “There are no cons where I live. I want to see the cons that I wish I can go to in my life!

However, conventions across the country have been experiencing a long anticipated sense of relief over Vidgle’s “Con Goer” series.

“I’m glad the Vidgle nightmare is over,” said Christopher King, a con-chair for a Chicago-based anime convention. “Now we don’t have to worry about Vidgle’s camera light hurting anybody’s eyes anymore.”

Zaragoza will pursue in a career of transportation when he leaves the company.

Since Google TV launched, major network TV websites blocked access on the Google TV, including NBC, CBS, and ABC. Vidgle, however, is the first independent and small company that blocks streaming.

When users navigate to a video page, it’ll say “Howdy! We noticed that you are trying to access Vidgle on your Google TV. Sadly, its not available at this time. We are working hard to bring Vidgle to your living room! Stay tune for updates!”

We’ve gotten emails about this and our response was “We want to evaluate the performance and experience before we allow streaming on a specific device. And we also would like to look for the opportunities available on this new exciting platform.”

On the TV, Vidgle has a Wii version for Wii users, a Playstation 3 version is under programming though video streaming is not blocked. Vidgle is also programming a app for Google TV’s competitor, Boxee, and a GoogleTV app is on the waiting list. Vidgle is already playable on the AppleTV in HD via iTunes Store and in a user’s library.

Jenthony announced to staff on Friday that Vidgle’s master videos will be mastered in 1080i. Since February 2009, Vidgle’s HD production was only mastered in 720p though original raw video is in 1080i. “HD is a bit difficult to work with,” I discussed. It took us several months for preparations to launch Vidgle HD in April 2009. New York Comic Con 2009 (the first con for 2009 circuit) was the first con taped in 1080i while MangaNEXT 2008 (the last of the 2008 circuit) was shot in 480p widescreen. There was a huge difference in quality between the two coverages. Along the way, new equipment was put on the field to handle the HD transition, such as lighting. The HD upgrade for Vidgle cost nearly a $1,000, in system updates and new equipment. For iPod users, there was a great quality difference as well when we went HD.

In May 2010, Vidgle’s “Con Goer HD” was featured on Miro Guide. Vidgle HD rolled out on iTunes in September. Vidgle is also in negotation with MSO providers to provide on-demand and HD On-Demand content; currently one MSO has Vidgle On-Demand both standard and HD.

Though Vidgle HD on vidgle.com will still continue to be in 720p, Vidgle is now mastering in 1080i so “Con Goer” episodes can be sold on Blu-Ray in addition to DVD-Videos. Vidgle will not stream 1080i.

Vidgle announced, in addition, old HD videos will start fading away. For videos that turn at least 1 year old, the HD stream will be removed based on its popularity.

I got a tip last week that several users on 4Chan, a messageboard website, were planning a attack on a Jenthony website; mostly targeting Vidgle. Vidgle is a sister website of WRAJ Internet Radio, which is owned by Jenthony Enterprises, Inc. We were able to ask the moderators of the forum to take the threads down. Within hours it was removed. Then days later, WRAJ was attacked.

For what they were discussing is an attack on vidgle.com. They added that Vidgle is “impossible” for a DDoS attack because the site is cached and with its filtering settings.

They later found out that WRAJ is a partnered website and then “looked” around for loopholes in our site codings. It was the photo gallery module that had a loophole.

Then Tuesday, August 31, 2010, our hosting provider noticed requests for the photo gallery of what appeared to be over 150 requests a second. And this is not just a page request when you cue up a page, this is a request of starting a new session on the photo gallery. For example, when you first go to the photo gallery for the first time, a temporary session is stored in our database to handle requests, such as searching. After an hour, the session is removed from the database. So in this case of the attack, the user was making a new session at 150 times a second, something that our database can’t handle. To prevent the server to crash, our hosting provider put a temporary shut down page; they called me and emailed me immediately. Within 4 hours, the site returned and the photo gallery section became disabled. The photo gallery will be updated to resolve this issue in the upcoming week.

Going back to the thread on 4chan, there was no exact reason  for the attack. This is not the first attack on WRAJ or Vidgle, WRAJ was attacked in 2003, 2005, 2008, and 2009 and Vidgle was attacked in 2008. As I will say, “no one can’t stop me, we will be back.” Since 2005, I always hire a good friend of mine, who is a hacker and does it for a living, and makes note to us of what can be “tampered.” This situation, though, was not listed as an easy target.

WRAJ Internet Radio is undergoing a core makeover that is launching later this year. It will be the first core makeover since 2003.

Though medical websites advise people to see a doctor if the pain occurs for more than several hours. Instead, I just simply took a nap, which I woke up by pain. I just don’t want to go to the ER for hours and I don’t want to hear the results. I think the pain is caused by the stress that I built up.

Currently, I have symptoms of Carpal Tunnel Syndrome, which is associated to Kidney Failure. My family background has had history of kidney failure, my uncle  died in 2000 of a kidney failure. I also have a disease that  I do not want to discuss.

If something does happen to me, please remember my quote…

Can you guess where the title came from? Hint: I’m Bolted to the Wall!

The studio and offices flooded late Saturday night due to a power outage. With heavy rainfall, it caused the water table beneath the basement to overflow the pumping stations and it then leaked through the stations and the cement floor beneath the rug. The water raised above the rug to about 3 inches. We had no power for at least 20 hours.

“We had a generator to start pumping the water once it began to rise, that generator failed. After a replacement generator was purchased 12 hours later, we received power shortly after.”

Now a planning process is about to start Monday. This includes new furniture, lighting, set props, and new wiring configurations. “We are planning to upgrade our network to high bandwidth with CAT6 network cables,” Zaragoza added. A new studio patch bay will be installed for WRAJ Internet Radio which will allow interactions with Vidgle’s video productions.

The last flood logged that hit the studio was on March 13, 2007 when a storm drain failed.

This flood comes a week after Jenthony Enterprises, Inc. is planning to move to a new location by 2013. This is the first major flood which had to move the company out for longer than a week. It is also the third flood since WRAJ Internet Radio started in 2003 in that location. WRAJ Internet Radio is currently broadcasting at a temporary location and the company is renting space at another location. There is no date when the company will be able to operate out of its home location. “The only date we can come up with is the date of April 12 or the 19th, maybe even later than that.”

Some photos have been released here.

A DoS, Denial of Service, attack is when a user uses multiple machines at once to use up the entire resources of a server of a website that needs to render pages. Of course, social networking sites need to be rendered since it is different for everyone.

And now, Jenthony Media is confirming, for a third time, there was a DoS attack on its web properties. WRAJ Internet Radio was hit with a DoS attack at 6 AM PST. The last attack was in June 2008 when a user requested multiple requests at once to get the current song information. “Vidgle was attacked a short time afterward, in which the podcast feed was being requested every 5 seconds from what seems to be 500 computers,” my friend Maria has noted to me. The podcast feed is able to handle up to 500 computers at one time, but not every five seconds. “And the podcast feed is what uses the most resources on the site’s server.”

In August 2008, WRAJ Internet Radio setup a sleep page when the server believes there is too much resources being. The sleep page requires no rendering and doesn’t use too many resources of the server. Luckily, it was able to activate for the first; some users saw the web page (above) for about 30 minutes saying the site is unavailable. With the latest report from a couple of hours ago, our site speeds and resources are back to normal.

My friend in California who monitors the site closely, Maria, will keep up to date with this development. We were able to get the IP addresses of the attackers and they have been banned from accessing any Jenthony Media website.

The internship posting is here:

Position: Content Producer, Jenthony Media
Students will be able to help produce content for the online media platform of Jenthony Enterprises, Inc. Including its online radio station, WRAJ Internet Radio; audio podcast; video podcast, Vidgle; websites, and mobile platforms.

Requirements that we have established for internship at Jenthony Enterprises, Inc:
• You must be 16 years of age or older
• For this program, you must receive an academic credit, it is necessary to set up the internship with your school
• The internship program will not provide transportation reimbursement costs
• You must be enrolled at an accredited four or five-year college or university.
• You also must be on track to receive a bachelor or advanced degree from a college or university.

This job posting is available in:
•    Fall Semester
•    Spring Semester

Students can fax their cover letter and resume to 1-413-521-5976. They can also send their cover and resume through email to internship@wrajradio.com as a word (.doc) file (formatted for Word 2003) or PDF file. Students who are accepted will be contacted by phone or email. Students are encouraged not to call the company.

We will then schedule an interview with the student. Students will be contacted within two weeks after the interview if they are approved.

We would like to know what do you look for while you are in the dealers room at a convention?

• T-Shirts
• Cell phone charms
• keychains
• wall scrolls
• wallets
• cosplay items
• hats
• figure
• other (specify below)

Please take our survey at http://vidgle.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=16&t=44 to let us know what products you mostly look for. I would appreciate if you take the survey on the Vidgle site so we can easily get a percentage of the products.

Now, comment on this note for what anime do you look for in merchandise? Rather it be something as popular as an ongoing series like Naruto, or a completed old favorite like Kenshin. Or even a series that’s still airing in Japan. I’d like to know so we can look into getting these products! We would like to know so that we can decide which more anime series we should have more in stock on base on its popularity. We don’t want to have products that comes from an anime that doesn’t sell, like Dragon Half, because its not popular.

Please, add your comments, add your suggestions, and what other products we should have! Just comment on this note, all comments and suggestions are welcomed!

We would like to be successful with the expanded business of Jenthony, which brought you WRAJ Internet Radio and the newest service Vidgle. And we hope to continue to communicate to you to help improve the services and product selections that we will have running in our new store in the future!

And don’t worry Vidgle fans, our series “Con Goer” will continue when our dealer operations begin for 2010.

So whenever you catch Antonio and Gannypoo online on Mario Kart Wii, you’ll know that red light green light might be the game to play!

Enjoy the Spinys (or blue shells, or whatever you want to call them)