Sadly I have to announce that our small adventure called Minorating is going to end right now.

I had two different views on the GDPR - one was that it's not going to be hard to be compliant in the end. We're not the type of business the GDPR actually aims for, also we're not *really* storing sensitive data. Even the opt-in could be most probably be dodged.
The other view was looking at the lawyers - especially in Germany we learned a lot about them in terms of copyright "protection". Some invented borderline business models, where the biggest lever is not an actual violation but the asymmetry between the lawyers office and a clueless private person. And it looks like they explore that areas again.

So even if I'm doing everything right, there is a chance that we will find out in court - which puts me and my family on an existential risk, not to speak about the time and efforts I'd rather put in my new workplace (and most of you should go with me at that point). At that point, I have to ask myself if it's worth it - and to be honest we're not fighting for civil rights or whatever equality here.

I'd go even further and state that maybe the time has come anyways: The community is way different than it was when we had the strong need to invent something like MR; you'd need to be around a long time to even know how the situation was before. Only few people ever met a W grade driver, and they are not a problem anymore. Most drivers that still drive AC have learned and improved, and the Wreckers lost their interest months and years ago. Regular drivers forged their servers and groups where the world is ok. For the rest, there is (finally) an alternative with KMR, and SRS is where the real AC MP is happening anyways.

Looking back, I have to specifically thank everybody around. This was a very good ride, and the probably most interesting project I've done in my life. Nothing would have been possible without the strong support, ideas and feedback you guys around gave me. Thanks a lot & keep up the good work. Hopefully we can go on just like that pretty soom (tm).



So the technical procedure will be: Starting now, the auth will not do anything and let any MR server accept anybody, regardless of the MR rank. That will prevent AC servers start lagging until the AUTH line is removed by the server admins. The backend will shut down, so no recording or response will happen.
Server admins, please blank out the AUTH_PLUGIN_ADDRESS= in the server_cfg.ini (most important for now). As you're already there, you could also disable UDP_PLUGIN_LOCAL_PORT and UDP_PLUGIN_ADDRESS.
For Rackservice users, please wait for a message of Kevin Maatman.