SNW shutting down after 9 years

I don't know where to start. So I'll just cut right to the chase. I'm shutting down SNW. I've had this website for 9 years, and those have been 9 wonderful years. But it's time to let go. I have several good reasons for me to come to this decision and I hope you all understand.

As some of my friends might have read on Facebook, recently a load of electronics in our house broke down. Not all at once, but most of them broke the past few weeks. A few big examples: My main computer is "broken". The hard disk has been giving problems since the beginning of 2012. I already sent it back for repair back then but Apple said there was nothing wrong with the hard disk. Well I was right, because the hard disk has been showing loads of bad sectors and it's come to a point where I can't boot to Windows anymore, which is where I play my games. If I cannot play my games, I can't write any reviews and I can't make any downloads. It's a long story but basically, I don't have any warranty on this anymore (I should, I have Apple Care) and of course I'm getting it fixed anyway, but I don't know when I'll have it back. Then there is the laptop, which started smoking out of nowhere the other day. Scared the hell out of me. But yeah, broken. Cheetah's computer also broke down yesterday. It's probably the power supply which shouldn't be too expensive to replace but, it's yet another broken computer. If you all remember, in January we lost a lot of stuff when the server crashed. I really did suffer emotionally from that. Besides all these computers, other electronics are failing too and it's just too much for me at the moment. I'm so done with this.

Besides the failing hardware and electronics, you might have noticed there aren't that many updates on SNW. This is mainly cause I have a lot of issues updating the site. It's a long and complicated story. Long story short: I need half an hour to post 3 lousy walls. And for the news it isn't any different. I need to post the English news. Then translate. After I've translated the article, the Dutch article will have an English url and the English article will have no proper url at all, just numbers. I then have to edit both the English and the Dutch articles to fix the urls. With images it isn't any better. If I want to use images in my content I have to add those images first, then add news, link the images to the article. Save the article. Edit it again and then I can insert them. Don't ask me why, there are just a lot of bugs. I'm so fed up with all the stress I've gained in 2013 and I really need a break.

As if these aren't enough reasons, I'm also really fed up with the hate in the community. It's nothing new, the hate has been around for years. But I notice there are STILL sites out there who hate me (or my site), for no good reason. I can try to be nice and I can try to be mean, nothing helps. I'm really tired of this hate in the community and to be honest: I have better things to do than to sit here and be hated on by people who think they are better than me. I don't deserve to be treated that way. I just hope this will be a lesson for people in the community. Try to get along at least. Try not to hate. Isn't the whole idea behind The Sims that you can be whoever you want to be, no matter what colour or sexual preference or hobbies? Why hate? I realize in most cases the hate comes from jealousy but jealousy is just a nasty thing you don't need. If I can give people in the community some good advice: Be original in your work and be nice to others. You'll get far if you at least try to do those things.

So the past few weeks I have been talking about these issues with Greg from SimCookie and Daniel from SimsGalore, who happen to be very good friends. And we all just sort of feel it's enough. We feel like maybe it's time to let a new generation of Simmers take over for us in the community. There are so many fansites already. So yeah, not only is SNW closing, my friends from SimCookie and SimsGalore are also closing their site.

Au revoir, my friends!