en / (fr)
news & updates 2003
les nouvelles du site 2003
This page contains news of notable updates and changes to the site as they occurred in
2003.
Cette page contient les nouvelles et les changements majeurs sur ce site comme ils se
produisaient pendant 2003.
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2003-12-13 Well, this is likely to be my last update here this year, since nothing unexpected is due to happen before it ends, although clearly I can't possibly know whether something unexpected will happen. So, for those of you who celebrate such things, have a happy Xmas and New Year, and I hope a Renault 4 features in it somewhere. A few more days and I'll drag out that same tired substitute graphic for the home page - with the black background and spangly festive bits - as my site's sole offering for the season, like I do every year. Abnormally dull but festive star signs have now appeared in the Playroom, despite nobody answering my plea in the previous post, below. As a consequence, they're deliberately boring as an act of revenge. Another much shorter report on my meetings with R4 owners abroad, based on my Interrail novel but containing just the R4 aspects of the story, has been added to the Your Articles page, where you can also find a massive set of pictures related to Portuguese enthusiast João Seabra's 1973 Renault 4LC. This is a new addition containing images from before and after the car's dramatic orange transformation. The actual restoration pictures have been updated, and nearly 200 now appear in the Technique section, since a second CD containing the latter details of the process arrived in the post towards the end of the year. They detail just about every nook and cranny of the R4 in some position. The final pictures of my second R4, Nicole, are now added to the My Pics page of the Gallery, where there are plenty of new photos still being added in other sections such as the People's Pics. The queue of photos will not be cleared until at least the new year, and look out for a fantastic new Star Car that will be appearing soon. It seems that the acquisition of my third Renault 4 will not occur until at least January; more details of that will follow eventually. An enormous site overhaul heralding Renault 4-Play version 3 is due for sometime in 2004, but it will be an unenviable job, and I'm making no promises about what it will contain or when it will be done. It could well be quite a dramatic update, however. Unfortunately, various other commitments this year have held back progress a little on this site, though the only new item previously assured and since failing to materialise is the insurance guide. This may still happen one day but it is too big a job for me to implement at present. I hope to get some new Gift Shop designs and products on sale before the spring. |
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2003-12-01 A while since my last mammoth posting here, shortly after which my second R4, Nicole, sadly took her final drive under my ownership, to the home of Malcolm Vardy in Bedford (who runs the renault4.co.uk site). He and Clementine the Cat have been busy restoring another yellow car and using Nicole as a spare for some parts. I hope to soon be borrowing and driving one of his other Renault 4s instead, as a stopgap until I one day buy another gleaming model somewhere. There's been a rush of great pictures being sent to me recently, which are gradually being rolled out in their respective sections, including plenty new People's Pics, Mystery Cars and additions to the Playroom. Keep your eyes peeled for more as I work through the rest of the queue. The calendars have been selling well, so order yours soon if you want to receive it in time for the new year. In the last poll, you voted 'Cor, I used to own one of them' as the most common response received when taking your R4 to a garage. The latest vote is putting the question, 'What reaction do you get from people in vehicles alongside your R4?' A few very keen people may have noticed that the Pointless Comments have disappeared from this page, and gone to the Rants page in the Articles section where they belong. I don't have much energy for spouting off so much at the moment. Most of my waffling of late was reserved for my Interrailing travel novel, which has been online since 11th November, at www.railtales.me.uk. Until now, it has been publicised only to a private audience but I'm giving readers of this site the next chance to view it. This mammoth tale encompasses my meetings with R4 owners Asier and Luis in San Sebastián, and Fernando and João in Lisbon - all frequent contributors to this site over recent years. It features a few R4 photos and other excerpts about the car. My aim is to find a publisher who will be keen to turn it into a standard paperback novel, and if I have any luck it is most likely that the pages will be altered or removed from the website, so I recommend you read the story now if you're interested. Other work on this site has been a little slower than normal due to my writing, but I hope to implement many new features and improvements during 2004. The autumn star signs never materialised, which hardly matters because most people seem to hate them, but I'll try and get into predicting mood again and rustle up something for Xmas and New Year. If anybody actually likes the star signs, send me an anonymous mail simply saying 'I like the star signs', else I might not bother with them any more. Here's me trying to make the site original and interesting, and all people want is the measurement of a bloody wheelbase. I'm almost going into another rant here, I'll shut up for now.... |
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2003-08-25 A couple of things to note recently: Firstly, an issue has been identified that affects users of my Classifieds section who run Norton Firewall, and possibly other security software. Stupidly, this program blocks access to the page containing the adverts, simply because its filename contains the word 'ads'. This can also result in all the categories in the Classifieds index becoming invisible. A workaround for accessing the ads page has been found, and details appear on the Classifieds index page. You can also simply disable your firewall if desired. Secondly, some changes have had to be made to the guestbook, due to the large volume of rubbish entries I was beginning to receive. It appears that spammers may have been targeting the email addresses listed in the book. Many adjustments have been made to counteract the problem, and most will have no impact on users. A full page of information regarding this has been added to the Guestbook section, and a set of rules has been implemented. It is sad that actions like this should be necessary, but it will not adversely affect most users. |
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2003-08-04 Yesterday marked the 42nd birthday of the Renault 4, and this week was also notable because one of its counterparts, the original VW Beetle, was produced for the very last time in Mexico. With the 2CV, the old Mini and others all now history, we face the threat of modern cars taking over life completely, and our classics will become harder and more expensive to maintain. Renault 4 owners will be lucky if they can keep a model running until the 50th birthday in eight years' time. Various updates of late: In the previous poll you decided that the R4's own modern successor, the Renault Kangoo, was more derivative of the car than any other vehicle. The next poll is an amusing question that asks what kind of reaction you normally get to your R4 at a garage. A new Famous Driver graces the Playroom and another Star Car appears in the Gallery, whilst you may also note a cute new counter on the home page, woohoo! Work on other areas of the site is currently held back as I am writing the equivalent of a novel. My travel report is going to form a new site which I hope to launch later in the month, with the aim of attracting some travel writing work if I'm lucky. When finished, there are a myriad plans for this site to continue with. |
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2003-07-13 Well, I'm back from my voyages abroad. In fact, I arrived home last weekend but updates to this site didn't appear until midweek when I could muster up the energy again. The Classifieds are completely updated with many new ads. Other things are trickling along gradually, with a new short story on the Your Articles page about a crushing setback suffered by an R4 owner, and the summer star signs a little late but now available to view on the Fourtune Teller page in the Playroom. I spotted countless Renault 4s abroad, so many in fact that any plans to take pictures of them were immediately shelved else it would have ruined my trip. I did photograph the odd few and left a handful of my cards for this site on windscreens, but the further I travelled, the more I found, with my brief visit to Marrakech uncovering vast numbers of white models around the city streets. An article about this and my R4 meetings with fans in San Sebastián and Lisbon will follow later, along with a link to a complete weblog of my travels for those that are very bored. I have so much work to do on this site that it would take me until Christmas to complete if I went at it hammer and tong, so please be patient as I have many other things to attend to in life, and updates may be a little slow. |
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2003-06-05 I now declare this site closed for a month. Well, it's as action packed as ever but there'll be no new updates until July. I'm off on my big bash around Euroland, that is providing I even reach France in the first place, what with all the latest French strikes. I'll probably be marooned on a ship in the English Channel for a month not being allowed to enter Dieppe harbour. Some of you out there in Europe may even be lucky enough to find one of my cards placed on your R4 windscreen, what a treat! If you send anything to me now - pictures, adverts or whatever - you won't hear back from me for a while. I have to keep stating this all over the site because every time I've had a short break in the past, people pepper me with emails. I'm estimating about 500 to deal with when I get back, so please be patient. About 90% of those, however, will be viruses, offers for penis enlargements, free mortgages and donations of 10 million pounds from the son of the ex-king of Nigeria, so I can sort through them fairly rapidly. |
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2003-05-25 Fantastic new set of photos finally added to the My Pics page in the Gallery, showing my sister's second R4 in glorious technicolour after the repainting was finished. Other new pictures of my car, Nicole, have been added to that page recently, and there are many more photo additions around the site, in the Gallery and the Playroom. They don't know it, but I was a secret spy at the Renault UK headquarters in Rickmansworth the other week. By coincidence, I was posted to work there by my company, but the nature of the job I've been involved in this year is faffing about in the accounts departments of various companies based around Europe, and they're all pretty much the same, you can't tell one office from another. There was little opportunity to meet and greet with Renault enthusiasts, not in the boring financial part of the building I was in anyway. I did get to rummage through all their invoices and expenses but I didn't uncover any secrets about R4 reproduction plans! So, I just kept shut and didn't dare give them one of my business cards in case they viewed my Rants page and filed a lawsuit against me. The pecan pie in their canteen was a bit tough, but the food was otherwise edible, that's about all I can tell you. Maybe I'll get assigned there again next year and you can send in your suggestions for my mission. Just make sure your emails self destruct in five seconds. Their car park was full of 'cars with arses' - all those new Meganes, Lagunas, Vel Satis and so on with the huge back ends. The horrible silver Mazda we had to travel up in was about the only car amongst thousands in their vast parking lot that wasn't a spanking new Renault or Nissan model, so presumably all their staff get company cars or use one of their pool cars. I'm almost starting to warm to their bum designs though, it at least sets them apart from all the other bland cars on the road that look exactly the same. A huge gamble by the company, but I suppose we should credit them for taking the risk and attempting to be different. What next then, cars with genital piercings? I'm not sure which part of the anatomy the R4 most resembles, although I always imagine it as a whole in laying on its front, and I have a strange habit of coming out in sympathy with it whenever it acquires any damage. If the front wing gets a ding, I get earache, and if the rear wheel bearing starts grinding I get a dodgy ankle. Toothache is closely related to the spark plugs and cataracts are a result of headlight failure. Am I loopy? Well, maybe I am, so it's about time I had a long break from all this. Three and a half years of hard work on this site and no real holiday for eleven years means I am now at last looking forward to a month's vacation interrailing around Europe, so during this time there will be no updates to this site, including the Classifieds. Send any adverts in now before the end of May to guarantee publication. I will not return until early July, and I shall provide a further update before I go. Finally, the International R4 Meeting in Italy is almost upon us, and I would be grateful for any pictures or info anybody who attends the event can supply. Additionally, anything from the 24-hour R4 race at Onzain in France in early May would be welcome. |
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2003-04-23 Happy Birthday to Renault 4-Play! Three years old today! Yes, it's time to blow my own trumpet again. I can't believe I've sat at this computer creating this pap for so long. So, here's this year's summary: Good points: - Visitor numbers continue to swell, especially since early 2003 when I launched the French translated pages. This has also brought about a lot more adverts to the Classifieds section, which must be of some use to many people, and justifies the time it took to translate everything. Currently, up to 500 people per week are browsing this website, which is five times the target I initially set when I launched, and around double the figure from a year ago. It's been constant hard work the last year adding and upgrading things, and only the last week or two have finally given me some respite. But, as ever there's plenty more ideas in the pipeline. Last year finally saw the introduction of video onto this site, both with the film from Arnhem and some smaller, short clips from Portuguese meetings; hopefully more might follow. A new broadband version of the 40th anniversary event has been prepared and can now be found on the 'Arnhem Video' page in the Articles section. One more good thing, or perhaps bad depending on your viewpoint, is that I seem to have lost the ability to rant quite so much about everything and anything, in part due to life being mildly more pleasant over the previous twelve months than it normally is. Or maybe I've just been too knackered. Bad points: - Ah yes, there always have to be some. I can think of two this time. Firstly, that bloody useless company rename.net at last collapsed into the quagmire as I always predicted it would, thereby rendering my original website and email address completely invalid. This has taken so much time to put right, but thankfully is now virtually all complete. I'm finally rid of them and with any luck the present provider, PlusNet, will serve me better for a long time to come. And sadly, Nicolexia, my pride and joy, the blue and yellow wondercar and my second Renault 4, may well be on her last legs. Or last stomach anyway, because it's the front chassis that's in a bad way. I still have one cunning plan that I may be able to effect to save her for another year, which would be welcome else my whole idea to travel around Europe in her this summer goes tits up. However, it all depends upon one man's eye operation, extraordinarily enough; an operation which, by coincidence, is taking place today, so hopefully I'll soon find out the car's fate. Well, I've said enough here and will wrap up, save to point out a few other recent updates. In the last Vote 4 It! poll you decided that the Renault 4 was based more upon the Renault 4CV than any other car, with the Citroen 2CV coming in a close second. The new poll asks the opposite: Which car is most based upon the Renault 4? More new additions to the babes and the Gallery, and the People's Pics page has almost reached its 100th entry. Astonishing! |
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2003-04-05 Phew! That's that lot out of the way. It's been a monstrous last month working on this site. Virtually every last page has had to be trawled through and modified to bring it up to date with the new address and other changes, but the entire site is now overhauled. In the process, I've made a couple of other minor improvements, one being that all the pictures and articles you find around the site are now linked to each other for easier navigation, so you can go back and forward through the whole series quickly. The Gift Shop products are also updated with the new address where necessary, although an improvement is long overdue and one of my next tasks will be to provide a range of new gifts later in the year. Spring star signs are now added to the Playroom; I know how much you hate them but it won't stop me writing more. The Links section has been updated too, and the Classifieds have recently seen their most popular period yet, with dozens of adverts pouring in, including several from our many new French visitors. Worse news with my own car, which is on the verge of dying, short of extensive welding or basically a new front chassis. I may have to hunt for my third R4. Let's hope I can make a silly name out of the letters on the number plate, as with my last two. It's an important consideration when buying. |
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2003-03-09 IMPORTANT! The original address for this site (http://play.at/renault4play) will no longer work after March 31st. This is because the company that provides it has gone bust, which is hardly surprising given the poor service and the many rants I have made about them over the last three years. So, please ensure you have this site bookmarked under the newer address of http://www.renault4.plus.com/ instead. This also applies to anybody who has linked to my site from their own website. Even if your address bar appears to show the correct URL, please double-check the bookmark or re-bookmark the site, because due to the way it was originally set up, you may find your browser still has the old address listed and it simply redirects to this new one without you knowing. The old URL is not a proper address, only a function that points to another address, but come April 2003 it will be something of a black hole on the Internet that will suck you up and spit you out in the middle of nowhere. I now have to update several hundred pages across the site once again, which is the last thing I need given the little time I currently have at home, and I will have to redesign some of the Gift Shop images which will be outdated. Not to mention the Four Files and Arnhem video, which have the old address embedded in them and will require a stupendous and possibly uneconomical effort to put right. Bah, here I go again, just when I thought I'd cleared a lot of outstanding issues and could move on to doing something new on this site, another little sod pops out of the woodwork and throws everything into chaos. And to make things worse, this week I have to work in Bracknell. Help! |
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2003-02-16 After several months in waiting, at long last a second CD-ROM sent to me by our R4 fans in Portugal and Spain during 2002 has finally been sorted out and added to this site. You can find it on the Star Story page of the Articles section (number SS5). This follows on from the previous three parts, and contains countless more incredible images of quatrelles around the Basque region, and at Santarém during the First Great National Meeting of the R4 in Portugal in September 2002. It also includes a few short video clips. Thanks to João Seabra and the rest of the gang once more, and apologies for the five months' delay in getting it processed, but as you probably know, I've been very busy working on other bits of the site and this was a bit of a mammoth undertaking. There are also quite a few more Mystery Cars in the Gallery to tie in with the above article, and other odd recent additions around the site, including a stunning new babe in the Playroom, which must not be missed. As previously mentioned, I am currently in a new job which means I am often away from home and unable to attend to this site at such times, so please expect no further updates until the very end of February as I will be abroad until then. This includes updates and additions to the classified adverts. |
2003-01-20
Bienvenue sur Renault 4-Play à tous les Français, et ceux-là qui parlent français autour du monde! Ce
site est disponible maintenant en deux langues. C'est seulement les pages principales qui ont des versions
traduites, mais j'espère le site sera plus facile pour comprendre à l'avenir. Dites-moi ce que vous pensez
du nouveau site et veuillez corriger des erreurs en m'envoyant un email.
Basically, you probably already know: This site is now available in French (or at least the main pages are).
The work is now fully completed, so if you feel like dabbling in a bit of French study go ahead, or more
likely just email me to smugly point out all my mistakes!
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2003-01-16 New poll in Vote 4 It! Which car do you feel the R4 is based upon more than any other? Choose from a range of cars that were around before the Renault 4 was launched. In the previous poll, you decided that the standard hatchback model of the R4 beats either version of the van, the pickup, Plein Air or Rodeo, to the accolade of best body style, which isn't particularly surprising as it has well defined curves and angles, and is more prevalent than the other models. What is slightly more surprising is that the Plein Air received no votes at all, so there's no sporty followers of this show-off model to be found around here. They must be too busy entertaining girls with champagne in Monaco or something. Stage 1 of the massive effort to create French translations of pages on this site is almost complete and ready to launch. Only the main pages of the site will have alternate versions available; whether stage 2 will ever actually happen is another matter. This would involve translating large parts of sub-sections, which would not only be time-consuming, but would present tremendous logistical problems for the structure of the site, so I haven't decided on that yet, it's a long way off anyway. I did have an idea to do Spanish versions as well, once my ability in that language has improved, but that's really going to start overcrowding pages and that idea will have to wait for the day I totally overhaul the site design, sometime in the 22nd century. |
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2003-01-08 Right, business as usual now we've got that Xmas crap out the way. I've been very busy at work on this site over the holiday period whilst the rest of you have probably been indulging in dead overweight birds and uninvited relatives. There is a continuing effort to get all the main pages of this site shabbily translated into alternative French versions, which is taking a little longer than expected. A few contributions from the end of 2002 are still sitting here waiting for attention and should for the most part be uploaded by the end of the month. This will include the second, and doubtless not the last, massive article about Portuguese R4 meetings that was sent to me on CD-ROM by our quartet of quatrelle fans in Lisbon and San Sebastián last year. I have a number of plans for new features and other additions throughout 2003, not least an insurance guide that I dreamt up about a year ago, and which now seems all the more needy having just sat here at home today sorting out my own premium for the coming year. The idea being that UK visitors can contribute details of all their insurance quotes and premiums for their Renault 4s, and provide therefore a valuable reference for other users as to where to obtain the best deals. It will only work with considerable submissions from visitors, however, so please start gathering and storing your details now in preparation for when I implement the feature in the next couple of months. Right now, the place to go is the Playroom, which has a new babe, baby and some more silly star signs to occupy yourselves with for at least, well, two minutes maybe. And, some pictures of the 'First Great National Meeting of the Renault 4 in Portugal' have been added to the Your Articles page (number YA10) in the brown section. Bonne année! |
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