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Relaunched!
By John
I know, you guys are probably wondering what happened to The Officers' Club. In short, junked. Here's why:
The OC really took off. And I when I say it really took off, I mean it really flippin' took off. After about a month and a half of blogging (we started in late Oct 05), Charlie and I had three standing offers on the table to pull us off of blogspot and onto a more capable platform. In the end, it wasn't a difficult choice. Military.com, who also sponsors Defense Tech and Milblogging.com, picked us up, redesigned us, and found us a nice cozy home on their server. They wanted us to help them connect military folks with the benefits and services found on their website, and we wanted them to help us plug their 6 million members into the blogosphere. Not a bad trade eh?
So why the name change? A few reasons, one being the fact that we felt bad calling ourselves "The Officers' Club" when some of our most loyal readers are enlisted troops. That and Officers' Club was clunky; it was two words too many and no one could get the punctuation straight.
OpFor works on a couple of different levels. In the military tongue, OpFor stands for "opposing force," an army-ism that we felt accurately summed up this grand experiment we call milblogging. Plus it's short and makes civilians feel important when they say it.
As for the site itself, we've made "some special modifications." You'll notice a few extra pages up top: resources, support the troops, and podcasting. The resources page was a little project of mine, I was sick of using Red Google to solicit research materials for posts and decided to consolidate a link dump of military and defense sites that would benefit all of our readers, not just Charlie and I.
Support the Troops is self-explanatory, we owe the armed forces a lot. If just one willing donor uses OpFor to connect with a charity that suits him, we've done our job.
As for podcasting, we've already done podcast #1 and we're looking foward to more. That's Charlie's bag, he'll talk about it in future posts I'm sure.
Although we are blogging under a new identiy and a new (and sexier!) site, we're the same John and Charlie, and we'll be blogging on the same topics that we hit on the OC. Many, many thanks to Sekimori Design and Military.com for making OpFor possible, and a huge thanks to Steve Green at Vodkapundit, who has offered phenomenal support, advice, and drinking tips from week one.
We're really excited about OpFor, and hope you guys are too. Thanks for your patronage, you readers are the ones who made this new site a reality.
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» Moving Day from Target Centermass
… for a couple of the troops at the Officers’ Club, one of my daily reads.
Charlie Munn and John Noonan have settled into their new digs at OpFor, military jargon for opposing force. Go check ‘em out … often.
... [Read More]
Comments
Glad to have you back & online!
Good luck with the new site. Changing my blogroll.
Good luck with the new site. Changing my blogroll.
Impressive new digs. I made the change and a short post in your honor. Don't forget the little guys!
Love the new look, looks fabulous! See you next week....
I dig the new blog, guys. Thanks for the linkage!
And once again, the cream rises. Congrats, guys; you've earned it.
OUTSTANDING!
I have seen some good things from Military.com and you guys are now at the top of that list. Congratulations! Be sure to stay true to your original principals and you won't go wrong!
By the way, OpFor is a very appropriate term. It is the one of the mechanisms by which our own troops get better.
PS - Go NAVY!
Love ya, love your show.
And congrats on the new dig. I wish you even better.
But just one thing I hope you remember: you don’t need to concern yourself with making us civilian folk feel important.
We already own your ass….
(Lest you get the wrong impression, I am a very proud owner...)
OUTSTANDING!
I have seen some good things from Military.com and you guys are now at the top of that list. Congratulations! Be sure to stay true to your original principals and you won't go wrong!
By the way, OpFor is a very appropriate term. It is the one of the mechanisms by which our own troops get better.
PS - Go NAVY!
DOH! Double post!
Comin up in the world Milltary.com.
Nice site looks good. You guys have done excellent work at Officers Club and well deserve the new digs.
Keep up the good work.
I was made to understand that there would be punch and pie here?
But seriously, congrats on the upgrade. I've been following the OC--no, not the stupid TV show--since pretty much your first day, so I know that OpFor has a bright future ahead of it.
Looking forward to reading your work!
>>> J.
CONGRATS!! I guess that makes us...ummm...blogbrothers. Yeah, I know, one more blogging-term for the books. I used Milblogopedia the other day on Milblogging.com and almost lost it. Cheers!
Congratulations on the new site! Only complaint is you need a little red, white and yellow....
Nice new place you got here. Congrats.
Now, I heard something about punch and pie, but I would have thought you'd be serving vodka.
Could you folks standardize on OPFOR / OP-FOR / Op-For / Op For?
Nice new home you've got; I look forward to more smart analyses now that you have made your move.
Good luck in your new home!
Very cool. I'm glad this is taking off, and working out so well. Your blog posts are now on my list of daily reads.
Outstanding!
And it's about time. :) Nice new place with trackbacks and everythin'!!
And just in time to show off for the Milblogger's Conference, too. WTG, fellas! I'm proud of you.
PS: Where's the beer?
Congrats, the place looks nice! I can almost hear Dennis Haysbert doing the voiceovers...;-)
The new site looks sweet!
Thanks for the blogroll linkage; I've already update mine.
Congrats on the launch!!
Welcome back, you guy's were always a good read. Congratulations on the new site, it's outstanding.
excelent!
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Welcome to life, guys. Here's to keeping the momentum going.