Contrary to popular belief, he was not obligated to do ANYTHING, but what he VOLUNTARILY did anyway happened before anyone suggested RAFO. He "handed over the keys," as Nighthawk put it, but many parts were given away because 1) RAFO did not exist to take them, 2) even when it did, RAFO did not WANT several and 3) in some cases the creators DID, for their own sites.

Mike was not obligated to run wotmania till the last members heir died. He was not obligated to grant requests to (indefinitely) use his (copyrighted) intellectual property just to preserve a home for wotmaniacs—he did anyway. He was not obligated to find new homes for WoT content RAFO never wanted—he did anyway, so people would still call him a heartless SOB three years after they last spoke with him. He was not even obligated to let me make a final wotmania class shirt on CafePress (or rather, let nossy, Sansa and a few others after I proved hopelessly unequal to the task I proposed and promised)—he did anyway, and was nothing but pleasant and helpful; asking him what font the site logo used was a lot easier and better than just guessing.

I am continually amazed Mike created, as an often grueling labor of love, a site that brought so many people together in a tight unique community for a solid decade, yet so many members so resent him. Seriously, wtf? If anything, WE owe HIM, and I cannot help feeling it extremely ungrateful and childish to think the reverse. Nothing demonstrates that better than the community fragmenting in his absence, but the fact is that had already begun long before wotmanias demise. Mike did not kill wotmania: He just called the time of death. It is not his fault necromancers could not convincingly reanimate the corpse.

With that in mind, remember RAFO was never meant to be Zombie wotmania in the first place: It is an independent site that must stand or fall on its own. Even if every single wotmaniac EVER joined RAFO and posted daily for 50 years RAFO would fail its stated goal, which is not "wotmania clone." It is not Mikes fault people quit posting at wotmania nor Bens fault people have quit posting here. New people came to wotmania despite its maddening format for years ere that stopped, because MEMBERS gave them a reason. When the reason disappeared, so did they; when it returns, so will they. Anyone who wants to help RAFO should post constructive things and stop posting destructive ones, so, with THAT in mind, I have said plenty and more on the topic.