Those looking for SMF, a forum-based CMS, could not reach SMF's host server the past few days at Simple Machines. SMF's server was down for an extended period of time from July 22nd and 23rd. Thantos, one of the SMF developers, posted a message that only gave vague reasons for why there was a server outage:
The cause of the outage was the result of a non-technical issue involving our service provider. Failings happened on our both our part and their part. We have resolved the issue and are taking steps to ensure it doesn't happen again.
What I find interesting is that he also acknowledged and addressed user's fears of other reasons for the server to be down:
We would like to take a moment to let you know that we were not hacked, bought out, quit, or any other such rumour.
He is right. When an open source project isn't reachable on the Internet...we fear the worse. The fear is that somehow the open source project is dead. If I see Google or CNN down my first thought is that they're having network problems or experiencing a Denial of Service attack. However, when a site for an open-source project is down I don't really ask why it may be down...but instead ask if and when they'll be back up. Fear of losing something we love is always the hardest fear to overcome.