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Mike Stay (Feb 12 2026 at 19:06):I haven't been able to get it to load for a few days, but I see in the blog feed that Mike Shulman posted yesterday. Is anyone else having trouble? Loading through Tor Browser also seems not to work, so I'd expect others not to be able to load it either.
Joe Moeller (Feb 12 2026 at 19:10):I also couldn't open Mike's post.
Nathanael Arkor (Feb 12 2026 at 20:30):It's currently working for me (https://golem.ph.utexas.edu/category/2026/02/the_univalence_principle.html).
Mike Stay (Feb 12 2026 at 21:15):Hrm. Still no access for me with or without Tor. Is @Jacques Distler still the one maintaining it?
Andrea S (Feb 12 2026 at 22:44):It loads for me when I am not connected to a vpn, but it didn't connect for me when I was on a vpn
Andrea S (Feb 12 2026 at 22:45):But now it is loading when I'm connecting to a vpn in other parts of the world
John Baez (Feb 12 2026 at 23:39):Yes, Jacques Distler is the one running the n-Cafe. It's working for me here now.
Mike Shulman (Feb 13 2026 at 03:40):I haven't had any trouble recently, but I have heard at least one other report of issues.
David Egolf (he/him) (Feb 13 2026 at 04:42):That link doesn't load for me.
David Michael Roberts (Feb 13 2026 at 06:40):Works ok for me
Joe Moeller (Feb 13 2026 at 09:03):Now it works for me.
Tom de Jong (Feb 13 2026 at 09:30):It doesn't load for me either (in the UK). I had also trouble with that blog yesterday. More specifically, it times out.
Paolo Perrone (Feb 13 2026 at 10:28):It's working for me (London)
Tom de Jong (Feb 13 2026 at 10:34):https://downforeveryoneorjustme.com/golem.ph.utexas.edu?proto=https also reports it as down
https://onlineornot.com/website-down-checker?requestId=uPiLYjAbUNn9wtfghFuRg&url=https://golem.ph.utexas.edu/category/2026/02/the_univalence_principle.html reports it as partially down
I think we can definitely conclude that there is some issue with the server.
Zoltan A. Kocsis (Z.A.K.) (Feb 13 2026 at 14:25):As of now, I too get a timeout when trying to load the site both from 5G or my wired network (Australia, no VPN). I guess it might be some sort of overeager protection on UT Austin's network?
Mike Shulman (Feb 13 2026 at 16:30):Has anyone told Jacques?
John Baez (Feb 13 2026 at 23:24):On Friday February 6th Tom Leinster wrote:
Dear Jacques,
I guess you already know about this, but just in case: for the last few
days, there seem to have been issues with connecting to the n-Category
Cafe.
Specifically, if I try to access the home page then most of the time
I can't: the browser eventually times out. The same goes if I try to
access the page for any specific post.
Right now it's mostly working for me. I can access the home page and the
few random posts I tried. They take a while to load, though, and sometimes
time out.
The same goes for the backend links
https://golem.ph.utexas.edu/cgi-bin/MT-3.0/mt.fcgi?tab=comments&__mode=list_comments&blog_id=3&approved=1
https://golem.ph.utexas.edu/cgi-bin/MT-3.0/mt.fcgi
Right now, the latter doesn't work for me. Firefox says "Hmm. Weʼre having
trouble finding that site. We canʼt connect to the server at
golem.ph.utexas.edu."
The first comment in the list is by David Roberts, on the post "Weil,
Venting"; David's post begins with the words "Working link". The backend
says this comment has been published, but it doesn't actually appear.
I'm doing all this on up-to-date Firefox on up-to-date Linux. I've tried
from different IP locations at different times over the last few days.
Many thanks.
Best wishes,
Tom
That day Jacques Distler responded:
Golem [the server] is currently subject to a DoS attack. I am doing what I can to remediate it (UT Networking have been unhelpful). Am happy to explain the details if that would help. Until I get things under control, golem will be functional but slow to respond.
I think the reason why Tom and I are in the loop but not you, @Mike Shulman, is that Tom was very helpful when the n-Cafe was under attack by my arch-enemy a while ago. It's possible that this is another attack from that person: I don't know.
Ralph Sarkis (Feb 14 2026 at 08:13):Does your arch-enemy use a drawing of them as Lex Luthor for their profile pic on Mathstodon?
John Baez (Feb 14 2026 at 23:14):No, they created lots of accounts on mastodon.social where they posted obscenities aimed at me.