I'm doing my best to get all of the new code done for the
upcoming revisions to the pool, and my time is limited. I spent a good amount of my "vacation" working on code for these updates, and a good chunk of my remaining free time. As most are aware, running Eligius is not my actual normal paying job. I do this on a volunteer basis and make zip from running the pool... the 0% fee is possible because Eligius is run by volunteers and donations.
Since I keep slipping on my time estimates for the manual payout, I'm just not going to give one. I assure you that when I have the contiguous block of free time required to make it happen, it will happen. Just so you know, I do nothing with the Eligius funds besides pay miners, verifiable in the blockchain, since I'm now having people accuse me via email of using miner funds for other purposes. A quick glance at the transaction histories easily disproves such nonsense since none of the coins have been touched since, you guessed it, the last manual payout.
Honestly, and this this directed at no one in particular, in my opinion if you can't handle waiting a short while for earnings to be paid then you probably just shouldn't be mining at all. One of the things that annoys me to no end is that I've had emails/tickets/etc from people with pending balances less than 0.01 BTC (below the automatic payout threshold)
demanding that I pay them
right now because they
need that less-than-one-bitcent to cover their expenses. If you
really can't wait until the next manual payout to get your dust payout, then you're doing something wrong and need to reevaluate your position. I understand that there are miners which have non-dust balances due, but at the same time there is only one miner in the payout queue with what I would consider as having a significant balance... and the ironic thing is that I think this might be the only miner NOT sending/posting messages on all channels about the pending manual payout.
TLDR: Please just relax. I will get to the manual payout as soon as the time is available and everything is in order. Miners abandoning Eligius are simply making the automated queue go more slowly, for one, and are also lessening their chances of getting some added benefits I have in store for veteran/supporting miners under the upcoming system (qualification criteria TBD). The coming revisions will speak for themselves, and I'm pretty sure there are going to be some folks kicking themselves later. Doesn't make much difference to me.