Don't know about the crack, but try
http://www.astalavista.com
PBEM is Play-By-E-Mail. This is a feature of Alpha Centuari (SMAC) and CTP1, that lets you play multiplayer games by playing a turn, then sending the game to the next person in line, who plays a turn, and sends it on etc. This feature is in CTP2, but not officially. Activision left in most of the CTP1 code, and the PBEM feature is available to find, like an "easter egg" in the game. To find out how, search for a thread by Mr. Ogre in this forum. It used to be stuck to the top of the Multiplaying forum, until we realised that multiplayer is dead, and closed the forum.
However... there is no human-human diplomacy in PBEM so it means that half the fun of playing with your friends (and making outrageous demands for 2 billion gold) is lost.
Be warned, there are a lot of bugs, especially in multiplayer, so you may get crashes quite frequently. Most of the modders here are concentrating on single-player, so Multiplayer might be overlooked for a while.
Ben
