XSW SP #3 – Shell of a Site (2000-12-11)

Litestep.net is one of the main web sites of the LiteStep
community. c0mrade, the current web master, took a dead site and
turned it into what it is today. While the site has gone though
some tough times, it remains the official LiteStep site.

Here follows a very interesting and information packed
interview I held with c0mrade. The past, present, and future of
LiteStep on the web and some personal questions are answered.

+——-<*>——-+

<XSWeekly> Seeing as we all know about litestep.net, tell us what got
you interested in starting it.

<c0mrade> Well, back when I started, I started with my personal site
called LiteStep UNLiMiTED. Litestep.net wasn’t updated at
all for almost a year, and abyssal was down for even more
than that. There was no place for current litestep themes
so I started my own site which got popular pretty soon.
<c0mrade> Then it’s transformed into litestep.net by the wish of the
domain owner. Of course I was the one who approached him
with the idea.

<XSWeekly> How did Chris feel about that? As I remember, he was a bit
hostile then.

<c0mrade> He just didn’t want to go through the hassle, but when he
saw the potential of my work, he changed his mind.

<XSWeekly> So after the transfer to you, how long did it take for
people to start realizing that ls.net was back alive?

<c0mrade> I’d say immediately.
<c0mrade> I had to put up what I had, which was not really a complete
site but people could already submit their work to the site
and it was dynamic.
<c0mrade> So immediate submissions within the first day.

<XSWeekly> Thats quite impressive. Did that make you do more for the
site?

<c0mrade> Of course.
<c0mrade> I love to contribute…and LiteStep was something that
really got my attention right away. The more responses I
got, negative or positive, the more I wanted to get done.
It’s sort of a stimulator.
<c0mrade> You know, for us, developers, or web guys, a single positive
email a month does it for us…gives us second wind.

<XSWeekly> I can relate to that.
<XSWeekly> After that the site just started to get larger of course,
but then came the mess with the b24.5 release and a lot of
problems arose. How did that affect you and the site in
general?

<c0mrade> It didn’t. The litestep.net team continued to do what we
were supposed to do. Keep people up to date, have new
themes, and screenshots.
<c0mrade> So, as far as site goes, we didn’t get affected at all.

<XSWeekly> It didn’t affect you, personally, at all?

<c0mrade> Yes it did, but in a better way.
<c0mrade> Well, dev team internal problems, then personal problems of
webmasters of headdomains. Me for litestep.net and
warewolf and bob wells for litestep.com and .org (then).
<c0mrade> Where did it lead to? Well… we lost valuable dev team
members, we embarrassed ourselves, and litestep in general,
and well…nothing positive came out of there.
<c0mrade> So, I started a peace process and now warewolf and I are
combining forces to not have anymore separate sites. We are
in fact meeting about final details tonight. That’s how it
affected me in a good way.

<XSWeekly> So now that the TLD’s of litestep are combining, what is
next for ls.net?

<c0mrade> What is next for litestep.net… well… there will be
no more litestep.net. The site’s called litestep, that’s it.
All tlds are the same site, we are not planning to divide
responsibilities.
<c0mrade> Litestep.com, believe it or not, is a HUGE repository of
information about litestep since the early age. If we
combine what’s there and what we already have, plus
something that we don’t yet have, we get a one stop litestep
site.
<c0mrade> Now, we ARE planning to have subdomains for ease of
remembering. Like themes.ls.net,.org, .com will just point
to the theme archive and so on. Support.litestep.net,.org,
.com, etc…
<c0mrade> The main innovation and main accent will be made on creating
SOME type of support for LiteStep besides just having a
good documentation archive online.
<c0mrade> Of course, the whole site is being rewritten from scratch
as you know. Visually there might not be any big changes,
unless someone contributes a nice layout, but structurally
it’s totally different. It’s more compact on the screen
and in code, as well as better organized, and easier to
maintain as well as easy for customization, and much faster.
It’s started with the fact that there will be no separate
sites anymore in mind.

<XSWeekly> That is some huge news. It’s also a bit controversial.
Some people feel that the combining of the TLD’s into one
site is too much control. How do you feel about that?

<c0mrade> Control? Over what? We are creating a community site for
the litestep community. We are going to host themers. We
are giving @tld web based email. We are going to SUPPORT,
not try to ELIMINATE. That’s why I approached jalist for
instance when he was mumbling about uselessness of his site.
<c0mrade> So whoever thinks that, they are wrong, and if they don’t
believe it, I’ll prove them wrong when everything is in
place.

<XSWeekly> I think the main feeling on that is that this huge site
will push aside other, independent sites like ls2k into the
background.

<c0mrade> I don’t agree with that. We are not trying to centralize
EVERYTHING in one spot. When I say “one stop shop” I mean
a user comes to main site, looks at official resources, but
hey, it’s impossible to have everything.
<c0mrade> Look at FPN, or LS2K for instance. They have so much useful
help and interesting information there besides just news.
<c0mrade> Or desktopian.org for instance, although tin_omen stepped
away from LS theme for some reason.

<XSWeekly> True, but what will make them stray away from litestep.net
if 90% of what they are looking for is there?

<c0mrade> We are going to have a lot of references to third party
sites.
<c0mrade> Ok, if you want, here are the things that are in mind to
keep these sites alive. You know the commercial banners we
have now? How about we setup litestep ring banners or a
shell banner system of our own. Or have a random or features
site with ss and everything on the front page? How about a
community site. My.litestep.net type of site?

<XSWeekly> Sounds like you have thought everything through pretty well.
Any other plans? Near or far in the future for the site?

<c0mrade> Well… I don’t really want to unveil ALL the plans…but
generally, yes I’ve thought of everything, but not all by
myself. I’ve got ideas from people like yourself (I give
you official credit for my.litestep.whatever idea yes).
Everyone contributed, I’m just executing. But there are no
long term plans for at least another year. The new site
will be up and running (hopefully) and then we will see.
<c0mrade> As for any particular new features, I guess you guys will
have to be a bit patient, wait and see :) Just follow
http://www.c0mrade.org/changes.txt whenever I bring it
backup tomorrow.

<XSWeekly> It looks like we have something new and interesting to look
forward too.
<XSWeekly> Tell me a little about yourself.

<c0mrade> I’m originally from Moscow, Russia. In 1994 I came to
the United States and since then I’ve been living in
Lincoln, NE.

<XSWeekly> How was that transition like?

<c0mrade> It was fairly easy. I grew up post hardcore communist era,
and was more “Americanized” than my older brother for
instance. Although, of course, cultural shock is
unavoidable.

<XSWeekly> So what do you do besides work on ls.net?

<c0mrade> I work for a company called Globabilities, Inc., a startup
company, doing pretty much everything. My official position
is VP of Intelligent Interactive Systems. So I do anything
from sysadmining, installing, troubleshooting, web design
and backends, manage projects. Mostly I do web development,
but like right now I’m upgrading FreeBSD on our web server.

<XSWeekly> Do you have any other interests outside of work and ls?

<c0mrade> Of course. I like techno music and I like to dance. I play
tennis occasionally. I like reading science fiction and
technical books. I like fishin’. I like to relax on sundays,
and do absolutely nothing, although last time that happened,
was looooong looooong time ago. I LOVE playing guitar and
singing. I learned how to play guitar so I can sing, but I
mostly do Russian songs but mostly I’m a computer geek. :)

<XSWeekly> Arn’t we all (=

<c0mrade> Yeah, who else would sit all day at computer with buncha
IRC windows open, with HomeSite open and so I can code,
couple of browser windows, but at least I have a beautiful
girl sitting right next to me.

<XSWeekly> Do you have anything to add that I haven’t asked?

<c0mrade> Thanks to all the litestep users, devteam, and any one else
that I have forgotten.

+——-<*>——-+

It should be interesting too see what becomes of LiteStep
with the combined sites. No matter what happens, it’s going to be
an interesting ride to say the least.

- demigod

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