Re: The mystery of DT's new owner - SOLVED
Posted: 20 Jan 2024, 16:16
I do apologize in advance if this comes off a bit personal and/or wanky. While I haven't been active here for a fair while, this forum and its members were an important part of my teenage years, and I still hold them uncomfortably close to my heart. And when something is close to my heart, I sometimes can't help but to wax lyrical. I do also want to explain my actions as well as I can.
When it was first announced that Deskthority would be sold to a new owner, I wasn't concerned about whether or not the website would stay live - clearly, the new owner would have no reason to take it down or fail to upkeep it. Sure, there were a few judders here and there under Onecommerce's ownership, and our new owners rarely showed their faces. But I worried not.
That changed recently when Onecommerce announced their desire to sell the website again. To be honest, when Deskthority was first sold I already considered it to be a near valueless asset to any profit-minded company; unlike Geekhack, which was wisely and considerately bought by Massdrop, Deskthority has never been friendly towards companies or profit-driven endeavours. But regardless of my assessment - the website was still a little active at that point, and had its merits (notably: it's history and it's wiki). Fast foward to now though, I'm far more steadfast in my assessment. This forum is dead, kaput. This forum that once fostered enthusiasm and fanaticism is a husk of what it once was. There are still some shining hubs out there for keyboards, but Deskthority is no longer one of them.
I fear that Onecommerce will not be able to find a buyer willing to pay a satisfactory amount, and that they'll grow tired of paying to prop up a wasting asset. I fear that this forum and all of the fond memories it contains will go offline forever in the near future. My fears have definitely been exacerbated by the intermittent downtime and nginx errors recently too.
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To quell my worries, I've cloned Deskthority. Not raw, unsearchable HTML pages like Wayback Machine or HTTrack, but a full clone. All posts, images and files have been downloaded, and thread/post databases have been recreated. Search functions will be carried over, and you'll be able to browse the forum exactly the same as you do now.
If Deskthority happens to go offline in the future, you will be able to find the clone here (likely after a short delay): https://kbdarchive.org/
To see a similar live example, have a look at OTD Archive - a clone of OTD.kr, which was an incredibly impactful Korean keyboard forum that sadly no longer works (except for the homepage).
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As pathetic as it might sound, my life would probably be very different if it weren't for Deskthority. I still remember spending hours every day trawling through old posts, constantly discovering things I'd never seen before. I still remember seeing Sixty's photos of Cherry keyboards for the first time, sending me down a rabbit hole I still haven't climbed out of. I still remember talking to countless lovely people here through PMs, one or two of which are surprisingly still here today. That certainly helped with my loneliness at the time.
The same goes for Geekhack, the same goes for OTD and kbdmania. But only Deskthority feels threatened. If you're like me, if you have fond memories of this place, I hope this clone will help you to revisit them if things go to pot.
Thank you to webwit and sixty for creating this place. It was lovely.
When it was first announced that Deskthority would be sold to a new owner, I wasn't concerned about whether or not the website would stay live - clearly, the new owner would have no reason to take it down or fail to upkeep it. Sure, there were a few judders here and there under Onecommerce's ownership, and our new owners rarely showed their faces. But I worried not.
That changed recently when Onecommerce announced their desire to sell the website again. To be honest, when Deskthority was first sold I already considered it to be a near valueless asset to any profit-minded company; unlike Geekhack, which was wisely and considerately bought by Massdrop, Deskthority has never been friendly towards companies or profit-driven endeavours. But regardless of my assessment - the website was still a little active at that point, and had its merits (notably: it's history and it's wiki). Fast foward to now though, I'm far more steadfast in my assessment. This forum is dead, kaput. This forum that once fostered enthusiasm and fanaticism is a husk of what it once was. There are still some shining hubs out there for keyboards, but Deskthority is no longer one of them.
I fear that Onecommerce will not be able to find a buyer willing to pay a satisfactory amount, and that they'll grow tired of paying to prop up a wasting asset. I fear that this forum and all of the fond memories it contains will go offline forever in the near future. My fears have definitely been exacerbated by the intermittent downtime and nginx errors recently too.
-----
To quell my worries, I've cloned Deskthority. Not raw, unsearchable HTML pages like Wayback Machine or HTTrack, but a full clone. All posts, images and files have been downloaded, and thread/post databases have been recreated. Search functions will be carried over, and you'll be able to browse the forum exactly the same as you do now.
If Deskthority happens to go offline in the future, you will be able to find the clone here (likely after a short delay): https://kbdarchive.org/
To see a similar live example, have a look at OTD Archive - a clone of OTD.kr, which was an incredibly impactful Korean keyboard forum that sadly no longer works (except for the homepage).
-----
As pathetic as it might sound, my life would probably be very different if it weren't for Deskthority. I still remember spending hours every day trawling through old posts, constantly discovering things I'd never seen before. I still remember seeing Sixty's photos of Cherry keyboards for the first time, sending me down a rabbit hole I still haven't climbed out of. I still remember talking to countless lovely people here through PMs, one or two of which are surprisingly still here today. That certainly helped with my loneliness at the time.
The same goes for Geekhack, the same goes for OTD and kbdmania. But only Deskthority feels threatened. If you're like me, if you have fond memories of this place, I hope this clone will help you to revisit them if things go to pot.
Thank you to webwit and sixty for creating this place. It was lovely.
—is different from what I was getting when I posted it: