Browse by topic

News

AfterDawn.com, the domain - 10 years

31 March 2009 13:57 by Petteri "dRD" Pyyny | 26 comments

First of all, I'd like to emphasize that today is not AfterDawn's birthday. Our site's "official" birthday will be celebrated on 10th of June this year.

However, today we celebrate an important event in our site's history. Exactly ten years ago, on March 31st, 1999, a group of nine guys gathered for an IRC meeting to decide what name we should give to the "site about MP3 technology" that we had started building a month earlier.

I emailed all participants a day before, asking everybody to come up with names that they considered to be good enough for the site. Only rule was that the name should be available in "dotcom form" -- we didn't want to have .net or .org domain.

At the beginning of the meeting, everybody's lists were merged and then handed out to all participants. After a couple rounds of voting, the name was finally decided. AfterDawn.com was registered later that evening. Unfortunately, nobody remembers the other suggestions for the site's name anymore and the logs from that meeting are already lost.

The development work that had begun in February, continued through the Spring until the first official version of the site was launched to the public in June -- the 10th of June, 1999 to be exact.

After some digging into our archives, we actually found an ancient backup copy of the codebase of our site -- dated in April, 1999. This version lacks all the graphics, doesn't have stylesheets whatsoever and is very, very limited in terms of functionality -- but after some tweaking, we managed to get it running on our current server setup :-) So, here are couple of screenshots of what AfterDawn.com looked like almost 10 years ago -- 2 months before it was opened to the public:

front page of the site, layout from April 1999, news items from 2009

a news page, layout from April 1999, news from March, 2009

And for comparison, here's a link to a screenshot of the "v1", the version that was used when the site went live in June, 1999:

P.S. Every time we make changes to our site's layout, there's a massive wave of complaints, so we've been thinking, maybe we should just roll back to the April, 1999 version with our next update.. ;-)

Permalink to this article

Speedo and iRiver bring underwater MP3 player to North America (14 April 2009)

« Previous news article
Playing music for horses? Pay license fees!

Next news article »
Sony cuts price of PS2

Post your comment

Discuss this article!	There are more user comments available, read them here
7thsinger (AfterDawn Addict) 31 March 2009 14:03
*Quote:* P.S. Every time we make changes to our site's layout, there's a massive wave of complaints, so we've been thinking, maybe we should just to roll back to the April, 1999 version with our next update.. ;-) LMAO! Good call Boss. That would go over like a turd in a punch bowl methinks. :) [ + quote]
smokyrain (AfterDawn Addict) 31 March 2009 14:41
I think you would have a massive flood of complaints or questions then, lol. Would be funny though for April fools [ + quote]
DXR88 (Senior Member) 31 March 2009 14:46
i'm all for Plain Text. i think it would be a great idea, people with dial-up will love you. [ + quote] This message has been edited since posting. Last time this message was edited on 31 March 2009 14:48
dRD (I hate titles) 31 March 2009 14:53
*Originally posted by DXR88:* people with dial-up will love you. ..all three of them? [ + quote]
noelyf (AfterDawn Addict) 31 March 2009 14:59
Four, including me lol Eamos Library - http://eko.4shared.com/ Eurovox Guide - http://forums.afterdawn.com/thread_view.cfm/674371 Updating Starview Boxes - http://forums.afterdawn.com/thread_view.cfm/663923 Latest Firmware- http://forums.afterdawn.com/thread_view.cfm/722659 [ + quote]
7thsinger (AfterDawn Addict) 31 March 2009 15:01
No no...you are #3 Noel. Hee hee. Dvd Backup Resource Thread Backing up New Releases Have a problem...start here! [ + quote]
noelyf (AfterDawn Addict) 31 March 2009 15:03
LOL, Hows things 7th ;) Eamos Library - http://eko.4shared.com/ Eurovox Guide - http://forums.afterdawn.com/thread_view.cfm/674371 Updating Starview Boxes - http://forums.afterdawn.com/thread_view.cfm/663923 Latest Firmware- http://forums.afterdawn.com/thread_view.cfm/722659 [ + quote]
imnomyth (Junior Member) 31 March 2009 15:09
Laugh it up guys, but I live in a very rural area in NC (Olin, NC) and VERY FEW friends have anything but dial up. I don't see or suggest afterdawn changing to a retro look, I'm just saying there are tons of people still w/ dial up...God Bless 'em. On another note; Afterdawn is by far my most visited site, here's to another great 10 years!!! [ + quote]
smokyrain (AfterDawn Addict) 31 March 2009 15:13
I know what you mean imnomyth, there are people here with dial-up in the "middle of nowhere Alberta" I myself have wireless broadband. Its pricey though. So yeah lots of people still would appreciate it. [ + quote]
dRD (I hate titles) 31 March 2009 15:23
The upcoming site version, "v4", will be more heavily based on stylesheets than the current version. A change, which should make life much, much easier for people on dial-up. Turning images off, but allowing CSS to come through should keep the site readable while minimizing the bandwidth required. Petteri Pyyny Webmaster http://AfterDawn.com/ Please read our guides before posting questions! Guides are available here: http://www.afterdawn.com/guides/ [ + quote]
7thsinger (AfterDawn Addict) 31 March 2009 15:32
*Originally posted by dRD:* The upcoming site version, "v4", will be more heavily based on stylesheets than the current version. A change, which should make life much, much easier for people on dial-up. Turning images off, but allowing CSS to come through should keep the site readable while minimizing the bandwidth required. Awesome. I've said it before: i'm really looking forward to the new version. Dvd Backup Resource Thread Backing up New Releases Have a problem...start here! [ + quote]
Thoatih12 (Senior Member) 31 March 2009 16:08
Cant wait :D [ + quote]
beanos66 (Junior Member) 31 March 2009 17:01
*Quote:* And for comparison, here's a link to a screenshot of the "v1", the version that was used when the site went live in June, 1999: What you mean AfterDawn wasn't in english! :) [ + quote]
dRD (I hate titles) 31 March 2009 17:14
*Quote:* *Quote:* And for comparison, here's a link to a screenshot of the "v1", the version that was used when the site went live in June, 1999: What you mean AfterDawn wasn't in english! :) AfterDawn has been in English and Finnish ever since the day the site was launched (and nowadays also in Swedish). We just don't have any screenshots of the English "v1" in our archives, but it looked just like the Finnish one. [ + quote]
lawndog (Member) 31 March 2009 20:16
Wanna send my congrats to AD and all its employees. Love the site and the changes you've made through the years. And although my postings have gone way down, I still visit almost daily. Good job guys and gals [ + quote]
Lethal_B (Moderator) 31 March 2009 21:07
Congratulations guys, the site continues to go from strength to strength! Keep up the good work. [ + quote]
glenmike (Newbie) 31 March 2009 21:48
One of the most functional, interesting, and useful sites on the net. I visit, read, and learn every day. Congratulations on 10 years. Looking forward to the next 10. [ + quote]
Mik3h (AfterDawn Addict) 1 April 2009 2:32
Would have been an idea to change the layout to the basic old style for a day as an april fool's joke. The massive wave of complaints would be worth the laugh. [ + quote]
Evastar (Senior Member) 1 April 2009 4:14
It's still not too late, still early in the morning! :) [ + quote]
hendrix04 (Junior Member) 1 April 2009 9:05
how about march of 2000??? http://web.archive.org/web/2003112914042...FTOKEN=63641422 [ + quote]
creaky (Moderator) 1 April 2009 13:05
*Originally posted by dRD:* The upcoming site version, "v4", will be more heavily based on stylesheets than the current version. A change, which should make life much, much easier for people on dial-up. Turning images off, but allowing CSS to come through should keep the site readable while minimizing the bandwidth required. Looking forward to v4 as i spend most of my time on mobile broadband in an area that has no guaranteed coverage ie it's a wonder it works at all. Forums such as DD-WRT (for example) are very light on bandwidth, 'fraid Afterdawn does pack a mean punch ie it's very unforgiving on dial-up connections :) I'll let you all guess the percentage of 'page not found' errors when trying to edit a post or reply to something, there's something bandwidth-heavy in those actions. But as i say, am looking forward to v4, am sure it'll be worth the wait :) Forum Rules ~ http://forums.afterdawn.com/thread_view.cfm/2487 / Xbox softmodding software ~ http://forums.afterdawn.com/thread_view.cfm/557450 Main PC ~ Intel C2Q Q6600 (G0 Stepping)/Gigabyte GA-EP45-DS3/2GB Crucial Ballistix PC2-8500/Zalman CNPS9700/Antec 900/Corsair HX 620W Network ~ 2 node DD-WRT (v23 sp2) WDS over WPA2 comprising: Buffalo - 2x WHR-G54Ss. Plus 2 adhoc nodes comprising Linksys - WRT54G v5 & WRT54G v2 [ + quote] This message has been edited since posting. Last time this message was edited on 1 April 2009 13:11
borhan9 (AfterDawn Addict) 1 April 2009 20:06
*Quote:* P.S. Every time we make changes to our site's layout, there's a massive wave of complaints, so we've been thinking, maybe we should just roll back to the April, 1999 version with our next update.. ;-) LOL I think that is a great way to keep everyone happy about the new format. I love how this site has grown and it is great that it has expanded to what it is today. well done. [ + quote]
ak472009 (Newbie) 2 April 2009 8:21
afterdawn is da best place to get info and provide it too [ + quote]
xyqo (Senior Member) 3 April 2009 12:12
Hmmm.. June the 10th is my parents 32 anniversary. [ + quote]
gamename (Senior Member) 4 April 2009 3:59
glad to see everyone is alive and doing well. [ + quote]
miketrev (Senior Member) 4 April 2009 12:51
*Originally posted by hendrix04:* how about march of 2000??? http://web.archive.org/web/2003112914042...3641422 This link is a "make money from google" scam Get a life [ + quote]