Steve Hall Site Take Down Plan Officially Announced

[DAW89446]

I won't pretend to understand his reasoning for refusing to transition the site to long term hosting.  He literally put years of effort into creating this content, only to effectively throw it away.  If he was concerned about keeping the content updated, then converting it to PDF or dead tree format will obviously not accomplish that goal. 

Its frustrating and disapointing that some people who have taken up the mantle to host Death Valley knowledge & communities can be so capricious about what they started, with little regard for those who have come to rely on their efforts.

I think I understand Steve’s reasoning on two levels. The years of creating content and prioritization.

I’ve experienced much of the two points I quoted from Netllama’s comment.

* I put years of content into the early forums, including the grandfather of this forum. I was a struggling author (and spending a lot of money on each project), yet gave away a lot of content that I could have put into a book and made money on. So looking back, I basically shot myself in the foot.

* I also had a large website that was very popular. I also gave away a lot of my work on that as well. Great Basin Research / Reconnoitering Through the Sagebrush in the Great Basin by 4x4 became a burden and strain on my marriage as I daily worked on it on dial-up internet while also working full time in Trona working 12-hour rotating shifts. Twice I took my website down, both times popular demand by those who lived vicariously through my website hunted me down and in various ways influenced me to keep the content flowing.

Until I took my life offline for good in 2011 for a few years. My wife’s increasing disability changed my priorities. Steve’s health has changed his.

As for the last point, I’ve been burned as well by similar forums that suddenly disappeared with no warning. I put a lot of effort into those forums, then had the carpet yanked out from under me and others who really liked them; their owners decided You Tube was more profitable and went for the sensational paranormal angle instead of what they felt was boring old history. Lonnie’s forum is in reality in its third life (D-V.us, D-V.net and now dv.netllama.us), and I thank him for resurrecting it. Panamint Valley.com has also been taken off life support after it went away for a while recently. It’s also in its third life (Panamint Charlie, Panamint Valley and Panamint Valley 2.0). And it still is showing damage from its brief demise in the form of an information gap of over a year of lost data.

Behind the scenes, those who host and create just can’t keep giving forever. Knowing a little of the behind the scenes, the money drain, the eventual breakdown of and lack of cooperation by those working on these forums, and their toll on personal lives; and things we in front of the screen took for granted all these years are sad to see them go away. But I understand because in some ways, I’ve been in those shoes behind the screen as well.

Years have passed since I stepped back into the shadows. I don’t post near as much as I used to, I am more choosy about what I respond to. I don’t jump in and give details on 4x4 trails, locations, history and the like because it’s all there already. And since I’m not actively involved in writing / researching I’m am really no longer relevant anyway.

It’s nice to have the chains off so I can live out the remainder of my life unfettered. I wish Steve well in his fighting his health issues and hope for a successful outcome.