Steve Hall's Not Slowing Down - DEVA 2022

[GowerGulch42]

He has no reason to justify his decisions or motivations, and we are not entitled to his content no matter how long it was previously available for. He is entitled to do whatever with it he wants. Don't speculate on his reasons, for the reasons are his and his alone.

[Daymoth]

I agree that he could leave his website online. But does he pay for his website? If so, then depending on cost it might be a financial burden. It appears he’s still relatively young. His interests and priorities appear to have changed and he’s going with them. And if he can profit from them, I hope he succeeds. I’ve tried to profit, but those years I was active in writing it was between the old way of doing things and the new web based way of publishing one’s self.

Yes, he was paying for hosting.  But he received multiple offers to have the site mirrored and/or hosted elsewhere at no cost, and he turned them all down.

And offers for donations to pay for hosting the website over the years where turned down.

It makes me inmensely sad. I havent gotten over it yet.

That's quite understandable.  Steve's explanation & justification for taking down the content has been wildly inconsistent to say the least.  It doesn't feel like he's been honest about his motivations.  At this point, this feels like he's driven by a desire to monetize the content via some book deal, which wouldn't be viable if the free web version remained available.

Well im sad the material is not available, be it free or not, and whatever the motivations are.  It is extremely sad that welth of good information just poof! into thin air like that not leaving even a copy in an archive. 

If there was a book deal I would be very happy because it means that would be available again soon. But it sounds like his focus has changed to film and I have the same expectations of a book happening as of game of thrones getting finished. 

So just have to grieve the loss. I bought the Digonnet book and its helping the process.

[trailhound]

Daymoth - Do not overlook Kauri Jacob's excellent web site.

http://kaurijacobphotography.yolasite.com

[Daymoth]

Daymoth - Do not overlook Kauri Jacob's excellent web site.

http://kaurijacobphotography.yolasite.com

I dont! Her website was of huge use this last trip we did!

[MojaveGeek]

My friend Jim Boone has a bunch of DV stuff at birdandhike.com. His descriptions are oriented a bit more toward natural history, and a lot more toward helping one navigate to the places he describes. I took him to some of those places and my gang is in some of the pix He's got great coverage for the common hikes, and some of the rather out of the ordinary ones (e.g. Zinc Hill).

I also noticed that more and more of the "obscure" or "semi-secret" places are showing up on alltrails, which I find a bit disturbing.

[bbbb]

That's quite understandable.  Steve's explanation & justification for taking down the content has been wildly inconsistent to say the least.  It doesn't feel like he's been honest about his motivations.  At this point, this feels like he's driven by a desire to monetize the content via some book deal, which wouldn't be viable if the free web version remained available.

I'm really grateful for the trip reports that Steve Hall's site provided when it existed, but much of his motivation always seems to have been attention-seeking or gatekeeping information generally, which is disappointing for people who exchange information freely. I don't know if this can all be explained by his attempting to monetize the content. It certainly makes some sense in retrospect.

[Candace66]

That's quite understandable.  Steve's explanation & justification for taking down the content has been wildly inconsistent to say the least.  It doesn't feel like he's been honest about his motivations.  At this point, this feels like he's driven by a desire to monetize the content via some book deal, which wouldn't be viable if the free web version remained available.

I'm really grateful for the trip reports that Steve Hall's site provided when it existed, but much of his motivation always seems to have been attention-seeking or gatekeeping information generally, which is disappointing for people who exchange information freely. I don't know if this can all be explained by his attempting to monetize the content. It certainly makes some sense in retrospect.

Both of these posts make excellent points.

I was wondering if Steve was still blaming health problems (namely, cancer) for shutting down the site; sounds like the answer is no.

Though I only talked to Steve via email a few times over the years, I also sensed the same "attention-seeking or gatekeeping" tendencies. But everyone is different so I figured that was simply his personality.  Overblowing the difficulty or obscurity of his destinations and outings still got annoying at times.  The odd bits of misinformation were simply amusing, lol.

[Brice]

I used Steve's site previously to see whether features/bridges I've found while hiking have been already documented. Last year I found a long tunnel in the chloride hills but wasn't able to check his site before it disappeared to see if it was on there already. Given the crumbly nature of the chloride hills, I was too chicken to climb through by myself. At least 40 feet long I would guess, with some windows in it, but it went around a corner so I can't say much more. Anybody know if this is a known spot?

35.84374, -116.61312

If Steve wants to turn his content into a book or monetize it some other way, that's great! However having a free site that keeps track of the known bridges and other major features would sure be useful for us explorers. I seem to remember there were a few "unconfirmed" bridges that people sent him that he listed on his website and now that information is gone. It would be a shame to have lost stuff like that.

Hell, maybe I'll make a new site to keep track...

[netllama]

I used Steve's site previously to see whether features/bridges I've found while hiking have been already documented. Last year I found a long tunnel in the chloride hills but wasn't able to check his site before it disappeared to see if it was on there already. Given the crumbly nature of the chloride hills, I was too chicken to climb through by myself. At least 40 feet long I would guess, with some windows in it, but it went around a corner so I can't say much more. Anybody know if this is a known spot?

35.84374, -116.61312

If Steve wants to turn his content into a book or monetize it some other way, that's great! However having a free site that keeps track of the known bridges and other major features would sure be useful for us explorers. I seem to remember there were a few "unconfirmed" bridges that people sent him that he listed on his website and now that information is gone. It would be a shame to have lost stuff like that.

Hell, maybe I'll make a new site to keep track...

That sounds like a useful effort. If you want to work on this project, I'm happy to help (offer hosting, technical support, etc).

[MojaveGeek]

I used Steve's site previously to see whether features/bridges I've found while hiking have been already documented.  Last year I found a long tunnel in the chloride hills but wasn't able to check his site before it disappeared to see if it was on there already. Given the crumbly nature of the chloride hills, I was too chicken to climb through by myself.  At least 40 feet long I would guess, with some windows in it, but it went around a corner so I can't say much more. Anybody know if this is a known spot?

35.84374, -116.61312

Caltopo shows this coordinate as being in the Confidence Hills.  If so, I don't recall any previous mention of it, but to be honest I've not "collected" bridge sightings, as I don't really consider a bridge in fanglomerate to be more than an ephemeral feature.