The Whole Earth 'Lectronic Link Sold To Its Members

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The Whole Earth 'Lectronic Link Sold To Its Members

Posted by Soulskill on Friday September 21, 2012 @04:00AM from the well-done dept.

New submitter nadaou sends this quote from the NY Times: "One of the earliest online communities, The WELL, has a new owner: its members. On Thursday evening, Salon Media Group, the previous owner of The WELL, said it had sold the community to the Well Group, a private investment group consisting of longtime members of the community, which was founded in 1985, long before the rise of the Web."

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WELL... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-21 04:09 · Score: 0

All's WELL that ends WELL.
1. Re:WELL... by Paradise+Pete · 2012-09-21 04:37 · Score: 2
  
  All's WELL that ends WELL.
  That's deep.
2. Re:WELL... by plover · 2012-09-21 04:43 · Score: 2
  
  All's WELL that ends WELL.
  That's deep.
  So who gets the shaft?
  
  --
  John
Back to the roots by arth1 · 2012-09-21 04:09 · Score: 3, Insightful

Slashdot was more than a little influenced by WELL (Whole Earth 'Lectronic Link), and today's WELL web interface (there's also a telnet interface) looks more than a little like Slashdot did when it first started.
I for one am proud of my @well.com address, and welcome our new wellpern overlords.
1. Re:Back to the roots by wordsnyc · 2012-09-21 06:25 · Score: 3, Interesting
  
  I've been a member since ~1994. I drive by about once a week, get into a conversation every few weeks. It's like the general store that somehow survived the mega-mall built next door. Conversations tend to be very sane, with a complete lack of the idiotic noise you get in places like this.
  
  --
  Sent from the iPad I found in your car.
How will the MASSIVE community cope? by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-21 04:09 · Score: 1

All 2000 of them
Does anything even still happen at The WELL?
Wink Wink Nudge Nudge? by SJ2000 · 2012-09-21 04:12 · Score: 4, Funny

Is someone giving us a less than subtle hint?
1. Re:Wink Wink Nudge Nudge? by Nethemas+the+Great · 2012-09-21 04:17 · Score: 0
  
  Don't be silly. There's money to be made. This site is a pre-sorted demographic pool for advertisement exploitation. *rolls eyes*
  
  --
  Two of my imaginary friends reproduced once ... with negative results.
2. Re:Wink Wink Nudge Nudge? by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-21 04:44 · Score: 0
  
  could either of the users without Adblock confirm?
  I think you miss a "two" between "the" and "users".
3. Re:Wink Wink Nudge Nudge? by Anne_Nonymous · 2012-09-21 04:49 · Score: 1
  
  >> This site is a pre-sorted demographic pool for advertisement exploitation.
  What do basement-dwelling troglodytes buy anyhow?
4. Re:Wink Wink Nudge Nudge? by arth1 · 2012-09-21 04:57 · Score: 1
  
  What do basement-dwelling troglodytes buy anyhow?
  Anything found on its (now formerly) sister site http://www.thinkgeek.com/, plus servers, UPSes and pizza.
5. Re:Wink Wink Nudge Nudge? by Nethemas+the+Great · 2012-09-21 05:09 · Score: 1
  
  The essentials that enable their habitation of said basement. i.e. Cheetos, pizza, energy drinks, microwaves, refrigerators, delivery services, computer hardware, software, pacification gifts for mom, etc.
  
  --
  Two of my imaginary friends reproduced once ... with negative results.
6. Re:Wink Wink Nudge Nudge? by ThatsNotPudding · 2012-09-21 05:21 · Score: 1
  
  The purchase price was $20 million, IIRC; hope you know how to make it rain big time.
7. Re:Wink Wink Nudge Nudge? by Nethemas+the+Great · 2012-09-21 06:07 · Score: 2
  
  It is the same story for all forms of advertisement. You have three groups of people, A (the sellers), B (the marketers), and C (the consumers). Group A wants to sell to group C, group B is really just another group A in disguise because they think of group A as C. Group C generally ignores group B because B has nothing to do with A. Group C however will usually listen to A if A has something C wants to buy. Group A thinks they needs group B to tell group C to buy their product because group B promises to sell group A to C and since group B is a group A to the other group A and A is a group C in this case group A will listen to group B. What group A doesn't realize is that group B is ignored by group C because group C only listens to group A.
  
  --
  Two of my imaginary friends reproduced once ... with negative results.
8. Re:Wink Wink Nudge Nudge? by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-21 08:13 · Score: 0
  
  The purchase price was $20 million, IIRC; hope you know how to make it rain big time.
  Where'd you get that figure?
9. Re:Wink Wink Nudge Nudge? by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-21 09:34 · Score: 0
  
  $20M was the price for Geeknet's media holdings, not the WELL.
10. Re:Wink Wink Nudge Nudge? by Patch86 · 2012-09-21 11:11 · Score: 1
  
  That was including SourceForge and FreeCode too. I bet Slashdot isn't worth much compared to SourceForge.
  To play imaginary maths- if Slashdot had 10,000 members, and the price was $5,000,000, then that'd be a $500 price tag per person. Still too much, but not crazily out of reach. How many active users do you think Slashdot has these days?
CIX - older and hopefully bigger by clickclickdrone · 2012-09-21 04:25 · Score: 4, Informative

In the UK we still have CIX which predates the well a little and hopefully has more than 2000 members but it's a shadow of it's former glory when it counted Douglas Adams and Terry Pratchett amongst its regular users.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CIX/

--
I want a list of atrocities done in your name - Recoil
1. Re:CIX - older and hopefully bigger by clickclickdrone · 2012-09-21 04:27 · Score: 2
  
  Actually, CIX was just after the Well, it's precursor was pre Well. Apols.
  
  --
  I want a list of atrocities done in your name - Recoil
2. Re:CIX - older and hopefully bigger by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-21 04:32 · Score: 0
  
  Alternatively, CIX have their own site!. Who would have thought it possible?
  Do you think that there might be other things that exist outside of Wikipedia?
3. Re:CIX - older and hopefully bigger by squiggleslash · 2012-09-21 06:16 · Score: 2
  
  I remember CIX being announced, with it being made clear in Personal Computer World et al that CIXs inspiration was Byte's BIX network. (Read on before responding it couldn't be because BIX was from 1985, and CIX 1983. CIX did NOT exist in 1983. I'll explain.)
  Some sources put CIX at two years older than BIX making the above look... odd. However, those sources kinda confuse the history. CIX was a replacement for an existing FidoNet BBS. The FidoNet BBS that CIX replaced dated to 1983. The replacement, with complete rebranding, occured in 1987. From a "corporate" point of view, it was the same thing, users were migrated, data was, etc. From a technical point of view, it was a completely new system seeded with an existing database.
  
  --
  You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
4. Re: CIX - older and hopefully bigger by gidds · 2012-09-22 10:25 · Score: 1
  
  It is, however, gaining members and activity again.
  After a long period of gentle stagnation, it was acquired a year ago by an internet company with a long experience of Cix and its community, and is now enjoying something of a revival. We're all fairly optimistic about its future again!
  (I'm gidds@cix, and spend more time there than here or anywhere else. I'd recommend it to anyone looking for interesting, intelligent, wide-ranging discussion.)
  
  --
  Ceterum censeo subscriptionem esse delendam.
5. Re: CIX - older and hopefully bigger by gidds · 2012-09-22 10:26 · Score: 1
  
  P.S. I meant to say: I hope the WELL's new ownership brings them similar reason for optimism!
  
  --
  Ceterum censeo subscriptionem esse delendam.
Re:Oh no, the people owning themselves? by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-21 05:19 · Score: 2, Informative

Just so you know, the Divine Right of Kings doctrine is 180 degrees divergent from what both Christianity and Judaism teach. See the Books of Samuel as a reference. Here's the synopsis:
Israelites: We want a king.
God: No way. Kings screw everything up.
Israelites: We still want a king.
God: No way. Kings screw everything up.
Israelites: We still want a king.
God: OK. Here's your king. Don't say I didn't warn you.
Israelites: This king you sent us. He screwed everything up!
God: Oh noes! If only someone let you know ahead of time!
Abandonware by Animats · 2012-09-21 05:22 · Score: 1

I had a Well account back when it was on a VAX/750 and you paid by the hour. But it's been a long time since the Well mattered.
Re:Oh no, the people owning themselves? by alexander_686 · 2012-09-21 05:38 · Score: 1

You don’t have to worry – it is not happening here – The kings still rule. I personally find the title misleading.
“Member owned” implies that it is some type of co-op – where customers buy into the company. Like a co-op, a mutual insurance company, or something along these lines.
This is more like Victor Kiam when he bought the Remington razor company – you know the tag line - "I liked it so much I bought the company".
For those who like them some history.... by sootman · 2012-09-21 06:06 · Score: 3, Interesting

Wired, May 1997 - The Epic Saga of The Well

McClure shared an office with someone from the Whole Earth Software Catalog. His computer, a Compaq, sat on a piece of white plywood board; he cadged a stenographer's chair from the Whole Earth office. It was high tech in the middle of funk, and funk wasn't the ideal setting in which to launch a cutting-edge enterprise. The building had no insulation to speak of, and the roof leaked. In the summer the office was an inferno, and in the winter the temperature indoors dipped into the 50s. The computer room, a modified closet, was just big enough for the disk drive and CPU cabinets. A window-mounted air conditioner -- the largest unit Sears sold -- cooled the VAX.

--
Dear Slashdot: next time you want to mess with the site, add a rich-text editor for comments.
1. Re:For those who like them some history.... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-21 07:29 · Score: 0
  
  > McClure shared an office...
  Aha, that's where he ended up after doing that western... I remember him, seemed a good guy! I guess everybody ends up in IT after all...
  I loved Bonanza!
2. Re:For those who like them some history.... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-21 09:13 · Score: 0
  
  Sigh... Wired writes (wrote) such great stories, but they were tales and yarns well-retold; always hard to figure what to make of them versus remembered history.
  FWIW, Brand put out the Whole Earth Software Catalog just before this tale of the VAX. I remember /quite/ a hellabaloo at the time. Instead of the hippy digs and starvation wages the regular Whole Earth Catalogs were launched out of, Brand rented real offices for the Software folks, and paid the Software staff real salaries. To say the noble hardworking regular Catalog people felt betrayed and fucked-over is understatement.
  Yup, that's "just another story", but take it as a caution. The WESC wasn't spawned from quite the same Sausalito mud as the famous catalogs. The retellings tend to gloss that for effect, and this writeup is swinging pretty heavy red flags for me.
WELL... I gues you have to pay to have.... by 3seas · 2012-09-21 06:42 · Score: 1

... sane conversations..... Who'd thought? Oh wait... Do I get paid to think?
Some important info missing? by Compaqt · 2012-09-21 07:20 · Score: 1

Like how much the sale was for, and how many paying members are there?

--
I'm not a lawyer, but I play one on the Internet. Blog
Re:Oh no, the people owning themselves? by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-21 07:26 · Score: 0

Good thing I wasn't thinking of either religious tradition!
It's actually a tenet of Pastafanian Jedism.
Re:Oh no, the people owning themselves? by osu-neko · 2012-09-21 08:06 · Score: 1

'cept it's not like one member bought the company, it is a group. A better comparison might be the Roman patricians of the Senate. Of course, whether this a pre- or post-Augustus Senate is an open question...

--
"Convictions are more dangerous enemies of truth than lies."
Whole Earth Catalog by Taco+Cowboy · 2012-09-21 22:42 · Score: 1

I still have my complete collection of Whole Earth Catalog and hopefully they will start publishing new edition of this most useful books.

--
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !