Two Influential Sites Close Forever
Within the space of a week, two influential websites have closed down, seemingly forever.
It may not have drawn the visitor numbers that were expected of it, but Bruce Perens' Technocrat provided an informative series of articles and insights from a small community that were loosely aligned with Perens, or at least shared a common vision. Citing a lack of revenue and a divergence in the site community, Perens has decided to close the public side of the site.
As with any online community, especially those that are small and self-regulating, it is possible to have the direction of the community taken over by small interest groups (trolls to some) and there was evidence that this was the case with Technocrat.
It isn't the first time that Technocrat has gone on hiatus, but this time it appears to be a closure for good.
The closure of CastleCops means that one of the best free Information Security sources online has now disappeared. Hopefully there will be groups or individuals who can step forward and provide a mirror of what there once was, and that there will be a new community to take on the role that CastleCops carried on.
Having been successful in attracting a high profile and significant attention, the closure of CastleCops is sure to be keenly felt by many, especially amongst those who the site and community assisted.
Quiet questions are being asked about the speed with which CastleCops was shut down and the apparent disappearance of all the historical data. Jumpy conspiracy theorists might point to Paul Laudanski's new job at Microsoft as being one reason why the site and historical data suddenly disappeared, but historical acquisitions by Microsoft in a similar vein, such as SysInternals, has seen corporate knowledge retained and continued to be made available.
There are those in the community who are upset at the way the closure of CastleCops has been handled and there is sure to be a sour taste left in the mouths of many. To ease the risk of speculation getting out of hand, and to soothe those that are upset, the team behind CastleCops should provide some form of public announcement on the site as to why the shutdown has taken place and why the archives have vanished so completely.
Across the Internet many of the once stalwart websites that could lay claim to a recognisable portion of the overall Internet traffic are now facing the reality that their site visitor numbers are slipping in the face of newer social networking sites and the latest and greatest Web 2.0 site (due to be replaced by the next one in six months time).
Falling advertising revenues, as well as visitors who are more likely to be blocking advertising, means that there could be more than a few sites headed for a rough period over the coming months and years, at least while the broader financial crisis is ongoing.
29 December 2008
Social bookmark this page at eKstreme.
Alternatively, Bookmark or Share via AddThis
Do you like how we cover Information Security news? How about checking out our company services, delivered the same way our news is.
Let our Free OS X Screen Saver deliver the latest security alerts and commentary to your desktop when you're not at your system.
Comments will soon be available for registered users.
Subscribe to our feed.