You are dead to me

Since 1997, SFFWorld.com has been a gathering site on the internet for Science Fiction and Fantasy readers and writers. The site has hosted an active discussion forum where folks from all over the world come to gush about what they are reading or announce what SFF projects they are working on.

Recently, a member started a thread stating the SFFWorld.com’s forum was “too dead for me“.

With the advent of social media, we’ve all experienced the need to connect with our peers in other ways. Connecting with people on other sites, however, means that folks have less time to spend discussing books on discussion forums. Thus, the proclamation that the forum here at SFFWorld.com is “dead”.

We recognize that internet usage changes over time. Since SFFWorld.com’s beginnings, it has gone through various iterations, waxing and waning accordingly as software (and spammers) improved and members literally grew up or away. Regardless, SFFWorld.com and its discussion forum is here to stay.

Oh, and that “dead” thread? As of this writing, it is up to 127 posts, 9 pages, with over 157 member-views and 4,723 total views (includes lurkers – we know you’re out there!). By today’s social networking standards, that’s not much, but it is significant. It shows that discussion forums still have a purpose. And that purpose is to bring us together to discuss things, even if that happens to be our imminent demise.

So, what’s this post all about? Who or what the heck is ‘Daigoro’?

If you read through the ‘dead-thread’, you’ll find many members shared why they frequent the forum here at SFFWorld.com. Not only did they say why they came here, but some also indicated they had grown up on the site and how much it meant to them. It occurred to me that I didn’t really know any of my fellow forum-mates. And I thought…hmmm…maybe I should get to know them? Maybe…we all need to get know know each other!

Like all the hare-brained ideas I get, I ran with it and here we are with our very first:

Member Spotlight

Every Friday (or every Friday I manage to nail down a member), I’ll present an interview of one of our members. And who better to start with than the site owner himself?

The following is the first of many Member Spotlights. If you want to be featured here, shoot me (N. E. White) a PM (private message).

Daigoro

Hello Dag, thank you for taking time out from your busy schedule to chat with me. I promise I’ll make this quick.

SFFWorld: What’s your forum handle and why did you pick it?

Rambraut: It’s daigoro and I must admit I’ve never been good at finding forum handles, but at the time, I was reading a Japanese Manga which I really enjoyed called Lone Wolf and Cub. It had a character named daigoro, which is a bit similar to my first name.

SFFWorld: Your hobby internet site, SFFWorld.com, has been around since 1997 – far longer than most social networking sites. Did you ever think you’d still be managing SFFWorld.com?

Rambraut/Daigoro: I’ve never really had a grand plan. The website has sort of lived a life of it’s own and developed into what it is today. SFFWorld was here before Facebook, Twitter and Blogs. Who knows, maybe we will be here after?

For several years, the “spam wars” was really tough to handle. Most of my time was spent just keeping everything up and running. That didn’t feel like a very constructive usage of my time. That’s (fingers crossed) under control now and has given me a lot of motivation to keep going. 🙂

I also started the whole thing fresh out of school and had all the time in the world, which has changed greatly over the years. Now, I have a family and job that also keeps me busy.

I must also say that none of this would have been possible without the great people who have helped out over the years, many of whom are still here. Click here to read about them.

Over the years, there are many good stories about the people who have been part of the community and how that involvement has impacted their “real” lives. I know some of the volunteers have ended up with jobs in the industry. A couple of our moderators even got married to each other and have children today.

SFFWorld: In the past year, we’ve seen some significant changes to the main site as well as the forums of SFFWorld.com. You’ve updated to using WordPress for publishing book reviews, author interviews, and articles. Though you are still using vBulletin for the forums, you’ve implemented some updates to handle an influx of spam-attacks we recently had. Are you happy with the look and operation of the site now? What else would you like to see change?

Rambraut/Daigoro: I’m quite happy with how the WordPress part of the site has turned out. Both the design and functionality gives us a more professional look on that part of the website. Also, with some tweaks to both WordPress and vBulletin as well as the server config itself, the constant spam attacks are more under control.

When it comes to the forum software, I really want to move to a more “modern” framework. The new versions of vBulletin is not going in the correct direction, in my opinion, and I have my eyes on a new software platform called xenForo. It seems much better suited for the great number of mobile devices people use nowadays. So that’s the major change I’d like to see.

SFFWorld: I noticed the site got a new logo, too. I love it, by the way. But I’ve noticed you’ve changed the logo several times and that got me curious. Do you have a collection of them you’d like to share? Who created the latest one?

Rambraut/Daigoro: The new logo happened a bit by chance when Mark Chitty’s brother from Ctrl Alt Design, more or less out of the blue, came up with some suggestions. I think it’s by far the best logo we’ve ever had.

There has been quite a few logos up through the years, but not many that are any good, I’m afraid. For anyone who wants to dig into the past, The Wayback Machine is a great website to do that.

SFFWorld: I know the site is a hobby of yours. And if you are anything like me, hobbies come and go, but not SFFWorld.com. It is coming up on its 20th anniversary. What do you see in SFFWorld.com’s future?

Rambraut/Daigoro: I hope the forum can continue to be a place for the more in-depth discussions despite the huge amount of other arenas to discuss things available nowadays. January 2014 saw the most new monthly posts since 2013 and there is a steady number of members visiting daily. The writers forum is also an interesting area to follow and I also have to mention the anthology that you are in charge of last year, it is something I’ve really enjoyed helping out with.

I believe we also have a strong position for reviews, interviews and such. With several new reviewers joining us this past year, it will be interesting to see how that section of the website will further develop.

I think the genres we cover have changed tremendously since the website started, both with a well of sub-genres and a completely different publishing industry. So who knows, maybe new changes are still to come and will take us on new adventures yet to be discovered.

SFFWorld: What’s your favorite book?

Rambraut/Daigoro: Doppler by Erlend Loe, a story about a man and his moose. More genre specific, I’d have to say The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams and Thief of Time by Terry Pratchett.

SFFWorld: What’s your favorite author?

Rambraut/Daigoro: It’s hard to name one, but there’s something with the British humour that I’ve always enjoyed; Terry Pratchett and Douglas Adams in particular. I also have several Norwegian authors among my favourites. Erlend Loe I’ve already mentioned, but I’m also a huge fan of Unni Lindell who writes what you would probably call Scandinavian Crime. Also the Morgan Kane western series by Louis Masterson ranks high.

SFFWorld: What’s your favorite genre?

Rambraut/Daigoro: I think that over the years I’ve enjoyed the Fantasy genre the most, but nowadays I like to try a bit of everything. Steampunk, timetravel and post-apocalyptic are probably the sub-genres I’ve felt most drawn to lately, but I’m sure that will change again.

SFFWorld: What’s your favorite place to read?

Rambraut/Daigoro: At the cottage, which used to be a place without internet, electricity nor running water. Now both electricity and internet is in place, but it’s still a place to relax and get a bit away from the everyday distractions. Not to much used during winter though as there is a 7 km cross country trek on skies to get there.

SFFWorld: Favorite con (convention)?

Rambraut/Daigoro: Never been to one actually, which might be because I live a bit in the middle of nowhere as far as the big conventions are concerned.

SFFWorld: What do you do when you are not reading or messing around on SFFWorld.com?

Rambraut/Daigoro: For a starters, I live in Trondheim, Norway with my wife and two year old son. I work for a large oil & gas company where I have the technical responsibility for several IT systems used within the gas and power area.

At least some of the holidays tend to end up in Japan since my wife is Japanese – which is a wonderful and interesting country, I might add. Spending time at the cottage when time allows is also high on the list, along with trout fishing and hiking in the mountains.

SFFWorld: Thanks for taking the time to talk to me, Dag, and catch ya around the forum.

Be sure to check back every Friday for more Member Spotlights!

© 2015 N. E. White / Dag Rambraut / SFFWorld.com

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