1. What is your name?
Ryan William Postma
2. What is your quest?
To free my soul from fear.
3. What is the air-speed velocity of an unladen swallow?
That's a Monty Python reference. I get that.
4. How did the idea for Everything and later Everything2 come about?
Bored college students, marijuana, alcohol and no real connection with women. Pretty much the same way wars and rockets are built.
Only Nate could really tell you for sure. I was friends with Nate Oostendorp and the "Slashdot boys" before there was a Slashdot. While Rob Malda was working on the /. site Nate was toying around with Everything on his laptop. I'm sure there was input from Kurt DeMaagd and Jeff Bates during this highly creative period and I'm sure Rob worked on Everything and Nate worked on Slashdot. Ideas were flying around. For the record, I had nothing to do with any of it. I wasn't a "computer person" as these nerdlets were called, and I wasn't a "geek" whatever the hell that was. Mostly I was a waiter and a DJ and amateur writer. So, waiter.
Nate went on a trip to India in the Spring of ?1997? I think it was and asked me to babysit the site and edit it as I see fit. After Slashdot sold the boys decided to start up a few projects under the Blockstackers Inc umbrella and "Everything2" was funded. I was hired on as creative director and editor and I think I was also supposed to find a way for us to make money. It was never clear.
5. How did you discover Everything, and how did you become a noder?
See above.
6. What do you see as the most significant changes that have happened to Everything over the past decade?
Well, changes from Everything to E2 were major, of course. Much longer writeups, infinite writeups per node, the chatterbox. Not much compares to those.
7. What are your favorite writeups -- both your own and from other noders?
Looking over my writeups my favorites are from the short story Letters from a Savior; Offer for a Few or the disturbingly accurate predictions contained in A Toast To The Unlikeliest Of Futures.
As for other noders' work, please to see the bookmarks on my homenode. They are a testament.
8. What do you see for the future of Everything2?
A pet project for information sciences professor(s). I think it will pretty much continue on as it is, continuing to shrink slowly to a core group of actives and an ever changing orbit of browsers/one-time contributors.
9. What has surprised you the most about the evolution of the site? Is there anything that you expected to happen that hasn't yet?
I was initially surprised at how seriously some people took (what I thought to be) minor changes and tweaks to the code/conduct of the site. Ditto for how seriously some people took just about everything else. Working on E2 was sort of how I was introduced to "The Internet" so after a few years I wasn't really surprised anymore.
10. What are your favorite and least favorite memories from E2's history?
Oh, any major drama was probably my least favorite memory - especially if it was my fault. I think one of my favorites is the Everything2 Civil War. That was nice.
11. What keeps you coming back?
Oh I still hope to squeeze a paycheck out of this at some point. If we can just get another grant ...
12. What do you hope for E2's future?
Massive funding. See above.
13. What does E2 mean to you?
That's just the kind of open-ended interview question I've vowed never to answer. No way for me to answer that without sounding ridiculous. Oh wait, I've got it - masochism.
14. Is E2 a writing site, a community site, an online encyclopedia, or something else? What should it be?
Obviously it's different things to different people, much like everything else. I personally would lean towards the writing site aspect if I could do it all differently. I don't think there's another website that does it as well as E2 could do it if the focus was there.
15. Who are your favorite noders? Which ones do you miss the most?
I miss pingouin the most and I'm not much for favorites. I'm a big fan of many different writers at different times. When a website is based on an art it's hard to separate the personality from the work.
16. Who would play you in the Everything2 movie?
Either Johnny Cash or Space Ghost.
17. Any questions that I didn't ask that I should've?
Why would a guy bring a gun to an interview?
Everything2 Decaversary Interviews
If you have questions or comments, please contact dem bones or Jet-Poop.