Some of you may have recently seen the talk of Swaylocks shutting down. Someone mentioned it in a forum post here, and of course there was talk of it on Swaylocks. From memory, the upshot was that the figure behind Swaylocks was essentially losing money keeping the website running. Please correct me if I'm wrong on that, or if anyone recalls what was said in the Swaylocks forum thread discussing its closure. It may have happened.
I'd look on Swaylocks myself to find out what's going on, but alas, if one attempts to load the website now, they're met with the following error ("PDOException: SQLSTATE[HY000] [2002] Connection refused in lock_may_be_available() (line 167 of /app/public/includes/lock.inc).".
I have limited programming knowledge, but I've gathered that (maybe) one reason for such an error, is that the stuff under the hood of the website can't connect to the actual database that would constitute the website itself. There's meant to be a book on the shelf ("Swaylocks"), a hand reaches out to get the book, but there's just an empty spot. Kinda.
In any event, I hope I'm wrong, and the website is just temporarily down, getting upgraded, whatever. Is Swaylocks not a time-capsule, an archive of surf culture history, if not a part of that history itself? Like all subculture Internet forums of the 2000's, it was, in parts, an utter cesspool of incomprehensible ramblings. But there was, I think, genuine knowledge about the craft of shaping to be found on there. In some cases, knowledge imparted from those with decades worth of dust in their lungs. In other cases, knowledge to be gained from the mistakes of a backyard with none of the right gear and too many ideas, an honest ignoramus with a curiosity about these strange planks of foam and fibreglass that go in-between us and the ocean.
Some discussion posts are still available the view via the web-archive Wayback Machine. But the functionality is limited, and not everything has been captured. From what I can gather, the discussion post about Swaylock's future from a few weeks ago wasn't archived. Does anyone know?
Can anyone confirm, or dispel, the rumour of the death of Swaylocks.com? Or know who I might reach out to, how I might reach out to them, to find out more?
Some of you may have recently seen the talk of Swaylocks shutting down. Someone mentioned it in a forum post here, and of course there was talk of it on Swaylocks. From memory, the upshot was that the figure behind Swaylocks was essentially losing money keeping the website running. Please correct me if I'm wrong on that, or if anyone recalls what was said in the Swaylocks forum thread discussing its closure. It may have happened.
I'd look on Swaylocks myself to find out what's going on, but alas, if one attempts to load the website now, they're met with the following error ("PDOException: SQLSTATE[HY000] [2002] Connection refused in lock_may_be_available() (line 167 of /app/public/includes/lock.inc).".
I have limited programming knowledge, but I've gathered that (maybe) one reason for such an error, is that the stuff under the hood of the website can't connect to the actual database that would constitute the website itself. There's meant to be a book on the shelf ("Swaylocks"), a hand reaches out to get the book, but there's just an empty spot. Kinda.
In any event, I hope I'm wrong, and the website is just temporarily down, getting upgraded, whatever. Is Swaylocks not a time-capsule, an archive of surf culture history, if not a part of that history itself? Like all subculture Internet forums of the 2000's, it was, in parts, an utter cesspool of incomprehensible ramblings. But there was, I think, genuine knowledge about the craft of shaping to be found on there. In some cases, knowledge imparted from those with decades worth of dust in their lungs. In other cases, knowledge to be gained from the mistakes of a backyard with none of the right gear and too many ideas, an honest ignoramus with a curiosity about these strange planks of foam and fibreglass that go in-between us and the ocean.
Some discussion posts are still available the view via the web-archive Wayback Machine. But the functionality is limited, and not everything has been captured. From what I can gather, the discussion post about Swaylock's future from a few weeks ago wasn't archived. Does anyone know?
Can anyone confirm, or dispel, the rumour of the death of Swaylocks.com? Or know who I might reach out to, how I might reach out to them, to find out more?