Our present host suffered unfortunate hacking due to security exploits, therefore we've closed down and moved away over to iWinUX. Stay tuned... you'll be redirected in 5 minutes....

Next-Tech community

January 2008

February 2005 was when the previous version of this site started. Ben dubbed it "Stairway to Nowhere", and at that time it didn't have a point and was just another random IPB board Ben made (a few years ago he enjoyed making random IPB boards). We had no purpose for the site at this time, so we just treated it like an off topic topic, but as a whole entire board. There weren't many members yet, in fact, unless I go check the members list, I don't remember at all who was all there at the time other than myself, Jase, Ben, and Tom since we were the founders. So after some fun shenanigans for a while, we decided to try actually giving the site a point and make it professional after some people actually joined and were becoming members.

So we made yet another tech site. I remember we took Next L3vel's name accidentally and caused some heat with Chris123NT, but that eventually blew over and worked itself out after a while. Some where along the line we dubbed ourselves Next-Tech, and Tom started designing a main page and a few board skins. Also some where in the early days of this time line we got mooodi as another coder to work alongside Tom. We successfully advertised around and surprisingly were growing big and were very active after a short period of time of starting up the site. By early spring we had constant active news posting with real news posters and a decent staff team. We all knew what were doing, and life was good.

By spring, the idea was presented to me by Chris123NT of Next L3vel to merge and (temporarily) close down Next L3vel (but leave the site up with a redirect to us). He had noticed the inactivity of his own site and the activity of ours and thought it'd be beneficial of both parties and help us all out to try a different type of merge. All their members came over to our side, and we obtained their skins. So our size grew even bigger. Some where in all this, I don't remember when exactly, we had our own radio station with disc jockeys. I can't remember if we had them before the merge, though. But anyway, this merge got us new news posters and radio disc jockeys.

Then by summer of that same year, things started falling apart. Tension and drama between staff started between myself and other former staff. I believe we weren't in agreement over some personal matters, and unfortunately it spread amongst the rest of the staff. Action was later taken and staff changes were made to let some people go to resolve these issues, myself included. However, I was given a chance to work myself back up in the ranks a bit, and I did fine. Some where during this point it was also discovered that we made the mistakes of pirating copies of VirtuaNews and Invision Power Board, but I didn't know of this at all during the entire time I was a member of that site. I do remember talks of purchasing licenses for said products, but I wasn't aware of pirating being possible reasons as to why. Soon enough, by the infamous months of June/July, Next-Tech closed down for good with a typical temporarily off-line message setup. Shortly after that, I remember a former host of us regained control over the domain, and with the assistance of another member, the main front page was edited to add comments from various other members about the pirating. The messages I honestly can't remember, except for some being quite harsh and profane. I do remember the people that had control over the page let me speak my mind on the matter and other things, so I had actually stood up and defended the site and our staff and members even though I was an outcast at that time. I believe it didn't take long for the domain to finally die out and the mess was gone for good. I truly don't remember what happened during the dark time that was Next-Tech's final breath. (UPDATE: Surprisingly, the "take over" is still around in the form of an attachment on Mess.be's forums in a topic. You're on your own finding it because it isn't pretty.)

After that ordeal, Ben got the new domain that is where we all are now, BetaXP. We started all over completely fresh, except for the members. Why not anything else? I don't remember who's right and who's wrong in our old staff topics in our old staff forum, but as you can see, it really doesn't matter any more. All though we basically reformatted ourselves and reinstalled the members, I remember there was still some fighting between ourselves and Next L3vel after the merge fell apart. Chris123NT had reopened Next L3vel's doors. But things just weren't the same for either of us any more. Business and activity on both sides suffered severely after our fall as Next-Tech. Next L3vel eventually shut down its doors for good, but I don't remember when that was. I do remember I stood up for both sides and made sure the drama stopped, and hopefully it really has, because this was all a very long time ago and we've all moved on. Some of Next L3vel's members still came back and were active here for a short while, but then I noticed they later moved on over to AeroXperience which is where they seem happy now.

Our inactivity has been an issue even before BetaXP and Jase's "Naro Network"... it happened after the fall of Next-Tech. Now, just a few weeks shy of our three year anniversary, we feel ready to accept that we'll most likely never get back the activity we used to have from the NT community, and most of us are now ready to move on to other communities, such as the previously mentioned AeroXperience, or joejoe, or JCXP. But for now, as stated earlier, we consider Solst1ce's iWinUX our current home. A recent hack we had in January 2008 basically just finalized my decision to close down (although it wasn't because the hosting was bad). The board's directories have been deleted, and there won't be anything special on the main page any more. Our host probably does have backups of our databases (I don't have that level of access) and the files that I deleted, so all of BetaXP will probably be archived some where for safe keeping... just like my friend Chris did with Next L3vel, so at least two good communities could possibly make a come back some day, but as of now, we have better things to spend our time on. Our other admin, Nic, has a blog he may use to keep anyone interested updated on his life, and I also have my own I'll keep updated sometimes.

We had a good run, and I enjoyed being a part of BetaXP (and Next-Tech), and I appreciated what members and activity we did have, as well as the support. Thank you all. Ben, I think you and I both can agree this was our most successful community we ever had. I am honored to have served alongside you. Xander, you're a great host, and we thank you and appreciate you having given us a home. I know you had your reasons running outdated hosting and server software, so don't take this closing of BetaXP personally. As previously stated, it was just BetaXP's time to go, and the hosting quality is not why we're closing down. It's just time to let it go and move on.

To any former BetaXP staff: if you have a personal site you'd like a link to, let me know and I'll add it up so people can stay updated on how you're all doing.

Thinking of you, wherever you are. We pray for our sorrows to end, and hope that our hearts will blend. Now I will step forward to realize this wish. And who knows: starting a new journey may not be so hard, or maybe it has already begun. There are many worlds, and they share the same sky - one sky, one destiny.