The never told story before of the ebike revolution..

[steveo]

I came accross these on es facebook.. very interesting.. a good watch, and a lot of info you may not know about the es..

Part 1
https://youtu.be/2uwUq-Ivvsg

Part 2
https://youtu.be/h0jfke2pzmw


-Steveo

 

[MadRhino]

I found it interesting too.
I believe there should be many other inside stories, with various points of view.

I always found that a forum is the best way to learn about a new thing that one does plan to get into. As long as he is capable to screen and gather the info, everything is possible. That is because there are so many different people willing to help, each with different specialties and goals. Looking at the various opinions and realisations of all builders on ES, helped me a lot to achieve building the bikes I would be happy with. It is also helping me making plans, giving me ideas about building something new.

ES is far from being the ideal graphic and up to date website design of course. Yet I appreciate that the owner does not get involved and kept it a simple forum. That is what is making ES open to all different ideas, and fulfilling the need for info of so many different people.

The EV revolution is still a small green area in an immense petrol field, but the knowledge that is building here in endless discussions and experiences is making it grow for sure.

 

[Samd]

Sub'd.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[whereswally606]

Thanks for that Steveo, agreed MadRhino, good to get others perspective on the past. I think the fact that Justin rarely ever posts speaks volumes. He has done as he said and let the forum stay independent / ad free. It was as a shrewd deal and nobody has been let down. Personally I've no issues about how the forum feels to use and functionality it may lack. One Idea I would like is for the facebook group content to be added in here so that I don't need to be going there to see that stuff and vice versa like a cross platform content sharer.

Lets also not forget ES is not the only show in town. Id like to see more cross translation of the other amazing sites out there.

http://electrotransport.ru/ussr/index.php
http://www.pedelecs.co.uk/forum/
http://visforvoltage.org/
http://www.pedelecforum.de/forum/index.php EDIT -lets not forget our German friends. Thanks Spinning Magnets

also there are other places where charging and batteries cross over like
https://www.rcgroups.com/forums
for example where there is lots about modding server power supplies and lipo charging.

I think consistency of format has been good for Endless-sphere.

 

[dogman dan]

One reason I'm still here is because its not at all like facebook.

Old dog,, facebook is a new trick for me. Some things about FB are very cool, others not. I find ES FB like drinking from a fire hose. I'm sure that's fixable, but I don't know how.

Not sure how you make searching ES better. Search BMS. oh that's helpful ,one billion posts. How do you fix that, every third post has the term bms in it.

 

[MadRhino]

The search engines bots are indexing ES pretty good. Use Google instead of the forum search function, it does make a precise search much better.

 

[Drunkskunk]

Well, that's certainly an interesting perspective of history.

I don't have face book, and my sister this Christmas was telling me how behind the times I was, and how I needed to become more modern and join, when her teenage kids interrupted her to inform her that only old people use facebook.

 

[waynebergman]

Good one Drunkskunk

 

[Rube]

Interesting story, I don't understand the part about having a copy of the database and setting up for free.

 

[dogman dan]

Multiple people had saved a copy of the entire website, because there was fear it could all be lost. KnightMb was not maintaining the site, and much, mostly pictures, had already been lost.

When it got sold, some wanted to buy it back legit. Others said lets just not pay for it, and set up a new site with a new name and web address, but start with all the posts they had saved. The buyer was screwed, because he had bought a web address and a data base, but he did not have our support. Many of the membership was ready to just bolt to another site.

I was not involved in any of this, so don't ask me for who said what or when. Where ever the guys I liked went, I was just going to head over there.

There are legit arguments for both approaches. Did the original owner of the site actually own our intellectual property we posted over a period of years? Certainly he owned the website name, and could sell it if he wanted to. But did he really own our content? As a group,, why should we buy our own words back? If the new owner put up a bunch of ads, why would we ever give our knowledge to him for free after that?

Personally,, I would never post one word or picture on the net with any expectation that I owned it after the post. I give it freely, so it can be free, on the web. Copy it if you like, make money off it if you can, whatever. The toothpaste is out of the tube. But don't cry if somebody copies it off your site and makes money of it, or gives it out for free. I consider a web forum to be exactly as if I stood on speakers corner in Hyde Park London. I can shout all I want, but its heard by all who pass. It's not a book with a copyright if I shout on speakers corner.

But on the other side,, no way I write for free, knowing some guy is selling ads on that page.

The biggest, unfortunate thing about the whole process, was that Justin could not, without excessive additional cost, change the name. Electric bike not really right, because this is not just a bike forum. Other names like EV forum or whatever likely taken, or could only be had for a big price. And really, you need a more or less permanent redirect from Endless sphere, to the new web address. So you still had to buy that old website even if you did buy a new one. Otherwise you'd just get the whole V for voltage mess repeating itself.

 

[Green Machine]

I made those videos. both unplanned.

video 2 was made after scooter crash left me with lame left leg and couldnt shoot the video we actually planned. so we did this video instead.

Nobody but me had an actual PHP Database back up which means the entire forum could be set up on any domian name in a few hours (and in fact i did have it set up ready to go) without losing anything. ES could have been had for free easily during that revolution.

It takes an admin to make a database back up.... and at the time i was granted admin access by knightmb for a short time.

If fact all the lost pics that were lost a year before the revolution could have been recovered from the database i had.

there was and still isnt any copyright notices posted on this forum..... the content is owned by the people who wrote it and not whoever owns the forum.

So if all that content was put up on a different domain...everyone would have quickly followed. At the time there were less than a few hundred active members.

 

[DAND214]

I REMEMBER! Kinda new to the forum and was worried what to do if it was gone. Ypedal posted to follow his site for any changes to ES. So glade it was saved since V/forum was a drag.

Dan

 

[markz]

You gotta start giving years.

 

[dogman dan]

Yes,, only the domain name endless sphere is really saleable. The content is not under copyright that I know of.

So bear this in mind when you put your pictures up,, they may show up in some dorks website or facebook.

I still think purchasing the domain was the right thing to do though, to keep masses of people from becoming completely confused by what they found when they went back to ES after a time.

As I understand it, many members copied what they could, without the admin status. To try to preserve what they could.

 

[justin_le]

Hey everyone, there are a good many new members on this forum who've only been around for a few years, let alone the 5+ years ago when all of this unfolded. I haven't watched all the videos from Eric and don't intend to, but at the start of this year we made publicly accessible again in the "epic topics" subforum a slightly redacted version of the original discussion threads that took place during this saga. For everyone who wasn't around at the time and is active on this forum I HIGHLY recommend doing the full read of these threads since they get to the very heart and soul of what the ES community is about.

It started off as an "open letter" from the forum host KnightMB, informing us that someone called Trevor would now be taking the reins. Most people were caught completely off guard by this, and in the ensuing discussion it became clear that the planned vision for the forum's future in no way matched the spirit and reasons that brought us all in to participate.

Part One: The Open Letter: https://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=29&t=30842

At the time, though I had no role in the back end side of ES I was good friends with a number of moderators (YPedal, Methods, Fechter..) who let me know what was going on, and became seen as a trusted person who could potentially be counted on to negotiate with Trevor to get forum back and then host it under the terms that everyone thought it was for. This all played out here in the update thread:

Part Two: Update on My End https://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=29&t=30961

That week Aug 2011 I'll always remember as one of the craziest periods in my life, everything else ground to a complete halt while being holed up in my bedroom dealing with international phone calls, emails, PM's, legal docs etc., with no idea what I was really getting into. Some people were saying it was a waste and we'd start over, while others (myself included) felt there was something very special about ES that would be a shame to loose. In the end the original threads above had to get hidden and swapped for this post here, which was slowly getting buried into obscurity but was always live on this site:

Summary Letter: https://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=29&t=30741

To anyone who wasn't around then and is an active participant on the forum, again I highly recommend reading through all 3 of the threads above to have a full appreciation on the history of this space.

ES is far from being the ideal graphic and up to date website design of course. Yet I appreciate that the owner does not get involved and kept it a simple forum. That is what is making ES open to all different ideas, and fulfilling the need for info of so many different people.

Thanks MadRhino and I'm glad that people appreciate this. It's super important IMO to the health of this scene that there is a community space where people can share honest experience and opinions about this stuff without ulterior motives, where we can hold to account businesses that overstate and overclaim their products. That more than anything is what I wanted to preserve and not see get lost.

But it is possible to have that and also have a more updated webpage and interface that is easier for people to use, and I am guilty for not being very pro-active on this front. We are having discussions on the moderator panel about certain avenues that could work for modernizing the interface and look of ES while sticking to the mission.

The EV revolution is still a small green area in an immense petrol field, but the knowledge that is building here in endless discussions and experiences is making it grow for sure.

Amen!

 

[bchaney]

Wow, really cool history lesson. I'm pretty much brand new to the forum but I can already tell that it's a different place than any others I'm a member of. Everyone that I've come into contact with via ES has been eager to help out a newbie and compete stranger, and generous with their time and even money in one case. From this history lesson to my experience here so far, it's easy to see that people here believe that ebikes are not just fun toys but something bigger.

I have a lot of respect for the few members I've interacted with so far, and now I have much respect for Justin and all the OG ES members who helped preserve the integrity of the forum.

One question that wasn't answered by the videos or the old forum threads, where the heck does the name "endless sphere" come from?

 

[spinningmagnets]

ES member "KnightMB" owned a website services business that he named "endless sphere", no idea why.

At some point, he bought a mild front hub 36V electric bike, and he had tons of server space, so he started an obscure ebikes forum. Right about that time, the VisforVoltage forum had a meltdown, and the endless sphere ebike forum was a place that a few V members stayed in touch with each other. I started at V and fechter was there too, he recommended ES to me because there was more ebike activity there (just before the V crash).

Once a few major ebike posters from VisforVoltage began meeting up at endless sphere, it took off from there. VisforVoltage remains an active E-scooter forum (now that it has recovered)

Originally, the ES ebike forum was in a small corner of endless-sphere. Once Justin got ahold of it, the EV portion became independent of any other non-EV entanglements. Many other sections were added, such as EV aircraft, EV watercraft, and non-hub ebikes (thanks, Miles!), a used-parts and new-parts for sale, etc...

 

[Green Machine]

There is a large thread in the moderator forum that details the revolution everything pretty much as it was unfolding that is way more revealing then the public statements available now to the membership.

For now that thread is only viewable by moderators. But during the entire revolution many moderorators thought that entire thread should be made open for the membership to read and we thought it would happen but never did.

i would encourage any of the new moderators (most of the current moderators) who havent read that thread to read it.

Really that is where the real battle for es can be seen, but there was a lot of side emails and phone calls and side deals going on.

What was revealed to the membership base is just a tip of the iceberg of what went down. The membership base really knew very little and what was revelaled to them is a small part of the story.


Its a really interesting read and it would be good to see the moderator thread which details a lot of the revolution is made public for the entire membership base. I dont see any reason why it should be hidden or buried.

 

[markz]

Informative

All I knew was the whole deleting posts then STOP! LOL I'm not big on drama.

 

[justin_le]

There is a large thread in the moderator forum that details the revolution everything pretty much as it was unfolding that is way more revealing then the public statements available now to the membership.

I'm not quite sure what thread you are talking about Eric, since the two discussion topics that played out as everything was unfolding are already made public

Part One: The Open Letter: viewtopic.php?f=29&t=30842
Part Two: Update on My End viewtopic.php?f=29&t=30961

Other than these two here is what I can find in the mod forum on this subject
1) A May 2011 thread started by Fechter on called "ES change of ownership?" where he discusses being approached by you and Mr.Electric about wanting to buy the forum
2) July 2011 thread started by Trevor called "ES management changes", which seems to be the first discussion with Trevor after it became known that he had purchased the forum from KnightMB, and where a lot of mods made their various positions and feelings known.
3) A short July 2011 thread called "Should we announce new ownership to the whole board?" where Trevor is seeking input on the public announcement, and the suggestion is to fix corrupted images first

All of those predate my involvement or awareness in anything, and after this I can only find 3 more related discussions:

4) A thread from Methods started on Aug 6th "Trevor has agreed to sell ES" - basically telling people to hold off deleting all their posts
5) Another thread started by Methods on Aug 6th "Need your help guys" saying the same thing, presumably posted in a different part of the forum
6) And finally a thread started by Nicobe "OK, so what do you really think about the forum take over?" that is about 3 pages long and seems to have run in parallel to the "open letter" post but with much less activity.
**********************

Can you reveal to us which of these is the "large thread that is way more revealing then[sic] the public statements available now"? I'm happy to have everything out there since an accurate understanding of history (in general, not just of ES!) is of paramount importance.

 

[Rube]

Thanks to OP, Eric, Justin and all who posted to give perspective to new members. The outcome of your efforts is great for the community and on that note....
If anyone thinks they'd rather be in a different part of history, they're probably not a very good student of history. Life sucked in the old days. People knew very little, and you were likely to die at a young age of some horrible disease. You'd probably have no teeth by now. It would be particularly awful if you were a woman. Elon Musk

 

[markz]

To be honest, I wish I knew of electric bikes and whatever forums there were back in 2001, my life would have been so much easier. The only thing I came close to was thinking about a small gasoline engine, maybe there were forums for that back then, maybe I looked at them I cant remember. I remember though I mocked one up out of cardboard but I never followed through. I spent a lot on computers back then, it was kind of my hobby I guess. If I had the electric hobby back then I would have been happier.

 

[Tats]

Having read all posts - Justin if you're ever in Perth Australia I'll shout the beer.

 

[electrocats]

ulterior motives, where we can hold to account businesses that overstate and overclaim their products. That more than anything is what I wanted to preserve and not see get lost.

This part, I don't really agree with at all. I agree with most of your entire post but was this really the spirit of ES?

This should be a place of easily accessible knowledge and resources, not a "if you don't agree with our opinions of advertising, you're wrong." community. Let the customer make their own decision on who they want to support and buy their products from. Present the facts if you want, but this whole "it's time to crank down on these scumbags for aggressive advertising" is a silly idea for the ES community to adopt and preserve.

It will only incite more vendor war stuff and more petty arguments from both sides, which is pretty much what we have now.

EDIT: For the record, I don't think Eric should've made this video, again, it will only cause others to push back and continue fueling the arguments. And I think this sort of passive aggressive "shit talking" does more harm than good for his company, but overstatements and overclaims are a different matter imo. Advertising is a very competitive business.

 

[Rube]

ulterior motives, where we can hold to account businesses that overstate and overclaim their products. That more than anything is what I wanted to preserve and not see get lost.

This part, I don't really agree with at all.....
EDIT: For the record, I don't think Eric should've made this video, again, it will only cause others to push back and continue fueling the arguments. I think this sort of aggressive "shit talking" advertising does more harm than good for his image.....

The language of "holding business to account" sounds too authoritative but the sentiment is valid. Advertising is an ethically questionable business and E-products are massively prone to overstatement and over-claim. Uptake of e-mobility benefits from space to openly debate the merit of products and a home for creative ppl to refine, optimise and experiment.

I don't see a problem with Eric's video as long as ideas can be debated. Probably felt good to let it all out, especially while cursing on a scooter. Vendor squabbles come and go, no big deal; as long as we openly discuss the merit of info, products and content, from within and outside ES, another 'revolution' won't be needed.