The growing pains had been evident early in 2003. On March 27, the server went down, prompting upgrades to the blogging software and database and a subsequent move to a dedicated, and faster machine at the ISP. A week later, on April 3, Markos announced that because Movable Type couldn't handle the traffic, he'd be moving the site over to Slash, which powered slashdot.org, among others.
Slash was found wanting, because on June 30, with another server on the way, it's Scoop that's going to get the nod. Users immediately expressed concern that the simplicity of the blog presentation would be lost in a move to Scoop. These concerns would continue to be expressed even during Scoop's eventual rollout.
First, there was the month and a half of upgrade hell. Markos and his webhost immediately came to the conclusion that Daily Kos had grown too big for the hosting company, and it was time to fly solo, doing his own hosting as soon as Markos could get a server in and configured. Things are so bad that day that Movable Type comments have to be shut off on July 1 until the move. HaloScan comments are installed the next day as a stopgap, with the full knowledge that they will be lost to posterity once the move is complete. What no one knew was that this temporary situation would last until August 16—there are no comments extant from that period. It's very odd to go back and see open threads with no thread in them. The final migration to the new server was 95% complete on August 17; the final 5% was never later referred to.
Historical sidelight: exactly four and a half years ago today, Markos wrote the following warning in an Open Thread:
And please, stop with the "first post" silliness that has suddenly afflicted the site. I will start deleting such posts.
May I say how glad I am for this policy and its current equivalent?
Finally, on Monday, October 13, 2003, the big day arrived: Markos wrote that the MT version of dKos is now obsolete at 6:33pm on the Movable Type site, and "essentially" cross-posted as the first story at 8:01:05pm on the Scoop site. At the same time, he started the DNS changes that would give the dailykos.com site to the Scoop server, while the Movable Type site would take over dailykos.net in preparation for archiving; it wasn't practical to load Scoop with the Movable Type material. This was to be a fresh start.
Then he waited until 9:17pm before revealing the URL of the new Scoop site on the Movable Type site. By this time, the Scoop site already had two posts...but no comments.
The first comment on the first Scoop post wasn't made until shortly before midnight, and was by sgbyou:
Hmm, it's so lonely down here.
The comment, like all of those at the beginning, was automatically assigned a "Re:" subject by the software. Seven other comments would be made, for a total of eight, the last on Friday, October 17.
This was not, however, the first comment to a Daily Kos post. The second post was Getting Started, posted by kos at 8:16:52pm, and Expo (uid 27) got commenting started under Scoop by grabbing its first comment at 9:34:26pm:
Not bad.
Ah, those blasé bloggers.
There were definite growing pains. Recs were weird starting out. 2.50 seems to have been the most common average rating, even for comments with 0 or 1 ratings. (Yes, 0. Yes, 1. You could only rate using integers 1 through 5 back then. Yes, I know it doesn't make sense. Not to worry: this was eventually fixed.)
People signed up at a very fast clip. Userid 100 (Adam) posted a comment at 10:02:25pm, 205 (fyreflye) at 11:16:50pm, 313 (Skubwa) a diary at 1:36:43am on the 14th, 415 (g wiz) a comment at 5:25:38am, etc.
The first sig was posted by MercuryX23 (uid 24) at 9:37:51pm (at least the post was; the sig could have been created anytime in the next 117 minutes), and recorded by Draco at 11:25:26pm.
Since this is Top Comments, I have to mention one of the earliest by Sharoney. Made me smile.
The third post, at 10:36:16pm, gives the bad news that Safari on OSX isn't working, and IE or Mozilla should be used. A new release of Safari in a few days may or may not solve the problem.
The fourth post, Staying beta, keep suggestions flowing, arrived at 11:15:17pm. Lots of suggestions are made, and somehow clyde manages to change the font to courier in the middle of his comment, and it stays that way for every subsequent comment in the diary. I rather suspect this caused a fix to be made to the comment-posting code...
The fifth post was First poll: keep titles in comment headers? All I can say is thank heavens comment titles/subjects won, but it was a near thing: 132 to 109, with 39 "don't care". There was also a problem when this post was updated, resetting the individual selection votes but not the total; the poll claims 311 total votes, but only shows 280 individual votes. See tis's comment which records 13 individual votes and 41 total, posted shortly after kos's update; manyoso's slightly earlier post claims 32 votes lost, while tis shows 28, and the diary still shows a discrepancy of 31.
As the day turned, kos posted Giving props, highlighting the work Kevin (uid 280) and Grant (uid 2) did setting up the site. This diary was later bumped for reposting on October 16, but its first appearance was shortly after midnight on the 14th.
And then...came the first diary. Not 25 minutes after the props, this diary showed the way to the fulfillment of the site under Scoop in six words:
This is Kos testing this feature.
Yes, you guessed it: the diarist's name was test. kos was premiering the first sockpuppet of the Scoop era. :)
Diaries mushroomed. Less than 45 minutes later, Skubwa wrote the first by a non-kos, entitled Sub blog-blog, and garnered one comment. daniel supplied a three-word diary 17 minutes later that didn't get any comments at all, and an hour later Joe in Illinois wrote two sentences with an equally small payoff.
kos was finally dragged to bed by his long-suffering wife at three in the morning, announcing he was Signing off.
Alas, I'm out of time. I should have at least gotten us to the first substantive diary, the first post by another front-pager, or the moment when Movable Type was shut off and Scoop became official, not to mention the Open Threads back on Movable Type on October 14th. That will have to wait for another diary. I do, however, have a highly germane quote from the August 20 Cattle Call on August 20, 2003, less than two months before Movable Type gave way to Scoop:
Note: One of the features of Scoop (which will hopefully come online in a few weeks) is community moderation. Things have been getting a little out of control in the boards, with supporters of certain candidates attacking others. If this board is hijacked by similar crap, I will put the Cattle Call on hiatus until scoop arrives. Then I will grant Mike S the power to ban those "eating our own". Don't force me to take drastic measures.
The guy you want to bash today may be our nominee. You don't want your words used against you when you do support that candidate, do you?
We haven't learned much from our own history, have we?
~~~~~
People have, however, learned how to send emails to the TopComments mailbox. Several arrived today, and may be seen below. If you saw any great comments that are not mentioned here, please do link to them in your own comments below. The address of that mailbox:
TopComments AT gmail DOT com
(change " AT " to "@" and " DOT " to ".")
Anyone can submit deserving comments to our address—the direct link to a comment is available from that comment's date/time—as long as they arrive by 9:30pm Eastern Time. Please always include your Daily Kos user name in the body of your message, so we can credit you properly.
There were a couple of nominations from Keith Olbermann's debut diary I Hate To Interrupt, But... Unfortunately, at this time, following a link to any comment in that diary results in getting the following message: Comments have been Disabled for this Article. ct says he's working to re-enable comments [late edit: comments are working again!], so I'll list them here:
From imisa:
This comment points out the obvious which, unfortunately, we all need to be reminded of.
From sccs:
I'm sure there are tons of good comments in here, but this one is a beauty...
And, by the way, Keith reappeared in this morning's Open Thread.
lamzdotes sent the following:
In response to litigatormom's GBCW/TTFN diary, undercovercalico wistfully wishes for a respite from the flame wars. Kumbaya, everyone!
From Spathiphyllum:
Dump Terry McAuliffe has a great one in FLS's diary: Unbreaking news... Dems capitulate again.
annrose submitted the following:
MA Liberal hits the nail squarely on the head with this one. From william f harrison's wonderful diary Misogyny Is Perfectly Acceptable In Our Society, that veers off into a discussion of racism vs. sexism.
From BeninSC:
You know, I know those who stand vigil in the IGTNT diaries each night comment for the sake of the fallen and their loved ones. I know they do not seek 'mojo' or acclaim for their comments. And yet, simple as they can be, for me they contain very profound truths. Witness this comment by llbear in greenies's IGTNT diary tonight:
Never forget: His life mattered.
ABSOLUTELY his life mattered! And it still does! For me, that is the very definition of profundity and soul in comment form.
From sardonyx, your diarist du jour:
Our beloved (and possibly jealous?) Bill in Portland Maine lectures those of us who dared to tip Keith Olbermann in this morning's Open Thread, and who should reply but... Keith Olbermann, who quotes Thurber...among other things. Actually, lots of people reply to both Bill and Keith, and the threads are not to be missed. And these, at least, can still be read!
breezeview takes an unusual stand on persecution, and so do the responders.
When bernardpliers says he's stocking up on fertilizer against future shortages, nightsweat has a theory about why the shortages are coming.
Dallasdoc makes a case for changing the ways we measure the economy, and dallasdave replies with an additional one. What is it with these guys from Dallas, anyway? All this and much more in Jerome a Paris's diary The Emerging Democratic Economic Consensus.
No Top Comments diary would be complete without that day's top comments by number, aka top mojo—those comments which have received the highest number of recommendations from Daily Kos users like you. Today's is supplied by sardonyx, using his own revision of cskendrick's mojo-to-Excel magic.
First, Top Mojo excluding search-identifiable tip jars, first diary comments, and Cheers and Jeers comments:
1) If you are going to use your name by Kagro X — 129
2) Card Carrying Members of the ACLU by Nulwee — 103
3) Oh Tom by taylormattd — 94
4) "Sir, Put Down The Shovel" by DHinMI — 91
5) troll n/t by Plutonium Page — 90
6) Did you take up this girl's case? by Kayakbiker — 82
7) If so, then let 'em "pimp". by Lisa Lockwood — 81
8) It's important to state by turneresq — 78
9) This is what I've been saying by sarahlane — 76
10) Troll-ratings are the bane of this site! by musing85 — 73
11) I often think... by reflectionsv37 — 69
12) Been a 'card carrying member' by Lisa Lockwood — 66
13) PP by RenaRF — 62
14) Stop. Just Stop if You Want to Help Hillary by DHinMI — 62
15) Page is joking by taylormattd — 60
16) If It Makes You Feel Any Better... by DHinMI — 60
17) I'm leaving the site by Plutonium Page — 58
18) And it's high time given that recession is here by Jerome a Paris — 57
19) I enjoyed this more than I have any of the rec by roseeriter — 55
20) S'OK by droogie6655321 — 55
21) did your see Bob Herbert this am? by anna shane — 55
22) He's a troll?! by Raybin — 54
23) Tee. Hee. by grannyhelen — 54
24) Hmm by droogie6655321 — 53
25) This smear by Cohen is by TomP — 53
26) Exactly by droogie6655321 — 53
27) We need to act on every press release and by Owllwoman — 52
28) That's Dr. Sinatra to you, punk! eom by Geekesque — 51
29) It really sucks by GiveNoQuarter — 51
30) Tom, they have taken over the election process. by SaneSoutherner — 51
Top Mojo with No Exclusions:
1) Tip Jar by David Brock — 519
2) ye olde tip jarre by poblano — 510
3) See you after February 5th by Frank — 439
4) Tip Jar - 15 January by Jerome a Paris — 279
5) Am I electable? by Redstateresident — 168
6) Tips for my rambling diary? by Ellinorianne — 155
7) Tips for Dr. Martin Luther by TomP — 151
8) This is too important by MaskedKat — 130
9) If you are going to use your name by Kagro X — 129
10) The McCain/Abramoff Scandal Cover-up by dengre — 122
11) Amen! Rec'd. Will tip you too by Snud — 121
12) Tips for hard work and time for play by MontanaMaven — 120
13) Tip Jar by Eric Schmeltzer — 111
14) Card Carrying Members of the ACLU by Nulwee — 103
15) Tip jar by JedReport — 97
16) Oh Tom by taylormattd — 94
17) "Sir, Put Down The Shovel" by DHinMI — 91
18) troll n/t by Plutonium Page — 90
19) Tip Cauldron by irishwitch — 88
20) Tips and Recs for being in it till the convention by chuckles1 — 84
21) Tips for John Edwards's message by Rob in Vermont — 83
22) Did you take up this girl's case? by Kayakbiker — 82
23) If so, then let 'em "pimp". by Lisa Lockwood — 81
24) It's important to state by turneresq — 78
25) tips by jsamuel — 77
26) This is what I've been saying by sarahlane — 76
27) I'm checking under my couch cushions by sgary — 75
28) Cohen sucks... by Universal — 74
29) Troll-ratings are the bane of this site! by musing85 — 73
30) Happy Tuesday by vigilant meerkat — 72
© sardonyx; all rights reserved
All quotes are the property of the original authors or the websites that held them
