Letter from the editor

Dear readers,

When I purchased the domain thepowerbase.com back in 2008, I never expected it to be a site about open source, let alone one that people actually read.  It was originally intended to be site dedicated to the Sega Master System!  That’s actually why we have such a silly and seemingly rediculous name.  The Sega Master System, in the US and Europe, is also known as a “Powerbase”.  Years went by before I decided last October to stop sitting on my hands and actually do something with it.  A lot of things happened between 2008 and 2011 that changed who I was as a person, and the things that mattered to me.  I had 2 children, and they changed my priorities drastically.

I also learned that I loved writing more than I loved Sega, and that my pursuit of infinite knowledge on the topic was a wasted effort.  I have used Linux exclusively for almost my entire adult life and I have always been an advocate for open source.  My day job is Linux, all day long.  I love it.  I also have a lot of opinions about it too.  That’s how this all happened.

Here at The Powerbase, we take open source technology seriously. Whether we’re talking about space travel or Ubuntu, we take the highest quality editorial approach in everything that we do. We are not the most successful open source site out there, and we are certainly not an article mill designed to increase our rank on Google. We are very proud of not succombing to the easy money, and we never will.

We love you, even though you don’t always love us. Sometimes we are right and sometimes we are wrong. You are all quick to let us know and our appreciation for this runs deep. Like any great open source blog, we try and monetize our offerings. Phoronix, OMGUbuntu and others all follow this same philosophy. That said, we haven’t made a lot of money since last October. After expenses, we haven’t even made enough to be taxed by the US Government! But we don’t care. We will continue to bring fresh content even if we have to reach into our own pockets over the coming year. Why?

Because we love to write.

It’s is easy to publish just anything. You’ll notice at The Powerbase that we use original featured artwork with nearly every article. This takes time, and sometimes we will get a news piece out just a little later than needed because of it.  Also, the editing… We speak English and we will never butcher it for our readers –intentionally. If you are reading this and you are the its troll, you might disagree… (If you’re curious who the its troll is, just ask in the comments…)

The Future

So what’s next for The Powerbase? Well, first of all, we hope to gain more staff writers so that we can grow our offering. People who love to write. We also plan on finding new ways to contribute to open source. Whether that involves donating to our favorite projects, or finding new ones to promote, we will be at the ready. At the same time, The Powerbase has been working very closely on an open source project already, and it has all been a big secret until today.

The Powerbase has teamed up with a new open source software house, Abian Software. Together we have developed a new open source application for Android designed to help other open source blogs spread their message. We are debuting this new software today on The Powerbase, and you can read all about it right here.

If you read The Powerbase already, but haven’t followed us on Google Plus, Facebook and Twitter, please do. If this is the first time you are reading, we want you to follow us too!

Thank you for a great first year from everyone at The Powerbase!

Sincerely and gratefully yours,

Dean Howell,

Editor-in-chief