Surfing around on Christmas Day, 2001, I noticed that a bunch of my buddies on the Ars Technica forum had Gone Missing! After a bit of searching, I found this new thing called Free-DC and there were my buds, including Dyyryath, IronBits, Jammy, Marc_1, Chinasaur, ColinT, JTrinkle, Guru, Richard Clyne, FoBoT, pointwood, rcoulter, Supp, ulv and probably others that I can't remember. Many of us had been in situations where a lot of pressure was put on crunchers to produce. We believed that everyone should be able to change projects, to crunch or not crunch, as the mood moved them, even to crunch for another team(!) without undue harassment from their peers. Hence the name "Free-DC". It was a nice change. We did preserve the smiley, but we keep it light - much more fun without the pressure.

I believe the first server was hosted by Marc_1. Dyyryath wrote the first stats engine. IronBits helped everybody, all the time. A small burst of us joined immediately and more followed as word got around. It grew in both forum members and team crunchers from all over.

Here we are, nine years later. People come and go. Interests, priorities and circumstances change. I do miss many of the old team, especially IronBits, FoBoT and Dyyryath. The upside is that we have gained some great new people over time.

Still, good to see *some* old-timers still active. The important bit is the fellowship. Crunching for the team is appreciated, but distinctly optional. Merry Christmas 2010 to All and Happy Anniversary, Free-DC!



If anyone has additions or corrections to what my admittedly faulty memory has been able to supply, please feel free to pitch in.