Wednesday, July 7th, 2010
Ben and Dion Step Down as Editors of Ajaxian.com
In the spring of 2005, the two of us gave our first Ajax talk together. The subject of the talk was DHTML, but Jesse James Garrett had just coined “Ajax” a few days previous, so we sprinkled the term throughout the slide deck. We needed a place to put some source code that accompanied the talk–an RSS reader was called “RSS Bling”. Ajaxian.com was born.
Here’s a random picture someone took of us right before we gave that first talk:
(Surely we’re just reviewing the slides in this pic, not hurriedly hacking together something at the last minute.)
Because the Ajax space was moving so quickly, we wanted a place to track the fun hacks, great libraries, and fantastic showcases that were coming out daily, so we started using Ajaxian to post Ajax news and very occasionally, an editorial. It’s fun to think back to those early times; the web world was drunk with new possibilities and no one was really quite sure how the draw the boundaries.
After a few months, things were moving so fast we thought it would be great to get the emerging Ajax community together. With help from Jay Zimmerman of No Fluff Just Stuff and Chris Haven, we put together the first Ajax Experience show in San Francisco. It was incredibly fun seeing so many of the folks in person we’d been covering on the site, and sharing with the broader developer community what was now possible.
Our little Ajaxian blog grew over time–we still remember with awe when someone compared the traffic Ajaxian sent them to Slashdot–and we’ve gone on to co-produce several more Ajax Experience shows. It’s been a thrilling ride.
Now, years later, it’s time for us to formally hang up our Ajaxian hats. We’ve always juggled the site with our full-time jobs (various start-ups, Google for Dion, Mozilla, Palm, and now HP), and posting daily while balancing families and work can wear on you after a while–we can’t do it all anymore. TechTarget (the company that has owned Ajaxian.com for some time) will take on editorial ownership of the site. We will still carry on posting every so often–it’s in our blood–but it won’t be on a regular schedule.
This transition comes at an important time for us. Palm was an opportunity to show the world that an OS based on the Web can be fantastic, but now, with HP’s resources behind Palm, there’s an even bigger opportunity ahead that will require all of our focus and energy. Oh, and it’s summer, too. :-)
Thanks for being there for us over the years. We look forward to the next series of adventures. With HTML5 continuing to build steam and browser innovation hotter than ever, it is going to be a great time for us Web folk.
As always, you can keep up with us on Twitter: Ben and Dion.
All the best,
Thanks for creating such a great site. It’s been my source for all things AJAX for the last five years. Good-luck with HP, and everything else you choose to do in the future!
You guys have been awesome running this site. Congrats, and best wishes with your endeavors at Palm.
You did a tremendous job! Best luck to you guys in all your endeavors!
I wish you the best Ben and Dion, you guys have been great running this site and you’re doing and awesome work at Palm. Best of luck, Nicolas.
Very sad to hear this, but here’s to pushing webOS even harder in the coming months. Thanks for the years of hard work, we’re all better devs because of Ajaxian!
Thanks so much Dion and Ben – you’ve done an awesome job running this site!
Thank you guys for all your hard work over the years. You’ve really made a difference and for that we should all be grateful.
Guys thanks for all your hard job, wish you the best at HP/Palm,
1 question.. new editors?
It’s been great following you guys and the ajax trend over the years… In an era of zip-zap 5-second sound-bites, retweets, reposts, feed-frenzy, you’ve done a tremendous job of sticking to the core and sticking with it for so long. Thanks!
Thanks guys for creating this site that is so helpful for the community. Wish you the best of lucks in all your new projects!
Thanks for all the hard work Dian and Ben. You guys rock! Do something amazing at HP!
Thanks for the memories.
Thanks for your hard work and for all the great traffic you’ve sent to developers! You’ve done an amazing job of keeping Ajaxian interesting and relevant over the last five years – good luck with your new endeavors… Thanks!
Thank you guys and good luck with your new job!
This site took the web from 2.0 to 2.5 and it goes on… Thank you for all your hard work! Your news brought digital humanity to the next level. Thank you very much! :o)
Along with this blog, the Audible Ajax podcast was one of the first podcasts I really got into back in ‘05, and it turned me into a believer that JS could be a viable application platform. The contributions the both of you have made to the JS community are immeasurable and it’s been a pleasure watching your careers progress as ambassadors of the open web. Palm/HP are extremely lucky to have the both of you.
As a Palm fanboy, I can’t wait to see what you guys come out with now that you have the resources. I’ll trade my iPad in a second for a webOS tablet!
It was a good run guys, thanks for all the awesome news and info over the years.. you will be missed!!
Besides your being a prime source of informative content, you infused the site with a lot of personality… You will be missed…
Thanks for all the work you guys put into this site, it’s a daily stop for me. Hopefully that won’t change.
Thanks guys, hope the site stays true to your vision, good luck.
Thank you all, dearly; this site has pointed me in the right direction more than once! You helped me have fun programming again.
Thank you Ben, Thank you Dion ! Wish you all the best !!
Thanks a lot! This site has always been my number source for AJAX news. Thank you thank you!
hey guys, thanks for all the kind words!
When I reached the point that I realized I had too many distraction at work, I stopped checking all my other news sites, but I drew the line at Ajaxian. Great work guys. You’ve been a constant source of news and inspiration.
Thank you for all, Ajaxian has been an invaluable resource to me.
For the future, I just hope that Ajaxian will open up its doors and make content publishing by the JS/CSS community possible.
We could have editors blogs as well and maybe a directory, an Ajaxian who’s who :D
I just hope it’s not Ajaxian end but a rebirth!
ATB guys
A massive thanks to Ben and Dion. The timing of the site was wonderful and has been a real help to me over the years.
Good luck with the next challenge. I’m super excited by the work you’re doing on the Web OS. Looking forward to seeing HP get their weight behind it.
I had no idea that you’d sold Ajaxian. Congratulations on that. Good luck to both of you now that you’ve moved on to better things.
This is a bit of a shame for the JS world as there are not many sites that aggregate JS news quite so well. Will the new editors be as impartial as you guys? Do they have the inside knowledge that you have? I doubt it and expect this site to go downhill pretty quickly.
Where do we go next for JS news?
I’m really going to miss Ajaxian! Thanks for the great content you have produced over the years, Dion and Ben.
You’ve been a great source of information and inspiration – thanks. We can only hope that Ajaxian carries on with the same level of quality.
Like Dean above I didn’t know Ajaxian had been sold (congrats) – and also I think the site will go down hill quickly. I visit Ajaxian on a daily basis and it has been my main source for whats hot in the web dev world – Thanks to Ben and Dion for helping me to get better at what I do. I thought something was up as the last posted article/news was nearly a week ago… I hope this is not the sign of things to come… but I suspect it is…
Sad day! Thanks a lot for all your efforts with Ajaxian. This site has truly been the goto place for JS news.
Good luck to you both with your future gigs!
/Mats
Good luck in the future, you will be missed.
Thanks for all the good work. I can’t say I’m surprised, given the difficulty of combining a site like this with a more than full time job. For years now ajaxian has been my first stop for web dev news. I hope that won’t change, but I agree with the others that it’s not likely the new editors will be as well-informed as you guys were.
This has always been the definitive site for AJAX. You guys have both done a great service for the developer community. I’m less surprised of the announcement as much as I had been that Dion was still going strong with Tweets and blogs. I trust we will still hear from you both often and you’re not going anywhere far.
Ajaxian was a great place for me. Thanks for the memories. Especially having to repeatedly answer what the X in Ajax stands for.
Gracias, gents, for coming up with Ajaxian and tirelessly covering nifty JS things over the last five years. The comments here reflect a community of readers and fans you’ve built up over the years, which speaks to the success of your efforts. It’s a small Internet, so I expect we’ll be hearing from you guys in one form or another in the future. Keep the open web thing going!
You guys have been the heart and soul of the Ajax community — what’s Ajaxian without its Ajaxians? We’ll see… Thanks for an unbelievably rich, broad, and insightful stream of everything Ajax over many years.
Thanks for all your efforts, guys. Is there a future for the Ajax Experience conference?
On top of consistently pulled together the most important Ajax news, you’ve also helped give attention to projects and individuals, helping them grow and gather their own audience. I count myself in this group, and can think of many others. Thanks for all the cross-posts! You’ve supported my evangelism and have been an invaluable resource for improving the quality of the Web.
Just wanted to chime in too, thank you so much for all you do. Ajaxian.com has been my primary information source for all things Ajax. Great community with great info, and I’ve soaked up a lot from it all over the past 5 years.
Once again thanks and I wish you continued success in all your future endeavors.
Been checking this site almost daily since it was born! We’re gonna miss you guys.
I hope our new overlords hire some great editors to try and fill these shoes. So much is happening in the HTML5/Ajax space now, it demands more coverage!
Thanks for all your hard work. And good luck to you both.
Good luck with everything — hope the site doesn’t change!
I heard about jQuery for the first time on your website — since then I’ve been an avid reader of Ajaxian. Incredible website! Thank you so much for all your hard work!
You have been the Crow and Tom Servo to my Ajax Satellite of Love.. You will be missed.
hey guys,
Thank you for all the things I’ve learnt here during the last few years.
It’s been my fav blog(one that lives in bookmarks toolbar and not google reader) and I’ve read every post since. Event the comments have been very constructive and learnt a lot from them too. Even seen dean edwards in here. Wish you both nothing but the best and we will all miss you.
The Fall 2006 Ajax Experience is by far the best conference I ever attended! Great job moving the web forward!
You guys will be missed.
Thanks for all the great content – this site has been an important resource in my career as a web developer.
I started working professionally as a web developer in 2006, and it was great to take part in the excitement around rich web applications at the time. You guys were an important part of that – best of luck in your future endeavors!
you will be missed,
both your work is legendary, sure you’ll do well.
Thank you for pushing the open web forward!
Congrats to both of you, that’s quite the only interesting site i know for web development today.
Wish you luck at HP (I’m sure you’ll need some) :)
OMG, I hope you know what you’re doing …
.
Anyway, good luck guys :)
Thank you so much for keeping this site going, I check it every morning when I get in to work. I’m already going through withdrawal! I hope that somehow this site will be able to live on. Good luck at HP.
Thanks for Ben and Dion for your excellent work. At the same time, it is wonder who will be the new editors?
Good luck, gentlemen!
well good luck for both of you guys.. thanks for the great site. And don;t forget, What does the X in Ajax stand for?
This site got me into web, thanks guys! Best of luck with your future endeavours.
When the new editors will update this site?
Well, thank you both for all the time you spent helping us developers all around the world. Thank you from Italy and best of luck!!!!!
Bye!!!
Good luck to both u… When can we expect an introduction of the new owners ?
I have only been here a few months but I this is one of the sites I check regularly for little Web development gems. thanks for all you hard work and thank to TechTarget for keeping the site up and running!
Is this because you’re starting HTML5ian.com? :P
Thanks for all the personal time you guys poured into this site. You’ll be missed!
I was on vacation when this was announced, so I’m a bit late to post, but just wanted to wish Ben and Dion the best! I posted a short ode to Ajaxian on my blog here:
http://blog.codinginparadise.org/2010/07/ode-to-ajaxian.html
Best,
Brad
We actually also wrote an article for this on the day when Ben and Dion leave:
http://newsicare.wordpress.com/2010/07/09/ben-and-dion-goodbye-ajaxian/
Thanks for all those years of hard work and all the best for your future projects.
Thanks guys, i’ve had your daily post in my RSS feed reader – keeping me in the know for years. I’ve pretty much read every article with interest and been inspired to write my own.
Many thanks for all your effort and contributions to the web.
Thank you both! You’ve done an amazing job and I hope you know it!