Re: How did *you* get into this business?

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>Here's a question I've been wondering about for some time: How and why
>do people get into the FAQ-maintaining business? I know some newsgroups
>have a formal selection process with a vote and everything, but I
>suspect this is the exception. I'd be interested in hearing how you
>became maintainers.

[I maintain the "Stardates in Star Trek Mini-FAQ", which describes a fairly
plausible theory of how stardates work. Seriously.]

My FAQ existed for some months before it got onto the 'net. In early 1994,
when I didn't have network access, I decided to answer the question of how
stardates work. I had looked for a solution before, and found that the
standard reference books gave no solution. So I spent a weekend going through
my stardate lists and the official Star Trek Chronology, trying to work out
plausible parameters. Having come up with a credible system, I spent a week or
so writing it up for a fan magazine. This was about 20kB.

When I got onto the 'net in October 1994 (not the first time I had had network
access, btw), I soon found the rec.arts.startrek.tech newsgroup, and wondered
if anyone had any theories on stardates. None of the 30 or so FAQs regularly
posted there or on rec.arts.startrek.misc tackled the issue, and when someone
asked for a solution the answers given were all elaborations of "nobody has any
idea". A couple of weeks later, when the same question popped up again, I
responded by posting the write-up of my system, with minor revisions. This
received a couple of favourable responses, as did the repost a month later.
Someone suggested that I continue posting it as a FAQ.

Since then I've done a couple of major revisions, reorganised it, and got it
approved for news.answers. The same question still appears every few weeks,
but now elicits the response "read the FAQ".

-zefram

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