I was one of the original authors of the 1up website, back in 2004. It was one hell of a chaotic project. The result was some of the worst code the internet had ever seen. That was a contract job that ended when 1up shipped. I went and did other things. But a year and a half later, I returned. For the first time in my life, I had not a job, but a mission. I wanted to rewrite 1up. Some of that shitty code was mine and it never sat well with me.
So I returned in March 2006 to rewrite 1up. I did the bulk of the work myself, but had help with tuning from some VERY smart people. I've never worked as hard on anything in my life, never cared about my work as much as I did for the next 6 years. I became known on the site and users would writie me all the time asking for fixes or help. I frequented the boards and tried to answer questions (and goof off).
When UGO bought 1up in January of 2009, it was a very sad time for 1up, particularly the editorial team, who could never be the same without some of those great folks. And yet, one of the losses was my boss, leaving me in charge of tech. So frankly it was happy times for me. The only boss I had was the CTO of UGO, who was back in New York. Hardly ever heard from the guy. I got a taste of management, of having a say in the direction the site took (from a technical point of view).
But one thing UGO did NOT want to do was to expand the team and make the site even cooler. Sam and I had a ton of great ideas, but unfortunately we were always understaffed. When UGO took over, they cut QA, my boss and a few engineers. Then they cut another one, and yet another quit. That left the 1up tech department with 2 back end and 1 front end engineer. When we did the relaunch in 2011, the trivia engine, the 'Happening Now' module at the upper right, the community center, the updates to the front page. I did ALL the back end work myself. It was a labor of love. I stopped playing video games and would code late into the night after my wife and son were asleep.
When IGN bought the site from UGO, I was the last man standing. I ran the entire site myself. At first, IGN was happy to have me, but I quickly grew to hate it there. They have a couple of serious douchebags running the department, and it wasn't long before I called out one of them on his douchebaggery and he had my fired for it. I was ultimately fired (ok, forced to resign) from 1up because I made someone look bad in a fucking email. And yet, I'm far more depressed upon hearing this news than I was getting canned.
I miss Sam and Jeremy terribly. They sure were fun to work with. Hell, I miss the whole crew. Every damned one of the editorial staff cared DEEPLY about video games, and it showed.
I knew this was coming, knew it was coming soon. Ziff can't run 1up because there is no one left that has the faintest idea how it works. I suppose I can take some solace in the fact that since January 23rd of last year, the site has literally run itself. I did my job and I did it well. Goodbye 1up. Fuck.
