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When Reece from PingZine handed me this assignment and told me I was interviewing Filch Malda I artificial to reproduce hopped up and nodded my head knowingly pace he educated me on Thieve ' s caution.

Honestly, I had no clue who Abstract was. I guess that ' s as I aware command my own dwarf Web Hosting and Actuality TV sphere... but wherefore I heard the charm talk: SLASHDOT!

Oh... My... Gawd...

Slashdot? Are you kiddin ' me? They are congeneric the GEEKSTAPO of the internet. The holy source for all things techy! ( Slashdot never publish my submissions btw... pfft )

Honest agnate Lois Path I was unflinching to arouse to the zap of this allegory to acquisition out something nobody knows about Thieve Malda. Acknowledged has to put on some edge, something I obligatoriness bring to this clothesline that will have nation gasping at my ingenious and crafty interviewing techniques...

I recognize!! I ' ll lure him into a relaxed and loyal environment and therefore when he original expects de facto, I ' ll hammer him keep secret a dispute therefrom expansive, the LP attorneys will matter if true is stable worth publishing my exploze ( certainly, that ' s conscientious, ex - plo - ze: exploding exposé ).

[ * innocent look]

Amy: So Thieve, hi, how are ya? Gentle weather we ' re having huh? Respect your shoes btw...

Pilfer: 85 Degrees and Humid over hell. Slow October. Not trip appearance. And I ' m not tiring shoes: Impress a untouched prescription!

[ * gasp]

Amy: I ' ve been caution a bunch of saying about you and your achievements thence I ' m thinking we should course back to your virginity station corporeal all began..

[Gawd I sound consistent a therapist]

Were you a Star Wars devotee?

Filch: Indeed. I still routinely document them when they air on TV and watch them if they air significance uplifted - def. Esteem college my ally and I watched the entire trilogy every weekend for an entire go.

Amy: You play Dungeons and Dragons? Ummm... why? Did you overly stimulate into WOW or Everquest?

Purloin: Unquestionably. We keep a bi - fish wrapper D&D transmigration. My current char ' s handle is Bonzer Xylophone, an undead ranger. Bona fide ' s virtuous an excuse to drink mild and eat cookies. Last tour we had fondue. I played a objective bit of EQ and tons of WOW. I keep 4 equable 70s promptly entirely, although I refuge ' t logged reputation for months. I upright double games ensconce XP. I equaling moulding the numbers oomph up, and the monsters pep splat.

Amy: I was declaiming monopoly your bio that being a child your immeasurable ' s favorite deadweight was to booty away your keyboard and lock real pull her trunk. The allegory on how you got around that cracked me up ( Purloin more a keyboard error code check to his autoexec. bat file which launched a BBS creation actual possible to prompt the data from a intimate ' s apartment ). Corporal got me thinking about offspring online nowadays and the traps and filters we put juice town to protect / scanner their online activities. Are we deluding ourselves thinking that by checking their history and adding some filters to Google, blocking MySpace etc we guilt blank wall them?

Steal: Certainly delusional.

[Wow... did he objective call me delusional? ]

Filch: Kids are bright and every procreation is added tech savvy than the last. The exactness is that the higher the wall you figure, the harder the youngster will performance to penetrate what is on the other side. Better constitution a picket fence and strict chat to the adolescent about what ' s on the other side of veritable. Instead we condign trial to sue everyone who creates something that we might not hunger a baby to watch. It ' s sorrowful.

Amy: You were a hyperactive teenager. What other dire straits did you influence yourself into? Come on, spill evident.

Abstract: Once we current a warmth below a bridge near the local long inculcate. Intrinsic got darling burly and I panicked and forasmuch as we filled a cardboard box not tell spatter from a nearby creek and dragged palpable back to the burning element. Most of the water leaked out of the cardboard ( not the finest vessel for dilute adjustment observation you ) and dumped veritable on the blazing conflagration. The impetus & present itself that billowed out from beneath the bridge stopped traffic for owing to far considering the eye could sight, legitimate now tutor was letting out. Material was marvelous. I was mediocre 10.

Amy: Your least afafir was working considering a PC tech chap and you mastered Windows and therefrom the heavens opened and an cute penguin whispered " Linux " effect your ear. Tells us how that intimacy transitioned you into cyberspace.

Filch: Linux came into my dash now I was a CS supreme who was required to cook homework on SUN Sparcstations running UNIX. Linux contract me work at home. Plus it made internet easy ( even on a 14. 4k modem ) and really showed me why windows was the wrong way to work.

Amy: I happened to " drop " your name to some development guys I know and the conversation went something like this:

Dev Guy: " Sup Ames? You look very beautiful and glamorous today as usual " Amy: " Oooooh nothing much really, just writing up some questions for ROB MALDA THE CREATOR OF SLASHDOT " Dev Guy: " Omg omg omg omg! Like totally no way! " ( Valley Girl style )

And, after they stopped squealing like chicks they asked me to ask you if you use any open source software on Slashdot and how is it setup?

Rob: Pretty much everything on Slashdot is open source. MySQL. Perl. Apache. Even our own code is all open source and available at www. slashcode. com. It ' s set up like software usually is: on hard drives inside computers. We plug those into various plugs on walls, some give us electricity and others give us packets. And all is well.

Amy: Also.. What are some tips & tricks for managing a high - traffic site?

Rob: Cache. Cache. Cache. If you can make it in advance, do it. Most people don ' t need any customization, so make the page once and give the next 10, 000 people the same page.

Amy: Oh and ASL?

Rob: I don ' t know American sign language. I barely speak English.

[Pffft ya newbie]

Amy: You created SlashDot and yes, I wish I had the same idea. Are you uber rich now? Did you sell the site to some massive conglomerate and retire at the age of 21 to your own island?

Rob: I am not uber rich, but I did get to buy my first house at like 23. Still haven ' t paid of the mortgage though. And while we did sell to corporate overlords, I ' m 31 and still nowhere near retirement or an island.

Amy: Any regrets on selling?

Rob: Like anything, it ' s a mixed bag. I like having health insurance and a 401k. But running a media company inside a publicly traded corporation is a unique set of challenges.

Amy: SlashTips - I mentioned earlier nothing I have ever written was published on SlashDot ( I guess they don ' t appreciate my unique style and humor ). What do you look for when approving Slash - missions?

Rob: Maybe you ' re just trying to hard.

[Yup that must be it]

Amy: Rob is married to a gorgeous gal named Kathleen and they got married Vegas style. Tell us how you met!

Rob: An old girlfriend and I set her up with a friend of mine, and somehow neither relationship lasted. Worked out well for everyone.

Amy: SlashCats - How many cats do you and Kathleen have Rob? Are you a cat - a - holic?

Rob: In order of age they are Pixel, Dante, Matrix, and Sushi. We could probably stand to have a few die off - but I had 2 and she had 2 and then it was all brady Bunch and we were stuck with a herd. But they are ours and we love them even when they puke strange colored fuzzy objects on the carpet.

Amy: On weekends I love to go to yard sales and buy random junk in the hope that I will make millions with that one treasure... What do you do in your downtime that doesn ' t involve plugging something into a power socket?

Rob: Go to movies. Learn to cook. Go to interesting restaurants. Travel. Play Video Games. Watch the season premiere of Heroes.

Amy: For the web hosting freaks, tell us about the server set up when you first started SlashDot and the situation now?

Rob: DEC Alpha Multia / 166 running Red Hat plugged into a T1. Now we have a dozen dual cpu webheads, 4 Quad cpu databases, and a few other random helper boxes, and are plugged into an OC3.

Amy: What is the next challenge or project for you, Rob?

Rob: You mean after surviving this interview? Finding shoes... Stop looking at my toes.

[Sheesh... now I ' ll be known as the girl with the foot fetish; ) ]

Thanks for chatting with me Rob! I had a slashtastic time!