History of PaGaLGuY.com

[pagalguy]

Why PaGaLGuY.com !???

For a long while I have used the nickname Maverick and its various iterations; mostly MaVer|ck - one fine day I wanted a domain name for myself. Why ? Um.. Basically didn't want to use hotmail or any webmail for emails. Wanted POP email access .. and I couldn't get the domain name maverick.com !!! Ok .. that was out of the way .. so after a lil discussion with my sisters settled on - pagalguy.com - mainly to use my email ID at pagalguy.com

Did I have plans for the domain name ? NOPE. I didn't even want a personal site there. I am a stickler for privacy and having too much info on me on any site wasn't my way

Why the forum ?

Once upon a time there was a forum where a couple of CAT aspirants used to hang around. It was called Sify forums and boy the bunch who used to frequent there was a super loyal bunch

I was never a fan of yahoo groups, except for one yahoo group of the name 'mbamatters'. Used to have decent CAT discussion. But having been used to larger forums for computers and related stuff, I just couldn't make do with the sify forums - Check it out at:

http://clubs.sify.com/CAT_2002/index.asp?cbid=OTMy
http://clubs.sify.com/MBA2002/index.asp?cbid=OTgx
(Now the above links are invalid)

The major gripe was lack of a decent search, quoting and err..well .. lets just say I never liked it ! Who says hate never brings up anything good in life .. This forum is simply a manifestation of the extreme hatred I had begun to harbor against the above forum

Couldn't resist - I had to install a forum and show the junta an alternative existance and the feel of a 'propah' forum ! First thoughts - "where do I install such a forum ??" "I don't want to shell out more money for a new MBA related domain name " "... phir bhi .. who is going to visit the forum anyway" .. just on a whim I installed the forum software on pagalguy.com and IM'd my friend who was online proudly stating that I had created a new forum - she went - "Forum ? Woh kya hota hai?" - she is pagalneha . She looked at the forum and announced - "mujhe kuch samajh mey nahi aa raha hai" .. I did try to guide her through the forum .. but it was too much at that point. I guess I realized at that moment, that the interface is not something our junta would get used to - as it hadn't been seen earlier.

Now I did mention that I wasn't a yahoo group fan .. so no publicity there. I headed straight to sify forums and posted the URL. Half didn't believe the URL and the other half thought I was crazy .. so here I was .. a lonely forum which no one knew about and a crazy URL to boot !

Boy was I wrong about people and their ability to adapt. 22 days into the forum we had exceeded 1000 posts! From my perspective - that was STUPENDOUS. People found out that calling me pagalguy was 'tough' and accordingly snipped my nick to 'PG'.


We started out as a forum with a single category. Only the CAT section. No chit-chat , no other exams. Nothing - Just one category. I believed that we could always grow as we needed and that attitude kept us in good stead. My first post was at -

http://www.pagalguy.com/cat/showthread.php?t=1 (Welcome :))

The first time the talk of a new category like chit-chat came up, the first person to support the cause was - capreal26 . He said we needed the chit-chat forum so that after graduating from bschools we guys could be in touch ! He is one person who has been rather quiet on the forums, but has been in touch with me constantly regarding the way the forum evolved. Today, the forum also owes quite a lot to him for constantly bringing issues to my notice and keeping the larger issue in mind - trust me, very few people can actually do that

The forum had started in Sept 2002 and by Feb 2003, we had overgrown our needs. Posts had crossed 10K and we were growing in a rather slow and steady manner. The only way people had access to the forum was knowing the full URL - http://www.pagalguy.com/cat/ . If you didn't know the URL, you couldn't access the site because the forum was not linked to the main page. So I reckon we added 1.5K users by way of being famous on yahoo groups and due to word of mouth ! A huge challenge - but we stuck the guns on not letting the forum go 'public' as we were rather afraid of quality degradation.

Somewhere around this time we were regularly checking for what the junta needs. The first requirement was a file uploading setup , Chat system etc etc. I was able to slowly able upgrade the setup to include all of them. The influx of messages had caught us on the wrong foot and the forum had grown beyond me .. The junta voted for anil and uRmad to be the moderators for the forum. Needless to say both have done a stellar job as mods - considering I don't pay them a penny Barkha became the mod for the Chit-Chat section. At a later stage, she decided to quit the forum in a rather unceremonious fashion. She deleted herself. Reason - Her impending marriage - I guess. I never got an explanation for that act. From that day onwards, none of the mods of that far reaching abilities on the forum. For me, I felt betrayed. What if one of the users..or else.. I had been deleted ? - a piece of story I wouldn't like to discuss further on - but yes, a part of the forum folklore

As a moderator the most stretched and stressed guy has been anil. He has single handedly kept the forum clean by the incisive post editing, removing of double posts, the double threads etc. I have to admit, anil has modded way more than I or anyone else have Anil bhai deserves a bow for the relentless work he has put in here !

As the forum grew ..so did our aspirations . After the final results for all the bschools were out - we checked with the junta on what should be the next destination for the forum - The discussion can be seen at : http://www.pagalguy.com/cat/showthread.php?t=707 (The next step for PG forums)

Loads and loads were discussed, but right now I would consider it - almost a failure. Reasons ? Well - I am not sure where we went wrong and/or if we could've done it better in any other manner.

Ok.. a major surprise for you guys. We upgraded the forum gazillions of times, but I have kept a copy of our old forums for nostalgic reasons . Check out the below link - Thats our old forum before being upgraded it in Feb 2003

http://69.72.242.67/cat/


Sizzling fast, but no bells and whistles as the current forum has .. I had kept its existance a secret .. but I just wanted you guys to take a look and see the difference yourselves as to how much we've grown in terms of functionality and 'beauty'

Many guys have contributed tremendously to the initial growth of the forum. That'd include gnkumar_guru , ravi, bingo, bharathram, gaurav k and loads of others. But these guys were there in EACH and EVERY CAT related thread - SIM analysis and had pretty much cemented the place as a hardcore CAT addicts arena

I may have forgotten names here, but I know everyone who has significantly contributed to the forum and my heartiest thanks to the dudes/dudettes! What is a forum without its junta ? NOTHING. We've been lucky to have the best people in our midst. Now that is something the junta now needs to maintain

Cheers,

[puneet]

Great post pg ... Not read a latest post which came close to this 1... i think it's all about patience and persistence... ok ... so most of the initial memebrs were from sify grps , yahoo... hmmmm now that many of them r in b schools n moved on as most of them are not to b seen , i get ur point regarding future of pg.com ... i.e current members role in the future... motivation behind staying on ... valid pts ... something to discuss in the future ... as for now , we know how it all began ... lets see what other initial members have to contibute ...

[qwezark]

Nice to note the background finally.. the links to the older versions and posts were especially cool. Keep up the Gud work PG.. (i always called u that way)..jus joined a month back already feel at home.

[Absolutely Agent]

Stages of publicity

1) Sify forum <PG posted the link there>
2) Word of Mouth <anil brought me here...and many other brought their pals>
3) Cat-2003 <mecca for cat-aspirant.....>
4) IMS flash mob <shub where are thou>
5) PG made Googlable <It took 1 year for us to convince PG to do this ......"online dating girls in pune" ....do we have any regrets ?? >
6) What Next ???

[pagalguy]

5) PG made Googlable <It took 1 year for us to convince PG to do this ......"online dating girls in pune" ....do we have any regrets ?? >

C'mon .. our intentions were to keep quality and the issue running on the back of my mind was server resource usage We're pushing 1GB of data a DAY now. Last February, during CAT results, we were pushed 1.8GB or so in the entire MONTH

But yes, luckily we've been able to maintain quality and its always nice to see that the maximum number of searches are for "pagalguy" - Almost 8% of the searches ! So i guess its still word of mouth

[snan]

Wow

[pagalguy]

3) Cat-2003 <mecca for cat-aspirant.....>

Another major boost for us. For those who came in late .. , Anil ran that group and included the forum URL in all the messages!

But there even came a time when he removed the link because even he felt the forum quality was taking a hit ! .. So you guys .. its not a perfect science running this place - but most often its the concern of the people which ensures its constant growth and quality

[MavericK]

Originally Posted by pagalguy

Another major boost for us. For those who came in late .. , Anil ran that group and included the forum URL in all the messages!

Hey man.. I still run (?) that group!

[Chandoo]

Originally Posted by anil

Hey man.. I still run (?) that group!

anil... you still what??

Hey PG... great great post yaar. Even though i know most of it, It was awe inspiring to hear (read) it from horse's mouth(keybaord). And yeah, we can continue the discussion about the 'Future of forum and its how its alumni can contribute to it'. But lemme become one first.

Goodday ,
Chandoo

[Indyan]

Originally Posted by pagalguy

Why PaGaLGuY.com !???


I was never a fan of yahoo groups, except for one yahoo group of the name 'mbamatters'. Used to have decent CAT discussion. But having been used to larger forums for computers and related stuff, I just couldn't make do with the sify forums - Check it out at:

http://clubs.sify.com/CAT_2002/index.asp?cbid=OTMy
http://clubs.sify.com/MBA2002/index.asp?cbid=OTgx

The major gripe was lack of a decent search, quoting and err..well .. lets just say I never liked it ! Who says hate never brings up anything good in life .. This forum is simply a manifestation of the extreme hatred I had begun to harbor against the above forum

Cheers,

Hiii PG ,
Nice Post Mate .In fact i was a witness to whatever you have described above.I was moderating the yahoogroup cat2k2 , which was popular among junta last year .Thought I an add my two cents to this .

One fine day , just two weeks after CAT in 2002 ,I was browsing lazily in a Satyam i-Way in Chennai and the message I had always dreaded came to my inbox .It was from Shubh001 , one of the popular members in cat2k2 .

From: "Pach" <shub001@softhome.net>
Date: Wed Dec 4, 2002 4:05 pm
Subject: http://www.pagalguy.com/cat



Hi,
This is yet another site about CAT. It might be helpful for your GD/PI and other CAT related queries. check it out
http://www.pagalguy.com/cat


__________________________________________________ ____
Shub001@yahoo..com






.Though cat2k2 was popular and quite useful , i knew if somone devised a new format for more fruitful/useful discussions we will have a member drain .Cat2k2 had 800+ members but had some inherent disadvantages like simultaneous replies by many users for the same question, spamming ,flaming ,wild arguments about many topics that were not related to the topic and so on.When I saw that message , I rejected it thinking that it was irrelevant and couldnt connect it much to CAT.Anyway I visited the link, and the moment it loaded I knew we may have to shut the shop(cat2k2) and this forum is going to score over cat2k2.It had quite a decent format with a separate thread for each discussion , a search functionality where the results were more relevant , an option to see replies to your thread .In a yahoogroup whether you are interested or not all the mails come to your mailbox ,just clog in and you have to go through them rather unnecessarily and many of those mails may not be useful to you.

Well, when I logged in a PGite <a href="http://www.pagalguy.com/cat/profile.php?mode=viewprofile&u=91">archie</a> was online, I havent seen her much after that.She told me the forum was created by a guy who called himself Pagalguy(Our PG) and it was very useful and interactive forum for CAT aspirants .(She was the first PG Addict I talked to).I browsed through all the messages and couldnt help but admire the forum.Mailed this guy (PG) and congratulated him on this new forum.After three days I got a reply from him telling that the number of registered members has increased thanks to the mail by Shubh.PG had around 120+ members then and I feel around 200+ members from cat2k2 joined here like arun,adiieu,philiptj,girish,manduks,kunalrana,lynd on,prasanna etc...(CAT VETERANS).U can see them in the introduction messages in the link How You came to know about PG Forums?

http://www.pagalguy.com/cat/viewtopi...hlight=pgforum

It is the momentum and quality of the members that carries any forum forward and I had been a PG addict from that day though in different avatars .I became a PGAddict along with many of my group members