TweakTown
Encyclopedia
TweakTown is a company founded by Cameron Wilmot in the early 1990s and was dedicated to his late grandfather Val Grimm, who first introduced him to computers some 15 years earlier. The company featured a website that was officially named and launched to the public on 15 September 1999. Originally, TweakTown was known as "Wilmot's Website", which basically served as Mr. Wilmot's personal homepage
with information about him and links to other websites.
"tweaking
" (fine tuning or optimizing) guide for friends that were crawling along on slow 56k dialup Internet connections. By helping those friends that needed a little extra speed boost in online game
s to improve their ping (latency response time), the word quickly spread about how well the Modem Tweaking Guide improved performance.
Wilmot's Website was hosted by a local ISP
early in its infancy. They eventually kicked the site off their server for exceeding bandwidth
limits. By that time, Wilmot had also released additional tweaking guides for his growing audience. On 15 September 1999, Mr. Wilmot suddenly came up with the idea of renaming Wilmot's Website to "TweakTown" as it is known today.
During 2004, TweakTown became too large to handle alone and was officially registered in Australia
as Tweak Town Pty Ltd. TweakTown, formerly known as Wilmot's Website, eventually grew bigger and bigger at a rapid pace to the point where it was eventually adapted into a fully functional tech website, with talented writer
s and contributors dotted all over the world.
TweakTown is featured in many mainstream press magazines, newspapers and many high-profile websites such as Digg
, Gizmodo
, Engadget
, Slashdot
and Fark
on a regular basis and even on CNN
, The Screen Savers
and TechTV
. TweakTown's content is syndicated to thousands of readers through their RSS feeds as well as by Google News
, buy.com
and others. Presently, TweakTown provides content for other publications including GigaZone magazine, APC magazine, Atomic magazine
, PC PowerPlay
magazine and others.
TweakTown now posts many daily high quality news articles, reviews and guides from a long list of contributors and staff writers based around the world including Australia
, Taiwan
, United States
, United Kingdom
and Europe
.
Homepage
A home page or homepage has various related meanings to do with web sites:* It most often refers to the initial or main web page of a web site, sometimes called the front page ....
with information about him and links to other websites.
History
In the early 1990s Wilmot had a pretty good understanding of how to obtain peak performance out of 56k dial-up modems. With this knowledge, he decided to publish a modemModem
A modem is a device that modulates an analog carrier signal to encode digital information, and also demodulates such a carrier signal to decode the transmitted information. The goal is to produce a signal that can be transmitted easily and decoded to reproduce the original digital data...
"tweaking
Tweaking
Tweaking refers to fine-tuning or adjusting a complex system, usually an electronic device. Tweaks are any small modifications intended to improve a system....
" (fine tuning or optimizing) guide for friends that were crawling along on slow 56k dialup Internet connections. By helping those friends that needed a little extra speed boost in online game
Online game
An online game is a game played over some form of computer network. This almost always means the Internet or equivalent technology, but games have always used whatever technology was current: modems before the Internet, and hard wired terminals before modems...
s to improve their ping (latency response time), the word quickly spread about how well the Modem Tweaking Guide improved performance.
Wilmot's Website was hosted by a local ISP
Internet service provider
An Internet service provider is a company that provides access to the Internet. Access ISPs directly connect customers to the Internet using copper wires, wireless or fiber-optic connections. Hosting ISPs lease server space for smaller businesses and host other people servers...
early in its infancy. They eventually kicked the site off their server for exceeding bandwidth
Bandwidth (computing)
In computer networking and computer science, bandwidth, network bandwidth, data bandwidth, or digital bandwidth is a measure of available or consumed data communication resources expressed in bits/second or multiples of it .Note that in textbooks on wireless communications, modem data transmission,...
limits. By that time, Wilmot had also released additional tweaking guides for his growing audience. On 15 September 1999, Mr. Wilmot suddenly came up with the idea of renaming Wilmot's Website to "TweakTown" as it is known today.
During 2004, TweakTown became too large to handle alone and was officially registered in Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
as Tweak Town Pty Ltd. TweakTown, formerly known as Wilmot's Website, eventually grew bigger and bigger at a rapid pace to the point where it was eventually adapted into a fully functional tech website, with talented writer
Writer
A writer is a person who produces literature, such as novels, short stories, plays, screenplays, poetry, or other literary art. Skilled writers are able to use language to portray ideas and images....
s and contributors dotted all over the world.
Current operations
TweakTown has now transformed into one of the biggest and most successful technical media websites in the world, being accessed by millions of readers monthly.TweakTown is featured in many mainstream press magazines, newspapers and many high-profile websites such as Digg
Digg
Digg is a social news website. Prior to Digg v4, its cornerstone function consisted of letting people vote stories up or down, called digging and burying, respectively. Digg's popularity prompted the creation of copycat social networking sites with story submission and voting systems...
, Gizmodo
Gizmodo
Gizmodo is a technology weblog about consumer electronics. It is part of the Gawker Media network run by Nick Denton and is known for its up-to-date coverage of the technology industry, along with topics as broad as design; architecture; space and science....
, Engadget
Engadget
Engadget is a multilingual technology blog network with daily coverage of gadgets and consumer electronics. Though on appearance Engadget functions much like a blog and may be defined as such, much of its editorial content takes the form of an online magazine...
, Slashdot
Slashdot
Slashdot is a technology-related news website owned by Geeknet, Inc. The site, which bills itself as "News for Nerds. Stuff that Matters", features user-submitted and ‑evaluated current affairs news stories about science- and technology-related topics. Each story has a comments section...
and Fark
Fark
Fark is a community website created by Drew Curtis that allows members to comment on a daily batch of news articles and other items from various websites. As of June 2009, the site boasts approximately four million unique visitors per month, which puts it among the top 100 English language websites...
on a regular basis and even on CNN
CNN
Cable News Network is a U.S. cable news channel founded in 1980 by Ted Turner. Upon its launch, CNN was the first channel to provide 24-hour television news coverage, and the first all-news television channel in the United States...
, The Screen Savers
The Screen Savers
The Screen Savers was a live American TV show on TechTV. The show launched concurrently with the channel ZDTV on May 11, 1998. The Screen Savers originally centered around computers, new technologies, and their adaptations in the world...
and TechTV
TechTV
TechTV was a 24-hour cable and satellite channel based in San Francisco featuring news and shows about computers, technology, and the Internet. In 2004, it merged with the G4 gaming channel which ultimately dissolved TechTV programming...
. TweakTown's content is syndicated to thousands of readers through their RSS feeds as well as by Google News
Google News
Google News is a free news aggregator provided by Google Inc, selecting recent items from thousands of publications by an automatic aggregation algorithm....
, buy.com
Buy.com
Buy.com, Incorporated is an online retailer based in Aliso Viejo, California.Buy.com began by selling computers and electronics in 1997 and has since expanded into many other categories...
and others. Presently, TweakTown provides content for other publications including GigaZone magazine, APC magazine, Atomic magazine
Atomic (magazine)
Atomic is a monthly Australian magazine and online community dedicated to computing and technology, with an emphasis on gaming, modding and computer hardware. Atomic is marketed at technology enthusiasts and covers a number of topics that are not normally found in mainstream PC publications...
, PC PowerPlay
PC PowerPlay
PC PowerPlay is Australia's only dedicated PC games magazine. Also available in New Zealand, PC PowerPlay focuses on news and reviews for upcoming and newly released games on the Microsoft Windows platform. The magazine also reviews computer hardware for use on gaming computers...
magazine and others.
TweakTown now posts many daily high quality news articles, reviews and guides from a long list of contributors and staff writers based around the world including Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
, Taiwan
Taiwan
Taiwan , also known, especially in the past, as Formosa , is the largest island of the same-named island group of East Asia in the western Pacific Ocean and located off the southeastern coast of mainland China. The island forms over 99% of the current territory of the Republic of China following...
, United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
, United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
and Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
.