In Memory of Mike Magee (1949-2024) and Our Best Wishes to The Register, Which He Founded in the 1990s
Mike Magee founded quite a few important tech sites. The best known one is The Register. He died this past summer and as far as we can tell The Register didn't even mention that, only Nick Farrell (his friend) did this informal piece (not an ordinary obituary). We wanted to write about this at the time, but I do not know Magee in person, I never met the guy, but despite that I have a lot of respect for him. I've known about him for a very long time. I nearly sent him E-mail at one point. Now it's too late.
The Register's Editor in Chief recently approached me and I brought up the subject. The reason I respect if not admire Magee a great deal is his approach to writing. Basically, he said it very unequivocally; he disapproves the way The Register was run after he had left. He created an alternative (similar to LXer after Linux Today; same founder), but it went offline completely. That was a few years ago. They did not explain why. Instead of The Register it was called The INQUIRER (or "INQ") and its writing style was unique, referring to Microsoft as "the Vole"... because who needs "professionalism" (suit-and-tie superficiality) anyway?
Months have passed since Magee died (August 11). I cannot say anything about him, I can only quote things sites/people say about him. It was actually health problems that were his Achilles heel. They say he's lucky to have survived till the age of 74.
To be clear, I'm not against The Register, but I think it used to be a lot better until around 20 years ago (actually "biting the hand that feeds IT", not just saying it). About a decade ago The Register helped expose EPO corruption and when the EPO's management bullied me over it it was The Register - not the BBC - that exposed such an attack on journalism (Kieran covered it). I'm told Kieran has since then had a career change, but that's too personal to get into.
With or without Kieran, who is still appreciated by EPO staff, the existing staff at The Register surges forward, boosted by good recruits like Liam.
We fondly follow The Register and if we express concerns (habitually) it is because we care. Fellow associates of mine agree that the site, The Register, did improve a bit in recent years. █