Tim Whitfield: Building a Techy: How to put the tech in Techy, Part Two

For Part I of this blog, click here.

It was at this point that I got to explore the internet without the guidance of a teacher on the AOL Browser.  I was enamored by the shear pioneerism of the internet.  It was 1997, Yahoo was the major search engine, AOL was still the major Internet Service Provider and Juno was offering free email accounts.  Internet businesses were rising up left and right and I was determined to figure out what the fuss was all about.

As I stated before, the computer at my grandmother’s house was running Windows 3.1.  I couldn’t run the latest and the greatest from that Operating System so I borrowed the Windows 95 disks from school and installed it one night.  I then proceeded to install AOL and then Netscape Navigator.  I discovered a neat part of the Navigator suite called Composer.  It was a basic What You See Is What You Get webpage editor.  I created my first personal website using this powerful yet simple tool.  I was so proud of myself.

It wasn’t long before I started thinking about launching my own business.  Bear in mind that I was 13 at this time.  I had been watching PBS and there were some shows that talked about these young kids that started businesses.  That became my inspiration.  So in September of 1997 I started to create my business.

First thing I did was chose a name.  Whitfield Innovative Web Creations or WIWC for short. I went on and got some free web space from Hypermart with a url of WIWC.HYPERMART.COM.  I was ecstatic. 

My first client was Asbury Honey Farms.  The Asburys had approached me to help them build a website to sell honey.  As this was my first commercial account, I had no idea what I was doing.  I went to A World Wide Web Mall and purchased a hosting account and the domain name AsburyHoneyFarms.com, which I still own today for reasons of nostalgia.

My parents bought me Microsoft FrontPage ’97 for my Birthday and I used it to build the Asbury Honey Farms website.  I was able to make a nice profit of $70.00 on the deal.  Wow, what I could buy with $70.00 back then.  I think I bought bubble gum and a Sega Saturn game.  The rest went into savings.  Yes, by this point Mario and Luigi had been retired and replaced by Sonic the Hedgehog.  So goes the cycle of the world.

WIWC was becoming fun.  I worked with Plainsburg Elementary School on their site and a few other pet projects of some friends around school.  I think being in the 8th grade, running the school newspaper and talent show and finding time to run a business was a little much, but looking back now, I see that being overwhelmed and stressed is the environment that I thrive in to this day.  This was also the year that I found Disneyland. Disneyland, for those that don’t know me, is my home away from home.  The wife and I like to head down there every two months or more often.  We even own a part of it through the Disney Vacation Club.  We also like Walt Disney World, but can’t go there as often.  We’re averaging every two years.

Next time I’ll talk about the first computer I ever owned, the Redneck Luggage and the ill fated short lived Innovative Computing Technology Solutions (ICTS).

Part Three