Point site born of mishandled purchase

In its first 10 hours online, the USG's new website point.princeton.edu — which contains information ranging from Dinky times to campus events — received about 2,600 individual user log-ons and 8,800 hits, USG President Matt Margolin '05 said.

But along the road to its launch, Point has encountered some financial bumps, dating back to its formative phases.

The site's forerunner, find.princeton.edu site, was created by Matt Stack '04 and only provided information about eating club events.

Last year, the USG purchased Find from Stack for $3,000 to "keep it going so that students could still use all the great features it offered," Margolin said. "We didn't want the site to disappear after [Stack] graduated."

Margolin asked USG Webmaster Clay Bavor '05 to renovate and improve the Find site. The USG planned to pay Bavor $600 for this work.

Bavor turned to Jamie Niemasik '06, David Kaplan '06 and Darsh Ranjan '05 to help him renovate the site as part of a project for COS 333: Advanced Programming Techniques.

Upon returning to the University this fall, Bavor said he thought the site far exceeded expecations, but that much remained to be done.

He asked Margolin and the USG to help secure an additional $9,000 to $10,000 to pay for a dedicated server and to compensate him and the three computer science majors for hundreds of hours of work that would be required to complete the site.

Clay explained that a website like the one he had made — with 19,352 lines of code — would normally cost $40,000 to $100,000, a figure Margolin said was confirmed by OIT.

Security provisions provided the greatest hurdle in designing the site, and Point eventually made access available with University user names and passwords.

"We had to make sure that Tilghman's password couldn't just get out in the open," Bavor explained. "The site is the product of five design revisions and about 400 hours of work . . . It's really been a hobby and a part-time job."

Margolin asked Vice President for Student Life Janet Dickerson for the additional funding. Margolin said Dickerson believed the site would be a valuable addition to student life and agreed to give Bavor $3,000.

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Dickerson could not be reached for comment.

Margolin then proposed that the USG supplement Dickerson's funds with $1,000. The USG agreed to the plan in a vote on Nov. 6.

Bavor said he is planning a number of additions to the site including P-Bay — "similar to E-Bay but for Princeton." Bavor continues to maintain the site from his computer. The site averages 6,500 hits a day and has had almost no down time — periods when the site is not functional.

Bavor said he was excited about the project because it would "keep students aware of all the great things happening off of Prospect."

Though Margolin is pleased with Point, he said the purchase of Find was mismanaged and poorly planned by the previous USG leadership.

"When I was a U-Councilor, I voted for [the purchase] because I was really excited about the Find site, but I was presented with the wrong information," he explained.

Find cost $1,500 for the computer that housed the site and $1,500 for the site code.

"We don't know where the computer is," Margolin said.

Bavor also said the only part of Find carried over to Point were the eating club icons.

"It was really pretty inexpensive and practical to pay [Bavor] that amount," Margolin said. "This year, we are doing a very good job making sure we don't waste USG funds."

And Margolin added that he believed it was a wise investment.

"This campus operates by word of mouth, email and posters. We have 400 student groups and eating clubs," he said. "It is great to finally have one location where students can find all the information."

Stack also complimented the design and layout of the new site and said he was "pleased to see they took it to the next level."

"It is definitely better than the main Princeton web site," he added.

However, Stack said he was disappointed at the lack of recognition of his "original team," including his roommate and members of the track team, who helped design earlier Princeton student portals.

"[Point] is a fantastic work, but it builds on the work of many others who came before. It would have been nice to have more credit," Stack said. "The things on the site that I would say are truly original ideas are the Dinky times and events calendar."

Stack, who was also webmaster for the Class of 2004, the Student Agencies, Health Services, Office of Dean of Undergraduate Students, Cap and Gown Club and Disiac, said he was frustrated by the lack of University support he received while running the Find site.

"I had a seven-computer cluster in my room to run all the sites I was managing, but I didn't receive any University resources," Stack explained. "I didn't care about my personal funding. I cared about resources."