411mania.com started out as a tiny little Geocities website in August of 1996. Founder Ashish Pabari created the site with little knowledge of website design and no experience with basic website tools such as HTML. The original site featured nothing except a single column by Ashish and hell, that column didn’t even have line breaks until ’97!

Word of mouth slowly built for the site, along with the divine intervention of Dinferno, and people started visiting in big numbers.

At the end of 1997 and start of 1998, the internet was a hot place to be. Everything was booming. Millions of new people were discovering the ‘net each day, and many of them found their way to 411. 411 moved on from Geocities to other shady homes (MDK anyone?) and eventually to its own domain. It was a proud day for 411 when the site finally shed the long URLs for its own domain. Traffic boomed, and the site grew.

Few journeys, however, are complete without some hurdles. As the year turned to 2001, the dotcom bubble burst. 411 resorted to losing money daily as Ashish paid money out of his pocket to keep the site alive. But where there is a will, there is a way, and 411 would soon grow to new heights. As the years went by, 411 continued to expand. Soon new sections popped up and dozens of new writers came to share their voices via 411. It became normal to hear about 411mania.com on channels such as MTV, ESPN, or VH1. It became normal to see 411mania.com signs being held up during TV broadcasts that aired on channels such as the USA Network and SpikeTV. It became normal to see 411mania.com mentioned in publications such as ESPN The Magazine, Yahoo! WebBound, The Houston Chronicle, and Maxim Magazine.

And that brings us to the present. 411 continues to set traffic records on a nearly monthly basis. Founder Ashish Pabari remains at the helm, over a decade after founding 411, continuing to evolve the site to new heights.

For a full list of the current staff, head over to the 411 Family Tree.