MountainZone.com, the site that introduced a generation of mountain sports enthusiasts to a completely new way of getting news, interviews and authentic information, is still cranking. From the ashes of the dot-com meltdown, MountainZone.com has emerged, still breathing and eager to fly high, but somewhat battered and broken at present. Stay with us, though, as the famous Zone is once again in the hands of the people who first created it, people who remain committed to bringing to this loyal audience the kind of definitive mountain sports reporting that changed everything in the late '90s.

There are more than 10,000 pages of features, news, and expedition coverage on MountainZone.com, but there are also plenty of broken links, missing audio and video files, unworkable features and other annoyances and frustrations. Check back frequently in the weeks to come, however, as the existing site is rebuilt and exciting new content posted. It's going to take some time, but MountainZone.com aspires to once again reach the same high standards it set years ago, and to get there quickly.

Many of you in our huge audience might well ask, "What happened, anyway?" From 1996 to mid-2000, MountainZone.com invented a kind of coverage and community that never before existed: a central place for climbers, mountain bikers, skiers, snowboarders, hikers and adventure racers to come and find out what was really happening. During those formative years, MountainZone.com brought you historic moments such as the discovery of George Mallory's body on Mount Everest, the first Olympic snowboard competition in history, live reporting of historic adventure races, the live action of Ed Viesturs on five 8,000-meter peaks, comprehensive real-time coverage of ski and mountain bike competitions, the intelligent commentary of Dave Hahn, and a roster of athlete interviews unrivaled anywhere.

But the economics of the web industry at the turn of the millennium resulted in an inevitable consolidation. MountainZone.com was purchased in April of 2000 by a "digital sports entertainment company" called Quokka Sports, Inc. The company, which hoped to build a sports portal covering everything from auto racing to soccer, was forced to file for bankruptcy protection in April of 2001.

The financial failure of Quokka saddened many of us who had struggled to build MountainZone.com into the premier mountain sports site. So with faith, and hard work, certain assets of MountainZone.com are being successfully extricated from the bankruptcy proceedings.

So we're back at it, and we're hard at it, but it's not going to be easy. Give us a few months to rework and streamline the site, to find our old stringers and correspondents now somewhere deep in the mountains, to rekindle old relationships and build new ones.

Our pledge to you is to never settle for less than what we know MountainZone.com can be.

— MountainZone.com Staff