From the vault
This interview first appeared online at Niphal.com.
Since then, the world has changed and things have moved on. It is replicated here for historic interest including associated imagery.
Links are provided to the closest view of the site as you would have seen at the time, using my favourite internet archive site Archive.orged.
Niphal: Welcome to Niphal, it’s great to have you here.
Thankyou kindly.
Just for all our listeners out there, would you care to introduce yourself? Who are you, what do you do?
We are Ben and Karen Beilharz, people who are married to each other and (just quietly) enjoy student administration most of the time. This is fortunate because we like each other and are employed in student administration. Works out quite nicely. Ben is only in student administration until he starts with the Ministry Training Strategy next year. Karen is probably there until babies.
What is Hippocampusextensions and why have such a long name?
Hippocampus Extensions is primarily an ezine that we publish every two months. Each issue tries to be specific about some area in which our knowledge of God should change the way we think and act. In addition, we both blog and host other resources such as the World’s Great Sermons. Karen publishes her creative writing as well.
Why have such a long name? If you have a long name people will think you are very clever. We are very clever so it’s only fair that people are warned early on.
With only two years behind you, you are bringing out some great design and content, how did you get so good so quickly or were you just good all along?
(Ben) I could break the “just good all along” myth quite easily if Angelfire still had a copy of my first site: Fatima Allsorts’ Fat Portions. The name was by far the best thing about it. I think my personality is suited to web design in that I’m shy and pedantic with a perfectionist streak. Things like XHTML validity, separation of style and structure and accessibility appeal to that kind of personality. And it’s fun. In terms of content, we’ve both had the privelege of excellent Bible teaching over the last couple of years and been part of a Christian writer’s group which has been invaluable.
Do you think that the Internet is a medium through which Christ is being proclaimed loudly? (If not why not, if so, how does your site fit into this?)
You can only proclaim something loudly on the internet if you already have an audience that respects what you have to say. 100,000 Christian sites aren’t going to proclaim Christ any louder than one 1 site is, that’s one of the amazing things about the internet. The only advantage to there being more than one site is that different things will be attractive to different people. If our site is attractive to some people we hope that it will help them in practical godliness and wisdom.
What originally was it that motivated you to publish your work on the Internet?
(Ben) One word: Pookenhole. It may not look like the most inspirational page but it is the reason I’m here today.
(Karen) Ben.
Are there any Christian sites that you visit frequently that you think are a valuable resource for Christians online?
(Ben) I think the blogging community in general is a valuable resource. It exposes us to so many different personalities who are grappling with different elements of the truth in different ways. Other than that I mainly use the big ones like the Bible Gateway and Crosswalk.com’s Bible Tools.
(Karen) I find Matthias Media’s Web Extra section quite useful. And I like reading the Anglican Media site for information about what’s been happening – particularly Southern Cross and Culture@home.