moto.nnov.ru was the site of a Nizhny Novgorod shop selling motorcycle and bicycle parts, operating in the Nizhny Novgorod domain zone nnov.ru. In the nn.ru directory it was listed under the name "Moto&Velo" with the description "Sale of parts for motorcycles and bicycles"; on the page itself the owner signed differently — "World of Moto&Velo Parts"[1]. The surviving snapshot of the home page is dated May 11, 2011, and the last snapshot of the site in the web archive is dated March 2, 2014[3].
What the home page looked like
The home page was organized as a feed of product news: the heading "Moto-velo parts: news," below it seven short notices dated from October 1 to December 23, 2010, each with a "[ more... ]" link and a link to "[ news archive >>> ]"[1]. A separate line carried the note "last updated 27-04-2011 12:34" — two weeks before the web archive captured the page[1].
The right-hand column gathered the whole service set typical of a small online shop of that era: an invitation to "Order parts in our online shop," a "Get your discount!" block, a subscription form "for site news and price list," a "Send link to a friend" button, and an "On-line consultation" with ICQ number 577916628[1]. Wholesale buyers were offered a separate program — as the home page put it, "We offer a program for wholesale buyers," with a link to a 624 KB file[1]. At the bottom stood the copyright line "World of Moto&Velo Parts" and the credit — Designed by "Step"[1].
What was sold
Despite the domain name and the directory category, by 2010 the assortment had gone far beyond motorcycle and bicycle equipment. The home page news offered parts for the "Buran," "Taiga," and "Rys" snowmobiles, rowing boats from Ufa and Yaroslavl[1], as well as garden and clearing equipment: the ST1076BS snow blower, the Champion GBV326S petrol two-stroke leaf blower/shredder, the Champion AG 252 earth auger, and the Champion GC 243 mini cultivator[1].
Motorcycle equipment proper was represented in this lineup by a single item — the Cobra 125 Crossfire motorcycle, for which an engine description was given: "Engine type: four-stroke, single-cylinder," with an overhead-valve valvetrain[1]. The most detailed listing turned out to be a children's sled: load capacity up to 50 kg, frame made of 16 mm steel tube, runners of 50 mm formed strip, seat of natural wood[1]. Such a range — from snowmobile parts to sleds — is typical of a shop that maintained seasonal turnover and built out its assortment for winter and the dacha season.
Place in the Nizhny Novgorod internet
The site came to the attention of the Nizhny Novgorod internet through the nn.ru directory: that is where its listing and its Counter.nn.ru counter figure of 557 come from (on how these figures were collected and what they mean, see the Archival study of the Nizhny Novgorod internet from the counter.nn.ru rating). In the surviving results table of the Nizhny Novgorod Internet Day vote of 2004, the domain moto.nnov.ru does not appear[2]; no votes for it are recorded in our data.
For the Nizhny Novgorod Internet, moto.nnov.ru is an example of the "second tier": not a portal or a community, but the storefront of a specific retail outlet, held together by a self-updated news feed, a price-list subscription, and consultations over ICQ. Neither a postal address nor a phone number is given on the surviving home page — the only means of contact besides the subscription and order forms is the ICQ number[1].
How it closed
Judging by the snapshot, the site was still alive by the spring of 2011: the last update is marked late April 2011, and the product news ran through the end of December 2010[1]. The further history of the domain breaks off in our data: the last snapshot of the home page in the web archive is dated March 2, 2014[3], after which the address stops responding. Where the shop moved, or whether it operates under another address, cannot be established from the surviving material.
Sources
- web.archive.org — Home page, 2011 (archive)
- web.archive.org — Voting results of the Day of the Nizhny Novgorod Internet, 2004 (archive)
- web.archive.org — Last snapshot of the home page, 2014 (archive)