Editing History of Signal Cartel (section)

== The Beginnings ==

The story of Signal Cartel cannot be told without first talking about [https://wiki.eveuniversity.org/Thera Thera].  Thera was introduced to EVE Online with the [https://community.eveonline.com/releases/rhea Rhea] expansion on December 9th, 2014.  The impending launch of Thera was the catalyst that led [https://evewho.com/character/95158478 Johnny Splunk] and [https://evewho.com/character/95142600 G8keeper] to co-found [https://evewho.com/corporation/98361601 EvE-Scout] as a neutral service corporation tasked with publicly documenting the ever-changing wormhole connections to and from this hub system. As a result, [http://www.eve-scout.com/ eve-scout.com] was born which provides a live updated listing of all wormhole connections to Thera.<ref name="Live Updated Thera Connections">[https://www.reddit.com/r/Eve/comments/2p4eac/live_updated_thera_connections_we_scan_so_you/ Live updated Thera Connections We scan so you don't have to EvE-Scout]</ref> According to Johnny, "I still remember the first time I traversed into Thera and the following week of maintaining the connections in Thera with our co-founder G8keeper. We would take shifts between sleeping, real life, and scanning Thera. It was stressful and exhilarating: some of the best parts of EVE!"<ref name="SOTS #12">[https://forums.eve-scout.com/topic/4990/state-of-the-signal-12 State of the Signal #12]</ref>

However, Johnny and G8keeper soon realized that the endeavor was not sustainable with just two of them.  Fortunately, volunteers from the greater EVE community were eager to help scan Thera's wormholes as scouts.<ref name="Talking in Stations - 8 April 2018">[https://www.talkinginstations.com/2018/04/tis-04-08-18-signal-cartel/ Signal Cartel, Talking in Stations]</ref> In an effort to maintain the corp's neutrality, the original Thera scouts were not permitted to join EvE-Scout. Johnny stated, "When we launched the Thera scanning project we wanted to provide neutral information to all of New Eden. Not to favor one group over another. Our scouts were not even able to join our corporation (EvE-Scout). We only accepted out-of-corp scouts. The reason was we could disavow our scout's other activities and while at the same time allow us to attract scouts without them leaving their existing corp."<ref name="Johnny">[https://www.reddit.com/r/signalcartel/comments/348y3g/anoikis_division/ Johnny on Signal Cartel Subreddit]</ref> Due to EvE-Scout's dedicated and trusted scout team, the service became the de facto source of Thera wormhole connection information. <ref name="Live Updated Thera Connections">[https://www.reddit.com/r/Eve/comments/2p4eac/live_updated_thera_connections_we_scan_so_you/ Live updated Thera Connections We scan so you don't have to EvE-Scout]</ref>