Founder
Chris Ravenscroft builds intentional products.
From early game studios to large-scale community platforms, Chris blends design taste with deep engineering to ship products that feel human.
Product strategy
Design systems
Engineering leadership
Early career. Chris began in the early 90s helping launch Atreid
Concept (later Kalisto), contributing to titles such as The Fifth Element before the
studio was acquired by Pearson/Mindscape. He then served as head of IT and managing
editor for Atari ST and video game magazines, building online entertainment services
and revenue streams. A stint writing BBS software with an internal DSL led to voice-based
forum work and an early move into networked products.
Networks & enterprise. In 1996 he joined a major telecom to develop
network management software, relocated to Southern California, and advanced into
software development and devops leadership—guiding an international team of over 100
people and securing patents along the way, experience that informs the reliability focus
in his later products.
Android community. In the early 2010s, Chris became prominent in the
Android scene, co-authoring tools like RootTools, building malware removal utilities,
and contributing to open-source projects that strengthened platform security and access.
VoilaWeb & communities. Chris founded VoilaWeb LLC in 1999 to deliver
rugged hosting under brands like HostingGroup and ReadySetHost. He launched Clic!Dev for
mass community hosting and militate.com, an early community with geo-location, blogs,
reputation, and revenue-sharing that joined Big-Boards in 2005.
Open platforms. He created nextBBS for multi-community installs and
led engineering for Zoints 1.0, federating profiles and tags across forums. Technical
writing and open-source contributions followed on his Nexus blog.
Today. Chris leads VoilaWeb’s modern products like AppDecoder and
Talky—macOS and web tools with privacy-aware design, pragmatic engineering, and a
human-first experience.
