Hello Racers,

Today I present you an interview with which could have been held in a language I’m hopefully speaking better than English. But then again 95% of my readers wouldn’t understand much so we did it in English. He’s a friendly and nice guy, and when he’s up to speed hard to catch.

Say hello to Bismarck!

Hello Bismarck, thx for joining this little Interview

Please present yourself to your audience!
My name is Sören Schneider and thank god (Jan) I can make this interview before I will be 30, but as this is quite some time away I am still 29! :)
I was born in Cottbus/Germany and since a week I live in Munich/Bavaria and work as a consultant / software-engineer.

Please explain us why did you choose Bismarck as nickname.
When I started playing computer games in the mid 90's I needed a name that's 8 chars long, because of MS-DOS restrictions. It should sound strong and serious. We also got taught about Bismarck (the first German chancellor who united Germany in 1871) in our history lessons in school at that time.
In LFS I learned that foreign people often think of the German warship "Bismarck", when they hear the name, so if I had to choose a new one, I would take "Ethicist" nowadays, based on some characters of the "Riverworld", a series of science fiction books written by Philip José Farmer. (READ IT!!!)

What did you wanted to do when you were a little boy, what are you doing now?
I always wanted to grow up and as you can see I reached my target. :)
I never had a real idea, what I want to be, because I was too busy, playing with my computer.
So I still play with my computer and finally get some money for it.

Well, we all know that LFS takes its time, but I'm sure that you still have other hobbies. Please tell us about them.
Well, reading Sci-Fi-books makes me happy from time to time. Ringworld from Larry Niven and stuff from Stephen Baxter is very interesting. Playing poker online gets boring, so I play real tournaments from time to time.
So now when I earn some money I can possibly visit some casinos soon and get rich. ;)

Another addiction from me is enjoying Grand Theft Auto. I don't speak about violence, I think of the great atmosphere in it. If you are interested in what i mean, have a look at the movies here  and here .

Please complete the following sentence: "Since I play Live for Speed..."
"…I wasted too much time with it.""

What is the special thing that keeps you playing Live for Speed?
The memories to races, people and events and the hope, that there will be some huge steps forward in the next years in the immersion of Racing (sound, handling, feedback, atmosphere) in LFS, because LFS is far from being perfect, but there is simply no better alternative atm.

What do you not so like about LFS?
Personally I am really scared, that LFS is professionalized to death and supercharged with hundreds of options, that can only be handled by a small elitistical minority, instead of progressing in the (in my opinion) four main problem areas: Sound, Damage, Collision detection, handling at low speed.

One thing that really pisses me off is the disabled "can reset" option as default setting. If I am stuck in a gravel pit in lap 2/20, because I get kicked, I don't accept that I just watch the rest of the race from the tribune. There should be limits on the way to realism in simulations. Else we end up, that we can't race no more in LFS because we don't have the money to repair our cars or to buy fuel.

How did you find Live for Speed, in other words: Who was the pusher? ;)
I always searched for a street car simulation with realistic handling, that is not based on F1 or Nascar. So I found, what I had searched for at that time. The online experience was an additional gift, I did not had in my mind at that time.

What was your most memorable time in LFS?
My most memorable times in LFS were definitely offside the track! There are two events, that always change my mind, when I again think about leaving the team, because lack of time or motivation.

There is on the one hand the visit of the Games Convention 2005 with Bernd (BBO), where I met "Vykos" and "DasBoeseC".

On the other hand the meeting at Fordie's home at the first T7R birthday party.
First shock was meeting two (at this point) completely foreign people (Jan and Bernd) from the internet at the airport in Berlin. I had a picture from Bernd, so I was prepared, but Jan looked completely different as I had him in my mind at that point. :)
Later I kicked all my imaginations, how my team mates might look in real life, when I had met Dave, Lippy, Dean, Shaun and Tristan.
There were so many memorable events in these 3 days, like the discussion with Dean regarding main sponsors (with his naked arguments), hanging lazy around in Shaun's couches looking motorsports and British comedians (Lee Evans) in TV, touring through the English pubs, drinking water ;) and playing billiard. Sleeping in the children's room and watching
Shaun ironing our T7R-Shirts. Nothing will be more memorable than these things!!!

Again another huge THX for this event to everyone, who made it possible.

What made you choose T7R?
T7R has chosen me. Fordie asked me and explained what's the idea behind T7R and that suited me well. Not to have the pressure to race and win, but to have fun and friendship.

Please tell us something about your LFS History!
I started with LFS in September 2002, drove some of the first seasons of André's OLFSL, met Fordman, SolarHydro, Basem, NoTron, and many many other of the nice oldies, that are still around from time to time.

Then i joined the Hollett Racing Team, but because of the lack of progress, I quit there and in december 2004 I joined T7R. Last big events I took part were the Racing Challenge powered by Fujitsu-Siemens in 2005 and the 6h of Kyoto in the Masters of Endurance in 2007

What's your motto?
I don't have a motto, because you need to have targets to have motto's and it's damn hard to find a sense in our life, if you know that in 10^100 years the complete universe is definitely dead.

What was your dream when you were young? Is it still your dream, or is there a new one?
Cant remember of my childhood dreams, but finding a solution for the motto-problem, mentioned above, sounds like an actual dream of mine.

Please tell us the three things, you would take with you to a lonely island? Why?
Me, myself and i. :)  So we were three and the island would no longer be lonely.
No, honestly to be more realistic, some basic tools, to be able to build something, a replicator and an unlimited energy source.

Your favourite superhero, why?
Batman & Robin (series from the 60's) were definitely cool guys. But "Batman begins" with Christian Bale is the best Batman movie so far.
Maybe Anthony Bourdain is another favourite superhero for me too, because he is just an open-minded, funny and arrogant guy who seems to understand how to live and who solved the motto-problem for himself.

Close your eyes, and grab something from your desk. What is it and why is it there? / For what do you need it)
Wow, what a surprise, its my mouse!!! It's an optical pointing device and it's here to let me move the mouse pointer. I need it to be able to communicate with my computer. (No i don't speak into it, like Scotty)
From time to time I use it for LFS too, but it's just a pain in Deans ass.

The audience is yours, feel free to speak to your fans :D
Never forget LFS is just a hobby, don't forget your real life! Don't waste your complete valuable life, in a virtual environment. Just be happy, that we are still easy able to recognize the difference between real life and virtual environments. Possibly our children wont be able to do so.
Just remember what you could have done, while you read this "little" interview. You could have planted a tree, made a baby or build a bird-house. ;)
THX for your patience to the 21% of people that have read until this point and to Jan for his interviews.

Thank you Sören for answering my questions :)