Hi there,
If you are starting a new shard right now, don't mess with 096 - start with 097. There is no distro for 096; current distro work is only done on 097.
The reason for this is that basically, 096 was a long (long, long) running Beta. During that time, many shards used it and customized their own versions and such, but there never was any work for a standard distro on it. For a while, POL development suffered from some lack of attention...
But then when POL development started back up in earnest, 096 was completed fairly quickly, and work on 097 began in earnest; there is now a release-candidate 097 core. This core is likely to be finalized in the near future. In the meantime, there has been work on scripts/config for 097, where there never was for 096. So.. you should start with 097. Any 'bugs' in 097 you might come across while beginning work on your shard should definitely be reported, and could likely be handled before 097's final release. And, at any rate, any such bugs may likely exist in 096 too, anyway.
So in pretty much every way, you'd be better off just starting with 097. Umm.. that's the last time I'll repeat that in this post, I promise!
