ILX is twenty-five years old

Really. (The actual anniversary was four days back, and this was the thread that started it all at ILM.)

Wow! Congrats all

Groke was with us all along

all around the world statues crumble for us

Wow!

Same age as this fella https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyren_Williams

Our next goal: our well deserved Super Bowl victory.

The infant ILE caught the attention of the crew over at Ask a Drunk. We were bemused.

Happy birthday to us. Oh god we're so old.

Do we have any users currently posting who are younger than the board?

I've been here for 19 of them. Christ

Bought Vocalcity at Other Music in Cambridge, was blown away and looked for people talking about it. I think ILM was still on Greenspun then. There are worse places to hang out online.

25 in message board years is like 85 irl

xps Maybe a couple of younger posters?

How old were you as of April 3, 2024?

H.P is the youngest regular ILXor I am aware of, and he's 30 iirc

Philip https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philip_Greenspun

key sentence in that wikipedia article:

Greenspun's Oracle-based community site LUSENET was an important early host of free forums.

Children Of Men actually an allegory for webforums, explains its popularity here

anyone else in the "ILXor for more than half my lifetime" club?

it was either the DroneOn mailing list or a simon reynolds blogpost that led me here in 2003. sporadic poster ever since. ilx can rent a car now!

ilx can stay on their parents' insurance for one more year!

I thought there were some threads that go back to 1999.

I think they were glitched somehow, iirc?

will this be the year ILX finally buys a car? _the_ car? the acura ilx?

I thought there were some threads that go back to 1999

this is a board for the NEW millennium, not the darkest past

https://web.archive.org/web/20011130073203/http://www.greenspun.com/bboard/q-and-a.tcl?topic=I%20Love%20Everything

https://www.ilxor.com/faq.html

I Love Music was set up in August 2000 by Tom Ewing, who wanted a bulletin board as part of his Freaky Trigger music website but didn't have the space or know-how himself.

(I'd not seen that FAQ page before -- found it linked from wikipedia. Is there a link for it here anywhere?)

Amazing you found it! As I recall, stet bricked it into a small chamber along with a cask of amontillado about a decade ago.

I'm drinking amontillado right now, no joke.. with some olive

*Reads faq. Still doesn't know what "hen fap" means.*

anyone else in the "ILXor for more than half my lifetime" club?

― c u (crüt)

It me!

I thought there were some threads that go back to 1999.

― Noob Layman (WmC)

I think they were glitched somehow, iirc?

― sleeve

Yep, some kind of glitch made date stamps on a few threads go haywire, anything pre-'00 is a lie.

happy birthday ILX it's been a fun ride

anything pre-'00 is a lie

so the Y2K fears were REAL after all

cheers emil.y!

I'm pretty sure at some point in the past... decade or so, the FAQ was still accessible from at least one page, like New Questions or something, but it seems that's not the case anymore.

It's always fun to stumble on site features that I've forgotten about or hardly ever see. Like Random Questions and Browse by Date

In my mind this place was around forever before I started lurking and I’m still The New Guy, but it’s been around 21 years. I have no idea how I stumbled into ILX but it’s my favorite place on the internet.

I've said this before, but I was googling "Charalambides" when I found the site in I think 2004. It took me at least a year to realize there were other views besides "New Questions", lol.

the first thread I followed was of a mentally ill guy on a roof in san francisco, threatening to jump... the police were there, and whomever started the thread was posting up to the minute photographs of the ordeal

I remember that one! I think it was There's a guy outside my window who's been threatening to jump all night!

It ended with him actually going off the roof then a few ppl (self included) being a bit scoldy about the whole thing, but in retrospect it was a bit grim to be making jokes about someone suicidal, wild west days etc

i don't remember how i ended up here. i leaned on this place through a lot of shit and spread some myself. i'm glad i stuck around. i've probably learned 50% of what i know or something stupid from this here message board. happy 25th baby, you're all grown now.

I'm still sitting in the same musty internet cafe, nursing a cold pot of lady grey

H.P is the youngest regular ILXor I am aware of, and he's 30 iirc

― jaymc, Saturday, 30 August 2025 03:50 (five hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

Very unnerving to read this

lol i dont know why i said "iirc." i found a 2021 thread where you said you were 26. thats the xls magic, baby!

Tbh, I am still sitting outside, sitting on the patio, ear to the wall every now and then, trying to make sure I'm on the bleeding edge of music and media criticism, only to hear dull voices through the fibro: maybe im writing in shorthand so you think im like, an idiot, when I think im making pretty clear sense? ...I have to say you guys are ignoring the larger question: what is reality.

25 more years!

baby diego

Xls magic will catalogue all your idiocy and worst moment, and you will like it!

How about that

jaymc, how old am i?

this is the thread where we ask jaymc how old we are (bcz we are so old we have forgot)

my first ilxor meeting was perfect: i happened upon alfred sitting outside a bookstore in miami reading and writing, he may or may not have been sipping a negroni. he seemed to be having such a lovely afternoon i was reluctant to interrupt his peace.

my second ilxor meeting was also perfect: i encountered stevie d at a music festival in philadelphia and he introduced me tons of people, clued me in to a great afterparty, and generally massively upgraded the entire trip

I’ve met Morbz (RIP), Swen, donna rouge, a load of other gays from the old days of the gay thread, Ned, sarahell (who is a homie), justin3, and many more who no longer post. i would very much like to meet many of you in person, where i only occasionally slip into what my husband calls “polemic mode”

obvs i see Stevie a fair amount, since we are both gay Philadelphians

table, I think you know the wife of one former ILXor Fluffy Bear; she is a poet named MC Hyland

20 years of on and off lurking - exactly half my life. pretty sure I stumbled on here via forks’ music blog back in the day. For a while, I didn’t even know other boards existed, I thought it was all ILM

Ned was the first person to reply to my introductory post, our constant and north star

I met wins, seandalai and the lex 10 years ago, can’t believe it’s been that long.

would love to meet more of you though - most of y’all are cool, even the annoying ones :)

oh i do! i have met Fluffy Bear too, i hope he is doing better, he seemed to be on the mend in a recent update from MC.

Yeah, he is doing much better, basically had the best possible outcomes you can get from a stomach cancer diagnosis

I've met quite a few, I think - never went to a London FAP but did play the ILx Has A Bucket fest so met a fair number of London types there.

Weirdest ilx0r meeting was probably Ronan being at my brother's wedding.

Still never met Ned ;_;

I met the shimura curves in liverpool once. they were great!

Oh yes of course emil.y we met once when our bands played the same Halloween bill at the Brixton Windmill, probably over 10 years ago I reckon

I have met many chilxors (jaymc, n/a, la lechera, & others) plus occasional visitors to Chicago (in orbit, Morbs, sic, WmC, Alfred & others). I can't remember at the moment if I have met anyone in cities that are not Chicago, but I might have.

I've met lots of ILXors on trips to Seattle, Portland, Chicago, Nashville, and multiple Big Earses in Knoxville. Too many to list, but it was my pleasure in every case. My first posts were in June 2001, mainly trying to gin up interest in people playing Literati (Yahoo's version of Scrabble) with me. Just a few posts before I drifted away for a few years. Starting posting a lot more in 2004. The less attention given to my first login, the better.

Oh yes of course emil.y we met once when our bands played the same Halloween bill at the Brixton Windmill, probably over 10 years ago I reckon

― Now read it backwards. (dog latin)

Yes! That was a good night, can't believe it's that long ago...

Ned was the first person to reply to my introductory post, our constant and north star

Too kind of course and thanks! It's not just me, though! DJP was there first day. (Trying to think who still is? Should double check that thread I linked up top.)

xp 2014, is my guess... Yeah feels like no time at all.

Been here since 2004, but far less visible/active than I used to be. Can only recall meeting ILXors three or four times way back in 2005/6.

omg i forgot to mention Jaq and the other Seattle area ilxors, who also met my husband!!

Seriously WmC, that first meetup we did in Seattle was EPIC. Gravel Puzzleworth in a cow suit, none of us actually living here, durian popsicle - all of it!

Table, that was an excellent listening club event!

xp 2014, is my guess... Yeah feels like no time at all.

― Now read it backwards. (dog latin), Monday, 8 September 2025 17:34 bookmarkflaglink

can confirm it was 2014 as I was there, iirc so was Fizzles

Jaq, that trip is one of my favorite travel memories. Still the only time I've been to a dim sum restaurant, I regret to say!

Was gonna say I'd never met any ilxors IRL, but then remembered exchanging a few posts of recognition upon encountering poster calling himself "peepee" (his initials) who worked at the uni radio station simultaneously with me, 20 years earlier

Table, that was an excellent listening club event!

we had such a good time, there’s also photographic evidence still up on facebook, with erstwhile ilxors donna brown, the Rev, and kate78, among others!!

I ended up here after seeing ILX occasionally mentioned on Dissensus forum. Initially signed up and posted some dire edgy challops hot takes before I got the lay of the land and got deservedly roasted for it - lurked for the next half decade before daring to post again under a new alias.

IRL I’ve met Dog Latin as mentioned above, and have a hunch one of the posters on here from Cardiff used to be a punter at a techno night we used to do at Clwb.

only ilxor ive met irl is frogbs (we were in 1st grade together which was pre-ilx by about 7 years)
Every piece of this is blowing my mind

― our beloved RIFF LORD (DJP), Monday, September 8, 2025 9:30 AM (eight hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

we did not know that we were both on ilx until 2020 during pandemic zooms when i noticed his christian name and figured out he was my best friend in 1st grade b4 he unceremoniously moved to wisconsin. 1993 was the last time we had knowingly seen or heard from each other.

Goddamn, bringing people together!

this is sort of like when i saw the handle of one “eppy” on early ILX posts and was like “that must be M1ke, the camp counselor who changed my life with a couple mixtapes when i was in 8th grade,” and indeed, it was. we are still friends, he is/was working on a book about “Party in the USA”

I met several former UK ilxors at various times in the mid-to-late 2000s, but I think the only one of them who still remains is mark s, who I last saw in 2015. North Yorkshire ain't exactly stuffed full of 'em!

xp in a similar way, i went to high school with Oops/Granny Dainger. and i also met Hstencil and Nabisco in Chicago before meeting them again on ILX.

Tipsy you forgot me, who stayed in your home!

― Piggy Lepton (La Lechera)

D’oh! And brought us tasty Chicago treats. My apologies, it was a delight!

Speaking of photographic evidence I wonder if I still have the pix of both Donut and Haitch lying in the gutter with their head in an abandoned child's pram.

Which they willingly posed for I will point out!

The only concrete evidence of my ever having been within a mile of an ILX poster may be this post indicating that I seemingly saw Casey B's high school band opening for Pseudo Echo as a young child!

[A few posts up from that one, strictly speaking]

I also went to high school with a couple former ilxors: one started a pretty infamous ILM thread, the other posted here for years before I realized I knew them irl

iatee was the only other poster I've met

oh wau, Nag, you necroed the Pseudo Echo thread!! good times.

: )
I believe it contained some of my very first posts. (I think I quickly established a pattern of disappearing for 10.5 months of any year though, ensuring that I'm something of a perpetual n00b lol.)

I typed my ilx origin story and got an error message

Xp way upthread — you can totally trade stocks and ilx at the same time

But I probably posted it on the 20th anniversary thread and a few others so … nbd

I have met many ilxors in person or via phone/zoom and everyone was great with only a couple glaring exceptions!

have met:
douglas (former ilxor, intro to ilx)
j0n w (former ilxor and for a time downstairs neighbor)
tehresa (former ilxor)
bell labs (former ilxor)
sexydancer
dmr
ian (d&d someday imo)
in orbit (thought of u at ren faire last weekend)
La Lechera (perpetual source of inspo/can't wait to hear new album!)
skot (major remaining to-do is visiting store!)
forks (hooked me up with greenwood cemetery and tons of cbr's)
ezsnappin (hooked me up with thin lizzy library)
thus sang freud (hooked me up with television tickets)
nate carson (hooked me up with Univers Zero by playing it on pre-show PA before Agalloch show)
kingfish
veronica moser
wins
dr casino
treeship
morbs
fizzles
without exception, wonderful people
weird that i've never run into mookieproof!

oh duh also jjusten!

It's nearly a year since rrrobyn left us. We've had some great people here.

i think i started posting on ilx my senior year of college, which was 2000-2001, so it must have been not too long after it started, fuck
i've met many ilxors but i have a memory like a sieve so i will not attempt to list them all
tbh i've found ilx more aggravating/boring than entertaining/edifying for a long time but i still come here from force of habit, though my level of interaction has declined a lot and there have been periods where i was off ilx completely

We've had some great people here.

A number to name gone who I'd met, like onimo, but I will always especially miss Rickey Wright, who had the all time great display name of "If Timi Yuro would be still alive, most other singers could shut up." A beloved member of the Seattle contingent and someone who I got to know more as I started visiting the city more in the 2000s for PopCon and other reasons. Way too soon.

i feel like i met rrrobyn but i never actually did

such was her vivid personhood

We have lost way too many of us! Rrobyn, Morbs, Bimble, Rickey, Liz, Onimo, Martin, and I feel terrible now that I might have missed someone. But I think of them all, at some time.

rrrobyn was just, like, the best person. so kind

Of that list I realize Bimble was the only one I hadn’t met. We had our differences but time has shown me more clearly what he was working through.

& 2 more deads - george gosset, cameron bain

miss these guys RIP

one lovely departed soul who has not been mentioned who i spent a good deal of time with (almost as much as Morbs!) and think of quite often:

Jack Cole

I miss him immensely