"Watson. Come Here. I Want You."

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Legend has it these were the first words ever spoken on the telephone (I got this info from - waitforit - a copy of the comic Doom Patrol).

What was the first thing you ever did, publically, on the Internet. Not just an e-mail saying "hey I've got an e-mail address", but something where you didn't know the precise audience. A posting to usenet? A website? A blog entry? A (gulp) post to ILE??

― Tom, Monday, 13 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

The first thing I remember doing was a post to alt.music.alternative sometime in 1995. Some girl was saying how Suede's own singles were much superior to the McAlmont and Butler material, which was too soul- influenced. And I disagreed.

― Tom, Monday, 13 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Early days of NME.com when it was still on IRC rather than web-based chat. I don't remember anything I said but it was a first foray into internet society, sometime round 1996. Conversation was as i recall it highbrow, but i would have been only 14. shortly thereafter set up a crappy website in the "Hi!!!!!! My cat's name's tiddle ohhhh my god!" manner. Probably stil have it somewhere, habitual anthologist that I am.

― matthew james, Monday, 13 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

1993, alt.music.alternative, some rant about something. Whee.

― Ned Raggett, Monday, 13 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

A terrible first bash at a website, revealing to the world at large that I thought Cary Grant looked like PC Dave Quinnan out of The Bill. This probably wasn't the first foray, but for some reason it's stuck.

But not even such a bold statement as this prepared me for the ILE bearpit...

― Paul, Monday, 13 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I truly can't remember. Probably Yahoo chat or something.

― Lyra, Monday, 13 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I think I posted what amounted to a brief review of His Name Is Alive at the ICA, in response to some query on 4ad-l. This would be August '93 - my first encounter with the Web, while on a postgrad IT thing in Liverpool.

4ad-l's archives don't go back that far, so when I rejoined the WWW in '97 from home I couldn't check to see if I'd made a fool of myself or not.

― Michael Jones, Monday, 13 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Probably trying to work out how to use Compuserve.

― DG, Monday, 13 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I believe it was 1997. I think it was something on the late & lamented Sick-n-Tired mailing list. Something something bla bla bla. Might've been on the Indiepop List. Don't remember.

The moral of the story is, don't send someone $5 for a Prisonshake mix tape if the guy in question is a bit sketchy.

My initial webpage was AWFUL. Terrible. As were all of yours, I'm guessing. Taco Bell employees shouldn't be allowed near a computer, regardless of their impeccible taste in music.

― David Raposa, Monday, 13 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I thought this thread would be about "The Double Helix".

― Kris, Monday, 13 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I was on Allmusic - was it bit.listserv.allmusic, then? Something like that. I lurked for several months, and made a post on bubblegum rock. This was sometime between late '94 and mid '95. I may have posted to university groups before that, but I don't remember the specific posts.

― Kerry, Monday, 13 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

The first thing I ever did online was get on IRC and try to convince some poor bastard that I was a 27 year old girl named Lorna. I have no idea why, it seemed really fucking hilarious at the time.

― Ally, Monday, 13 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

exmormon.org afte my excommunication.

― anthony, Monday, 13 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I always thought you *were* 27 or so in your early a.m.a. days, m'dear Ally. No doubt this was intentional on your part. ;-)

So Anthony, here's my question -- did you get a computer/on the net because of exmormon.org or did you get the tech first and then immediately do a search for it?

― Ned Raggett, Tuesday, 14 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

A got the tech first, but i was so depressed abotu the church ...

― anthony, Tuesday, 14 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Posted something on alt.music.alternative. About Lo Fi music. About five or six years ago. Since then my taste has reverted back to its original form.

― nathalie (nathalie), Tuesday, 14 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

First public utterance would have been on the international James Joyce mailing list. Quite possibly it was a fairly lengthy post suggesting, with excessive prolixity, that we ought to reopen or rethink or extend the debate on ch12 of Ulysses.

― the pinefox, Tuesday, 14 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Either something on soc.bi about what an idiot Alex Bruzzone was or a comment about MBV on ama. Both would have been mid-1994.

― Richard Tunnicliffe, Tuesday, 14 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

AN AMerican asking me whether O Brother Where Art Thou was too violent for kids after I had written a review which had been favourable but wondered at the bizarre shift in tone when John Goodman's cyclops beats the crap out of Clooney. I still think that was too violent for a British PG, and said so.

― Pete, Tuesday, 14 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Probably bombarding the Prodigy BBS with a ton of Cure messages in '91, followed by bombarding alt.sex with nonsense when I left home for college. THANK GOD the Usenet archive stops at '95...

― Dan Perry, Tuesday, 14 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

probably posting to the Stereolab message board in, wow, 95? maybe 96.

Some girl was saying how Suede's own singles were much superior to the McAlmont and Butler material, which was too soul- influenced. And I disagreed.

Tom, the girl was right and you were wrong;)

― gareth, Tuesday, 14 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I always thought you *were* 27 or so in your early a.m.a. days, m'dear Ally. No doubt this was intentional on your part. ;-)

Yes, because I am a compulsive liar. FACT.

The first time I remember ever speaking to Tom was in a nasty-edgy fight about the Manics, specifically the song 4st7lb. Otherwise I'd say that the girl who fought with Tom was me being devil's advocate, trying to piss people off, since that was my main goal (was?)

― Ally, Tuesday, 14 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

First time I remember crossing paths with Ally was pre the Manics fight, in that endless endless thread about whether people in Britain could make rock and roll music or not. There was some argument about REM. The Suede thing was aaaages before that - I was on a.m.a. briefly at the end of my time at University and became a 'regular' in December 1996 (I know this cuz I checked google groups last night).

― Tom, Tuesday, 14 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Yeah, but before you and I "officially" "met" I was on AMA under various fake names and email addresses - my time on AMA as a "regular" was simply the longest under one alias, and that was only because I got to know you weirdos so I figured I might as well keep to knowing you lot. I don't remember the Britain thread. I remember the Manics fight being at the peak of my hating-Richey-and-being- fucked-up phase and it was exasperating.

The BEST fight I ever got into was with Heather the Garbage Girl. Or Persi when we fought about good guitarists. "James Bradfield is a terrible guitarist, Eric Clapton, now there's a virtuoso". THANKS DAD.

― Ally, Tuesday, 14 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

One of the first posts I found on google groups started "Persi this is nonsense." He'd like IL* I think, except you can't do now-playing lists under your name.

― Tom, Tuesday, 14 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Hey this is topsyturvy fun. Cuz normally when we do whats-ya-first, I'm all, well that wd be in 1371, when I walked the length of olde Scrobbesbirg goosemarket to see Eathelweard Gallowglass and the Widdershins Serpents Experience. Only this time it's like Dec2000, ILM, rockism thread.

― mark s, Tuesday, 14 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

1371? You ain't THAT young, Mark. ;-)

― Ned Raggett, Tuesday, 14 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Mark, yr mistaken, and not about the 1371 thing. Cos I e-mailed you and said hey look at the site after reading your entry in the Rockcritics.com top 5 pieces you yourself wrote list. So that at least predates it.

― Tom, Tuesday, 14 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

One of the first posts I found on google groups started "Persi this is nonsense."

Didn't most posts start like that?

― Ally, Tuesday, 14 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

... and anyway, they didn't become Eathelweard Gallowglass and the Widdershins Serpents Experience until at least 1377, as you well know. They were the plain ol' Widdershins Serpents until Cnut Coed left (reputedly over creative differences concerning the relative merits of the thigh-bones of sheep and cows as those instruments you scrape but which nobody knows the name of, but rumours still circulate of a titanic power struggle within the group).

There's a big and crucial difference.

― Tim, Tuesday, 14 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

oh yeah, rockcrits.com... i'm such a shallow bitch!! (sorry scott w: i shall return)

but still, that was only like august 2000

― mark s, Tuesday, 14 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Didn't most posts start like that?

Only the ones that didn't start 'Oh, for fuck's sake Geir'.

― Richard Tunnicliffe, Tuesday, 14 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Are you saying that pure perfect melody isn't the basis of the entire universe?

― Ally, Tuesday, 14 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I think this is one of my first ILM posts:

They should continue. Lynard Skynard did. Iron Maiden did. The Beach Boys did. REM did. Duran Duran did. Poison did. Man or Astroman? did. Low did. Dinosaur Jr did. Hell, even Guns 'n' Roses are still meant to be going. Some of these bands made good albums after key peeps quit, or got kicked out!

-- james e l (freedunit@hotmail.com), February 11, 2001.

Have only been posting for six months?

Oh and they used to have that Telnet chat thing at my uni, I was talking to someone and they said "I like Kingmaker" me: "Kingmaker they are so old, no one likes them anymore!"...she was sitting opposite me in the computer lab...d'oh, coz she was quite pretty.

― jel, Tuesday, 14 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Hmmm. Pretending to like bands to improve pulling chances, classic or dud?

― Richard Tunnicliffe, Tuesday, 14 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Some post to rec.music.beatles in 1995. I don't remember it feeling like a big deal.

― Nick, Wednesday, 15 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

November 96 w/ this. Still kinda kewl. Closely followed by this. Mildly embarrassing cuz calls Oasis "profound". Ha!

― AP, Wednesday, 15 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Oh, & this (same time). Warning: contains cringeworthy grammatical errors & references to "breasts".

― AP, Wednesday, 15 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Duane Zarakov's wuz this (I think), also Nov 96. Ex'lent! Or this.

― AP, Wednesday, 15 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

oh those don't count 'cause in those days i'd never used the interweb myself, i just wrote em for a ordinary paper mag & was only dimly aware of that the stuff appeared in an "online edition" (whatever that was). I 1st used the internet in early 2000, I think the 1st thing I writ specifically "there" would've been in reader's comments on Mark Prindle's site.

― duane, Wednesday, 15 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

The first thing I did besides send emails to places like www.crashsite.com was post in some guys guestbook at house of evil or something. I don't think it exists now.

― Nude Spock, Wednesday, 15 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

four months pass...

i wrote a love letter to a boy named christian deroeck. it was actually a banal two sentence reply to something he had posted on the prodigy bbs modern rock boards. i was 15 years old and writing as a fake girl with the ridiculous name of Riverlee.

― amanda, Saturday, 22 December 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

posted on the metallica bulleting board the question:

Lars, where do you find five foot seven inch condoms?

― Menelaus Darcy, Sunday, 23 December 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

In the land of the giants.

― Lars, Sunday, 23 December 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Sorry! Please could we have a bad joke/ pun amnesty for the festive period?

― james, Sunday, 23 December 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

No way, this is the silly season you know.

You just cant handle the jandal :)

― Menelaus Darcy, Sunday, 23 December 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

something unmemorable to ILM.

― di, Sunday, 23 December 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Gawd, most likely something on the AOL MST3K boards. Probably some...

NO! I remember EXACTLY what it was! (And to think I thought I forgot!) It was a post saying that my favorite 'bot on the show was Gypsy. A dumb little me-too comment -- I didn't have the cojones to post anything more ambitious.

This would've been mid-January 1996. I'm so old-skool.

― Michael Daddino, Monday, 24 December 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

IIRC, a "guitar for sale" ad on the National Capital Freenet. I hope. Otherwise it would have been something embarrassing on ncf.sigs.punk or ncf.sigs.anarchy.

― sundar subramanian, Monday, 24 December 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Like Gareth, it was to the Stereolab message boards, late 1994 I expect. Or... the sadly defunct linda.com, which used to be an amateur poetry site run by a wonderful woman called Linda (who Gale reminds me of, strangely) where you could post your most profound outpourings. Needless to say, my friends and I used to sit in the university library coming up with more and more "humourous" non-poems to send to Linda. Ah, happy days.

― Mark C, Friday, 28 December 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Skipping 12 messages at this point... Click here if you want to load them all.

Here is the thread where I first cross paths with an ILX regular!

― Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Wednesday, 10 September 2003 21:03 (twenty-two years ago)

What makes the shamen industrial? What the hell is industrial anyway?

― Ed (dali), Wednesday, 10 September 2003 21:07 (twenty-two years ago)

This was the phase in my life where everything I heard that wasn't recognizably house, hip-hop or R&B was thrown into the "industrial dance" bucket (particularly applicable to The Shamen if you take into account some of their earlier stuff).

― Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Wednesday, 10 September 2003 21:10 (twenty-two years ago)

omg dan perry sig file i love you

― teeny (teeny), Wednesday, 10 September 2003 21:17 (twenty-two years ago)

Wow! The internet was rubbish in 1991.

― N. (nickdastoor), Wednesday, 10 September 2003 21:18 (twenty-two years ago)

Depressingly, this appears to be mine

I might have already had a message of thanks on a Mary Margaret O'Hara website before that, but I guess that doesn't count.

― N. (nickdastoor), Wednesday, 10 September 2003 21:23 (twenty-two years ago)

hmm.. egads.. looks like this was my first ever post, and this was the first thread I started. Both on the same day. 8 years of internet nerd-dom commence.

― Mr. Diamond (diamond), Wednesday, 10 September 2003 21:35 (twenty-two years ago)

Here is the thread where I first cross paths with an ILX regular!

Amazing stuff! From such small acorns etc.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Wednesday, 10 September 2003 21:39 (twenty-two years ago)

What was the first thing you ever did, publically, on the Internet.

As for 'publicly', (un)fortunately I've no recollection of that.
But I bloody well remember 'bout 'privately': sitting at a friend's office and, needing some info for my radio job on a certain African-American singer-guitarist, I typed in the li'l window --
"Taj Mahal"
&
clicked "Search".

It's ridiculously easy to imagine what ensued.

― t\'\'t (t\'\'t), Wednesday, 10 September 2003 21:53 (twenty-two years ago)

aha! that's who mr. diamond is!... oh shit, i think i said something about you on some thread... WHOOPS!

― gygax! (gygax!), Wednesday, 10 September 2003 21:54 (twenty-two years ago)

I actually can't imagine what ensued.

― N. (nickdastoor), Wednesday, 10 September 2003 21:56 (twenty-two years ago)

A zillion or three's worth of stuff, richly illustrated, on all imaginable aspects regrding a certain temple in India. Is what ensued.
And fuck all 'bout the guitar man, sir.

― t\'\'t (t\'\'t), Wednesday, 10 September 2003 22:00 (twenty-two years ago)

I totally thought Taj Mahal was some Estonian porn star, how about everyone else?

― teeny (teeny), Wednesday, 10 September 2003 22:05 (twenty-two years ago)

aha! that's who mr. diamond is!... oh shit, i think i said something about you on some thread...

i posted to ama under too many pseudonyms to remember (1995-03-21 was the earliest I could find from anything I could remember). I do remember chatting a bit with H3nry 0wings 93-94 and trading records with him (he was living in PA or NJ).

i was more of a mailing list0r back then.

― gygax! (gygax!), Wednesday, 10 September 2003 22:07 (twenty-two years ago)

I totally thought Taj Mahal was some Estonian porn star, how about everyone else? -- teeny

Everyone else is an Estonian porn star too. Like, totally!

― t\'\'t (t\'\'t), Wednesday, 10 September 2003 22:10 (twenty-two years ago)

sweet!

― teeny (teeny), Wednesday, 10 September 2003 22:12 (twenty-two years ago)

gygax ... wha? I don't recall having any contact w/ you before discovering ILM. Then again, I guess I don't know who you are either...

― Mr. Diamond (diamond), Wednesday, 10 September 2003 22:37 (twenty-two years ago)

What a weird place the internet is.

― N. (nickdastoor), Wednesday, 10 September 2003 22:39 (twenty-two years ago)

What a weird place the internet is.

Where else can you bare your soul and flash people without getting arrested/tossed into a straitjacket?

― Nichole Graham (Nichole Graham), Wednesday, 10 September 2003 22:54 (twenty-two years ago)

I'm still pondering the homoerotic subcontext of the A.G. Bell quote

― Curt1s St3ph3ns, Wednesday, 10 September 2003 22:58 (twenty-two years ago)

Me too. And I keep wanting to make my lemon entry joke.

― N. (nickdastoor), Wednesday, 10 September 2003 23:00 (twenty-two years ago)

"Michel Angelo Battaglia"?!?!?!?!?!? AAAAAHHHHH!!!!

[[sits down, shaken]]

― M Matos (M Matos), Wednesday, 10 September 2003 23:11 (twenty-two years ago)

Wait...that wasn't you, was it? Or did Andy Battaglia go by a different name then?

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Wednesday, 10 September 2003 23:12 (twenty-two years ago)

how the fuck did this guy manage to identity-thief me and Andy B's names both at once, 12 years ago?

― M Matos (M Matos), Wednesday, 10 September 2003 23:13 (twenty-two years ago)

that's like if there was a guy named Dan Raggett or something!

sorry, I know the point was Brian MacD but...damn!

― M Matos (M Matos), Wednesday, 10 September 2003 23:14 (twenty-two years ago)

that's like if there was a guy named Dan Raggett or something!

Oh, give it time...

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Wednesday, 10 September 2003 23:17 (twenty-two years ago)

wow, is that a decent proposal?

― RJG (RJG), Wednesday, 10 September 2003 23:30 (twenty-two years ago)

Dan Raggett.

― Chris P (Chris P), Thursday, 11 September 2003 00:26 (twenty-two years ago)

I FEAR.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Thursday, 11 September 2003 00:58 (twenty-two years ago)

Matos, I was thinking the SAME FUCKING THING. "Oh no there is a Matos Battaglia out there! We must destroy him before he destroys us!!"

Actually I was really confused because I read it and was like, "Andy's real name is Michaelangelo?? HUH!!!!" then I realized DOnut Bitch was down there.

― Ally (mlescaut), Thursday, 11 September 2003 01:30 (twenty-two years ago)

mr. diamond,

nevermind, i was totally cornfused.

― gygax! (gygax!), Thursday, 11 September 2003 01:38 (twenty-two years ago)

then I realized DOnut Bitch was down there.

This is me leaving this line ALONE.

― Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Thursday, 11 September 2003 01:39 (twenty-two years ago)

Touch his line. TOUCH IT!!!

― oops (Oops), Thursday, 11 September 2003 01:40 (twenty-two years ago)

SOME THINGS NEVER FUCKING CHANGE!!!!!!!!!!!!

― Ally (mlescaut), Thursday, 11 September 2003 01:41 (twenty-two years ago)

Alt,MusicAlternative, 1993 using pine!
ah unix line command.......

― Orbit (Orbit), Thursday, 11 September 2003 01:44 (twenty-two years ago)

Five years ago seems so far away now...

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Thursday, 11 September 2003 01:45 (twenty-two years ago)

That's not the oldest post I could find but I could not resist linking it--it's like, wow, how long have I "not been talking about music" and hating all of you people? Damn. I suck. I'm trying to find the origin of the Heather/Lulu catfight.

― Ally (mlescaut), Thursday, 11 September 2003 01:46 (twenty-two years ago)

FEELINGS, whoa-oa-oa FEELINGS

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Thursday, 11 September 2003 01:50 (twenty-two years ago)

Haha I am not the only one unable to resist the lure of the Usenet archives...

― Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Thursday, 11 September 2003 02:18 (twenty-two years ago)

A-HA! So that K!z... thing IS donut bitch! In that case, this li'l document is the first place where db and I were connected, although highly indirectly. (It's at the very bottom; search for "Piuma" and you'll see it.)

― Chris P (Chris P), Thursday, 11 September 2003 03:01 (twenty-two years ago)

Genius! :-) Man, even though I was some years into being a hardcore MST fan I'm annoyed I didn't think to contribute anything to this (my first Usenet posts were to a.m.a. and the MST3K groups...).

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Thursday, 11 September 2003 03:11 (twenty-two years ago)

Brian and I are this thread. He must be the Kevin Bacon of ILX.

bands w/ self-named songs

He's #14 and I'm #59.

I also had a one-message-each convo with Alexander Blair (who went by Sandy then) on a non-usenet network, may have been Fidonet. It may predate this one.

― nickn (nickn), Thursday, 11 September 2003 05:57 (twenty-two years ago)

...are on this thread.

― nickn (nickn), Thursday, 11 September 2003 05:58 (twenty-two years ago)

heaven forfend anyone was keeping irc logs in 93/94

― Ed (dali), Thursday, 11 September 2003 06:27 (twenty-two years ago)

Oh god. this seems to be the first usenet post I did *embarrased*. But I know before that I'd posted to the 4AD-l list, I said some gushing shite about Kristin Hersh and how she should be in the Nortons Poetry Anthology because Leonard Cohen was... and some 4AD staffer replied to tell me off because I spelt her name wrong! :-/

― Trayce (trayce), Thursday, 11 September 2003 10:41 (twenty-two years ago)

heaven forfend anyone was keeping irc logs in 93/94

Betcha somebody was, but they burned the evidence in search of coolness.

― Nichole Graham (Nichole Graham), Thursday, 11 September 2003 23:16 (twenty-two years ago)

six months pass...

I was on a University Bulletin Board and IRC from 94 onwards, but they don't have accessible logs, thankfully, as my earnest rants on pomo would make me cringe. Earliest I can find is this from May 95, from a Lancaster University ezine, subscribing to which was the reason I'd got onto the interweb in the first place.

― Dave B (daveb), Saturday, 3 April 2004 20:45 (twenty-two years ago)

Ah, the first post! And how appropriate given the recent KitH/Shadowy Men talk.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Saturday, 3 April 2004 20:51 (twenty-two years ago)

"Watson. Come Here. I Want You." Right now. On the floor. Doggy style.

― Skottie, Sunday, 4 April 2004 03:02 (twenty-two years ago)

The conception of technology, followed by its birth.

― Skottie, Sunday, 4 April 2004 13:45 (twenty-two years ago)

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