History of QPR messageboards

Yes sir, I was there right at the beginning when Ben AKA Battle Tank started the original and best qpr.org in late 96 if memory serves me. That was a glorious time and a wonderful board - I met a lot of friends I still have now through that site. We actually had a qpr.org Xmas party one year, 98 I think! I'm not an expert on the other boards that cropped up after as I was always a dot.org stalwart and followed it when it was hijacked by Drew Garro in an unseemly coup that happened when Ben was ill, around 2002 I think. Garro, AKA the Gnome, created qprdot.org as a mirror site which most people started posting on without realising there was a difference. By the time the coup came to light it was too late, 95% of posters had moved over unwittingly and it was too late to turn back. I continued posting on there, to begin with retaining my moderator status that I'd had on the original org, but Garro soon put a stop to that. "My gaff, my rules" was his maxim. i.e a dictatorship.

The original org was uncensored, free to anyone, ultra-lightly moderated and fantastic because of it. Garro split off the forum into several parts and even created a kind of VIP area, excluding loads of original members (I guess there's a certain irony posting that on this board, but Garro's VIP area was about him retaining control of everything, this is simply about being able to have good debate without being controlled.. I think!). I've always disliked split forums anyway, that's why I'd like this one to follow the pattern of one forum only (same as LFW), not like WATRB, as it is now, with separate 'non-QPR related' forums. For me, it is so much better all mixed together; like being down the pub chatting with your mates. It keeps the board fresh and is the lifeblood of good debate. That's one reason WATRB is dying IMO, and LFW is so much more successful.

I can't comment on not606 or the early days of LFW, maybe Pete CCJ know more about that.

The Tommy Nintendo saga, Matt Doran's classic post on the day of 9/11, the MancRs fatwa, all these were historical milestones in the history of the org. Some of the original posters are now on LFW, many have scattered elsewhere and I imagine plenty are still on the dotdotorg, but I never look at it. Ben did reboot the original board when he recovered (which still exists), but like I say, it was too late by then.

It’s fine to restrict people signing up to a board. But you can’t have people sign up and then only give them partial acesss!

I didnt know anything about all that . In 96 ,i had no idea that there was an emerging world of QPR message boards and hardcore porn

I posted on dot.org for a little bit but mainly I posted on Big Ade's message board before moving over to WATRBs. Good bunch on Ade's one, I forget the name of it now though.

Interesting thread. Hud had mentioned to me before about the dotorg situation but I hadn't heard the full story before.

I think I may have been registered on there but was more of a lurker those days.

As Hud mentioned I did used to post on the old BBC 606 forum which was good because anyone from any other teams area on the board could post on your teams area. The trouble was for that and other reasons it needed modding and given it was a BBC cost to do that it inevitably got closed during cutbacks.

However there was a new board set up called not606 that was started mainly by the Hull posters who had a big community on the original board. A lot of the QPR posters went across and are still on there. There are some great posters and threads over there but it's not that active now unfortunately. I occasionally post over there but here and LFW mainly now.

Next time I bump into Paul Stanley I will put him in the loop

So was 2008 before or after it became not606 mate?

That was the one yeah. I enjoyed my time on there but it kind of just fizzled out.