By: Leon
This November 9th marks the fourth anniversary of my SM site, Nyanko's
Sailor Moon. I'm sure you've seen it at some point; it was one of the
first Sailormoon sites to use Ebonics, one of the few combo pages that
never had an image gallery, and, at one point, was divided between
Angelfire, Homestead, HomePage.com, and two GeoCities accounts all at the
same time. Yes, what started out as a way to kill time while I waited for
my family to finish their classes at a local community college
(Ironically, I'm now a student there!) soon became my obsession (Yeah, drove
'em crazy, I'll tell 'ya!!) and eventually was the nucleus for my web
site collective. It was my hobby, my big project, my stress-reliever --
especially once I got my own computer! And, in the last few years, I've
seen many of the changes that took place in the Sailormoon Community.
You'll probably notice that Sailormoon sites have improved a great
deal in the last few years (Nowadays, anyone with Internet access can
create a half-decent page), and most of them are pretty well-planned and
designed. But some of you older folks will remember a time when huge,
direct-linked images and stolen, mixed-up info were the norm (That's what
I started out with on my site). I had many an image linked directly
from the now-defunct Transparent GIF Gift Shop (Which many SM site owners
used religiously!). Many sites were put together using GeoCities Basic
Editor (You can always spot a site that has utilized this utility) And
everyone flocked to BeSeen.com for their clunky hit counters, divider
bars, and those buggy chat rooms that always seemed to attract some of
the most racist, homophobic psychopaths... Those were the days!
I wasn't around for the Hentai Wars, but I was there for the Webring
boom, when it seemed that, if you had a SM site (Or any site), you just
HAD to run a webring. Some even had two or three, and many of them were
not very original or well-designed -- You just had to somehow combine
the words "Chibi" "Sailor" "Power" "Scouts" and "Ring", maybe toss in a
planet name, and you had most of the ring titles! And most of these
existed primarily for the purpose of staying on the bandwagon (Kind of
like Tamagotchi, only no 3 A.M. feedings!). And most of them used the same
images, maybe with a few variations (If I have to see that stupid 1996
calendar image of Super Sailormoon one more time...). Many of these
disappeared over time (This may have something to do with our favorite web
conglomerate, Yahoo!, taking over WebRing.org), but soon gave way to
OrbitCycle and those delightful little nuggets of script known as link
cycles. Yup, the SM Community's answer to red leather zippered jackets
and white rhinestoned gloves. If webrings weren't jacked up enough, link
cycles made you want to tear your hair out!! These were even less
thought out than webrings, and 90 percent of the time, you ended up with
broken images and mangled JPGs. Like webrings, this was a nice idea to get
traffic to your site, but was overkilled because people usually had
about twenty on one page (Can you say "LOADING SONG"??). Unlike webrings,
these puppies stayed popular for about as long as POGs did, and most
link cycles faded into Internet oblivion. Gives web clique owners
something to think about!!
Another thorn in the SM Community's side has been SOS, from the time
the dub was first cancelled (Remember that Kellogg's procott?? I still
can't stomach the sight of Strawberry Pop-Tarts!) to the "Prince Uranus"
rumor (Would sort of explain the manga a bit), right down to them
taking credit for every time they replayed the series. They've been the
source of many unfounded rumors, useless procotts (Like I'm paying $14
bucks for a jewelry box in the shape of Luna-P!!), and the downfall of MIDI
music! Anyone remember when they blasted Moon Revenge with no way to
shut it off?? And haven't they been using the same layout since 1995??
Still makes me want to track down Incognito and do a full-on, acid jazz
rendition of the Loading Song!
All in all, it's been a very great four years. There have been times
when I just wanted to hit that "Delete My Account" button on GeoCities,
but I held on, and my site is getting better with time. In nearly four
years (Actually, six since I first started watching the dub), has my
interest in Sailormoon waned?? A little bit. I'm not as obsessive as I
once was, but there is so much that I have yet to see, mainly the later
series and most of the manga. I've also found a few new interests, such
as RPGing, the former members of Destiny's Child and a newfound
interest in the 1980's cartoon Jem. What's in store for my site?? Though many
people have closed up shop for various reasons, my site will stay open
and be expanded a bit. I'm even in the process of renovating a site
that was given to me some time ago and turning it into an original
multimedia site. What else lies ahead?? Who knows what the next four years
will bring!!
**Blasts MoonMix MIDI and smiles**
Comments on this article can be sent to: Leon.
