Can we talk?

This is a history of the predominately gay newsgroups that webtv subscribers post to on a regular basis. These groups as of Feb. 1998 are:

These newsgroups overlap in time and membership and it is impossible to talk about one without talking about the others. They also have a common ancestry that goes back to other non-gay newsgroups, some of which are no longer with us. This history is written from my perspective but I have tried to include the input of other people who were present at the inception of the various newsgroups. Special thanks to Spike (Spikeman) and Tommy (n2play) for their assistance with this but also for their instrumental role in bringing these special places in to being. If you click on the newsgroup paragraph headings, it will link you to the newsgroup. Please note that only webtv users will be able to access all 4 groups. PC users may be able to access gruppen and woof if their servers carry them. These two groups do welcome non-webtv posters.

In the beginning, there was Talk. Talk was the original general discussion webtv newsgroup. It came in to being in early 1997 and was created by webtv in response to the demand from subscribers who were using the webtv technical discussion group, users, for general interaction. As such, it was officially sanctioned by webtv and directly linked to from everyone's webtv homepage. As the group grew, there began to be some discord among the members of the group. Certain factions began to deliberately disrupt the group and eventually began posting erotic pictures. As the group degenerated, a portion of the group broke off and colonized an empty Usenet group named News:alt.weemba. Eventually, webtv decided that Talk could no longer exist under the webtv umbrella and terminated the newsgroup. From these early days of Talk and weemba, the seeds of the gay newsgroups were formed.

Soon after Talk was created, Spikeman came on line and began posting in the newsgroup. In late February of 1997, he began posting a daily thread related to men's sexuality issues that he called Spikeman's Men's Forum and ended each question with the signature: "At the Men's Forum, it doesn't matter whether you are straight or gay..... only that you are a man." Through these posts, a core group of gay men was identified. The Men's Forum feature moved to weemba upon the demise of Talk. When Talk was discontinued, there were many posters to the newsgroup who were upset and let webtv know their displeasure. They also began to go out in to Usenet and colonize other vacant newsgroups. One particular newsgroup membership did not take too kindly to being colonized even though they were not using the site. They voiced a complaint to webtv. Webtv realized, not only did they have unhappy subscribers, that also the reputation of the company was being affected on the general internet. To diffuse the situation, webtv created the "w" hierarchy of newsgroups for webtv subscribers on June 1, 1997. Spike moved The Men's Forum to its own newsgroup site named News:w.mens-forum at that time. Soon after, Spike designated a co-author, Uncle Ebb, to help maintain the site in his absence. The membership mushroomed about this time and the first regular straight male poster, ManlyMan, came on board. Interestingly, he started posting to challenge the gay memberships' legitimacy as a Mens" forum but was soon won over by the acceptance and sincerity of the group. In the Fall of 1997, webtv discontinued the "w" hierarchy and moved all the "w" groups to the hierarchy, "alt.discuss". At that time, the Men's Forum took its current name. Today, News:alt.discuss.mens-forum consistently maintains 1000 posts. Although the membership of the forum is still predominately gay men, there are several straight men and women who post there regularly.

News:gay-net.gruppen.general

In March of 1997, I (Brad, aka Unicrawler) came on line and began posting to Talk and soon joined weemba when it came in to being. I also began searching Usenet for similar talk oriented newsgroups for gays. Much to my surprise, I found that all of the newsgroups that existed were devoted to sexual come-ons, erotic picture posting, and comercial spam. I began posting a message to two of these groups asking if there were any sites devoted to, or people interested in, gay discussion and interaction. Not being able to find an existing newsgroup, I decided that if I could get a group of like-minded guys together, we could create one. Another gay webtver, David (bottomboy), responded to my posts on Usenet and connected me with Tommy (n2play) and Matthew (Mermatt). We discussed the formation of a group and I soon found the gruppen site which is hosted through a German server. It was sitting empty, save for some minimal comercial spam. I decided that this would be an ideal site since it was initially intended for the same purpose. As you can guess, gruppen is German for group.

In mid April of 1997, News:gay-net.gruppen.general was colonized as a newsgroup devoted to discussion, support, and interaction among gay men. Other gay webtvers soon joined through David's efforts to spread the word among the existing gay webtv group. I also continued my posts to Usenet and recruited a few Non-webtv guys for the group. We have found out over time, that there are a lot of servers who do not carry gruppen. This has kept involvement from PC owners low, although all are welcome. From the beginning, gruppen has had three rules for the membership. We ask that there be no erotic picture posting (although posting the link is fine), that there be no sex come-ons or other personals posted, and that the membership not post comercial messages.

This last rule has been somewhat problematic. There are automated sites that post comercial spam without regard to the focus of a newsgroup. This has been an on-going problem for the internet and sexuality newsgroups in particular. At times, gruppen has been inundated with these messages. We attempt to minimize their impact by ignoring them so that they move on down the line. When the "w" groups were first created, we considered moving gruppen to a new site. The non-webtv people would not have been able to join us and the idea was dropped. Gruppen just passed the one year anniversary on May 5, 1998.

As mentioned earlier, Tommy had created a homepage called Re:Gay WebTV. It developed out of a thread, entitled Gay WebTV, which was a discussion about gays on-line at the original Talk newsgroup. At the time, it was one of the longest running threads on Talk. Much of the content of the thread had to do with whether or not gay discussion had a place on Talk, with some posters saying that the gays should leave to a place of their own. Of course, all of the responses to this thread had the title Re: gay WebTV. When Tommy created his first homepage, he decided to name it after this thread. When webtv created the "w" groups, he asked that a newsgroup be created called News:w.re.gaywebtv. His request was granted on June 2, 1997. The idea behind the group was to be a correlary to his homepage of the same name. After just 8 days, webtv decided that they did not want their name associated with the group and notified Tommy of their intention to terminate the newsgroup. Webtv asked Tommy to name a new newsgroup to fill the void left from the group removal. By this time, Tommy was suspicious of webtv's motivations and resonded; "If Webtv is sincerely only severing this group because it contains the word webtv, then perhaps w.gay might be in order". News:w.gay was created on June 9, 1997. Tommy changed the name of his homepage and began to focus on webtv technical assistance. The new group sat unused for awhile. At some point, I and some of the other gruppen members began posting in the newsgroup under the rationale that it would be a shame to let the only "w" group with the word gay in it go unused. We realized that this would probably be the first gay newsgroup that most new webtv subscribers would find when coming on-line. We were right.

By mid Summer of 1997, more people started showing up. Todd (janeway_fan) started posting and soon got his roomate Angie (Kozmic1) involved. As the first lesbian poster, she was encouraged to participate. She was also asked to see if she could get other lesbians to post as well. It was figured that this diversity would set w.gay apart from the other two newsgroups already in existence. Angie began posting her now infamous "Bound" series of female images to show a lesbian presence in the group. It wasn't too long until Maggie (Heard_A_Who) showed up. It just happened that she arrived just as Angie was going on vacation. We had to assure her that there was indeed another lesbian poster and that she should stay. Upon Angie's return, they quickly became acquainted and began e-mailing each other outside of the newsgroup. A romance soon developed between them and began to be played out within the group as well. This unique situation brought out several lurkers who began to post. The membership soon skyrocketed.

As with the other "w" groups, w.gay's name changed to its current form in the Fall of 1997. It is the most active of the gay newsgroups. It also has the sole distinction of being the newsgroup where cyber-love thrives. To date, there are 5 couples from the newsgroup who have announced their intentions to become partners. Three have taken the step of having one of the partners move across country and are going well. The other two are in their preliminary stages. This phenomenon stands as a unique testament to the kinship found within the gay family at alt.discuss.gay.

I found this newsgroup sitting empty while I was surfing the web in August 1997. I thought the name was too good to let the group go begging. I first proposed it as a sight where gay bears and others could post about sexuality. Some interest has been shown and currently there are a few regulars who post there infrequently about a variety of subjects. It has become another option for gay newsgroups.

News:alt.rasap

This is a gay men's newsgroup for men over 40.

News:alt.dgi

This is the newest newsgroup. It was colonized as a haven from some of the less desireable elements found in the larger groups. It has a growing loyal following.

Questions or comments?

Click on the rainbow flag to go to the alt.discuss.gay homepage!

About the author....

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