About
ALSTSC began as an exercise in html, and then later in graphical manipulation with the GIMP, which was recommended by LJ's brother. The earliest objective was fanfiction, and was aimed at Willow/Spike fanfic, thanks to inspirational scenes and spoilers of the first half of Season 4 of BTVS. Because of this, the name "A Little Sign That She Cared" was chosen - it is adapted from Spike's speech in "Lover's Walk", which was featured on the index page and can now be found on the main page of the fanfic archive: "She wouldn't even cut off my head, or set me on fire. Is that too much to ask? You know, a little sign that she cared?" Early editions of ALSTSC at freewebsites.com included "rants and raves" (a list of proposed essays that LJ had planned to write and also the results of various polls on the ALSTSC mailing list); a set of screencaps with comical captions; and a Giles/Joyce archive in addition to spoilers, fanfiction, challenges, and links. Later forms of ALSTSC had two separate fanfic archives (one for BTVS and another for ATS -- called "A Little Sign Archive" and "Shannshu", respectively), and also a challenge archive ("How? What? How?"). After the move to Geocities.com, the Giles and Joyce archive, "The Giles and Joyce Files", was soon abandoned (there wasn't any fic to be archived there at the time), as were "rants and raves" and the captioned screencaps, among other minor amenities. The original ALSTSC at freewebsites.com had also included a German links site, as LJ (aka Laura, die verrueckte Ami) was at that time very much involved on the German Buffy mailing list, buffy-de@mailing-list.de. This, too, was scrapped in the move.
Once it was decided that Geocities.com seemed to be reliable enough to stay at indefinitely, the site was revamped significantly, and it began to be called "ALSTSC&A" - "A Little Sign That She Cared and Affiliates". Visitors were greeted by more pleasant and original graphics on a main index page that led to the various "affiliates" - the various areas of the site - which hadd their own themes and motifs. A new "affiliate" was "Darla's Domain", which had promised to have Darla-centric fanfic, links, a gallery, and a biography of the character Darla, and was heavily inspired by the first half of Season 2 of ATS. By Christmas 2000, however, Darla's Domain was essentially ignored, although there were two fics in the archive. During this period, the main fanfic archives - "A Little Sign" and "Shanshu" - expandedd greatly, although even now they have yet to become as broad or as well known as the more famous archives known on the web. However, the small number of regular visitors and list members have been sufficient cause to maintain the site throughout the various struggles.
In January 2001, ALSTSC was again revamped, and this time got a theme - Sourgirl blue - and was decided to be "Version 3.0". "Sourgirl blue" came from the main index graphic, which was constructed from two screencaps of Sarah Michelle Gellar in the music video "Sour Girl". ("Sour Girl" happened to be the one popular song that LJ's psychotic roommate played on a regular basis that LJ could stand.) The "affiliates" were reduced to the bare necessities - "Spoiler Space", "The Sacred Grove" (links), "A Little Sign Archive", "Shanshu Archive", "How? What? How? Challenge Archive", and "Darla's Domain". In Spring 2001, LJ decided to go completely spoiler-free and "Spoiler Space", as well as "Darla's Domain", was abandoned. It was also decided to combine all of the fanfic archives into one - "A Little Sign" - and that the term "affiliates" would be abandoned as silly and superfluous. At this same time, LJ began putting together Restless and LJ's Reviews.
With the advent of the 100th episode of BTVS, LJ began to develop a new design for ALSTSC, based on the theme of Slayers and Master vampires - i.e. Buffy, Kendra, Faith vs. the Master, Spike, Angel(us), and Dracula. Other new theme ideas had included "Shanshu", "Liam", and "William", based primarily on a renewed interest in "Fool for Love", but these were soon abandoned despite extensive work done on them. As promotional pictures for the Slayers and Masters theme were easier to find, it was decided to stick with that. Work on this design theme continued sporadically for about three weeks, including two solid hours on May 22, 2001 - the day of the 100th episode and the Season 5/2 finales - up to the last ten minutes before the eepisodes aired. Two hours later, it was clear that the theme wouldn't work. A new theme had to be found.
Due to school responsibilities, LJ stayed at school over Memorial Day Weekend 2001 instead of going home and on the Friday night played around with some pictures from "The Gift" and other episodes from the last third of the fifth season. Soon she came across the picture of Buffy and Dawn from "Spiral" that was the origin for the splash, which is the same as the image at the top of this page. After much experimentation, LJ found a variation that she liked and decided to go with a theme based on the sacrifices of "The Gift", naming Version 4.0 of ALSTSC "In Memoriam" -- "in memory". It seemed fitting. The poetic theme - "a hero's courage is power forged by lovee and fear" - was created by LJ and, as far as she knows, is not a quote from any poem, book, or movie; if it is, it is purely coincidental. Due to the same responsibilities that had kept her away from home that weekend, LJ decided to go with a minimalist approach with version 4.0; the less time needed to update the website, the better, and so this version of ALSTSC is simplistic and has fewer graphics than ever. In realizing that it had indeed been a full year since the founding of ALSTSC, LJ also decided to write up a short history of the site, the result of which you are now reading (and probably wondering why LJ is speaking of herself in the third person).
Currently, ALSTSC has reverted to its original goals: it houses fanfiction, challenges, and links only.
For more information on submitting fanfic and challenges, please visit the fanfiction page and read the submission guidelines.
The updates and information mailing list is a_little_sign_that_she_cared@yahoogroups.com. Membership tends to balance around 45 individuals.
To request a link or for other information,
questions, concerns, please contact LJ at restless_cheeseguy@yahoo.com.
The Webmistress
LJ is a twenty-something graduate student,
currently in the Department of German at a UC school, but looking to transfer
to Linguistics next year. She has a BA in German from a university in Oregon,
which she completed in about three years. Ironically, she first took an
interest in BTVS in Germany as an exchange student - she was originally
a Trekker and X-Phile, but Star Trek: The Next Generation unfortunately
coincided with her host sister's talk shows and soaps, so she discovered
a new show to watch. (The X-Files had been mostly abandoned long
before in the US, due to homework and other responsibilities.) The first
episode of BTVS she saw in full was "Teacher's Pet" in Fall 1998
in Germany; by the end of the episode, she was hooked, and saw most of the
first two seasons while abroad. At the same time, she began to write fanfiction,
not at all knowing that there was such a thing as fanfiction and that there
was a very active fan community online for it. (She had previously written
a little ST:TNG, XF, Lois and Clark and Vampire Chronicles fic, but has
long since abandoned those fandoms.)
Upon returning to the US, LJ happily sought out resources to find out what had happened in the elusive third season and what "this strange Angel business was all about", and in doing so discovered the online fan community. More importantly, she discovered that she was not alone and there was a word for her writing: "fanfiction". After a number of months simply reading fanfic, she decided to start writing it again; then, eventually, she decided a website was in order. ALSTSC was thus created. Once one of her brothers discovered that she was learning HTML, he pushed her in the direction of the GIMP to create graphics for the site.
In the fan community, LJ works as a fanfic author, webmistress of three
(one active, two inactive) BTVS sites, a beta reader, translator (English-German/German-English),
and is list mum to two BTVS lists. In real life, she is the only American
of three roommates in an over-priced apartment near a UC campus, where
she and the other two are graduate students. She also teaches introductory
German to freshmen (and the odd upperclassman). She is currently working
on about ten novels and a multitude of short stories and poetry, most of
it easily classified as science fiction or fantasy. She also has an interest
in film and television writing/production. When she's not reading or studying,
LJ can be found creatively baking bread or crocheting doilies while watching
old BTVS and ATS eps or SF/F movies. In addition to becoming a published
author, LJ would like to teach English (possibly ESL) and German at the
high school level.
LJ can be contacted per email at restless_cheeseguy@yahoo.com.
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