Debaucherette University: the Legendary Journeys
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| Debaucherette University (Deb U) has been in existence for over five years now. Some of us have
been involved since the beginning, many of us have been involved since the first year and many
more joined in later in its history. Over that five year span of time as each new person joins
one of the first questions asked is how did this all start? Each of us “old-timers” has, at one
time or another tried to briefly relate this saga and I will now join this tradition with my
attempt.
In the mid ‘90s several trends just happened to coincide. The availability of reasonably priced PCs equipment with user friendly software, the longing by the TV viewing public for some different kind of programming and a decision by Universal Studios to vigorously enter the new market for new TV programming aimed not at network broadcasting but at the independent stations which up to that point had subsisted on re-runs of old network programming. One of the first and biggest hits generated for this new market was Hercules:the Legendary Journeys. Universal, hoping to capitalize on the potential of an Internet audiencelaunched a campaign advertising a website devoted to H:tLJ and included a bulletin board for fan comments. It was an almost immediate success and those fans from the old Universal board formed the nucleus from which Deb U was born. With the summer of that first year came reruns and as is usually the case, a drop off of active fan participation. One can only rehash the finer points of a TV show for so long before boredom sets in. Perhaps, the one thing that saved the community from failing was an announcement that Universal had bought the rights to a Hercules spin-off to be called Xena, Warrior Princess. Before the program even aired a new website and bulletin board was added for Xena. The Hercules group noticed almost immediately that those few male members of their board were abandoning them in favor of the Xena board for some completely unfathomable reason. Two of the earliest members of that first group of fans were known by their “board names” as Astraea and Nanaea. Determined to bring back into the fold “their Hunters”, a series of raids were planned with the object of capturing the hunters and bringing them back to H:tLJ in chains if necessary! At one point in time during these raiding parties one board member posted a prophetic statement to the affect that Astraea and Nanaea were turning her into a regular debaucherette. It wasn’t long before the Debaucherette’s adventures began to appear in FF. (Fan Fiction) story form. Perhaps, because one or more of the more prolific writers were associated with a university, a university became the base of operations and the idea of chancellors, students and student levels soon became a part of the FFs. I wish those old FFs were still available but most all of them were lost in The Big Delete a year or so later. In the fall the second season of Hercules began and it was “partnered” with the first season of Xena. Most stations chose to broadcast the two programs back to back with Hercules serving as a lead-in to the new Xena show. With new shows to talk about, some of the board members felt that the whole OT (Off Topic) silliness of Deb U would quietly disappear. It didn’t! The new shows inspired new FF and on the Hercules board, at least, Deb U was still a prominent part of the stories. This caused a slightly different meaning to be attached to FF. Instead of Fan Fiction a W was added to the end they were increasing known as Forum Family Wanderings. We did feel like family and some older members began to adopt newer members as part of their family. I ended up with 11 “children” and I have no idea how many grand and great-grand children. By early ‘96 the tension between the two factions was going past the point of good natured poking fun at each other and people were getting genuinely upset. To prevent the complete alienation of the two groups it was decided to move Deb U to a separate board. Universal, encouraged by the success and popularity of message boards for specific programs, had created new boards for many of their new shows. Even if a show was canceled after a few episodes they continued to carry those boards on their system. Deb U chose to move to an abandoned board for “Something So Right”, a program that had enjoyed a very short unpopular run. For Deb U at least, it was “so right” and we settled in to build our own community while still keep in close touch with those we had left behind on the Hercules board. On a personal note, this is the time I began keep records for Deb U and in my own mind atleast, this is the time when we became a truly independent organization. All went fine until Universal decided to sell their interest in the programs to USA. One of the first moves USA made was to get rid of the ghost boards by the simple means, or so they thought at the time, of moving the active legitimate boards to a new system and closing down all the old Universal boards. In the end it took them a couple of years to accomplish this and by that time we had already staked our claim at NW54 for our new home. We’ve been here ever since that time and hope to be here for a long time to come. I’ve skipped over a lot of stuff to keep this as short as possible but almost everything that has been written about Deb U since the move to the SSR Uni board is archived on The Deb U Website for all to read. Next time I’ll try to talk about some of the people at Deb U, some of the activities we have enjoyed in the past and some of the things that may happen in the future. |
