Sandy's Soapbox

It's difficult to look back at early RPGnet with a clear sense of what was going on. We were making up what we now take for granted because it was fun. We play games because they are fun. We do gaming business stuff because it's fun and also makes us want to pull our hair out in frustration. We go online because it's fun (and also makes us want to pull our hair out in frustration).

At the time of RPGnet's birth, our primary task was convincing game companies that having a website was useful. Nowadays, we know a website is an essential business requirement, but back then, it was quite a task just explaining why the web was a) important and b) going to increase in importance.

Some companies were early adopters, especially among small publishers in the GPA. Several folks in trade orgs like GAMA were clearly curious and open, but their primary income was from brick-and-mortar game stores and the benefits of the web had not yet been proven. We were invited to give talks at GTS and similar on why -- or sometimes if -- the web would be important. For everyone that thinks it was obvious the web was the future, I offer you 3-D movies and flying hoverboards as counter-examples of 'clearly it's the future'.

We (Emma and I) knew the web would be important, for the same reason we were already living on email and USENET (look that one up, kiddies.) Once the protocol wars between gopher, WAIS and HTTP were resolved with HTTP/web the winner, it was clear it was going to grow. True, we didn't predict dollar acquisitions, but even in the early days dollar deals were going down. The web was real and going to get bigger.

RPGnet took the idea of taking existing freelancers -- my own list of companies to write for, Etrigan's gamer database, Brian's essays and links -- and add them with links to those companies with websites to create a unified Portal. An additional reason to Portalize is all us folks making individual pages were starting to realize it took a lot of time to keep them up to date and maintain them while simultaneously having to be the sys admin maintaining the server. It helped to have a good URL (rpg.net)

Why not RPG.com? Well, that was already taken by a company called RPG that did commercial graphic work. RPG = roleplaying game, reproductive graphics, or rocket-propelled grenade, and one of us had to get the .com. In those days, to get .net, you had to fit a narrow criteria that included doing web hosting -- yes, you had to justify a reason and file documentation to get any ending other than .com! Now, you just pay money. We offered web hosting, so were granted the .net ending.

So how did I feel at the time? The business end of web was very exciting, kind of how I find the 'new space' movement of amateur and semi-pro satellites and rockets very exciting now. We knew we were on the leading edge of cool stuff, yet no one had a first idea where it would end. Turns out it was fun, and we got to connect a lot of people and help be part of the movement that basically led to gaming and the internet being nearly synonymous to many people.

It was fun, it was frustrating, it was new, it was worth it. Happy 18th birthday, RPGnet!

Until the next 18,
Sandy at rpg.net, freelance