The Story of The Republic

[Tristan]

We're collecting all of the history that everyone can remember about the posts, people, and events surrounding BTTS and TRoH, as a fun project. Please post what you remember in order here; we'll then try tie them together as a narrative. Thanks if you choose to help!

[orange]

hmm.. well it looks like I can reply to it at least as a different user, but is there a way we can set it so that everyone (not just mods and admins) has access to edit the single post?

[eniamrahc]

Hmm? I'm not sure what you're talking about.

I remember...

Louisa's departure (and return).
How I corrected everyone from thinking I was a boy.
Qu's banning.
Merlyn resigning as webmaster.
All the times the board went down, and how we survived.

And I shall think of more later.

[darren]

shiv's colour day.
the seating plan for the HDM premiere.
the sraffie awards.
the oldies who rarely post now... shiv and nick and justine and la and daniel and soup and lady.
when we decided on a new name for the pub. (i still think the post stuff about philip pullman's dark materials trilogy and other books and have lots of fun and treat yourself to a pint while your at it forum was better than the republic )

i'll think of more.

-- darren

[Celestial Madness]

Qwazzermans reaching 1000 posts in a month
Tonyon and his cool avatar
Shivy winning Sexiest Sraffie
Yukon and his evil posting
The "if will and harry potter fought" thread
Srafcon in the chat
Soup, Nick, qwazz, Whichgirl, LA, Lost in thought, Shivy, story, King ogunwe, Blinkus, Justine and all the others who have left TROH.

[lostinthought451]

when I thought Will was a lesbian.
when Tanya arrived.
Random Guy being hated by everyone.
Multiname.
the board crashes.

[jessia]

katinka's red hot chili peppers and dust thread (the first thread i e'er posted in)

plans for srafcon and the hdm premiere's seating plan and plans to go out afterwards and before kinders left for the first time, how he was hitting on everyone.

darrenesque threads

when noah used to be really annoying and then he left and we missed him and went to look for him like twice

when the forum went down, a couple times, including the time it went down because the bandwidth buckle

when the republic was called the retiring room and before that, whatever it was called

when merlyn was terribly eloquent about how he didn't spend too much time in the forums because rl is better

when louisa departed

when okibi.n.rookie departed, and then soup, and nick

the bondage scene in nerdvana

etcetera.

[eloquent]

The big shift from naivety to vulgarity

[Jameson]

in totally random order:
Nialls banning
My fight with Alec (so stupid, looking back)
when we had the first temp boards, and having that really perverted conversation with Will
everyone thinking I was a boy
the 'food' forum
Qu Klaani and Wills star wars fight (and not letting Micheal join)
The jkR is a racist thing

[Huginn]

Qu Klaani and Wills star wars fight (and not letting Micheal join)

I was never trying to "join." I was trying to get it to stop.

[Jameson]

Qu Klaani and Wills star wars fight (and not letting Micheal join)

I was never trying to "join." I was trying to get it to stop.

oh, right, sorry.

And I can't link it (no idea how, and can't be arsed) but that big thing with the cave with Qu Klaani was funny

[lostinthought451]

*remembers lots of posts in the depressed thread*

[Laura]

The 'most embarrasing moment' thread
Trillian's 'eat your soul' thing in her sig
All of the incarnations of One (lost one, unsettled one)
The thing that was King Chicken

...I can't remember much from when I was a newbie. Is that a bad thing?

[Qu Klaani]

Me and Will repeling an army of trolls so well that most people dont even know we were attacked.

[Tomsy]

The daemon fight when everyone left
The board invasion
Merlyn leaving
Rosie changing things, and everyone hating it
The big crash
Qu Klaani's banning

[Anoria]

Trolls and more trolls
My stupid n00b days (not a very fond memory, to be sure)
People's sentimental departures
Wishing I had joined earlier so there were more memories and fewer legends
Grammar/spelling/syntax/punctuation wars
The Library's evolution
UK vs. US arguments
Having to be reminded to participate in the HDM discussion once in a while...

[Enitharmon]

- Finding it on a Google hunt because I wanted to talk about the stunning books I'd just read twice in a row.

- Backing off when I realised I was much older than everybody else

- Being restrained from backing off because I was in a conversation about fanfic with Ceres

- Being baffled but also pleased about the Private Lives thread and wondering what was going on.

- Being amused and chuffed when Tony paired me off with jess

- Being delighted when Louisa praised my fanfic

- Crossing swords with Qu Klaani over Angela Carter, being startled by his anger but impressed with the integrity of his acceptance of beingt bested.

- Being pissed on Christmas night and startling myself with the realisation I was liking a certain somebody more than was appropriate

- Witch Girl calling my bluff and asking me how old I was, and seeing the shock when everybody found out.

- Getting to know Trillian, my soul-sister, in a private correspondence.

- Suddenly realising in January that I was no longer on the margins but right there in the thick of it.

- Alec's arrival, and my realisation that here was somebody as weird as me.

- Joining the Megamouth Club much earlier than I'd expected, and noticing that the 'vulgarity' took over from naievety from that moment

- Unmasking Wiil's picture and unleashing a new and unexpected Will on the boards.

- Finding myself alone with Will in the chatroom after a netsplit and being overwhelmed by starnge emotions!

- The daemon Wars - the boards' lowest point

- The May crash, and general mayhem in temporary premises, with power shifting significantly.

- Becoming She Who Must Be Obeyed with madcap rules about daffodils and trebuchets, none of which including the title were meant to be taken too seriously.

- A smashing Significant Birthday card with messages from several much-loved sraffies

- Trying to walk a tightrope between being laid-back and not letting tempers and spats get out of hand, and not always feeling I was winning.

- The September Crash, and the marvellous community spirit that kept things going in the Portakabin.

- Feeling I had to let Qu Klaani know I wasn't a doormat and he couldn't impose on my goodwill forever

- Being mortified by the sraffies' response to the above.

- Being exasperated at not understanding why Qu Klaani is so angry, and with his conviction that I don't like him (which isn't true, I like him a lot, he just drives me nuts sometimes).

- Being on a constant watch for my successor as {S|H}WMBO in the not-too-distant future

[Tristan]

- The day a crush of mine in middle school suggested this book called 'The Golden Compass' for a book discussion in the basement program room of the library...
- The agonizing week on a backpacking trip while waiting for a copy of The Amber Spyglass to come in at the library, leaving me to wander over the mountains of central PA wondering what would happen next.
- The day I decided to turn my interest in running an unsuccessful fantasy role-playing site towards running a small little fan site for HDM.
- The day somebody commented in the guestbook, suggesting that I add a message board and a chat room so that people could interact more with the site.
- The addition of an ezboard, and the arrival of Posmella as the first regular poster. If I remember correctly, Kyrillion was there in those days as one of the first moderators.
- The arrival of Jay as the first staffer, with his remodeling of the design of the main site.
- The move to a YABB style board, hosted by Neon Caparti on his Accursed site(http://web.archive.org/web/200210080016 ... rk/YaBB.pl), and the arrival of Jon as hdmdrummer on the boards and on the staff. Moderaters at the time were Scr1pt_k1ddY, Anna Coulter, Almaceen, and me.
- The arrival of Justine
- The arrival of Nix, and the initial annoyance I felt at having my post count (the leader at the time) surpassed so quickly
- The arrival of Shiv, and the writing of the immortal song, 'Pineapple Shivy'. Color day. Talk like a pirate day.
- The arrival of AySz88, thinking that he was a girl, and the surprising amount of time that it took me to figure out who people were referring to when they said 'Soup'.
- The arrival of Lady/Cecilia
- The arrival of Dan and Blighty, and the decision to vastly expand the staff
- The arrival of La
- The golden age of the chat room and its strange shape and environment, when it was full with the 'old' regulars, all of whom pushed me out of the window at one point. Falling hippopotomi etc. Justine claiming the only corner as her's. Accusing Justine of being an evil pink penguin in the chat room alone with her one day. Fishing.
- Gabe's uniclusters
-The arrival of eloquent, and a thread from Matt asking if anyone would be interested in helping him build another HDM site (which supposedly never really expanded out from HDM.org like he meant it to, but I don't know the history of that..), eloquent responding that he might be interested, and my decision that we should try to keep him for ourselves
- Naming it The Republic of Heaven (I recall some of the other options were 'The Retiring Room', 'The Abyss', and 'The Cave')
-Darren dubbing it the Pub of Heaven.
-Darren's sig, and all of his brilliant writing
-The play-by-play commentary on the radio dramatization on the BBC
- The vast explosion of new members when Jess, Trillian, Rosie, Qu and so many others first showed up. When I first began to not recognize the names of everyone who was posting.
- Anoria, and the attempt to regulate the game room more strictly Creation of her library. Fact that I've never been issued a library card (though I don't think I've ever asked, so I've only got myself to blame...)
- The fading of the old regulars, whether from lack of interest, resentment, or a dislike of where things were going.
- The fights that sealed their fate, initiated by the debate on daemons, which made me decide that I'm not made for maintaining the peace between factions who don't want to get along.
- The failed attempt to reconcile, the loss of many of the original regulars.
- The week at the Creation music festival at the end of June in which I met up with the sraffie who I most wanted to see face to face (and being recognized as"Internet Tristan??!" by a person from her church), confirming my decision that I was spending too much energy on the site and the board, and that I needed to focus more on real life -- thus passing the webmastership to ali, and meaning to only hover in the background, although I think I'm more involved than I meant to be, kept on by my interest in what will happen with the movies. I suppose I'll hover around, drifting away a little more each day, until when finally I'll post a comment and the regulars will ask, "Who's this merlyn person? And where did he get all of those posts? I've never seen him around here before..."

[Will]

Surprised no-one's mentioned it yet: The Big Read, particularly in the chatroom with live cross-Atlantic transcription.

[All_That_Jazz]

The huge argument in the vegetarianism/vivisection thread