{"id":4946,"date":"2016-04-21T10:00:07","date_gmt":"2016-04-21T14:00:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thepulp.net\/yellowedperils\/?p=4946"},"modified":"2016-10-17T16:34:02","modified_gmt":"2016-10-17T20:34:02","slug":"the-ebb-and-flow-of-pulp-fandom-online","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thepulp.net\/yellowedperils\/2016\/04\/21\/the-ebb-and-flow-of-pulp-fandom-online\/","title":{"rendered":"The ebb and flow of pulp fandom online"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"PulpMags<\/a>ThePulp.Net<\/a><\/em> first appeared online just over 20 years ago as .Pulp<\/a><\/em> on the old America Online dial-up service.<\/p>\n

By the time I started ThePulp.Net\/.Pulp<\/em>, I had been online for a number of years. First through a FreeNet<\/a> in Tallahassee, Fla., which provided access to the UseNet<\/a>, including alt.pulp<\/a> and alt.fan.doc-savage<\/a>. At some point in the early ’90s, we signed up for AOL, which eventually included forums for pulps and Doc Savage<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

This was in the long-ago days of dial-up modems, spending short periods of time online, and being interrupted when someone called the house and the modem dropped the connection because of call waiting. (That seems ancient history in these days of always-connected internet in your pocket.)<\/p>\n

I had learned HTML at work, so naturally I was eager to put it to work for fun. At first, I wanted to build a site devoted to The Shadow<\/a><\/strong>, then Doc Savage. But after finding that others had already created those online, I got the idea to start a clearinghouse for pulp websites — providing curated links divided into topics.<\/p>\n

It was discovering fellow pulp fans online that really spurred me into creating ThePulp.Net<\/em>, but it also rejuvenated an old interest in the pulps. Those online forums — on both UseNet and AOL — were great places to talk about the pulp magazines, pulp characters, authors, and artists with other folks who actually cared about such things.<\/p>\n

A few years passed, and activity in both AOL’s and UseNet’s forums ebbed. The alt.horror.cthulhu<\/a> newsgroup has been rather active the past year or so, but alt.pulp had 58 posts in 2015 — less than half as many as in a week 12 years earlier.<\/p>\n

Pulp fans began moving to the various Yahoo Groups<\/a> around 2000. Just as the pulp magazines became more specialized in topic, the Yahoo Groups became more specific, too.<\/p>\n

But by the end of the first decade of the new century, participation in many of the pulp groups at Yahoo peaked. At the same time, Facebook<\/a> was gaining ground as the<\/em> social media giant, and pulp groups began forming there. And by 2013, the pulp groups at Yahoo began a rapid decline in activity.<\/p>\n

The Flearun<\/a> group on Yahoo, for instance, was officially shuttered in March by founder Chuck Welch<\/strong> in favor of its Facebook version<\/a>. On Yahoo, Flearun counted over 580 members, while the Facebook version lists over 830 members (as of this writing).<\/p>\n

A few of the Yahoo Groups are hanging in there. PulpMags<\/a> has a steady stream of discussions, though at a much-reduced rate compared with six years ago. And FictionMags<\/a>, which has a broader interest than just the pulps, is thriving.<\/p>\n

As one online community wanes, another surges, then circumstances repeat.<\/p>\n

To compound matters, the future of Yahoo<\/a> looks uncertain. It is courting buyers, but the main selling point seems to be its online advertising base. I seriously doubt potential buyers are even thinking about its online groups.<\/p>\n

It would be a terrible loss if Yahoo’s new owners just decide to pull the plug on the groups. Thousands of conversations about the pulp magazines — and information about them — could just disappear.<\/p>\n

I guess that’s the march of progress.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

ThePulp.Net first appeared online just over 20 years ago as .Pulp on the old America Online dial-up service. By the time I started ThePulp.Net\/.Pulp, I had been online for a number of years. First through a FreeNet in Tallahassee, Fla., which provided access to the UseNet, including alt.pulp and alt.fan.doc-savage. At some point in the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","inline_featured_image":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_has_post_settings":[],"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"At Yellowed Perils: The ebb and flow of pulp fandom online. #pulpmags","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_wp_rev_ctl_limit":""},"categories":[9,14,15],"tags":[],"hashtags":[],"class_list":["post-4946","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-people","category-thepulpnet","category-websites"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"publish","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2qgXO-1hM","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepulp.net\/yellowedperils\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4946","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepulp.net\/yellowedperils\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepulp.net\/yellowedperils\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepulp.net\/yellowedperils\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepulp.net\/yellowedperils\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4946"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/thepulp.net\/yellowedperils\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4946\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5206,"href":"https:\/\/thepulp.net\/yellowedperils\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4946\/revisions\/5206"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepulp.net\/yellowedperils\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4946"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepulp.net\/yellowedperils\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4946"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepulp.net\/yellowedperils\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4946"},{"taxonomy":"hashtags","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepulp.net\/yellowedperils\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hashtags?post=4946"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}