Suck.com - our great intro to the web
Here’s a great history piece on Suck.com. I have my own version of Suck.com’s history.
I threw a party at the apartment I was living in (right when I got divorced) and most of the Sucksters showed up.
They promptly sat down - right in the middle of the dance floor and ignored the rest of us - for the entire party.
I found that amazing.
Up until then - I had never encountered such rash, arrogant, elitist attitudes in young technocrats before. This approach (of course) has become legendary by now - highly practiced by certain people - who’s names will be held to protect their guilty-ness.
But if you go to industry conferences - you run into these folks all the time. I believe that most of them learned this attitude from Suck.com.
“Look - there are some of those ‘web kids’” - I pointed to them, acting oblivious to the rest of us old fart “multimedia nerds”.
They went on to thank me for that party by putting me on one of their ‘cards’. They also decided that I was far game, spending the next few years poking fun at me, insulting me and in general acting like spoiled brats.
I responded to this attitude by making sure that whenever I would see one of them at a party, club, bar or industry event - that I would ridicule them in public, make them know that we all knew how young they were and in general - giving them their compeuppance.
But everyone loved Suck.com and it quickly became apparent to me that the web was different. You could do anything you want and get away with it.
I was able to find several references, insults and in general - Suck.com coverage - by searching the web.
But the truest personification of Suck.com I can think of - is in their misquoting my net worth and which virus I accidentally helped spread (it was Pagemaker - not Freehand.) How perfect.
Not only did they slander, insult and get the facts wrong - they also lied about me.
Thanks Carl, Joey and Ed.
You clearly made your contribution to the web.