The making of the Dan Reed Network Fan Page
How did this page get started? Well, here's the story. In about 1994, I didn't have a computer, but my mom, and my sister did at their homes. I would go surfing at my sister's place and thought it was incredible that you could search for almost anything, and find it! She had America Online at the time, and I still thought that was pretty neat. Well, after searching (and finding) cool stuff on Depeche Mode, Star Trek, and Miami Vice, we found a part of AOL where you could download pictures that people have drawn. I've always been into spaceships from movies & TV, so I downloaded a couple. I also drew (using Microsoft "Paintbrush") my own versions of Star Destroyers etc. and I wanted to upload a picture to that folder on AOL so other people could see it. Well, my sister helped me upload the picture, and a lot of people e-mailed her telling her/me that it was a cool drawing! My sister then said that it was good that I wasn't just taking from the Internet, and that I was actually putting something back. This really hit me, and stuck with me.
I eventually got my parents' hand-me-down 486 computer in 1996. One fine day after that I searched for "Dan Reed Network" using Alta-Vista, and any other search engine I could find. I found nothing. Being a big fan with what I thought were all of their CD's, I thought of creating the page. Note that I never knew the band, had only seen them twice, and although I shook hands with each member before one concert here in Seattle, that certainly doesn't count me as an "insider" as they say, just a fan with some CD's to scan & stuff. So, I scanned some CD covers at my friend Larry's house, added some text, read & typed the lyrics, recorded a couple of small wavs, and posted the page! Then I actually went to the search engines and painstakingly added my page to each one of them.
Slowly but surely, I started getting e-mail from all over the world! A ton from Scandinavia, some from England, and a bunch from the USA. I knew that DRN was a great band, and had a great history, but I had no idea how popular they still were! I still get e-mail from all over the world to this day. DRN still has a lot of fans!
A group of people approached me after I created the page and asked if I was interested in putting my resources (yeah, I had tons of those!) toward helping them with their page. This was the now defunct "The Tribe" page dedicated to DRN, Adrenaline Sky, and Rob Daiker. I was "approved" to be on their "staff", and well, nothing really happened with that page. It seemed that they were really aiming for being a current help to Adrenaline Sky, and Rob Daiker, and those projects ended. Dan Reed has moved onto other things, and Rob Daiker ended up fronting the great band "Slowrush" which used to have Blake & Dan P in it. I also found (through a fan) another DRN page called "Slam Society" done by Kurt T. His page was also on AOL, and was actually pretty good, but he hadn't updated it in a while, and apparently it wasn't on any search engines.
Eventually I started receiving lots of pictures and info from fans all over. Thank you all SO MUCH for your help! If it weren't for you, I would never have known that DRN had an album called "Breathless", and I would never have gotten to listen to the awesome B-sides that were hidden for so long.
Well, now I've got the domain: danreed.com, and a nice place to put the page. Lots better than AOL!
Special thanks to Larry R, for helping me with software, and allowing me to rent some of his space to put this page out to the world back when it first started! If it weren't for him, you wouldn't be reading this. To Blake & Dan P for contacting me, and giving me cool free stuff like "Breathless" and "Slowrush" stuff! And especially for the information you've donated to the page!
Also, thanks to Kurt, Frank, Wrinkles, Scott, Will, Juern, Magnus, JMC, and all of you who helped donate stuff to the page!
More thanks to Tina, Mel, Farron, Octobre (Commie hippie chick) and all who post on the Discussion forum. You rock!
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