TrekNation

The Trek BBS is an active Star Trek Message board, affiliated with the UGO Network and the Trek Nation. It was created in 1999 by Christian Höhne Sparborth, to allow for general discussion of Star Trek-related topics. However, the non-Star Trek forums are currently the most popular on the board (likely due to the fact that there is currently no first-run Star Trek TV series in production). The board currently welcomes over 10,000 registered users as of August 30, 2006.

In early 1999, Christian Höhne Sparborth and Saleel Majeed created a collection of websites: TrekSeek, TrekToday and TrekZone. TrekToday was given a sister site, the TrekBBS and both were linked from what would become the Trek Nation. The TrekBBS, originally located at www.trekzone.net/trekbbs, was eventually given its own URL, www.trekbbs.com on 8 June 1999. At this point, the BBS was still fairly basic: the Lounges and Comics board would not exist until the end of July 1999, there was a Star Wars forum and all the forums were open to guests for viewing and posting. This would change, however, as the board attracted more and more visitors. June 1999 brought a major shift in the administration of the TrekBBS. Saleel went on holiday and Christian, feeling angered by Saleel's lack of acknowledgement for his behind-the-scenes work, modified the server passwords, locking Saleel out of the system. A solution was eventually reached, whereby the TrekBBS split from TrekZone and the TrekNation was born. During this split, Christian admitted regretting the loss of TrekSeek, the largest Star Trek search engine online, which has now gone offline. At one point, plans were considered to restart TrekSeek, but this project never emerged. Saleel permanently departed from all online and offline participation in Star Trek. April 2001 saw the removal of the Star Wars forum. By this time, the board had been growing rapidly for some time and the board was now much more restrictive as a result. In early 2001, a poster known as Red Quacker was eventually banned for various misdeeds. As retaliation, several duals were registered under names such as Blue Quacker, Green Quacker and Teal Quacker. It has never been confirmed whether this was perpetrated by Red Quacker, but the official belief is that it was. As a result of this and other bannings, some members created a spin-off board - the Troll Kingdom (TK) - in order to troll the TrekBBS. Whilst the board's aims have changed, many of the denizens of TK still bear a great dislike of the TrekBBS. The TrekBBS was subsequently attacked several times by hackers, pornography-spammers and so forth. When it was discovered that the hacks were being perpetrated by members of TK, they were permanently banned from the TrekBBS (although many have been granted reprieves). These attacks continued throughout early 2002 and the TrekBBS's staff-only forum, The Briefing Room, was hacked multiple times, up to late 2004. Spam also became a major problem during this period and, to dissuade spammers, post-count was turned off in off-topic (i.e. non-Trek) fora. Partly as a response to these attacks and other rule changes, some members peeled off from the TrekBBS and formed their own boards, such as TerranBBS and EFCL. These boards were created as a refuge away from the perceived politics and chaos of TrekBBS. As 2002 drew to a close, the board was hacked in a spambot registration attack (perpetrated, once again, by TK). The board collapsed and the staff brought in Charles Capps to help with setting up UBB threads. Around this time, Christian resigned from day-to-day running of the board, handing it over to Lisa (who had already been running the board as co-Administrator for some time). TrekBBS changed hands once more in late 2004 and is to this day managed by T'Bonz (who had actually been running the BBS behind-the-scenes for a short time before officially taking over). Although spam still remains a problem and TK still plays host to some disillusioned members, the problems TrekBBS experienced during 2002-2004 have largely subsided and the board is now a more stable and welcoming online community. Recent changes include the addition of forums for Battlestar Galactica, Doctor Who, Lost and Stargate - an effort to keep the board busy and vibrant, now that Star Trek: Enterprise has ceased broadcasting. However, with speculation over Star Trek XI running at record levels, renewed interest in the franchise may tilt the balance between Trek-related and non-Trek-related threads in the near future.

• The original ranking system ran to Captain; it was felt that very few people would ever get enough posts to rise above this rank. A further 6 ranks have been added since then, the highest being Fleet Admiral (of which there are nine).
• The board was turned orange for Halloween 1999, bringing many complaints about the garish colour scheme; it was decided in future years that such modifications would not be made.
• Many people actually involved in Star Trek have posted at the TrekBBS. Among them: Trek's senior illustrator Rick Sternbach; Star Trek: Enterprise writers David Goodman and Mike Sussman; even Captain Kirk actor William Shatner, though he only posted twice in 2002 to promote his personal website.
• Many from Pocket Books post about Star Trek novels, including editors Margaret Clark & Marco Palmieri and former editor John Ordover. Authors such as Greg Cox, Keith R.A. DeCandido, David Mack, Andy Mangels, Michael A. Martin and Dayton Ward have also made regular posts on the TrekBBS.

• TrekBBS
• TrekBBS FAQ

Affiliated boards

• CSI Files (http://www.csifiles.com/ )

An official spin-off board for the CSI television franchise.

• Get Desperate! (http://www.getdesperate.com/ )

An official spin-off board for the Desperate Housewives TV series.

• SlipstreamWeb (http://www.slipstreamweb.com/ )

An official spin-off board for the TV series Andromeda; no longer updated.

Spin-off boards

In addition to the above boards, operated by the owner/administrators of the Trek BBS, the board has spawned a number of spin-off communities founded by current or ex-members.

• EFCL (http://www.real-efcl.net/)

A spin-off board started by members of the TrekBBS's Fleet Captains' Lounge. No longer active. *ExIsle (http://www.exisle.net/) A general board for sci-fi fans. Various writers and industry insiders post here.

• Kelly'z Korner (http://www.kellyzkorner.net/forums/)

A board for fan fiction and other writing, with a lesser focus on music and visual art.

• LoNAF (http://www.lonaf.com/)

LoNAF (or League of Non Aligned Fleets) was a board originally created when users began to overwhelm the Miscellaneous board with fantasy fleet threads. Now a general purpose board.

• Spacedock BBS (http://www.spacedockbbs.com/forums)

Focuses on sci-fi and fantasy movies, TV series', games and books.

• Starscape (http://www.starscapebbs.com/)

An experiment to test infinite diversity in infinite combinations.

• TerranBBS (http://www.terranbbs.net/)

A general board with a sci-fi bent.

• Troll Kingdom (http://www.trollkingdom.com/forum/ )

A board devoted to free speech on the internet; started by banned members of TrekBBS

• We Want Brunette Jolene (http://www.wewantbrunettejolene.com/)

A board borne from a discussion in the Enterprise forum by fans of Jolene Blalock, who played T'Pol on Star Trek:Enterprise.

• Wordforge (http://www.wordforge.net/)

An all-purpose political and controversial discussion board. Many of these spin-off boards were formed or populated by disgruntled subsets of the TrekBBS member base, a reflection of the complexities associated with Virtual community moderation.