Editor's Report
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Thanks to www.archive.org I was able to get this snapshot of LaughingPlace.com from October 1999. It's always fun to look back. So much has changed.
Thank You
Today is LaughingPlace.com's 3rd birthday. As usual on this day, I'm writing an Editor's
Report. And - as usual - the hardest part of the Editor's Report is the thank yous. Over
three years we've had so many people contribute to the site in so many different ways,
it's hard to list them all without missing someone. But that's what I'm going to try to
do. And if you don't see your name on the list, please know it's not personal, and please
do send it along and so I can add it..
So on behalf of Rebekah, I'd like to thank...
Barry Allender, Bob Barber, Paul Barrie, Kevin Beltzner, Josh Benton, Don Bitz, Coleen Bolton, Marc Borrelli, Benji Breitbart, Michael Broggie, Mark Carbonella, Lindsay Cave, James D., Alastair Dallas, Danny, John Frost, Michelle F., Scott Garner, Ramon Godoy, Bob Gurr, Erik Hageman, Stephen Halpin, James Hensley, Jeff in Orange County, John-Michael Hensley, Jim Hill, Kirby Holt, Kerryn Johns, Stuart Kuramoto, Daniel Kaplan, Jonathan Kaplan, Rachel Kaplan, Allison Keaney, Heather LaFlame, Warren Lee, Kaz Liput, LuLu, Dave Mastanich, Richard Mastanich, Stephanie Mastanich, Doug Marsh, Lee MacDonald, Greg Maletic, Michelle (from MouseEarVacations.com) Jim Miles, David Mink, Amber and Nick Morgan, Tim O'Day, Adam Pedersen, Ken Pellman, Paul Perrello, Chris Peters, Kim Petersen, Mike Pucher, Quentin, Chris Reed, Sean Ribblett, Roger Rodriguez, Marion Rosenblum, Susie Schurman, Chris Scott, Jennifer Sharward, Michelle Smith, Marc Spignese, Scarlett Stahl, Lee Suggs, Sunita, Linda Yatsko, Matthew Walker, Rick West, Mark Wharff, Rhett Wickham, Stacey Wright and those who prefer to remain completely anonymous.
And those are just the ones who've had very direct contributions. That doesn't include all the people who post on our Discussion Boards making them some of the most active Disney boards on the net. Or those that post comments in our various Guides. And, of course, we'd also like to thank all of our readers that have helped make LaughingPlace.com one of the most popular Disney sites on the net.
Another important group that can't be forgotten are our advertisers. It's those banner ads, button ads, text box ads and - yes - even those pop under ads that help pay the bills around here. Thank you, thank you, thank you!
Looking Back
As I said at the start, looking back is always fun. So for this Editor's Report I decided
to look back at LaughingPlace.com over the past 36 months and mention one of the
milestones or other major things that occurred during each month. This isn't meant to be
exhaustive and some important things obviously had to be left out. But it was fun to
accumulate and I hope it's fun for you to look back.
| August 1999 | LaughingPlace.com launched |
| September 1999 | Interview with Imagineering legend Bob Gurr. This was our second legend interview (X Atencio being the first), but this one was special because it established a relationship that developed into more (see below). |
| October 1999 | We think of Disneyland Updates as the thing really that put us on the Disney website map. On October 18th we had our very first Disneyland Update. |
| November 1999 | Our first major coverage of a Walt Disney World event was the opening of the Millennium Celebration. The coverage started in October but peaked in November with Reflections of Earth and Tapestry of Nations coverage. |
| December 1999 | Our first Guide to the Holidays at Disneyland with nearly 300 pictures. |
| January 2000 | Superbowl Sunday - we launched our Discussion Boards. Today we average nearly 1,500 posts per day. |
| February 2000 | The first time we covered a really big media event at the Disneyland Resort - the 45th Anniversary. This was a warm-up for what was to come next January. |
| March 2000 | Imagineer Bob Gurr wrote his first piece, a guest column, for the site. In May he would become a permanent part of the staff with a monthly column on Disneyland's early days from a first-person perspective. I'm still amazed Bob Gurr actually writes for LP! |
| April 2000 | |
| May 2000 | I interviewed the Sherman Brothers. One of the true highlights of my career. |
| June 2000 | The last Guest Relations. Guest Relations was one of the columns we started the site with. Due to personal issues it was the first to leave. It's a column I miss a lot. Chris ... are you out there .... Another opening day column, the Editor's Report, stopped its regularly weekly schedule. It's now published whenever - usually on anniversaries :) |
| July 2000 | Disneyland Resort President Cynthia Harriss sat down with us for her first extensive interview with a Disney website. |
| August 2000 | Marc Borrelli writes his first DisneySea column for LP - the start of some truly incredible coverage of Tokyo's new park. |
| September 2000 | The LaughingPlace.com Daily Disney Newsletter launches. Next to the Discussion Boards it's probably the most often-mentioned part of the site when I meet people. |
| October 2000 | With the addition of a new camera to our equipment list the October 31st Disneyland Update for the first time had these important words below each image - "Click here for a much larger version of this picture" |
| November 2000 | The Countdown feature was added allowing readers to countdown on LaughingPlace.com's front page to their next Disney trip. Today there are more than 500 upcoming trips on the list. |
| December 2000 | For the first time we took a trip to Walt Disney World just for the website. The result - our first Guide to the Holidays at Walt Disney World featuring more than 900 pictures from every park and resort - and some very sore feet. |