This other Eden, demi paradise

Grockle goes Global
By Grockle
November 16 2012

Peter Anderson. The larger than life figure at the heart of Somerset cricket in the 90's. Strong advocate for the counties and the four day game. Man who didn't always weigh the consequences before making a statement but was willing to argue the toss with anyone and expected to be proved right. Blustering, Boisterous sometimes Blathering and in a strange way lovable at the same time (I'm not sure that will be the abiding memory of everyone - he was an acquired taste) but saw SCCC through glasses more rosey than anyone accused of the same on here. The web era came in under his watch... but developed under the hands of others...

As I sit in the Middle East typing this while watching England v India being streamed through my Ipad and awaiting the first report from Hyderabhad to wing its way vie e-mail from Nick King (alias Bagpuss) it does amaze me that as the millennium arrived in Taunton we were stunned by the fact that Somerset finally had a website and Peter Anderson had learned how to use e-mail!

Grockles webprovider Rivals.Net was the largest supporter site in the world and we were part of over 400 websites providing fan access to stories and discussions about their clubs. We had thousands of forum posts a month and almost a hundred contributors to the site on a monthly basis. People had heard of the site - though we have never really gone in for anything above word or mouth marketing. There was one other method. I decided if Peter wasn't going to let people talk to me then I'd at least wear a shirt with the sites name on it so I started to appear in one day shirts with the Grockles logo plastered all over it. Another poster to the site decided to turn himself into a walking human posterboy for a while as well but as his publicised views on Championship cricket were a little 'out there', I had to tell him to desist because supporters started to think he had something to do with the running of the site.

At this time Peter had no real internet skills and as said in the last episode, viewed Grockles with a more than dubious eye. He was unaware that during this time Rivals were making requests to the ECB to classify the cricket webmasters on its books at the time (Somerset, Derbyshire, Middlesex, Scotland, Sussex, Surrey - from memory) as 'journalists' and as part of that process we needed to get our clubs sponsorship of that status. At the height of PA's paranoia, his marketing manager Gianna (lovely, helpful lady) was annually signing the sponsorship form to provide me with an ECB press pass.

As the club moved on, Mr Anderson did likewise and in his now extensive spare time he must have undergone some kind of IT training because a new poster started to appear on the scene - Gladiator became a semi regular poster on things Somerset and quite a reactionary little beggar he was too! Unfortunately PA hadn't quite mastered the art of hiding his e-mail address and it soon became apparent (by the posting style primarily) who Gladiator was. However he seemed to enjoy the banter and we had a much more enjoyable time with him as a poster than we had when he was in charge.

At the club the regime had changed. A new duo(trio) had appeared. Mr Giles Clarke entered the story along with a new Chief in the form of "Bobby's Boy" Richard Gould straight from Ashton Gate. The club website activity went up a notch and we had another forum for a while on there. These two men were much more at home with the Worldwide Web and almost encouraged our presence. They became contributors themselves for a while and were open (to an extent) and welcoming of our existence. However things were changing in the Rivals organisation as the push for higher advertising revenue took their eye off the local and independent world and put it firmly on national and international revenues.

So as I sat in 2002 experimenting in uploading data straight from the ground on my HP Jornanda handheld PC and phone using a mobile number as the modem and a touchscreen keyboard the wind was changing in the website world.......

More to come though we may have to hold fire during the India series if Baggy gets access in the subcontinent.

This other Eden, demi paradise

Posted by: Grockles.com (IP Logged)

Date: 16/11/2012 06:22

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Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2012:12:09:19:19:13 by Grockle.