r/DataHoarder

not a joke, thank you

A landmark lgbt+ website is closing it's doors due to lack of funds and aging out of moderators. Founded in 1995, DataLounge.com is an early internet forum that became a gathering place, support network, and living community for lgbt+ people, back when there was far less social acceptance and visibility than there is today. It's members shared their lives through historic events, from the AIDS crisis, anti-gay activism, DOMA, the murder of Matthew Shepard, the aftermath of 9/11, civil unions and marriage equality and so on. While the site became notorious for unsourced celebrity gossip (and an authority on vintage film and tv, which is how I, a young straight woman with a penchant for 80s sitcom and creative writing stumbled upon it), it also accumulated an archive of deeply personal and human stories, particularly from gay men of the postwar generation, documenting experiences of discrimination, family rejection, loneliness, resilience, and community-building. As such I think it represents an important historical record that future scholars could use to study early online culture, the formation of digital subcultures and communities, changing demographics and attitudes, and the lived experience of lgbt+ people across tunultuous decades of social change. Sadly, the site is set to close permanently on July 31, 2026.

For more information read:

Please let there be a kind hoarder out there willing to take on a project of this scale and importance. The pre-2022 archive is offline, so you will have to contact the site's owners to access everything. I'm not tech savvy so I don't have any concrete plans for financial compensation or how to make the archive publicly accesible but I think a patreon or gofundme would go a long way and I'd be willing to spread the word and gather advice on how to move forward.