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Celtic No.1 Website (the daddy of all Celtic websites)
Details
Name: The Internet #1 Celtic Supporters Club, The Internet #1 CSC
Started: 1996
Ended: 2000 (?)
Old weblink (long dead): http://www.presence.co.uk/soccer/celtic.htm
Summary
A sadly long forgotten Celtic website is the seminal “Bhoystalk”/”Celtic No.1” website.
This site is the father of all Celtic websites and billed itself as the first Celtic website.
In the same way that Twitter, the Celtic forums, E-Tims and Celtic Underground later become the centre of the Celtic online world, the “Bhoystalk” website was a central hub for information but also from which other Celtic sites were able to work from.
Old weblink (long dead): http://www.presence.co.uk/soccer/celtic.htm
The site started running around 1996, and this was way before the now standard forums were around. It was the early days of the web and much of it was testing the waters. Despite the limitations and novelty of the web at the time, the site was very well run with match reports, short daily news reports and articles on Celtic & Scottish football. Compared to today it was all quite primitive, running on the old “Netscape Navigator” web browsers but the gist of what the site did was little different to what many sites do now.
From Tony Cummins on twitter, @tonycyyz:
“The Internet #1 CSC was set up by Tony Weir at Herriot Watt and I ran some service via Strathclyde Uni Fond memories of rushing out to get the lunchtime editions of the evening papers, firing up the Cifer T5 terminal, connect to a VAX via a Gandalf modem to get the news out !”
The quality was excellent, and for those in the support who were ex-pats it was quite an information revolution. Beforehand, all ex-pats had to rely on were the Daily Record & The Scotsman newspaper reports and stories via word of mouth. Not the easiest way to stay in touch & keep up to date, and so “Bhoystalk” changed everything. It does emphasise the importance of supporters clubs and why they were so numerous.
One interesting aspect to the site at the time was its links page, where there was a large list of other Celtic sites on the web, and in those days people were likely to jump between sites rather than stay on the same sites (much more so than now). There were some great Celtic sites out there getting things going on Celtic on the web most of which have now disappeared.
Sadly, maintaining the site became a bit much and the admin had to regretfully end the daily news updates. In time the site was gone, but it was then overtaken by others it had influenced and given a lift up to, such as firstly “The Dog’s Bollix” and later “E-Tims“.
However, “Bhoystalk” was the pioneer for Celtic sites and for those of us who lived away from Glasgow, we will forever be grateful to them for the information and updates they provided to us on Celtic to get the whole thing rolling and so help keep us in touch.
It was a fabulous site and the people behind it should be very proud of what they put together. It set the ball rolling for all who followed.
Some of us still very much remember and appreciate all the work they did in the early days.