Desperate need to document the history of the QS movement.

[dk_angel7]

I have come believe that the fall of “deepsinking.org” to the QS community was the fall of Constantinople (or Rome depending on your perspective) to world history.

Looking at five years since its fall, it seems that we have entered a second age of the movement. It seems that an entire generation of QS’ers have entered the movement with no knowledge of its rich past, traditions, and why we did the things we did.

There are great people in our past whose contributions are vast. In just a few years, they will be forever forgotten as members of the first generation fade away and the second generation takes over.

I seriously believe that those of us who have joined the movement (particularly the late 1990’s group) must write down their perspective of what our history was of the movement.

I would like the second generation be able to turn to first generations for advice if they choose to do so.

There are some issues that I would like to see documented so they are never forgotten; who was Robert Blaine, who our Patron Saint was (Vietnamese lady who died 10 or so years ago), and the first known death in QS if we choose to even talk about it.

A very short list of people of a very long list of contributors could be Foster Blake, Toby O’keefe, Kaol, QSA, Duncan Edwards, Jiminy Thicket, Myself (for the little I was worth), Acid Tester, and others I can not think of off hand.

Some of it will not be flattering (i.e. notable personality clashes) but hey! The second generation needs to know that it is nothing new if and when it happens to them.

What are your thoughts?

[Duncan Edwards]

I agree very much. There are a lot of things behind the scenes that might never be recorded but there are also many hard won lessons that are destined to be repeated if not written down somewhere. Not certain how to begin though. Certainly the major players at the beginning would be Bill Shipton (Splosh magazine), Rob Blaine (Messyfun.com), Chuck Lang, all of whom are departed now. From there it goes to Dave Lodoski, JT, Rob Franks who originated "The Quicksand Page", and everything branches out quickly from there. There's a chronology but also some stories and relationships that might not fit a timeline. Depending on how deep you want to go it might require different chapters for each of those. Nothing huge but at least a mention.

[water_bug_62208]

This could almost be an encyclopedia or collection to the Quicksand Fetish or Interest or Fascination, etc.

- Volume 1: The Quicksand Pioneers

- Volume 2: The Quicksand Artists

- Volume 3: The Quicksand Story Writers

- Volume 4: The Quicksand Videographers and Photographers

- Volume 5: The Quicksand Models

[Duncan Edwards]

There are some issues that I would like to see documented so they are never forgotten; who was Robert Blaine, who our Patron Saint was (Vietnamese lady who died 10 or so years ago), and the first known death in QS if we choose to even talk about it....A very short list of people of a very long list of contributors could be Foster Blake, Toby O’keefe, Kaol, QSA, Duncan Edwards, Jiminy Thicket, Myself (for the little I was worth), Acid Tester, and others I can not think of off hand.

...What are your thoughts?

Here's an example why this is necessary. I know you were just making a list to make a point but you left out Dave of MPV and Fred of Studio 588 just like I left out Kaol and Foz. It's like leaving out George Washington and Abraham Lincoln in American HIstory. How are the newbies going to learn and respect their heritage that some people worked damn awful hard to create?

[James diGriz]

A definitive timeline of the community.. You have quite a lot to look for. The community was small but starting to grow a lot when I joined in back in 95. MPV was an archive of mainly Chuck Lang's works, as well as hundreds of manips. If you go on facts alone, and no commentary, then that would be easiest. Would take a lot of work to get those, and maybe a few stories about how people joined the community.

MjM

[dlodoski]

I think that one critical sub-project (and possibly a good starting point) would be to set a solid timeline as to where we have hung out and when.

I was thinking that a good resource would be the headers on some of the older stories that have been shared. The earliest came from the alt.sex.fetish.wet-and-messy newsgroup. There were a couple(?) mailing lists, then the Deep Sinking Yahoo group, then Deep Sinking itself (which is still there, thankfully, and is its own record), and now QSF.

And I think that small (on-topic) biographies of those no longer with us, and those no longer active, but significant to the history of the community would be nice to have somewhere. I'm not talking about trampling anybody's privacy, but more like pointing out when certain folks were active and in what way and what kind of general influence that they had. It gets a little stickier when the idea crosses into people that are still active in the community. My person feeling is that they have a 'living reputation' and should be known already in the here and now. In other words, let's write history only for those who no longer speak for themselves.

In any case, I think it's a good idea.

[jagfiles]

Also I wonder what kind of advice the models from like Chuck Lang and Kaol's work could offer to a model today in terms of how to handle a sinking situation.

[onesixthsinker]

I stumbled upon the community myself around 1997... and I have to say that in the past 16 years of interactions with the community in it's various forms has been very pleasant and enjoyable. I have truly only ever known of one individual who ever somewhat soured things with my interaction with them and hearing stories of theirs with others.

But if you were to include a chapter of notable less than honest individuals... I would say that we shouldn't forget "Jenn / Cindy / Ann" aka "Bob"or whatever name they chose to give at said time as the great deceiver of the community.

[Viridian]

^I don't think I agree with that. We're documenting the pioneers, the milestones and the achievements. I don't think we should be immortalising the infamous, who would get more recognition in this chronicle than other contributors to the community. At best, we'd be inflating their importance in the context of the community's history.

[Fred588]

While the suggested time line would be a good start, and would (or should) consist of basic, mostly opinion-frree information, it would be my suggestion that it will be critical in any such project to define (in advance) what a researcher would cal the "delimitations" of the project. In this sort of project, its delimitations would refer to such things as what is included and what is not. For example, is this to be about quicksandfans and its predicessors only or will it be about the development of the quicksand community? If the latter then there will be many more things to be documented, including many groups and forums and websites. There will be many such questions to be answered. And even when answered there will be innumerable similar questions. For just one example, is it about quicksand, anything invlving mud, all of WAM, or something else? For another, should the history of various relevent chats be included? If the history is solely about qsfans and its predicessors then the chats represent a different though overlapping history and ought to be excluded. If some are excluded but not others then the history would be incompleted and misleading to that extent.

I have thought about a similar project, consisting of an index or compendium of all the video efforts that have been done over the years. But even there difficulties, or questions to be resolved, arise. Should it be just material about quicksand or do materials involving mud but not sinking get included? What about materials that have been claimed but never actually released? Should computer-generated material be included? And so on.

None of the issues I raise here should be construed as the sligtest opposition. I raise them solely to be, I hope, constructive toward a project that can actually be executed.