WEBVTT - Ep. 6 Searching for Digital Traces 0:00:00.200 --> 0:00:02.960 Um, dude, you guys have social media. Were you guys 0:00:03.040 --> 0:00:06.320 like on my Space? Yeah? We had my Space. We 0:00:06.320 --> 0:00:09.400 were on it all the time. And um, that's why 0:00:10.000 --> 0:00:12.560 that's why we're getting showing computer class because we would 0:00:12.560 --> 0:00:14.840 try to like log in while we were in class. 0:00:15.280 --> 0:00:19.440 This is Alejandra, Emory's high school friend. Again. During our conversation, 0:00:19.720 --> 0:00:22.400 we talked about who Emory was at home and at school. 0:00:23.000 --> 0:00:25.200 But one part that stuck with me was when I 0:00:25.239 --> 0:00:30.320 realized that Emory also lived a life online. Were you 0:00:30.400 --> 0:00:33.959 guys on a site called techno for us? Yes, we 0:00:33.960 --> 0:00:37.839 were on that too. What was your I don't remember anymore. 0:00:38.040 --> 0:00:43.320 I wish I could tell you. Did Emory have one? Did? Yeah? 0:00:43.320 --> 0:00:47.360 She did. I was hearing from people about Emory, but 0:00:47.440 --> 0:00:51.639 I really wanted to find something from her directly. Some 0:00:51.720 --> 0:01:30.120 digital trace from I Heearts, Michaels go to a a podcast network, 0:01:30.520 --> 0:01:35.679 Vice and Elias Studios. This is Party Cruise, the untold story. 0:01:37.840 --> 0:01:56.280 I'm Jenisamoca. I've already taken you through what a party 0:01:56.360 --> 0:01:59.880 was like, talked about how we were policed, and now 0:02:00.640 --> 0:02:04.200 I'm going to show you our digital reality. Because this 0:02:04.280 --> 0:02:07.520 era in the New Millennium would change the game for 0:02:07.640 --> 0:02:11.080 all future partying. This was when how you showed up 0:02:11.120 --> 0:02:14.400 online started to become as important as how you showed 0:02:14.480 --> 0:02:17.560 up in person. And though we weren't doing it on purpose, 0:02:18.120 --> 0:02:22.000 we were showing our lives uncensored and on our own terms. 0:02:23.520 --> 0:02:27.080 The website that I talked about with Alejandra Techno four 0:02:27.320 --> 0:02:30.960 dot us or T four for short, because an early 0:02:31.000 --> 0:02:34.840 two thousands social media site that was basically a giant party. 0:02:35.919 --> 0:02:38.040 It was just a way to connect with everybody. It 0:02:38.160 --> 0:02:43.240 was basically like a message board for party people. You 0:02:43.280 --> 0:02:47.440 know your flyers or messaging. There was no swifting in 0:02:47.560 --> 0:02:51.000 social media back then. There was Techno four data. It 0:02:51.040 --> 0:02:54.560 was mostly Latin X teens living in LA messaging each 0:02:54.600 --> 0:02:58.680 other on T four and the profiles were chaotic, filled 0:02:58.760 --> 0:03:02.480 up with colorful funds than wacky spellings. The pages were 0:03:02.480 --> 0:03:05.760 plastered with tons of pictures the crews holding up their 0:03:05.760 --> 0:03:09.320 badges and girls doing que poses. It's how we chose 0:03:09.360 --> 0:03:14.840 to stand out and get creative. I know this because 0:03:15.200 --> 0:03:20.320 I was a member too profile name West Coast's Finest Mommy. 0:03:24.000 --> 0:03:26.160 I think I was like fourteen when I jumped into 0:03:26.240 --> 0:03:29.280 my first chat room. I was amazed at how far 0:03:29.320 --> 0:03:32.800 I was able to reach people in different states. Other 0:03:32.840 --> 0:03:36.080 than visiting my family in Peru and New Jersey, I 0:03:36.200 --> 0:03:39.360 didn't really get to know other places, and by chatting 0:03:39.400 --> 0:03:42.120 with different people, I was able to learn a lot. 0:03:42.920 --> 0:03:46.320 I had a penpal, some white girl in Montana. I 0:03:46.360 --> 0:03:49.280 also had a different penpal, a kid my age that 0:03:49.440 --> 0:03:52.520 lived on a reservation in Arizona. I met them in 0:03:52.600 --> 0:03:55.680 Yahoo chats. That's just to say how much I was 0:03:55.720 --> 0:03:58.800 starting to live on the Internet, and I wonder if 0:03:58.840 --> 0:04:02.000 for Emory it was like that too. I was curious 0:04:02.160 --> 0:04:07.360 and I felt like there were no limits. Amazingly, T 0:04:07.520 --> 0:04:10.840 four is still around, so last year I decided to 0:04:10.920 --> 0:04:13.640 check it out to see what I could find. I 0:04:13.680 --> 0:04:18.760 haven't been on there in oof sixteen years. Okay, i'm recording. 0:04:19.760 --> 0:04:25.000 I made it to the Techno for Us homepage, which 0:04:25.440 --> 0:04:28.880 was still active. It's still black and blue like I remember, 0:04:29.720 --> 0:04:32.160 and I wanted to see if I could find Emory's 0:04:32.240 --> 0:04:39.080 old profile. Okay, I'm to see you, Emory. Let's try Tears. 0:04:41.200 --> 0:04:43.119 Let's try it. Let's try for you. On T four, 0:04:43.440 --> 0:04:46.839 people use their party crew nicknames, so I started with 0:04:46.880 --> 0:04:51.120 Emory's nickname Tears, and then we can try Tears with 0:04:51.160 --> 0:04:55.120 a z or tears tears of a clown. All right, 0:04:55.600 --> 0:04:58.440 this is not hers. I've never worked on a story 0:04:58.480 --> 0:05:02.560 like this that brings so many personal memories. I'll tripe 0:05:02.560 --> 0:05:09.240 in Vicious. Oh, here's a vicious Cherry. This is Cherry. 0:05:09.279 --> 0:05:12.880 I typed in Vicious because of Emory's crew, the Vicious Ladies, 0:05:13.560 --> 0:05:17.360 and I found the main head, Cherry. Cherry's profile picture 0:05:17.720 --> 0:05:20.680 has the Vicious Lady's logo on it. It's a sparkly 0:05:20.800 --> 0:05:24.240 pink and white Louis Vitan LV logo that sits on 0:05:24.279 --> 0:05:27.840 top of the words vicious Ladies. I read what she 0:05:27.880 --> 0:05:31.119 wrote about the Vicious Ladies on her profile at nothing 0:05:31.160 --> 0:05:35.800 but a vicious thing repping them. Also fine, vicious ladies. 0:05:36.160 --> 0:05:38.679 If you were part of a crew, you wrapped it hard. 0:05:39.120 --> 0:05:41.599 This would be the one and only fame malicious rapping 0:05:41.680 --> 0:05:45.360 for nothing but the best vicious and then vicious ladies. 0:05:45.480 --> 0:05:48.000 Here we go. You got in contact with none other 0:05:48.040 --> 0:05:51.640 than did see screaming Vicious ladies to the fullest, like 0:05:51.760 --> 0:05:57.840 to party and have fun and just chill. Finally, I 0:05:57.960 --> 0:06:04.240 found a picture of Emory Ry Go Destiny and Emery 0:06:04.360 --> 0:06:09.360 Rocks all the boys all day, every day. There's a 0:06:09.360 --> 0:06:16.719 picture of m Emery and her friend Destiny. Destiny's page 0:06:16.760 --> 0:06:18.800 shows that she last logged on in the summer of 0:06:18.800 --> 0:06:21.840 two thousand and six, a few months after Emory's death. 0:06:23.360 --> 0:06:29.359 All Right, Amory Mounos forever in her hearts. It's a 0:06:29.400 --> 0:06:32.680 tight shot of Emory and Destiny's faces, so it looks 0:06:32.680 --> 0:06:36.200 like a selfie, maybe with a phone or a digital camera. 0:06:38.120 --> 0:06:41.600 The lights above the girls are giant luorescent rectangles, the 0:06:41.720 --> 0:06:45.080 kind you see in an office or in school. They 0:06:45.160 --> 0:06:50.600 probably took the picture in class. Okay, so I'm gonna 0:06:50.600 --> 0:07:00.480 save this picture one sec Destiny t four save. We 0:07:00.480 --> 0:07:03.880 were unable to talk to any Vicious Ladies party crew members. 0:07:04.680 --> 0:07:07.720 We did reach out to them, they either didn't respond 0:07:08.000 --> 0:07:11.280 or declined to be interviewed. One told us through a 0:07:11.320 --> 0:07:13.480 friend that it wouldn't be of any use to talk 0:07:13.480 --> 0:07:16.640 to us. They did press right after Emory's death, and 0:07:16.720 --> 0:07:20.440 her case is still unsolved. So going through these profiles 0:07:20.640 --> 0:07:23.240 feels like the closest I got to understanding the Vicious 0:07:23.320 --> 0:07:27.520 Lady's dynamics, just like my crew. The Lustful Ladies. They 0:07:27.520 --> 0:07:30.440 gave each other shout outs, posted pictures of their friends, 0:07:30.600 --> 0:07:34.080 and wrapped their crew to the fullest. In the end, 0:07:34.240 --> 0:07:38.080 I couldn't find anything from Emory directly, but it did 0:07:38.120 --> 0:07:43.520 take me back to that time. That world tfor feels 0:07:43.520 --> 0:07:47.560 like this digital ghost town, like this online version of POMPEII. 0:07:48.160 --> 0:07:52.360 All these profiles were frozen in time, capturing this new 0:07:52.400 --> 0:07:55.720 era of the Internet where we could express ourselves online 0:07:55.960 --> 0:07:59.120 without supervision. And it was like that for me too, 0:08:00.080 --> 0:08:03.520 until it wasn't. My first long term relationship was with 0:08:03.560 --> 0:08:06.680 a high school boy I connected with online, but the 0:08:06.720 --> 0:08:12.600 relationship wasn't exactly what I expected. Once upon a time, 0:08:13.320 --> 0:08:16.200 I worked it in and out in the city of Industry, 0:08:18.120 --> 0:08:20.960 and I remember one day my boyfriend and I had 0:08:21.000 --> 0:08:24.200 gone into a fight. I don't really remember about what, 0:08:25.080 --> 0:08:27.720 and he just showed up at my job. He wanted 0:08:27.720 --> 0:08:30.560 to make up or something like that. But when he 0:08:30.640 --> 0:08:34.120 walked up, I was chatting with my male coworker, and 0:08:34.200 --> 0:08:36.720 my coworker made a joke and I laughed. It was 0:08:36.840 --> 0:08:41.440 very normal, and my boyfriend saw me laugh, he made 0:08:41.440 --> 0:08:45.160 a face and he just turned around and stormed out, 0:08:46.320 --> 0:08:51.640 and I got really stressed out. From the very beginning, 0:08:52.480 --> 0:08:56.320 my boyfriend was really possessive. He didn't really want me 0:08:56.360 --> 0:08:59.319 to have guy friends. Or even girlfriends who he felt 0:08:59.320 --> 0:09:02.200 got in the way. He would call me at all 0:09:02.280 --> 0:09:04.120 times to make sure he knew what I was doing, 0:09:05.080 --> 0:09:07.920 and if I wasn't paying attention to my phone, I'd 0:09:07.960 --> 0:09:11.679 come back to it and have thirty missed calls. He 0:09:11.720 --> 0:09:15.480 was controlling about everything, including money, like he asked me 0:09:15.520 --> 0:09:19.160 to co sign his car lease. I started to get 0:09:19.160 --> 0:09:21.280 afraid of what he would do with all the information 0:09:21.320 --> 0:09:25.880 about me sharing the story. I find myself getting protective 0:09:25.960 --> 0:09:29.520 over my younger self and over all the other women 0:09:29.559 --> 0:09:33.439 that I found themselves in my position. It was really 0:09:33.440 --> 0:09:36.440 embarrassing in the cycle I couldn't break at the time, 0:09:37.679 --> 0:09:39.920 I was scared that he would see a compliment someone 0:09:40.000 --> 0:09:42.560 left on my MySpace page or a photo of me 0:09:42.640 --> 0:09:45.360 with a guy on my T four profile, and we'd 0:09:45.360 --> 0:09:48.880 have more fights, which could lead to a full day 0:09:48.880 --> 0:09:53.240 of crying. So one day in two thousand and six, 0:09:54.240 --> 0:09:59.000 I sat down, holed up all my profiles, my Space, 0:09:59.200 --> 0:10:05.479 Facebook techno for us, and one by one I deleted everything, 0:10:06.400 --> 0:10:12.960 all my photos, my posts, my friends, my party crew 0:10:13.040 --> 0:10:25.280 years we're gone looking back now, those are the memories 0:10:25.320 --> 0:10:28.000 I wish I had. As I was looking for traces 0:10:28.000 --> 0:10:31.800 of Emery on Techno for Us I realized that maybe 0:10:32.679 --> 0:10:35.160 I could also find traces of that time in my 0:10:35.240 --> 0:10:58.240 life online. That's after the break. I do have a 0:10:58.280 --> 0:11:02.240 few images that I printed out and stored in an album, 0:11:02.280 --> 0:11:05.520 but otherwise the only pictures I have from that time 0:11:05.960 --> 0:11:10.480 are with family, pictures with friends at school, and that 0:11:10.600 --> 0:11:13.560 giant portrait my parents have of me in their living 0:11:13.640 --> 0:11:17.600 room from my Kensaneta. It's like the good immigrant daughter 0:11:17.760 --> 0:11:21.720 version of me has survived, enshrined at my parents place. 0:11:22.760 --> 0:11:26.000 But this other, curious and more complex person I was 0:11:26.040 --> 0:11:34.800 growing up is mostly gone. But maybe somewhere in the 0:11:34.840 --> 0:11:38.520 Techno for Us Digital POMPEII, there is something from my 0:11:38.559 --> 0:11:42.400 past I can find. And if there's one person who 0:11:42.400 --> 0:11:45.800 could help me, it would be this man. How do 0:11:45.800 --> 0:11:49.760 you explain you know, a Facebook before there was a Facebook, 0:11:50.200 --> 0:11:52.840 MySpace before there was a MySpace. You know, this was 0:11:53.000 --> 0:11:57.120 very la This is just very la, very teen centering. 0:11:57.559 --> 0:12:02.240 This is Regal Rojas. He's the actual founder of Techno 0:12:02.360 --> 0:12:06.240 for Us. For me, this is as big as meeting 0:12:06.280 --> 0:12:09.959 Tom from my space. I actually can't log on to 0:12:10.080 --> 0:12:13.559 my old T four profile. I don't remember the password 0:12:13.960 --> 0:12:17.040 and don't have access to the old email address, so 0:12:17.080 --> 0:12:19.559 I was hoping Rigo could help me access it again, 0:12:20.000 --> 0:12:23.760 but first I had so many questions for him. I 0:12:23.800 --> 0:12:25.640 was honestly shocked when I found out that he was 0:12:25.720 --> 0:12:30.280 Latino and from la because nowadays I feel like it's 0:12:30.360 --> 0:12:32.920 rare that a social network be tailored to a specific 0:12:32.920 --> 0:12:37.720 community and founded by a member of that community. The 0:12:37.800 --> 0:12:41.680 site wasn't anything fancy. The idea was that you could 0:12:41.679 --> 0:12:45.480 connect virtually with people you met at parties in real life. 0:12:45.760 --> 0:12:51.720 It was just a profile with messaging. That's really it. 0:12:52.160 --> 0:12:55.960 And the theme evolved on its own to where, you know, 0:12:56.160 --> 0:12:58.880 she went to a party and you wanted to connect 0:12:58.880 --> 0:13:00.600 with some of the people that were at that party 0:13:00.679 --> 0:13:02.000 or there, or that are going to be at the 0:13:02.040 --> 0:13:05.160 next one. Just use technical But it was never Rego's 0:13:05.160 --> 0:13:08.040 plan to make a social media site. He kind of 0:13:08.080 --> 0:13:14.280 stumbled on it. Oh your home is very lovely, Thank you, 0:13:14.760 --> 0:13:20.280 a lot of effort, disorganized, there's water, anything else you 0:13:20.320 --> 0:13:26.520 may want, it's available. Rego in a family, came from 0:13:26.520 --> 0:13:29.360 El Salvador when he was eight years old. In the eighties, 0:13:29.880 --> 0:13:34.319 he settled in the North Hollywood area. In the mid nineties, 0:13:34.840 --> 0:13:39.079 Rego became a student at Kelsey University Northridge, not far 0:13:39.120 --> 0:13:42.199 from where he lived. He was a kind of studies major. 0:13:42.760 --> 0:13:46.960 I was working in music right as a hobby. And 0:13:47.040 --> 0:13:51.560 you know, there's new software coming out, new new devices, samplers, synthesizers, 0:13:51.880 --> 0:13:54.360 and you become very good at it, connecting to think 0:13:54.400 --> 0:13:57.960 the machines, and you become the technical guy in new 0:13:58.000 --> 0:14:02.440 Google Friends. This is in the late nineties, right, the 0:14:02.480 --> 0:14:05.720 Internet bubble is it's you know, it's building up and 0:14:05.800 --> 0:14:09.680 people are excited about things. Regal was on the Internet 0:14:10.000 --> 0:14:12.960 in the time of dial up connection, when images took 0:14:13.000 --> 0:14:16.920 forever to load, no tweets, none of that ease and 0:14:17.040 --> 0:14:20.600 lightning speed were used to now. But he still found 0:14:20.600 --> 0:14:24.840 a way to communicate message. Sports were popular, right, So 0:14:24.880 --> 0:14:34.160 I followed one the power Tools music board. Right here 0:14:34.160 --> 0:14:36.520 you go, Ladies and gentlemen, bad Boy Bill, Hot Mix 0:14:36.640 --> 0:14:39.600 number fourteen, It's power Tools riding on Power six, Humpty 0:14:39.680 --> 0:14:42.520 Vision the Rock. Like many young Angelinos at that time, 0:14:43.080 --> 0:14:46.200 he tuned into this radio show called the power Tools 0:14:46.240 --> 0:14:49.200 Mix Show on Power one oh six, lots of house 0:14:49.440 --> 0:14:52.080 techno and EDMA. I'll be in the mix up next, 0:14:52.280 --> 0:14:54.400 Humpty Vision, bad Boy Bill in the mix all night long, 0:14:54.480 --> 0:15:01.160 riding on power Tools boys. They also had a message 0:15:01.160 --> 0:15:04.320 board where people would discuss and learn about new music. 0:15:04.640 --> 0:15:06.920 Was that your first time kind of seeing that interaction 0:15:07.040 --> 0:15:14.720 with different people and not the same physical space, you know? 0:15:14.840 --> 0:15:20.320 It showed me that people can be very passionate about something. 0:15:20.520 --> 0:15:24.280 The audience can communicate with each other and have a 0:15:24.400 --> 0:15:31.400 voice in how to interpret the music. So he had 0:15:31.440 --> 0:15:35.800 an idea. He and his DJ friends realized we needed 0:15:35.960 --> 0:15:39.560 a website to promote our music. Rigo had an interest 0:15:39.560 --> 0:15:42.040 in music and tech, and he wanted to know if 0:15:42.040 --> 0:15:45.680 he can make a website himself. In March of two 0:15:45.720 --> 0:15:49.680 thousand and three, five months before my space launched, he 0:15:49.880 --> 0:15:54.560 purchased the domain name techno four dot us. He paid 0:15:54.720 --> 0:15:58.760 seventy five dollars for two years. Then he spent the 0:15:58.800 --> 0:16:03.240 next three months building the site. What was your visual 0:16:03.280 --> 0:16:06.960 design idea for the website? UM? I wanted a dark 0:16:07.120 --> 0:16:12.520 site with a bright contrasting color. Right, so it's black 0:16:12.920 --> 0:16:15.600 and the brighter blue, sort of like that Dodger Blue. 0:16:16.040 --> 0:16:21.080 Members didn't have to put any information except asl age, sex, 0:16:21.240 --> 0:16:26.040 location my favorite thing though, So that's where a lot 0:16:26.080 --> 0:16:31.360 of them could customize their their profiles. Again, a very 0:16:31.400 --> 0:16:34.240 amateur mistake was I didn't take away their ability to 0:16:34.280 --> 0:16:37.560 inject code. So it was a mistake that worked out 0:16:37.760 --> 0:16:42.440 in my favor because now people wanted to change their code. 0:16:42.560 --> 0:16:46.800 We could customize our profiles any way we wanted. Imagine 0:16:46.840 --> 0:16:48.960 if you can change the colors of your profile page 0:16:48.960 --> 0:16:52.480 on Instagram or have your favorite songue play when someone 0:16:52.560 --> 0:16:57.000 visits your profile. That's what T four was like. So 0:16:57.040 --> 0:17:01.440 I'm creating this site by myself writing code, but there's 0:17:01.480 --> 0:17:03.680 no point to it. There's no audience to it. By 0:17:03.760 --> 0:17:06.879 the summer of two thousand and three, the site is live, 0:17:08.119 --> 0:17:11.560 but it still didn't have an audience. Rego was trying 0:17:11.600 --> 0:17:14.760 to figure out how to promote it and seeing you 0:17:14.800 --> 0:17:17.119 know the power Tools message board, is like, well can 0:17:17.160 --> 0:17:20.040 I be that? Can I create that? Oh? Can I 0:17:20.119 --> 0:17:23.800 make it better? One promotion idea he had, and this 0:17:23.840 --> 0:17:26.480 is how you know it was early Internet, was to 0:17:26.520 --> 0:17:29.640 tell people about the website at a party in person. 0:17:30.680 --> 0:17:34.080 He had a friend that printed flyers like party flyers, 0:17:34.680 --> 0:17:36.920 and he put t four on one of them as 0:17:36.960 --> 0:17:41.080 a favorite Arigo. So in July of two thousand and three, 0:17:41.320 --> 0:17:44.320 Rigo attended the party and it wasn't like the parties 0:17:44.359 --> 0:17:49.439 that played house music that he was used to. This 0:17:49.600 --> 0:17:53.199 is in south central LA. It's a backyard party on 0:17:53.240 --> 0:17:57.960 a Friday night, summer night, and then gets hot. You know, 0:17:58.040 --> 0:18:03.760 and people who are listening to loud New right, they're teenagers, 0:18:03.800 --> 0:18:07.719 they're high school kids. Rego was new to this generation 0:18:08.280 --> 0:18:12.080 of flyer parties. We know they're wearing these these tags, 0:18:12.119 --> 0:18:16.920 these these laminated tags with their crew name and their name. 0:18:19.880 --> 0:18:25.800 You know, kids stands into right and hip hop. But 0:18:25.880 --> 0:18:29.360 I'm here trying to promote a techno site, right, So 0:18:29.560 --> 0:18:34.679 I'm like, like, is this gonna work? Maybe at the 0:18:34.800 --> 0:18:37.400 end of the party, the DJ would play a little 0:18:37.440 --> 0:18:41.600 house music, a little electronic music, but it wasn't about that. 0:18:41.680 --> 0:18:48.000 It was definitely just hip hop were dominant. The fact 0:18:48.040 --> 0:18:52.639 that Rigo bought I'm promoted your al called techno for us, 0:18:52.640 --> 0:18:54.840 just for it to become the social media site for 0:18:54.960 --> 0:18:58.840 kids like me who liked hip hop, and it's just 0:18:58.920 --> 0:19:02.840 so funny to me and also such a marker and 0:19:02.960 --> 0:19:07.040 time for me as an Angelino and the millennial, a 0:19:07.160 --> 0:19:11.000 time when the popular music among the youth shifted and 0:19:11.080 --> 0:19:17.560 a time when our world became more digital and interconnected. Slowly, 0:19:18.280 --> 0:19:20.920 T four started to spread in the party crew scene. 0:19:21.640 --> 0:19:24.679 You see the logos on flyers, and people were curious. 0:19:24.960 --> 0:19:27.600 So it drove some traffic to the site, but the 0:19:27.680 --> 0:19:31.040 site would really get attention when Rigo began attending the 0:19:31.080 --> 0:19:35.960 parties with his camera. People are happy to post for 0:19:36.040 --> 0:19:39.959 their pictures and they started asking you, hey, take my picture. 0:19:40.560 --> 0:19:44.160 He'd select around fifty pictures from the party and post 0:19:44.200 --> 0:19:46.680 them on the site a few days later. Girls wearing 0:19:46.720 --> 0:19:50.920 matching outfits, guys showing off their badges. People start asking, hey, 0:19:51.080 --> 0:19:53.439 where are the pictures. I'm like, okay, hold on, let 0:19:53.440 --> 0:19:55.040 me let me work on them. So, you know, you 0:19:56.040 --> 0:19:57.879 pick out the best ones, you edit them, and you 0:19:57.920 --> 0:20:04.359 put them up and the pictures start being shared everywhere, right, 0:20:04.440 --> 0:20:08.760 and the membership starts going up. People were always looking 0:20:08.760 --> 0:20:11.639 for a good picture, whether it was to upgrade their 0:20:11.680 --> 0:20:15.280 profile pictures or just save them at an album. And 0:20:15.359 --> 0:20:19.440 Rio could see who wanted to see those pictures. So 0:20:19.440 --> 0:20:22.359 you start seeing, you know, different plots on the map 0:20:22.800 --> 0:20:28.119 and it's red hot in La, right, and it's like, wow, 0:20:28.160 --> 0:20:31.560 this isn't La thing. But wait, there's a group in Texas. 0:20:32.280 --> 0:20:38.439 How did that happen? Right? So well, people from California 0:20:38.560 --> 0:20:41.960 have friends in Texas, right, and they share it, they 0:20:42.000 --> 0:20:45.080 see group of people, they join, and now they start 0:20:45.160 --> 0:20:50.520 building community. I was logging on all the time, even 0:20:50.520 --> 0:20:54.239 at the school library during lunch or last period, just 0:20:54.320 --> 0:20:57.080 to get onto four and message with my friends online. 0:20:57.560 --> 0:21:01.240 You get to the point where lau is d blocks 0:21:01.280 --> 0:21:04.600 the site because the students they're going into the library, 0:21:04.600 --> 0:21:07.600 they're going into the computer lab, and they're just on 0:21:07.640 --> 0:21:12.040 the site talking to each other, and we get blocked. Okay, 0:21:12.160 --> 0:21:14.920 do you know what high school still thought? Every every 0:21:14.960 --> 0:21:20.080 school high school, we were blocked at the district level. 0:21:20.320 --> 0:21:24.040 We can't confirm this, but I remember my Space was 0:21:24.080 --> 0:21:26.680 blocked at my school by the end of my senior year. 0:21:27.440 --> 0:21:29.960 What was the moment where you were like, oh shit, 0:21:30.320 --> 0:21:33.800 this is getting bigger than I thought. Um, when the 0:21:34.760 --> 0:21:39.160 servers begin to crash because there's just so many people 0:21:39.240 --> 0:21:43.119 trying to log in. In two thousand and three, the 0:21:43.200 --> 0:21:46.959 membership went up from fifty to over six hundred. In 0:21:47.000 --> 0:21:50.560 two thousand and four, the year I joined, an average 0:21:50.680 --> 0:21:53.639 there were sixteen hundred members online at the same time. 0:21:54.920 --> 0:21:57.600 In December two thousand and five, around the time that 0:21:57.680 --> 0:22:00.800 Emery would have been a member, there was on average 0:22:00.920 --> 0:22:05.680 over three thousand members online at the same time before 0:22:05.720 --> 0:22:09.080 peaked at about two thousand and six, two thousand and seven. 0:22:09.480 --> 0:22:12.040 You know, we're talking about maybe twenty five thousand people 0:22:12.119 --> 0:22:15.719 a day, you know, four to five thousand people at 0:22:15.760 --> 0:22:18.960 any moment, and Rigo was making a pretty good living 0:22:19.040 --> 0:22:23.040 off T four. I never went into my college career 0:22:23.440 --> 0:22:28.000 because of T four. Right, so the work I did 0:22:28.040 --> 0:22:32.879 on T four derailed anything to do with Chicano studies. 0:22:33.000 --> 0:22:35.159 I was going to be an activist. I thought, let 0:22:35.240 --> 0:22:37.919 me change the system from within, you know, let me 0:22:38.000 --> 0:22:40.960 let me go work in immigration services, let me go 0:22:41.000 --> 0:22:45.400 work in social services. I took one interview in that 0:22:45.880 --> 0:22:49.359 and I didn't even respond to anything any follow up 0:22:49.400 --> 0:22:51.840 on that because I was already working on T four. 0:22:52.600 --> 0:22:54.879 I mean, in a way, you still like maintain the 0:22:54.960 --> 0:22:58.960 community aspect of like activists. I mean, I understood what 0:22:59.040 --> 0:23:02.800 was going on, and I understood, you know, the way 0:23:02.800 --> 0:23:06.320 that these kids wanted to express themselves and have fun. 0:23:08.880 --> 0:23:11.840 Rego still keeps Tea for running. He says it costs 0:23:11.880 --> 0:23:14.600 one hundred dollars a month to keep it going. He 0:23:14.680 --> 0:23:17.480 keeps it running for himself and for the handful of 0:23:17.520 --> 0:23:21.120 people that continue to log on. I have a very 0:23:21.160 --> 0:23:27.600 tiny platform that has an incredible loyal following. Right, I mean, 0:23:27.640 --> 0:23:30.000 you go in there now and there's forty five people 0:23:30.080 --> 0:23:32.160 on I went in there last night there was forty four. 0:23:32.640 --> 0:23:37.080 There you go, I'm exaggerating. I'm exaggerating, right, I was 0:23:37.119 --> 0:23:39.040 just I was a little shocked, to be right, you 0:23:39.119 --> 0:23:44.080 have people that we're at that first party. I can 0:23:44.119 --> 0:23:46.320 think of one person that was that that first party 0:23:46.720 --> 0:23:51.240 that's on there actively. It provides a very basic service, 0:23:51.280 --> 0:23:55.199 which is people connecting. Right. People will always need to 0:23:55.200 --> 0:23:58.040 connect to people, and that's why all these social media 0:23:58.080 --> 0:24:02.800 sites are successful. Our digital footprint will last as long 0:24:02.840 --> 0:24:09.080 as we wanted to. Our digital footprint will last as 0:24:09.119 --> 0:24:12.800 long as we want it to. I chose to delete 0:24:12.840 --> 0:24:15.439 mine in two thousand and six when I did that 0:24:15.480 --> 0:24:18.960 whole purge I mentioned because of that controlling ex boyfriend. 0:24:20.080 --> 0:24:23.600 And as I continue getting older, it's hard to reconcile 0:24:23.840 --> 0:24:25.680 that a lot of us may never get it back. 0:24:27.720 --> 0:24:30.600 It feels like such a loss that I can't access 0:24:30.640 --> 0:24:33.880 my old profile to see if it's even still around. 0:24:35.720 --> 0:24:39.119 But after talking to Rigo, he does me a favor. 0:24:40.720 --> 0:24:44.680 He resent my password so I can lug in. So 0:24:44.920 --> 0:25:08.879 let me lug in let sech. That's after the break. Okay, 0:25:08.880 --> 0:25:12.320 I found my profile. I recorded myself going through my 0:25:12.400 --> 0:25:16.040 profile for the first time, and it instantly brought me 0:25:16.119 --> 0:25:20.520 back to two thousand and four. It's a picture of me. 0:25:21.800 --> 0:25:25.520 I'm pretty sure I was not eighteen, but I made 0:25:25.560 --> 0:25:29.280 myself eighteen at the time. My profile picture was not 0:25:29.320 --> 0:25:32.080 one of me at a party. It's a picture I 0:25:32.119 --> 0:25:35.080 have printed out somewhere, but it was still wild to 0:25:35.080 --> 0:25:39.760 see it online. I'm in high school. This was taken 0:25:42.240 --> 0:25:45.720 I was probably like seventeen. I think I'm wearing like 0:25:45.760 --> 0:25:51.200 a sparkly pink rhinestone heart necklace and then wearing Hiphuger 0:25:51.280 --> 0:25:54.879 pants with a hip Hoger belt that's like a silver 0:25:55.040 --> 0:26:00.760 chain with another pink rhinestone to heart. I know I 0:26:00.800 --> 0:26:04.560 should have kept that belt because apparently I could probably 0:26:04.560 --> 0:26:08.560 sell it to urban outfitters for like one hundred dollars. 0:26:08.560 --> 0:26:11.719 So it turns out I still have my profile picture, 0:26:12.760 --> 0:26:15.080 but I must have deleted my layout when I deleted 0:26:15.119 --> 0:26:19.120 all my other social media coming my profile was pretty bare. 0:26:19.680 --> 0:26:22.520 It was just the basic black background with that Dodger 0:26:22.560 --> 0:26:27.919 blue lettering. But my profile did offer some information. It 0:26:28.000 --> 0:26:31.560 says asked for your gender. I have female city. I 0:26:31.640 --> 0:26:35.000 put role in Heights a member since and it says 0:26:35.119 --> 0:26:39.200 June twenty seventh, two thousand and four profile hits. I've 0:26:39.240 --> 0:26:44.440 had twelve thousand, forty eight profile hits and my last 0:26:44.440 --> 0:26:49.040 log in was July tenth, two thousand and six, at 0:26:49.080 --> 0:26:52.200 one twenty seven am. The last time I logged in 0:26:52.480 --> 0:26:55.080 was when I deleted all my other social media profiles. 0:26:55.720 --> 0:26:57.560 I clicked around the page to see if there was 0:26:57.600 --> 0:27:02.520 anything else, and I found my journal section. Did I 0:27:02.560 --> 0:27:06.680 ever use a journal? Oh my god? How embarrassing. Um, 0:27:08.160 --> 0:27:10.639 Oh my god, this is so embarrassing. There were three 0:27:10.920 --> 0:27:15.719 whole entries. Okay, so it's here. The first journal mentry 0:27:15.800 --> 0:27:19.680 I wrote was July seventeenth, two thousand and four, at 0:27:19.760 --> 0:27:26.280 five seventeen am. Gosh, and I wrote, m well, it's 0:27:26.320 --> 0:27:30.920 about five o eight am and I'm up exclamation points tool. 0:27:32.640 --> 0:27:35.880 I've been thinking about stuff lately. But yeah, damn, it's 0:27:35.880 --> 0:27:38.880 five to eleven now. Lol. I better get in bed 0:27:39.640 --> 0:27:43.160 so my mama doesn't get all mad and shish. For now, 0:27:43.280 --> 0:27:47.679 I'm out show was. I ended up writing more in 0:27:47.800 --> 0:27:52.000 that same entry. Damn the drama, Fuck the haters. We 0:27:52.080 --> 0:27:54.440 gotta just live life, but sometimes you know, I wish 0:27:54.480 --> 0:27:58.440 there was someone I could come home because the game 0:27:58.480 --> 0:28:02.800 gets old after a long while. Lol, trust me, then 0:28:02.880 --> 0:28:06.359 there done that all right? For real? I'm outros. I 0:28:06.400 --> 0:28:09.480 have no idea what I was, who I was writing about. 0:28:11.840 --> 0:28:15.720 The game gets hold after a long while, embarrassing. There 0:28:15.800 --> 0:28:20.520 was another journal from July twenty eighth, two thousand and four. Okay, 0:28:20.720 --> 0:28:25.120