About

Written on July 16, 2010 – 7:30 pm | by admin |

AwayGoalsRule:  Oh yes they do!

The AwayGoalsRule project has been going for 7 years and counting in various guises, formerly known as 442Football, 442Forums and mixtures thereof. We provide a community forum, spreading race, class and girth to smash boundaries and bring people together – the fact we’ve still got members since the very beginning only go to show how successful we’ve been.

Entirely funded by donations, and supporting websites (thank you www.ianda-consultants.com and PaddyPower for your contributions!), we like to think we do things a different way. You see… this is how it all started…

‘Twas the Winter of 2003 or something, when all us 606 members were on a continuous quest to find a decent forum. A couple of rivals started up, afterhours was the first that I noticed and longest established, was an earlier 606 breakaway than us, and 606substitute but they never really appealled to me or took off in a big way, although I think both are still around. Then there was us.

606 Substitute: The Beginning, and the hasty name change

This is the first ever forum – under the second of three names we’ve gone by since 2003. We’ve come a long way since then!

A man called Rio’s Back Pocket started our forum, when he was banned from
afterhours (and 606 lol) for his drunken bluntness and ability to have a flaming
row in an empty forum. We were called “606 Substitute”. RBP hadn’t done his
homework over the name – so we had a member vote and “442 Football
Forum” was the overwhelming popular choice so we switched names. I built a
website to partner it, something we’ve done ever since (which is still online here if
anyone is interested).

I had joined at the beginning, but tbh wasn’t all that impressed, didn’t really know
anyone and so didn’t visit much and had set up a couple of other forums instead,
one to learn on, and one we used as a hang out, just a small group of mates.

A week or two after we decided to disband our “United Pub” forum, and I was
approached and asked to come back to RBP’s 606substitute. I said ok if I can be
in charge of the tech forum… and the deal was done. Been here ever since.

We started on ProBoards ad-supported free forum hosting deal. The whole point of creating this forum was because none of us could find anywhere that wasn’t run by many a little Hitler, so we figured we’d make a place that was fair, fun and friendly and a place where we ourselves would enjoy posting. And it was so…

We have been user driven since the very beginning, much to the delight of our members. Suggestions are always welcome… just not always right.

AGR in the old days: On Invision Free, awarded a Nazi Mod Seal of Disapproval and hitting the headlines

Learning the ropes and moving

Can’t imagine why now, but compared to proboards, invisionfree seemed like Christmas to us lol. Although tbh, so strict were they even on minor misdemeanors it felt like playing on a lead space hopper 120ft in the air on a glass bottomed thingy. The Pit and The Depths of Hell (TDOH) had to go for a while so they didn’t pull the plug on us.

But we survived. Oh yes! Just like we always do.

But there was regular disruptions, Invision had a terrible uptime record, and there were a few cliques and board dividing flamewars. And things, such as our leader taking the forum offline because he was balled off with it. Then one day RBP just thought “F**k it!” – and against popular opinion, closed the forums for the final time.

I checked it the next day and he was online, and not interested in opening it ever again. That week, Sparky’s Kneecap and Saner joined forces with me Saner offered to host it, and Sparky helped me round everyone up, and with a lil help from others, including vBulletin software given to us by Mr Brick, we launched on our own server for the first time ever. And of course, then we could add more features.

Pastures New

This continued for a couple of years until our host dropped out, and once again we were left adrift and offline… no place to be. And with the hosting went the domain name, so… we once again resurrected the place on a new host, got our new AwayGoalsRule name and entirely funded by web hosting deals and member donations, we survive to this day, better than ever. The fact many of our members have been with us for years is testament to our success, and we continually improve the sites to stay ahead of the competition. We like to think we did OK, too.

And we hope you’ve enjoyed the ride.

- The AGR Team