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In 1998, pulpfiction.com transformed into an online forum for all things "pulp." For the next several years, users interacted through the website in a variety of ways: posting polls, discussion boards, links to alternative/underground activities, and creative writing. In typical pulp fashion, the content was sensational and easily accessible. The "Essential Downloads" section displays various software that provides access to alternative and countercultural media. As O'Mara notes in "The Code," "the power of the computer came from its user" in the 70s and 80s. However, by the 1990s, users could download software programs and harness the power of the internet + build online communities with little barrier to entry.

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In 1997, Archive Books, an independent Seattle bookstore, owned the rights to www.pulpfiction.com. The homepage introduces the website's browser to the genre of "pulp fiction" and its sub-genres, offers an online catalogue of in-stock books, and links a glossary to pulp fiction terminology. The ease of browsing the bookstore's selection online would have been a revolutionary experience for consumers. In 1995, "The Year of the Internet," a Times reporter called the Web "an electronic amalgam of the public library, the suburban shopping mall and the Congressional Record."* This early interface demonstrated by Archive Books paved the way for online shopping and AI generated purchase recommendations.**

* "1995: The Year the Future Began,"

** "The Evolution of the Catalog," Indix HQ, 18 Aug 2016, https://medium.indix.com/the-evolution-of-the-catalog-a4dc0779d688

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"Drugs, Hippies, Beatniks, and the 60s" - Genre

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"Drugs, Hippies, Beatniks, and the 60s" - Genre

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In this subsection, Archive Books appeals to its consumer base by selling sex and promiscuity. Erotica and pornography remained taboo topics throughout the culture wars of the '80s - '90s. The description of the genre "erotica" confines "gay and lesbian" individuals within the realm of "today's alternative lifestyles," demonstrating the sexualization and lack of visibility for the LGBTQ+ community.

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These forum posts demonstrate the renewed social justice movement in the 1990s. The two articles posted above address topics including the negative effects of globalization, capitalism, and resource extraction. Online forums provided another platform for decentralized criticism of big business, environmental degradation, and Wall Street. Manual Castells argues the internet "protects the movement against the repression of their liberated physical spaces by maintaining communication among the people within the movement and with society at large in the long march of social change that is required to overcome institutionalized domination."* In discussion of McDonald's and the threat of globalization to Indigenous languages on pulpfiction.com, users engaged in a revolutionary form of discourse.

Castells, M. (2012). Changing the World in the Network Society. In M. Castells, Networks of Outrage and Hope: Social Movements in the Internet Age (pp. 218-244). Cambridge: Polity Press.

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Poll: "The overall design of pulpfiction.com..."

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Poll: "The overall design of pulpfiction.com..."

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This poll is indicative of the attention given to websites' interface during this period of rapid development. The options manifest the excitement, competitive nature, curiosity, and ingenuity of the website's programmers. The results of the poll demonstrate users' appreciation for the content and frustration with the developing interface. This frustration provided motivation for constant improvements in website programming.

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Pulp magazines, or "the pulps," were cheap fiction magazines published extensively in the United States from 1896 into the 1950s. The magazines were generally admired for their "lurid and exploitative stories and sensational cover art." Available for 10-25 cents, "the pulps" were a widespread medium enjoyed by the masses.

*The Pulp Magazine Archive, About the Collection. Internet Archive, 23 December 2011. https://archive.org/details/pulpmagazinearchive?sort=title

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The poster for Pulp Fiction is designed in the style of "the pulps," which sold for 10 cents. 

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Today, pulpfiction.com is a fan website for Quentin Tarantino, the director of the cult classic Pulp Fiction (1994). The film is considered a zeitgeist of the 1990s, and the term "pulp fiction" has come to be associated almost exclusively with Tarantino's movie and the decade. The film's aesthetic and content reflect a longstanding American obsession with "pulp" and countercultural media. This website was not directly related to the film Pulp Fiction in the 1990s, but embodied the ethos of "pulp" through its shapeless, freeform, and liberal structure (or lack thereof). The archived versions of pulpfiction.com reflect the social, political, and cultural upheaval of the decade and the revolutionary nature of the Internet as a platform for discourse.

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Poll: "How do you feel about President Bush?"

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Poll: "How do you feel about President Bush?"

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In 2001, the majority of the people surfing pulpfiction.com voted that President Bush was "a very bad joke." The results reveal a sense of apathy and mockery towards his presidency. At this point in time, Bush's approval ratings hovered around 50 percent; his approval skyrocketed to over 80 percent after the attacks on 9/11. This poll captures in a moment in time before the political and social landscapes of the U.S. were radically transformed by the War on Terror.

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This poll reveals cultural angst as the 1990s came to a close. Marilyn Manson, an American heavy metal musician, leads the poll by a wide margin. Manson was a widely controversial figure due to his profrane lyrics and violent music. Even on this site (which provided access to untraditional culture and media), voters displayed distaste for "goth" and "grunge" aesthetics in the late 1990s. The option "border guard" reflects anxiety about the mistreatment of refugees and asylum seekers at the U.S. borders under the Clinton administration. Monica Lewinsky is another notable choice, reflecting a continued American obsession with her relationship to President Clinton. In an article for Vanity Fair, she described the relentless attention paid to her on the internet: "every day someone mentions me in a tweet or a blog post, and not altogether kindly. Every day, it seems, my name shows up in an op-ed column or a press clip or two..."* Polls and forums on sites such as pulpfiction.com were unregulated spaces on the Internet for users to engage in popular culture and counterculture.

*Lewinsky, Monica. "Shame and Survival," Vanity Fair, June 2014. https://sakai.claremont.edu/access/content/group/CX_mtg_163055/Week%2011/Day%201/Shame%20and%20Survival%20_%20Vanity%20Fair%20_%20June%202014.pdf