North Stand Chat
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
North Stand Chat is an Internet Forum for fans of Brighton & Hove Albion which is an English football team based in Brighton. They play at Withdean Stadium and are currently playing in the Football League One. The forum takes its name from a stand at the club's previous home, the Goldstone Ground in Hove, which was the club's home from 1902 until 1997 when it was demolished to make way for a shopping centre.
North Stand Chat started off as a mailing list. It became a fully fledged internet forum in 1996 as part of the Seagulls Server (which can still be viewed via the Internet Archive [1])
The poor management of the club by the board (Greg Stanley, Bill Archer and David Bellotti) at this time caused great concern amongst the fans and North Stand Chat became a popular place to meet online for fans to discuss different tactics and actions. Events such as the Mansfield Town boycott, the march on Bill Archer's house and Fans United were all organised through North Stand Chat. Contacts were made meaning that things could be organised away from match days, at pretty short notice.
The board was a great help to the club in organising events to ensure that permission was given to build their new home at Falmer Stadium.
The board currently has over 3,700 members, following a heavy cull of unused accounts, and over 1,670,000 posted messages. The most users ever online was 399 on 27th July 2004. A collaboration with the club's management means that fans' queries, on pretty much any issue, are posted through the Ask the Club forum on the board.
Fans of rival teams, such as Crystal Palace, Cardiff City, Leeds United, Spurs and West Ham United regularly post messages on the forum, and new users are always welcome.
The site, and its predecessors, have appeared in a number of newspapers, including The Times, generally being quoted as a source for a rumour, and the initial Seagulls Server site appeared in the book Build a Bonfire: How Football Fans United to Save Brighton & Hove Albion. References to activity on the board and liberal use of internet handles from it occurs on the "fans phone in" on BBC Southern Counties Radio.
