The original SinisterRabbit launched in 2004, and I’ve been finding my way back to it ever since. I never really did anything with the site at first, I just registered what I thought was a cool domain name and parked it for a while.
Then in 2007 the ‘site about many things’ launched for real.
Originally I was posting news snippets and light commentary about movies, music, games… all the stuff that was popular in the late 2000’s. I’ve always been inspired by pop culture, and maybe more so by my nostalgia for the pop culture of my youth. Those amazing franchises that still refuse to die – Transformers, He-Man, Thundercats, and all of the spinoffs and copycats. And Nintendo… probably the company that has commanded my pop culture loyalty above all others.
SinisterRabbit was my place to talk about all of these things. Eventually other contributors began writing for the site, giving their own opinions on the same topics or chiming in with content that I wasn’t as familiar with. Then a podcast was created, because it was 2008 and that’s what you did. We had some success, but mostly we had fun. It wasn’t just a creative outlet… it became a little community. An excuse to hang out with friends, in the digital and physical world. I loved every minute of updating that site and recording the podcast. The goal wasn’t to be the first with a news story, or the most knowledgeable about a topic. The goal was to talk about the stuff that made me happy.
I learned a lot during that time. The site was built on WordPress and I had to learn the ins and outs of that platform so I could keep the site online. I’m not the world’s greatest writer, so I had to work at it… And that podcast? This was the early days of the medium and we were all figuring things out as we went.
A few years went by, and life took over. Writing about the newest Nintendo game or Transformers toy just didn’t rank high on the list of importance. The podcast stopped, and eventually site updates slowed to nothing.
I made a couple of attempts to bring SinisterRabbit back over the years… first in 2016 during a difficult period in my life, and again in 2021 when that creative itch returned… but neither relaunch really stuck.
There are no Wayback Machine snapshots for SinisterRabbit.com between 2017 and 2020. The domain was completely dormant.
2024 was one of the most painful years for me personally. I’m not going to address this now.
What I will say is life today is genuinely good.
Lately I’ve found myself nostalgic not just for the pop culture fun that the original SinisterRabbit represented, but for the excitement of the old, capital-I Internet.
The Internet has moved on. What used to be about expression and fun now seems to revolve around one word: monetization. I hate that word. The more you lean into making money, the less authentic the experience becomes.
And don’t get me started on social media.
So here’s the point.
I’ve decided to bring SinsterRabbit back purely as my creative outlet. An opportunity to share my voice in a corner of the world that is 100% controlled by me. No corporate overlords, no algorithm, just me and my computer. I’m going to talk about all of the pop culture nostalgia that I still dearly love, along with my nostalgia for the early internet that I wish we could bring back. I’m going to keep things loose in the beginning and just see where my thoughts take me.
I hope you’ll come along for the ride, or at least stop by once in a while.
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