How old is this BBG site ? I'm member #2812

[wag]

     I just became a member of BBB about 3 weeks ago and just letting y'all know the pictures and forum info is awsome.   Glad to be a member (#2812) and did a little posting already.   This BBB site rocks.  Glad I found it.  Question I have --- How long has this BBB site be active (was started)?   Looks like about 3 years by forum history.   BUT what I can't understand is many times in the past few years I GOOGLE  searched bream / bluegill / goggle-eye / perch and you name it fishing and never came across this site untill a ------- bluegill flyfishing fresh water ------ search landed BBB.  Y'all talk about landing big bluegill as a great catch ----- how about landing BBB on a Google search ---- THAT BLUEGILL FISHERMEN IS THE GRANDISH CATCH OF ALL.    Y'all have a good day fishing and enjoy this BBB site like I'm doing. 

                                 -------- THANKS -------    

          OH the question -------  How  old  is  this  BBB  site  and  how  did  it  get  started ?      

       

[Bruce Condello]

BBG was founded by Bruce Condello and Aaron Matos during the March Madness tournament of 2008.  On March 20, 2008, Bruce was watching an NCAA tournament basketball game from his home, and was talking by text to Aaron, when Aaron suggested a website dedicated to raising and catching bluegill.  Aaron did the work of identifying available domain names, and Bruce made the final decision to go with www.bigbluegill.com.  Aaron chose Ning.com as the web format, and purchased the domain name and started the site.  All of this took place over the course of two hours.  Aaron told Bruce, "Start adding content", and Bruce uploaded photo files, and wrote a few blogs over the next several days.  One of the original and primary intents, which is still true today, was to divert some traffic to www.pondboss.com, which was founded by world renowned pond and lake manager, Bob Lusk.  Pond Boss forums was, and still is, one of the most successful forums on the web today.  We still strive to not be a pond management site here, and to make sure that folks who want to manage their ponds and lakes go to the real experts at Pond Boss.

It was to everybody's surprise after a few days that people actually started joining this site.  They seemed to be attracted to the light-hearted "go have some fun" attitude of the early members.  One thing that has kept this site strong is the very strong set of rules that allow for no bashing of other members, or their beliefs, or their methods.  There are no second chances on BBG.  If you break a rule, you are not given a warning, you are not given a second chance and you are not given mercy.  Bash somebody and you're gone.

As far as google search, this site has been #1 when googling 'big bluegill' since late 2008, but did not make the top ten when googling 'bluegill' until late 2009.  Now if you google 'bluegill' on Bing, Google or Yahoo, BBG is firmly entrenched in the top five, and often in the top two, trailing only internet giant Wikipedia.

This site is about fun.  We don't take ourselves too seriously, and we don't generate advertising revenue.  Aaron and Bruce pay for the site with their own money and hard work.  If a really good advertiser ever came along who wanted to pay $100/month, and would agree to just a header ad, and if they were bluegill or fishing related, we might consider it, but otherwise the site maintains it's charm by just being a bunch of kind and generous fishermen and fisherwomen who like this sort of thing.

[wag]

    I'm sorry --- Is it  BBG instead of BBB ?    Either way it's an awsome site and again THANKS     and   The type of bream (bluegill) fishing my wife and I do is almost a mirror image of a lot of  members of this site.    THANK you Aaron & Bruce for this great BBG site.

[Jeff Soto]

No Wag, you're right.  It's B luegill B ig B luegill.  Did you get my message?

[Bruce Condello]

Actually you can call it anything you want, as long as you keep visiting. :-)

 

 

But I personally refer to it as BBG

[David, aka, "McScruff"]

Hallelujah - can I get an amen!

We love ya, Dr. Bruce and Aaron.

[Jeff Soto]

AMEN!  Now we know how it all started.  A big thanks to Aaron and Bruce.  

[David, aka, "McScruff"]

Great picture, Jeff!

[Jim Gronaw]

Bluegill freaks just flat out ROCK!...period!