this is what i have read.
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THE RISE AND FALL OF OVERGROW
When the world’s largest online cannabis community vanished, rumor and intrigue filled the void
By Chris Bennett
It was the beginning of February when they first started washing up on different cannabis forums around the Internet, like so many shipwreck survivors reconnecting on shore, searching for answers:
“Any other Overgrowers here?”
“I am, do you know what happened?”
On Jan. 31, overgrow.com, the Web’s most popular cannabis-based Web site, disappeared. As what was first thought to be a one-day scheduled maintenance interruption stretched into days, speculation began to spread like spider mites through the online marijuana community. Started as Weedbase in 1999 by a coalition of international activists with cyber nicknames like OT1, Angrydyke, NL420 and Foolgirl, this computer-based cannabis cabal was joined by master coder Shabang sometime around 2000. Later, controlling interests were sold to an anonymous seed seller known only as “RC,” who maintained the site up until its sudden disappearance.
By the time of its demise, Overgrow had grown to more than 100,000 members. In fact, the cost of operating such a high-traffic Web site caused some to suggest that its disappearance was due to the incredible financial burden of hosting Overgrow, rather than any legal reasons. But as RC’s other sites, including Eurohemp, Cannabisworld and Heaven’s Stairway Seed Company, followed Overgrow into the Web abyss, rumors of arrests and seizures quickly took precedence. As a result, an untold number of growers and breeders who frequented the site decided to pull up their roots and close shop.
At a time of unparalleled political and legal pot persecution, Overgrow was the meeting place of an outlawed society, bringing the wisdom of expert growers to novices, and the politics of cannabis activists to recreational users, all in an online world of information and photo galleries that helped in turn to fertilize the roots of the growing cannabis community that fed it. One of the more popular features on Overgrow was the Strain Guide, which traced the genetic history of hybrids such as Northern Lights x Jack Herer or Shishkaberry back through the different strains from which they’d been bred. The Overgrow photo gallery was an unmatched resource for pictures of both cannabis flowers and the state-of-the-art commercial and personal growrooms that sprouted them. Threads like “Wanna Ask the Old Farts” brought together wet-behind-the-ears novices and master growers who had perfected their techniques after years of guerrilla gardening. And for those who took the time to look, the all-encompassing FAQ answered almost every basic question likely to face both fresh and experienced growers, a valuable resource that has been particularly missed by the community. Overgrow also proved an ideal forum for cannabis-seed sellers eager to advertise their wares to the growing public, a gray-market force that generated much of the income that Overgrow required to stay financially self-sufficient as it expanded.
Considering the number of people who had traded information as well as sent in pictures of their gardens and harvests, it’s not surprising that the sudden disappearance of such a huge resource sent shockwaves throughout the global cannabis community. As the days turned into weeks with no official word as to what happened, that anxiety understandably increased.
