Rotten.com was a shock site with the tagline "An archive of disturbing illustration," active from 1996 to 2012. It was devoted to morbid curiosities, pictures of violent acts, deformities, autopsy or forensic photographs, depictions of perversesex acts, and disturbing or misanthropic historical curiosities. Founded in 1996, it was run by a developer as Soylent Communications. Site updates slowed in 2009, with the final update in February 2012. The website's front page was last archived in January 2018.
History
In late 1996, Soylent wrote a program that identified Internet domain names appearing in a dictionary, but not yet registered. 'Rotten' was one of the unclaimed words, and Soylent created the website. Rotten.com presented itself as a bastion of online free speech in an era when censorship rules in some countries had begun to restrict internet access. Rotten had a spartan layout - no thumbnail images were present next to links, and the links had one-line descriptions couched in morbid humor and often carried no hints at their content. Rotten content comprised user-submitted images, although in rare cases the developers would post content. The submissions were marked as real, but could often be misattributed: a file submitted as motorcycle.jpg was reported to be a motorbike accident, but the developers admitted it was probably an attempted shotgun suicide. Rotten received an alleged image ofmedical personnel recovering Princess Diana's body from a car accident, but confirmed it as fake. However, due to wide interest in the crash, they posted the image anyway. Publicity resulted in a large traffic spike. Rotten.com was one of the first websites to publish images of the September 11th jumpers from the Twin Towers, under the title Swan Dive. As of the 1st of October 2017 the website is no longer up.
Legal matters
Rotten.com was threatened with many lawsuits over the years, mostly in the form of cease and desist notices. These ranged from serious matters, such as requests to remove pictures of dead relatives from the site, to Burlington Coat Factory asking to take down trenchcoat.org, which was bought as a Trenchcoat Mafia reference, but simply linked to Burlington Coat Factory's webpage. On June 24, 2005, the US federal government ordered that the "Fuck of the Month" section of the site be removed, along with content from several ancillary sites. In posting the page's removal notice, the site's moderator criticized supporters of both Alberto Gonzales and the Bush Administration for the enablement of censorship.
Rotten Library
The Rotten Library was created as an encyclopedia to supplement the website. The Library contained hundreds of articles under seventeen different headings such as culture, art, medicine, crime, travel, and the occult. Articles contained detailed research, timelines, and occasional unseen images of events. At least one entry was written by J.M. Berger, a researcher, author and journalist who has written for The Atlantic.
Merchandise
Rotten had a store that carried t-shirts, mousemats, stickers, magnets, and bizarre DVDs.
Ancillary sites
''The Daily Rotten''
In late 1999, The Daily Rotten was started by Thomas E. Dell. Stories were published daily, focusing mostly on terrorism, murder, suicide, cruelty, excrement, and abuse. Daily Rotten, also known as Rotten News, is driven by user submissions which are edited by a self-described "Rotten Staff Duder". This also features comments for each one of the articles, posted by the registered members; they usually bring similar histories or gruesome images. They refer to themselves as "rotteneers", a satirical reference to Walt Disney's Mouseketeers, and/or "rottentots".
Boners.com
Rotten launched Boners.com in response to viewers who wanted a daily pictures page alongside the Daily Rotten newsboard. The word "boner" suggests an embarrassing mistake or a male organ in a state of arousal. The images typically consisted of amusing public signs, phallic imagery, and members of the public in embarrassing situations.
''The Gaping Maw''
In 2000, The Gaping Maw - an editorial/commentary archive - was founded. Most of the articles were written by cartoonist Tristan Farnon under the alias "Spigot" or by other webmasters. The pages contained news, satire, and commentary on modern society. Along with the Rotten Library, this has improved Rotten's standing in many communities since it has introduced a humane and intellectual aspect to the website. On June 22, 2005, The Gaping Maw went dark to comply with new government bookkeeping requirements regarding the distribution of pornography, specifically governmental age-verification of models, under. All articles were taken down, and the site's title page was replaced with a statement lamenting the passage of the laws, headed by the banner, "CENSORED BY US GOVERNMENT!". In January 2006, The Gaping Maw came back online with some articles heavily edited.
In November 2003, the Rotten Dead Pool was launched. The Dead Pool was a game in which players picked ten people they believed would pass away over the course of the next 12 months. A point was awarded to a player for each of their correct picks. A pick didn't count as correct if the pick was executed or murdered, or died some other way, after the 12 months had passed.
In mid-2002, Rotten launched NNDB, an online database. NNDB was a steadily-updated website that contained information about thousands of notable people. The news section ceased updating on January 16, 2016, and the celebrity deaths section ceased updating on December 31, 2016. The website itself is still live.
Sports Dignity
Sports Dignity was a gallery of pictures showing embarrassing or NSFW incidents in sports games and tournaments.
