I first came upon the online tickle scene back in 1996. Of course, back then, I was only 14, so I had to sort of "break the rules" in order to get into a lot of the tickling sites. A lot of them would have these big, official warning pages with messages such as
BY CLICKING THE LINK BELOW, AND ENTERING THE SITE, I HEREBY CERTIFY THAT I AM 18 YEARS OF AGE (sometimes you would have to be 21) AND THAT I AM READY TO VIEW ADULT-RELATED MATERIAL.
I can't remember if that's exactly what it said, but it was something like that. In short, I would have to click a link that by doing so I would be certifying that I was of legal age...when I really wasn't.
Okay, enough of that. 🙂
Most of the sites that I came across were personal home pages dedicated to tickling. They would usually have collections of tickling pictures, cartoons, stories, and the like. In fact, a lot of the stories that I read on those sites are now hailed as "classic tickle stories." A few of the stories I remember are "The House of Nefertari" and "The Babysitter." As for the sites...one that comes to mind is "The Tickemaster's Page." It was maintained by a guy who called himself "The Ticklemaster." There was also one called Tickle Central. It had some artwork, stories, and some accounts of tickling in the media (summaries of tickling scenes that had popped up in movies, television, etc.). In fact, I believe that was the first tickling page I ever found. I'm not sure if it has anything to do with the Tickle Central that is around today or not (i.e. the video company on clips4sale). By that, I mean that I don't know if it is owned by the same person or not. There was also Josie the Ticklish Pussycat's Page, and a page owned by a woman named Donna who was from Kentucky. It had a variety of tickling stories, pictures, etc. Hmmm...what else was there? Well, I remember a page called Alaska Tickles, which was pretty much like the rest I described. I also remember a couple, Steve and Beth, that had their own page. I think it was ASFT, now that I think of it. Additionally, there was an artist that was pretty popular as far as tickling art was concerned. His name was BAC, and he was based in Atlanta, GA. I got one of his catalogs once. He drew a variety of tickling comics.
Well, that's all I can think of right now. This has kind of made me nostalgic. The Web and Internet were so cool back then. Granted, it wasn't as massive as it is today, but not too many people used it, so using it kind of made you feel special. It did with me, anyway. Don't know about anyone else.