SHIV PANDYA: I first really got into the forums sometime in early high school. My whole internet existence at that time was finding music that was leaked online, and places where the people sharing it were talking about just one thing.

MATT MARTIANS: The forum is where you would go to find all the rare Neptunes songs, the scratch vocals. Certain people had inside information.

REMY BANKS: It was like an underground cult for kids that actually knew.

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PANDYA: There would be little stories shared on the forums. They would talk about people, like [Pharrell’s former manager] Rob Walker, or about a studio session that happened but the song was never released. Those tidbits that you never got to hear anywhere else. It made you feel like you were a part of what was really going on, getting to know the backstories of how things come about.

SHOMI PATWARY: Forums were the only social media type of thing that existed. It was the earliest form of social media, basically.

MARTIANS: The unofficial forum, which we called the Grindin’ forum—that’s where I met Janelle Monae. I met Tyler. M.I.A. used to be on that one. That was the one that was the free-for-all. Drake used to be on that one.

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BANKS: I first heard Drake there. He had a song with Malice from The Clipse. Somebody posted it in the threads, and I’m like, “What? Who’s this dude Drake?” Then I was like, “Oh, it’s that dude from Degrassi.” Then it was a whole thread about that.