1996 Bruce Gast Launches ElectricCars.com Silcon Valley, San Jose, CA In 1984 people were talking about this thing called "Internet". To get "on" the web you would get a "modem", a grossly overpriced thing you would plug into your "blazing fast" 18 Megahertz PC computer, then hook up to your telephone outlet to connect that lousy slow ugly computer with other people's lousy computers. Once you did this your "modem" would turn into a instrument of torture when you turned it on. It would screech like a bull being gelded while at the same time 25 geeks dragged their finger nails across chalkboards... If it worked, you would be able to type some insane "URL address" into your computer like */*:8080.125.05.229.22/ and you would see some sentences which usually began with the word "ERROR". Around 1996 the ugly screeching and foreign "URLS" were replaced by "domain names". Typed information also began to be accompanied by cartoon graphics... All you had to do was type in the Domain into your "still ugly" computer and with the magic of technology text, cartoons and maybe even a PHOTO would become visible to you! This "stuff" you saw on your green gray or black screen was called a "web site". THE GOLD RUSH OF 1996 People who envisioned this web actually "being something usefull someday" and who really had nothing better to do with their time would spend hours every day typing in things and creating and viewing websites. One of the first businesses on the web was America Online. An ingenious service concocted to charge people $2.00 per minute to hear screaching modems and busy signals... Gotta love AMERICAN ENTREPENEURS! Sometime around early 1996 people in coffee shops around Cupertino and San Jose California were buzzing about these "websites" creating a new way to communicate... new business... and even new culture. Some people became so involved they quit their jobs, sold there cars, mortgaged their homes and max'd their credit cards to buy into this new phenomenon now being called the "Worldwide Web". One of these people was a broke, bored musician named Bruce Gast. Bruce really got online to type text into the web to meet girls in scrolling text web sites called "chat rooms" and procreate his lame music to innocent listeners... But being of Amercan spirit and a gold panner Bruce sat bought a whole bunch of domains... Being a musician, most of these domains were "for fun"... Mostly having to do with music, girls, musical girls, girls who love music... etc. But, he was a semi-college educated guy so he also thought of having a couple websites that would "improve life on earth" or maybe "become something usefull". He looked up into the brown copper colored skies of San Jose and said to himself... "Self, I'm going to make a website about girls and call it BikiniGirls..com" WAIT! Wrong story... He bought a funky domain called... "ElectricCars.com" When he told his friends, family and understanding (but impoversed) Wife about doing this they all agreed "My gaad, bruce is a SUPER-GENIOUS!"... No! Actually the overall response was "Bruce, when the heck are you going to get a real job?" WHAT ELECTRIC CARS? Even though some people knew about electric cars they really were only displayed in "teckie" magazines and once in a while on a "cars of the future" tv show. General Motors, Ford Motors, and other manufacturers actually had tried to market electric cars in the 1980's and 90's but collectively they only invested about 26 cents in advertising, so those projects failed. If GM only built 50 Corvettes, ran a couple lame ads at midnight and priced the car at $30,000 more than the average car in 1956 we're guessing the Vette would have failed in the too! The first thing Bruce did was to sift through magazines and text books to find all the electric cars he could... He found four. These were all "futuristic concept cars" (translated: NEVER GANNA HAPPEN CARS) They all would have cost over $200,000 to make (If they could be made) all had about 20 batteries (each weighing about 20 lbs a piece) and would travel slower and for shorter distances than your 80 year old Grandpa after he's had 3 martini's! BRUCE DID THE SMART THING! Was Bruce discouraged by the laughter, disinterest from people, lack of electric cars, negative feedback about his website? Heck yea!!!... So he did the smartest thing a musician could ever do... He quit his job and devoted all his working time to working on his zero-income websites! That was a tough decade for Bruce and his family! Lucky Wife huh??? After a couple years of living on noodles and fast food, ElectricCars.com started getting visitors... Every day 50-100 people would log onto the website. Peopl began to email comments and information about new electric cars coming out, class projects involving batteries and wheels, and of course the number one message: "Gas is getting !$!@# expensive... where can I buy an electric car???!!!!" Pretty soon ElectricCars.com was getting serious inquiries from people who wanted to find cars, sell cars, make cars and about A MILLION OTHER PEOPLE WHO JUST WANTED RELIEF FROM THE OUTRAGEOUS GAS PRICES... at that time gas was a whopping 87 cents per gallon! Bruce was still broke... Now at this time an even more crazy phenomenon was starting... Some websites were taking their visitors credit cards and showing them photos of girls... and other things. LIGHT BULB! Bruce thought, what if ElectricCars.com could be an "online magazine" where people could pay a little smidge of money and see all the "stuff we've gotten through the years." People could to put in their credit card (securely of course) and see ElectricCars.com... People loved the idea right! Holy COW!!!! They hated it... Bruce started getting nasty emails from people who ridiculed him for "collecting money for something that should be free". Bruce would tell them about the years spent making no cash, paying THOUSANDS and THOUSANDS of dollars to build "web servers" pay "web pipeline fees", for "anti-virus protections", for "MODEMS" and computer "PROGRAMS". He also told them about long nights staying up to fix web problems, thousands of hours staring at computer screens, etc. Now we are not saying Bruce was the first person in the worldwide web to ask for money to view info... But, for sure ElectricCars.com was one of the first websites to offer usefull information. Shortly after this period, somewhere around 2001 people heard that a lot of the paper magazines were going out of business because people were logging on to websites to see stuff... Bruce, was finally allowed to make enough money off his websites to treat his Wife to Taco Bell... Life was good! THE FIRST 10 YEARS! From 1996 to 2006 ElectricCars.com was viewed by more than a million people. (lowest estimates) It was featured on TV shows, mentioned in countless articles, and Bruce's words were quoted on national news shows... Bruce has never focused on the future energy shortages and "doomsday" attitudes. Instead ElectricCars.com has always stressed "There is a problem coming but we have the solution". Electric Cars have been around since the early 1800's and even though they've always been expensive to build the time is here when the world has no choice... For sure if we do nothing, gas prices will consume us!   Thank you for your support, this is still just the begining!