Extremeskins

Extremeskins, or ES as it is known by members, is an online discussion forum for the Washington Redskins.

Founded in May of 2000, the site officially merged with the Redskins organization in 2005 experiencing a significant jump in membership from August of 2005 to February 2006. Currently as of July 2007 there are about 68,000 users registered to the site. Users register with the site and choose usernames that become their alias on the site. Members have options for creating their own "signature" which is either a graphic or text and receive an "avatar" that corresponds to how many total posts on the site the member has.

Forums
There are several forums for discussion on the site, each with its own focus. Of these forums The Stadium is the most visited, but The Tailgate is arguably the most popular among long-time members. Moderators are chosen by the staff to patrol the site and uphold the rules of discussion. Moderators or "mods" as some call them are experienced members hand-picked by the owners.

The Stadium
The Stadium forum is used exclusively for discussing issues directly involved with the Washington Redskins football franchise. This forum generally sees the most traffic of all of the forums and many newcomers to the site use this forum primarily.

The Tailgate
The Tailgate is a more relaxed forum where just about any non-football topic is fair game, from news to humor to science.

The Classifieds Forum
Members can buy, sell, or trade items or services in this forum. Mostly Redskins-related.

The Club Level Forums
The Club Level comprises four forums that include a graphic library, a Chat archive, a draft "war room", and a film library. Most of the material in these forums is created and posted by members. Non-staff members cannot post in the chat archive, but it can be viewed by anyone visiting the site.

Washington Area Sports Forums
The Washington area sports forums include forums for discussion of every major professional sports team in the Washington area. Teams include the Washington Nationals and Baltimore Orioles (Baseball), the Washington Wizards (Basketball), the Washington Capitals (Hockey), D.C. United (soccer), and the area's NCAA teams.

Stadium Maintenance Forums
Only two forums are in this area: Tech Feedback, which is open to all members, and the Owners Box, reserved specifically for Redskins personnel and Extremeskins staff.

The Redskins Tradition Forums
These forums contain past discussion threads and posts organized by year. These threads are editable, but no new posts can be made in these forums.

Origins

Extremeskins (ES) was founded by Die Hard (username) in May of 2000. Die Hard was fed up with message boards where discussions frequently degenerated into flame wars. Engaging discussion was impossible without countless posts from fans of other teams who had no intention other than to provoke a fight.

Die Hard set out to build a message board that was a haven for Redskins fans to discuss their team's issues without rude responses. At the site's inception, one didn't have to register for many of the online communities, the software was second rate, and the moderation was poor. The ultimate goal was to have the best Redskins fan site on the net with a committed, involved moderation staff.

Because Extremeskins started as a small group of devoted fans, discussions maintained a level of civility higher than one could find at other sports message boards. As the site grew, new members followed the positive example set by their predecessors. Throughout its history, Extremeskins has been entirely free to access and join. All funds necessary to run the forum came voluntarily from the pockets of the owners and members.

All of the staff are long-time posters at ExtremeSkins, who share the goal of fostering a pleasant environment for discussion not only of sports-related topics, but humor and current events as well. Many of the original members were refugees from a message board at "The Sporting News". The atmosphere at "The Sporting News" had begun to decline, and when ES was formed members quickly flocked to the fledgling site. The community grew slowly at first, but there was a dramatic increase in membership when Steve Spurrier was named Head Coach, and again when Joe Gibbs returned to Washington. Membership was also further bolstered when ES began to feature Bang Cartoons, satirical animations about the NFL, in late 2003. the cartoons became a hit, and fans league-wide signed on in large numbers to view them. Bang Cartoons became a weekly feature that stayed with ES until the summer of 2005.

Unbeknownst to the public, the Redskins wanted to add a message board to their official team site, Redskins.com. Realizing this would be a complicated task, the Redskins decided to acquire an established forum rather than start from scratch. After looking at all of the serious Redskins sites on the web, they found that ES was the busiest, best managed, highest quality site available. The team liked the way Extremeskins was run, the quality of discussion, and the friendly, hands-on approach of the staff. The Redskins assured the owners and members of ES that no significant changes would be made to the site as a result of the union, and the merger spurred a massive influx of new members.

The Present Day

Die Hard's goal has long since been reached, but the staff at Extremeskins is constantly working to improve the site. Each season ES welcomes new members and expands its features, but is still completely free. While some things did change with the merger, the sense of community, diversity of opinion and freedom of expression have not. Extremeskins owes these successes to the hard work and dedication of the staff.

Currently, a few moderators from Extremeskins have turn their attentions from attacking other Redskins Fans/Posters, and focused on attacking local beat writers. To the surprise of many in the media and around the league, the Washington Redskins allow these moderators to spend games in the press box.

(contributed in part by ES member Skinfan13 and in bulk by ES moderator Pete)

Extremeskins in the Media

"One of the most novel steps came in August, when the Redskins announced they had acquired ExtremeSkins.com. That was sort of the Neon Deion of fan Web sites, the most popular and brashest such outlet in the burgundy-and-gold universe. ExtremeSkins.com is the first existing fan site ever acquired by an NFL team."

"Still operated by the fan moderators who founded the site, ExtremeSkins.com--the largest Redskins fan site on the Internet--provides fans unique views and access to the team. Representatives of Extremeskins travel to all Redskins games, posting fan-centric articles and topics. Chats with players, coaches and team officials are also featured, along with "fan view" columns."

"And last August it bought a fan Web site, one that had kept a running tally of alleged errors made by one of the Post's beat reporters. The first Redskins executive to appear on the site after the acquisition was the team's owner, Daniel M. Snyder, who used some of his time to bash the news media for possessing personal agendas and overusing anonymous sources."[http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/07/sports/football/07redskins.html?ei5070&en983ae4b27d661ebb&ex1149825600&adxnnl1&adxnnlx=1149699915-s+Gc/B8CVzce6WKA6Pdzxg]

"McKenna takes a low view of shadow journalism, calling ExtremeSkins.com, a message board site purchased by the team, a Snyder "party organ." He feels the same way about the Redskins' TV shows ("infomercials," he harrumphs), Redskins.com, and Redskins Journal, a previously independent print publication now owned by Snyder." http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/cheap/2005/cheap1021.html

"Worst web site: Extremeskins.com, now owned and operated by the Washington Redskins and a place where no-accountability venom remains the lifeblood of a despicable operation."

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