It’s 1995.

The start up music on Windows sounds a bit like this.



Today Tonight has just made its debut on Channel Seven.



This mob has just taken out its 16^th premiership.



And Collingwood has just started dipping its toes into the World Wide Web.

Yes, the Magpies were in fact the first AFL club to establish a website of their own.

General Manager Rob Petrie announced the site to the club’s members in the October edition of the In Black and White magazine.

Predictably, the language used to describe the site and its medium is a little archaic by current standards.

“For those of you who don’t already know, Collingwood was the first AFL club to be on the new computer ‘Internet’ system and for those who have access to the ‘Internet’, I include below the code to access details about the club,” Petrie wrote.

“Also included is a summary of the interesting information that can be accessed. The companies listed have donated their services to set up this system for us.

“The information will be updated regularly, especially during the season, so I urge you to ‘surf the Internet’ when you have the opportunity.

“Code: http://www.collingwoodfc.com.au/”

It feels a little primitive nowadays, but to establish a website in 1995 was another example of Collingwood’s desire to lead the way.

In the twenty years since, collingwoodfc.com.au has evolved into a 24/7 entity.

Night match in Perth? No worries, the site will be full of videos, news and photos in the early hours of the morning back in Melbourne.

Heath Shaw announces he is going to move to Greater Western Sydney at 9.15pm on a Tuesday night? You’ll read all about it on collingwoodfc.com.au.

The team’s overseas on a post-season training camp in Arizona? Don’t stress, we’ve got our staff on the ground to capture the moment and relay it back to your computer, smartphone or tablet.

Of course, the advent of the social media age has changed our approach to news and the constant demand for immediate content, giving collingwoodfc.com.au extra branches through which the Collingwood Media team can reach out to the club’s supporters.

And it’s not just collingwoodfc.com.au that’s celebrating this year, either.

CollingwoodTV, formerly known as CTV, turns ten in 2015.

Launched in 2005, CollingwoodTV has brought supporters closer to the action than ever before. By 2012, the demand for content was so strong that the Magpies began to run their own half-hour television show on Foxtel.

The Club ran for three seasons on Fox Footy, before the decision was made to direct Collingwood Media’s video efforts onto its daily online channels and shown through the studio.

And now, in 2015, Collingwood Media is producing daily in-season studio shows, telling the stories of the people and moments that make our club the most famous in Australia.

But even when we wind the clock back twenty years, Rob Petrie was thinking of bigger and better things for his club in the online space.



“The Mag’Net’s primary function is to provide supporters direct access to the Collingwood Football Club,” he wrote.

“The Club has hundreds of thousands of supporters all over the world and this is the most innovative and accurate method to directly communicate with them.

“It is one of the largest Web Sites of its kind in the world and will be regularly maintain and updated.

“It will directly accelerate the exposure of the game and will assist in the continual promotion of the international reputation of The Great Australian Sport.”

That’s a fair mission statement, but Petrie wasn’t stopping there.

His column spoke of a website boasting “magnificent team and action photos” and “Twiggy’s Torpedos – a report from Ross Dunne on the day to day news”.

More impressively, listed under ‘In the near future’ was talk of “voice controlled conversation with Players and Staff, secure transfer of funds for On-Line purchase of souvenirs or booking of tickets of functions, to become the biggest and best Sporting Web Site in the World, overseas membership and Internet Users Membership”.

Collingwood and its web staff of 1995 were clearly thinking well ahead of their time.

Over the course of October, we will be charting the evolution of collingwoodfc.com.au and CollingwoodTV, featuring input from some of those who have maintained the website and its channels over the past twenty years as we tell the story of how the story has been told.

And we won’t stop there.

We will also tell the tales of those who have helped leave Collingwood’s footprint all over the World Wide Web in the guise of fan sites and forums.

From humble beginnings, sites such as Nick’s Collingwood Page and Extreme Black ‘n’ White have become a part of club folklore and have tightened bonds between the club and supporters like never before.

From wooden spoons to premierships, from Victoria Park to the Holden Centre, from a suburban team to a national powerhouse, from dial up to live streaming, a lot can happen in the space of twenty years.