Our Website Celebrates its Tenth Anniversary!

By: Andrew Bermudez

(Mustache Maniacs Film Co. Headquarters; June 26, 2021)

With the flurry of content that we have in the pipeline for this year, its hard to believe that our website has just turned ten years old! Not many of our new fans would realize this, but our website has had a pretty dynamic history over the past ten years, so let's take a look back at how our website has evolved!

2011 - The Website is Founded with Webs.com

What the website looked like at its debut...when the server can't find the site's CSS stylesheet.

When the official website for Mustache Maniacs Film Co. was founded on June 26, 2011, the official online network was only three years old (the online network's official founding date is April 25, 2008, when our YouTube Channel went live for the then-upcoming release of Johnny Thunder and the Secret of Marco Polo). But, at the suggestion of a friend named Joshua Maddux, the online network expanded to this press room on February 1, 2009.

It would take another two years, however, for our official website to be founded. Taking inspiration from Elizabeth Scarheart's own website, we chose Webs.com as the site host for the first-ever official website dedicated to Mustache Maniacs Film Co. The initial product was not one that any of us found satisfying, as even at the time it felt rudimentary and incomplete, so work immediately ramped up on fleshing out the website into a complete domain. One change that this new website did immediately bring? New comics for Tales of the Adventurers were at that point forward no longer released on the press room, but rather on its own dedicated webpage.

2012 - The Website is Fully Fleshed Out

It took a year, but the Mustache Maniacs Film Co. Website finally reached a state that was satisfactory from a user standpoint. There was a lot of experimenting in the first year with colors, backgrounds, and layout, but by the summer of 2012, everything was in place for the long haul. As a fun fact, because Webs only allowed up to 12 pages for the website at the free tier, several films were collected onto single pages, a far cry from today's website.

2013 - The Website Network Expands to Wikia

What the Mustache Maniacs Film Co. Wiki looked like at its debut.

While not pertaining to the main website, per se, 2013 brought about the introduction of the Official Mustache Maniacs Film Co. Wiki. This wiki, hosted by Wikia, powered by Fandom, is considered to be the quintessential encyclopedia to all things related to the Mustache Maniacs Film Co. Cinematic Universe, as well as any behind-the-scenes material. The wiki has been maintained to this day, with only some aesthetic changes over time to make more in line with the look of the online network.

2014 - The Website is Overhauled for Ten Years of Going Crazy!

With our tenth anniversary upon us, we knew that the limits that were imposed on our website at the free tier were holding us back. Therefore, we made a decision that would have been heresy in 2004: we started paying for our web-hosting service. At $49.99 a year, we were finally able to expand to an unlimited number of pages, allowing us to fully mature the website into something that it only could kind of be three years prior. At the same time, we expanded our online network to match our new releases, including the introduction of what is now a website staple in late 2014: online auditions. By this point, we had already seen what worked and what didn't, so as part of this overhaul, we siphoned out any content that got no attention at all. But we didn't stop there.

2015 - Andrew Bermudez Art is Founded

The following year, the website saw two massive changes. First, Andrew Bermudez Art debuted as a living online portfolio for Andrew Bermudez's artwork. This website saw one major change over its lifetime (more on that later), but has stayed true to its core mission since then. We also debuted our first-ever online store this year, named Mustache Max's Merchandise Market. It featured some t-shirt designs and art prints based on Mustache Maniacs Film Co. movies.

2017 - Trouble with Webs.com Begins

What the website looked like in 2016. It is true; we used to use a lot of stock graphics.

However, it must be said that, since Andrew Bermudez Art had is own custom domain, this also caused its fair share of issues that would ultimately lead to a falling out with Webs.com (more on that later). In spite of this, this year was when the network started to truly become interconnected. Before, all roads led to the main website, but 2017 brought with it a fluid structure that allowed fans to navigate around with ease. This year, however, also brought about the closure of Mustache Max's Merchandise Market, citing poor sales for the reason. This did not help when other, monetary-related, issues with Webs.com began to arise throughout the year, as the fees that were paid to maintain Andrew Bermudez Art's custom domain were not being honored. In response to this, the websites were dropped back to the free tier.

2018 - The Website is Reborn with Wix.com

The straw that broke the camel's back (or in our case, the Sobek-Ra that scared the camel away) was in April 2018, when Webs.com began charging us for web services that we were no longer using. Immediately, at the recommendation of commercial artist and instructor Cliff Cramp, we began the long task of switching our website to Wix.com. We worked to get the old domain closed and our money back (that took Webs.com a whole year to do, though the money was returned immediately) and rebuilt the website with an all-new aesthetic. Like the original website, this website went through some...growing pains (most of the initial graphics were to promote the then in-progress promotion Digital Decade), but quickly became the new home for all things Mustache Maniacs Film Co., with nothing lost in translation.

2020 - The Pandemic Changes the Website for At-Home Audiences

What the website looks like today.

Even before we knew what 2020 would ultimately mean for the world, we were already embarking on ways to make our website more user-friendly. We used streaming services like Netflix, Disney+, and Hulu as our inspiration for this update, allowing more content to display at once.

When the global shutdown occurred, the site updates went into overdrive. The wiki constantly received new pages, the website itself was further refined for at-home viewing, and other, minor changes were made. Of the utmost importance, however, was the change that brought about the creation of our story team, which started the formation of the "Join Our Team" segment of our website, which officially debuted on January 10, 2021.

2021 - The Website Grows for a New Era and Celebrates Ten Years

The finalized site map for the website for On The Theme Park Loop.

This year, we consider the announcement event 2/1/21 to be the beginning of our modern era, with this event's main purpose being to lay down the groundwork for how we plan on coming out of the COVID-19 pandemic. Among these announcements was an unprecedented expansion to our website, which will officially be finished this July! It has been a piecemeal process over the past few months, but we wanted to ensure that this expansion prepares our website for our new era.

On top of this, we never would have guessed one year ago that we would be branching out into another website for our network! May 28 marked the debut of the website for On The Theme Park Loop, which will be the home for that show when it is officially released on July 1. This change not only diversified our audience reach, but also aimed to bring more fans into our network!

Happy Tenth Anniversary to Our Website!

It's hard to believe that in ten years, our website has grown from just a handful of pages to well over 100, has changed its URL, and has seen two stores rise and fall on the site, with a third just days away! It has seen the online network grow from just three domains to nine, yet still remains as that network's center. It has become the home for all of our content, even when other segments of the network are only piecemeal representations of our portfolio, and we only see our website growing from here. And with more content on the horizon, thanks to both Twenty Years Young and Project U, we hope that you will continue to use our website to engage with our content. And if you haven't seen it yet or want to visit it again, just CLICK RIGHT HERE.

To wrap things up here, here are some images from our online network from throughout the years. Enjoy!