Tell me about yourself, where do you live, what is your FULL name, how old are you?
I live in Etobicoke Ontario, but its now a part of Toronto. My real name is AJ Taylor, or Arthur Taylor if you prefer, and as of today, im 26

UPDATE: I moved to the good ole' USA after getting a wicked job offer that I couldnt get in Toronto. Oh, I'm 28 now. Thanks "Free Trade"!

Why did you want to put up a site (or page) devoted to something about Degrassi?
Initially to make myself laugh, I liked the show enough to spend time creating the webpage, but I soon found it was also entertaining others. First time I saw Degrassi was around 1987, on television, and soon after they were showing it in grade 6,7, and 8 guidance class on a film projector. While most people moaned about watching another "educational" film, I thought it was great entertainment. It was a pretty low budget and cheesy show, but I was hooked. Thats what I liked about the show. There weren't too many Degrassi sites back then, not like today anyway.. so I was one of the sites online from way back when. Once I got hooked up in search engines and in the webring, things really started to pick up.

When did you come up with the idea to have a Degrassi site?
It was back in 1996, and I found myself with nothing to do, after being rejected from all the university/colleges I were interested in.. I decided to make a webpage for myself for fun. This was before the Internet was really affordable, online accounts were expensive, so I made the webpage just for myself on the hard drive, and would show it to friends. It was horrible. I needed content, and since I liked Degrassi, I decided to make a one page "webpage featuring" some bios and some episode guide commentary.

How did you finally decide to put it up?
At this point I already had a personal site called "Aj's morbid site (of love)" and with the need for additional content, I uploaded the Degrassi page around February of 1997.. and received many a email from people who "remembered that show" and found my site funny, on the other hand I also got email from people who couldn't take a joke and said I was a bad seed. Both sides of emails are great however.

How has it evolved?
My initial "Degrassi site" was a whopping 25k. A small intro paragraph, 14 character bios, pictures I screen grabbed on my computer of each one, all on one easy to view webpage. After that, I added additional tid bits to the bios, and added new characters. By November of 1998, the page had to be split into a main page, and a character bio page.. it was just too big. Graphics and the writing also improved on the site, now its all frames for better navigation

Have you gotten emails from Degrassi cast and crew?
This one is gonna be a little long, but is worth it I feel. I received an email from Pat, May 11 1998, it was hilarious. Basically people that visit my site either get the joke or they dont. Pat had a good sense of humor about it.. Originally in his little bio on my site I had written "I think Pat now delivers Pizza downtown, because I saw him once and he was delivering pizza's downtown." While true, that I did think I saw him once doing that, it turned out to be false and he emailed me to set the record straight, and to tell me he was in the new Godzilla movie. Everyone in the "Degrassi fan community" was impressed with the email I received, and the floods of "Can I have Pat's email address" soon followed. I continue to keep in contact with him to this day, and have helped on his personal webpage as well. I worked on the most recent update of his site and was promised a copy of the Degrassi behind the scenes video he sells on ebay. HE STILL HAS YET TO SEND IT TO ME!!

Aside from Pat, the rest of the Degrassi related cast and crew email have been negative. I received an email from "Shane" (Bill Parrot)'s real life sister, she was quite angry. At the time he was starring in a commercial for Eaton's, playing a cashier who gives free cds to everyone. It was pretty bad. She "set me straight" on other projects he was working on, and also included this nice tid bit: "Ive also noticed that I was the only person to visit your web page, people may show up if you get the facts straight."
I think at this point, my site had received at least 70,000 hits. She was a little off, but I still appreciate her anger/input.

I also have received several angry emails from friends/family of; Nancy, Arthur, Lucy, Allison, and Liz. They are all very hilarious to read!.. people really get upset. For instance; I saw Nancy walking downtown once (honest) and a friend of her's emailed me real upset that I said I saw her walking around downtown. "Arlene Lott who played Nancy DOES NOT walk around on Queen Street. Nor does she wear a button". The button she was talking about was "Yes I was on Degrassi". I agree with the button part, as I made that up, but the fact that she DOES NOT walk around on Queen Street is hilarious. Whats so bad about walking on Queen street?.

In my bios, I mention that Lucy is currently living in a hospital (in the Degrassi world anyway.. PRE: The Next Generation cured her).. I made this up, hey it could be possible! A "fan" wrote me an angry email about how she approached the actress who played Lucy on the street and asked her if she was in the hospital.. as it was reported on "my site". Hilarious again..

Allison and Amy were always together on the show, I wrote that they were lesbians, again a joke that was pretty clear. Apparently Allison is now a teacher, and one of her students asked her if she was a lesbian, as she had read it on my site. When this person heard "she wasnt", the student proceeded to angrily email me correcting me. Its great fun, because I really could care less, I just find it funny to write the things I do..and to get the hate email as well. Id like to receive more emails from the actual Degrassi peeps however. Especially the 'erotic' twins.

Any future plans for your Degrassi site?
Well its an on-going thing, I plan on adding the "Degrassi Dirt" section one of these days, I know a person that dated a cast member, and was invited to many a party back in the heyday of Degrassi (early 90's). Lots of Dirt to discuss that's for sure, and it should be pretty controversial.. at least in the Degrassi fan community, a page dedicated to the Erotic twins, and continue to add to the character/episode guide pages.

What do you think about Degrassi: The Next Generation?
I think its good. The show doesn't really have a strong male perspective. At times its pretty feminist.. I think that's to do with the original man/woman team behind the original Degrassi breaking up professionally.. leaving Linda Schuyler to run the ship. Every girl is a victim and every guy is a potential pervert. When the show was originally announced, all of the Degrassi fan fiction people were up in arms. They felt their concept of Emma being the focus of a new series was their idea. I don't know, there really could be no other connection, and its not like you people came up with Spike getting pregnant. If you did, and then had her baby being the focus of a new show, I could see your point. But you didn't. I also liked when the characters were announced.. there was a character named Paige. There was a girl named Paige who wrote Degrassi fan fiction! I think she got her dad to look into legal matters for this. And a guy named J.T on the show! This is a rip off of AJ! Ya sure.

I think its kinda weak that the same exact classic Degrassi episodes are being recycled for this new show. The episode where Terri (i think!?) is to go to the school dance, but gets drunk before.. and makes an ass of herself is a direct rip-off of the show where Stephanie K did the same thing. Not that I care, that was a great episode.. but writers, try to earn your money. I also like all of the Riverdale rejects that now are on Degrassi. Again, not a bad thing! I liked Riverdale.. (same people who did Riverdale are now doing Degrassi.. hence the Riverdale set being the Degrassi neighborhood. Sad.. but cost effective!)

How long have you been a fan of the show?
Im pretty sure since 1987, around grade 4/5 for me, I used to watch it after school, or as a part of school lessons which was pretty cool. The kids were older than me on the show, but I could still relate. I was never "hard core" into it, I guess that came later in life, I kinda wish I was more hard core into it, then id have some vintage Degrassi swag to show.. like posters, shirts etc. I could do without the hardcore trivia though. Do I know know the exact size of jeans that Nancy wore on Degrassi? Good god man! Why would I want to know such tidbits. And before you say "thats not very nice".. I also could care less what gauge string Wheels used on his bass guitar. The only thing that knowledge impresses is no one.

Tell me more about your self, hobbies, are you a student, do you work full time, part time, what is your profession?
I like collecting toys, mostly 80's era stuff.. star wars.. transformers, gi joe, etc. I graduated college a while back for computer graphics.. but it really hasn't led anywhere. I have a job that allows me to work from home.. and eventually Id like to move away from Toronto and do something else. Im pretty lazy, and laid-back. I like to Play guitar, record music with my band.. called "The AJ band" that consists of just me. I also like to watch US satellite and dvds in my home theater.

"I like Sex.. I'm Clinton" - Tim Meadows.

Tell me about other sites that you maintain?
I run the official page for a cool band out of California called Fu Manchu
http://www.fu-manchu.com

The Website for the National Lacrosse League's Toronto Rock
http://www.torontorock.com

My big Tom Green Machine website at
http://www.fu-manchu.com/tomgreen

A friend of mine is a great photographer based in Toronto, I did some site work for him at one point.
http://www.methodinc.net