About

The Site

Click on any of the headings below to view the full script.

The History of The Site

    Once I discovered Lord of the Rings, I started snooping around the web and found out just how many amazing fan sites there were for this fandom. It was amazing to find that so many people loved Tolkien's trilogy just as much (or more) than I did. I thought it would be the coolest thing to make a fan site of my very own, but I didn't know how to go about doing it. I wanted it to look good, and have lots of content and graphics that I could be proud of. The only thing was that I didn't know how to make graphics, or a website of any kind. One day on Arwen-Undomiel.com, my friend Evenstar and I were talking in the chat room and she told me that she had made her own fansite, MyLOTRsite. I was amazed by her small MSN Group that had a few pictures, some contests, some funny anecdotes about Elves, and fancy headings in different colors. I asked her to help me build my own site, and she graciously accepted. She showed me the ropes, and I created my first site, LuvLOTR.
    I didn't have very much content on the group, but a lot of people came and signed my guestbook and entered my contests. I was fascinated by all these hits, and I wanted to expand. After some hardcore nudging from my friend Mary-Kate, whom I also met on the A-U tagboard, I moved my site to Bravehost. I didn't want to keep the sites name, because let's face it - it was completely unoriginal. I changed the name to The Elfstone after reading a biography on the character Aragorn and going through his various names. Elessar, Estel and Longshanks didn't have what I was looking for, but I thought Elfstone had a nice ring to it (Haha, pun!...No one? Nevermind). Mary-Kate was excellent in helping me figure out how to use HTML, and I learned a lot on my own as well. She made me my first layout, but once the ads started to bug me, I had to get outta there. Freewebs seemed like a great place to be hosted because it didn't have any ads attacking the top of the screen, so I decided to move.
    I was hosted at Freewebs for the longest time. I taught myself HTML, CSS and some Javascript so I could expand the content of the site. I was making my own layouts and excelling at graphics, but then something terrible happened. Ads again. And Freewebs was relentless. Banners at the bottom of every page, ugly signs linking back to the host that you had to place on all your pages. I'd had enough. I searched around for a long time for someone who would host my site, and I found DistortedSky.net, and Jasmine was more than willing to host me. She taught me all about FTP, which helped significantly with the transferring from Freewebs to my new host. But all good things must come to an end, and one day I typed in the web address to my site and it came up as an error page. Someone had neglected to inform her hostees that she would no longer be paying for the domain. I was homeless and distraught, my website abandoned in the ether of cyberspace.
    It took me a while, but I finally got back on the web by purchasing my own network, Caution-Tape.net. I now host all my websites there, and I have the domain until May of 2012, so I won't be going anywhere for awhile yet. I'm finally happy here, and I'm able to do basically whatever I want to do without anyone's permission, which is nice for a change. Plus I get my own 404 pages (one of the many perks). I'm just so glad that I've gotten to share my website for so long, over 5 years, with the rest of the internet. I'm still very much in love with the Lord of the Rings, and I don't ever expect that to change. In fact, I will forever be branded a rabid!LotR fan by my uncle, who thinks he's making fun of me when he calls me "Frodo." I'm proud to be a fan, and I'm extremely proud of just how far The Elfstone has come in its long life online. I hope it continues to thrive even years from now.

Why Did You Create It?

I was fascinated with the idea that I could make a website, and I chose to base the content off my love for the Lord of the Rings trilogy. And honestly, if I had made a website back then without it being a LotR fan site, I wouldn't have known what to make it about. The only websites I ever visited back then were Lord of the Rings-related. I didn't even know there were other kinds.

What's With The Name?

At first, my site's name wasn't The Elfstone. My MSN Group's name was LuvLotR. When I switched hosts to Bravenet, I decided to change the name. I had been reading the Appendix of Return of the King at the time and I had noticed the term The Elfstone. I had also recognized it from a biography of Aragorn that I had recently read. I researched it a little more and found out it was an ancient gem that had been passed down to Galadriel, who had given it to Aragorn. There is also speculation of it being a sort of wedding present from the bride's family to the groom. It was also this gem that caused the people of Minas Tirith to refer to Aragorn as Elessar - if all my facts are correct. Since Aragorn is my favorite Lord of the Rings character, I naturally wanted to name my site with a reference to him. However, throughout the years the site has been open, other webmasters and visitors have called it The Elf Stone, which is incorrectly spelled and coincidentally one of my biggest pet peeves.

Coding and Design

Throughout my five years of web designing, I've mostly used HTML and CSS. I'm learning Javascript so I only have a few java codes that are my own. The rest is taken from Javascript Source. I plan to learn PHP some time in the future, and I have a little incorporated into the site already, but I'd never used it before because my old hosts wouldn't allow the script. I've also learned how to use FTP and I now transfer my files from my computer instead of using a site builder or a wizard. I use TextPad to edit coding. I use Paint Shop Pro 7 for all my graphics, and Animation Shop 3 for any non-static images.

Plans For the Future

• Get lots of affiliates
• Become a great graphics maker (thank you Frodofan ^^)
• Learn HTML/CSS/PHP/JAVA
• Make a layout completely on my own
• Finish the Armory
• Make a sound-accompanied Elvish pronunciation page
• Read Children of Hurin, The Silmarilion and Weapons and Warfare
• Create an interactive map

Making a Donation

There are many ways you can make a donation to the site. You can submit something of yours to the fan section, enter contests, nominate your site for awards at UHA, vote on the polls, become an affiliate, give gifts for the holidays, or simply link back to the site even without being an affiliate. All of these things would make me incredibly happy and keep the site running and active.

If you really like The Elfstone (or any of my other sites) and wish to do more than just participate, we now accept money donations. Having a network isn't exactly cheap, and I would be forever grateful to anyone who would help pay to host this website. Every single dollar helps and if that's all you choose to donate, I would still greatly appreciate it! If you can't or don't want to make a money donation, please don't feel bad in any way, because simply participating and visiting the site is still very important.

Every person who makes a donation (no matter how small) and leaves their e-mail address will recieve an Elfstone Appreciation Plaque and a custom graphic of their choosing. If you would like to make a money donation, please click the button below.

The Webmiss

Real Name: Amy
Online Nicknames: Telturwen, Tel, Telly, Tellywen, Telturwen Tarien, TT, Aurelia Colton, Lia
Age: 20
Location: United States of America
Contact: telturwen667{at}hotmail{dot}com   or   amy{at}caution-tape{dot}net
Hobbies: I'm writing a book right now and I write fan fiction. I also enjoy reading, music, and poetry.
Songs: Aqueous Transmission [Incubus], Must Have Done Something Right [Relient K], Crazy Love [Jason Manns, ft. Jensen Ackles], Facility in Under 2:05 [The Messenger]
Authors: J.R.R. Tolkien, Dave Duncan, Anne Bishop, J.K. Rowling, Kirsten Britain, Hilari Bell, Jenna Black
Books: Lord of the Rings, Tale of the King's Blades, The Iliad, Morgan Kingsley series, Farsala, Harry Potter, Green Rider, Black Jewels, Sebastian, Inheritance
Movies: Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, GoldenEye, Hidalgo, Forrest Gump, Pirates of the Carribean, Ned Kelly, King Arthur, Troy, Robin Hood: Men In Tights, Robin Hood, She's The Man, Mists of Avalon, Road to Perdition, The Last Samuri, Ten Inch Hero, Lucky Number Sleven, Underworld
TV Shows: Alias, Angel, Bones, Boy Meets World, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Dark Angel, Hawaii Five-0, Gilmore Girls, Good Wife, Grey's Anatomy, How I Met Your Mother, Merlin, NCIS, Off the Map, Private Practice, Supernatural
Actors: Tom Hanks, David Boreanaz, Heath Ledger, Viggo Mortensen, Sean Bean, Jensen Ackles, Brad Pitt, Alyson Hannigan, Keira Knightley, Harrison Ford, Kevin Costner, Sean Connery
Favorite James Bond: Pierce Brosnan, with Sean Connery as a close 2^nd

My Obsession with LotR

Retaken 11/16/09 with a previous score of 48.96266%

I'm 61.41079% obsessed. How obsessed are you?
The Ringer Obsession Test