Bought a geocities template pack for $30 back in 1998 and it was all broken links

I was so excited to finally build my own homepage about classic cars that I dropped $30 on a template pack from some guy on a forum. He promised it had 50 unique layouts with cool animated gifs and guestbook code built in. When I got the zip file, half the images were missing and the link to the font pack was dead. I tried emailing him three times over two weeks and never got a reply. That was a lot of money back then for a kid with a paper route. I ended up having to learn basic html just to fix everything myself. Has anyone else gotten burned buying those so-called professional template packs from the old days?

2 comments

2 Comments

gracecarr1d ago

30 bucks in 1998 was a ton for a kid. Those template packs were usually just stolen freeware repackaged by some guy trying to make a quick buck. You probably learned more from fixing those broken links than you would have from using the templates anyway.

wyatta301d ago

Yeah, I remember my cousin paying 50 bucks for a "professional" web design CD that was just geocities gifs with a readme file.