# Timeshare Users Group Turns 25!



## TUGBrian

25 years ago this month my father and a group of other Timeshare Owners began to organize what was originally a Prodigy Bulletin Board System (where TUGBBS came from) composed of a handful of Timeshare owners discussion resorts and Timesharing, into what we now call TUG. 

TUG was/is actually one of the very first commercial sites on the Internet and the very first website period relating to Timeshares! not sure how many of you remember back to 1993, but the internet wasnt nearly as popular as it is now. The TUG website is older than any other Timeshare related website (and the vast majority of all websites period!)


Over the last Twenty Five years, TUG has helped tens of thousands of timeshare owners, many to this day remain to pass on the gift of knowledge they likely received themselves many moons ago through the various websites and TUGBBS forum installations we have had over the years.

With Millions of dollars worth of Timeshares sold and rented by TUGGERS. With over 38 million in the past few years alone!

On top of that, literally millions of dollars worth of money saved just from folks finding TUG in time to discover the resale market....with over 10 million recorded in just this version of the forum!

More than that though is the unimaginable value of information passed on and learned year after year through nothing more than Timeshare owners helping each other understand and best use this product that comes with no instruction manual. I have even heard in the past TUG is the "handbook" for Timeshares, and believe it to be true to this day.

This community is truly one of a Kind, providing Timeshare owners a place they can truly get help and advice without having to worry about being scammed or ripped off!

Happy quarter century birthday to TUG and everyone here in this community!


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## T_R_Oglodyte

So, among those of us who are currently active, who has been around the longest?

I've been around since September of 1999, but I know I there are some who were active when I joined.  Makai Guy comes to mind immediately.


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## Passepartout

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, TUG!

I don't remember the exact year, but it had to be in the mid '90's. It was definitely on Prodigy and I was a paid member of TUG. I probably lurked more than participated, and mostly in Fern's Cafe. I was trucking and had a Tandy TRS-80 with a 9600? Baud modem. Truck stops had phones at the restaurant tables, and  Prodigy had local dial-up numbers in cities and good size towns across the country. It was before I owned a TS- that came along in 2003 or so. I had taken the advice to rent before buying a resale from Holiday Timeshare Resales.

Jim


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## pedro47

Happy Birthday TUG!!


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## Panina

Happy Birthday TUG.  I am proud to be a member.  I was a member back in the beginning,  left for awhile due to loss but so glad I found my way back home.  I love tug.  

Brian thank you for continuing your dads work.  Both of you and all the others who contributed have made TUG the best in  truthful timeshare information.


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## DaveNV

My profile says I joined in 2006, but I think I was here a bit before that. So at least a dozen years for me. Not nearly as long as many of you, but a lifetime, in my vacationing life. I’ll always appreciate all of you, and the knowledge you’ve given me. As I keep making the joke, you are the nicest group of imaginary friends I’ve ever had. 

Happy Birthday, TUG!

Dave


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## Karen G

Thanks for this great website, Brian. Thanks for carrying on the work that your Dad started.


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## Makai Guy

From an old post of mine (Mar 21, 2011):





> I remember Fern's Cafe (is it gone?).


Still here, renamed as TUG Lounge.  Longtimers will remember the very unpleasant period when the board was taken over by contentious political discussions that resulted in our current "no politics" rule in October 2003.  Things got so bad that Fern no longer wanted her name associated with that mess.   Can't say as I blame her, either.

Our original bbs was written by Laurence Chan, who used to be extremely active here.

I haven't been around as long as Fern, but I joined back when TUG only existed as a printed newsletter and the internet had not yet taken the world by storm.  Unfortunately, I lost a lot of my records in a hard disk crash several years ago [_now quite a few years ago_] so I don't have a lot of good reference dates.  I think I started helping Laurence out as Hawaii bbs co-moderator and Hawaii review co-manager around 1995, taking these over completely in 1997.

Laurence created a second version of his bbs several years later ... then at some point he convinced Bill Rogers to spring for commercial bulletin board software that was available by then, going with Universal Bulletin Board (UBB).   Think this was around 1999 or 2000.  We were still running UBB in 2003 when the "no politics" policy went into effect.

Our UBB became hopelessly out of date and just could not handle the volume of messages we generated, resulting in a need to keep the board purged of older messages.   This caused us to lose a lot of valuable history.  We switched to vBulletin software in June 2005 to try to combat this.

We outgrew the shared server space we were renting almost immediately and moved the hosting of the bbs several times, attempting to find a host that could handle our high volume of traffic.   Finally, we bit the bullet and went to our own dedicated server which runs nothing but TUG in August 2006.   We're still there 5 years later.​
[Now to add to the old post ...]

When we went to vBulletin in 2005 it was not possible to carry over everyone's old bbs registrations and everyone had to sign in as a new user.   That's why you see so many people with June and July 2005 registration dates.  I worked on customizing vBulletin to our needs for about a year before we could change over to it. That's why you see me with a 2004 date, as do a handful of staff members at the time that helped register and test things out. 

So now we've reached 2018.  We're still on our dedicated server, which has been upgraded several times.  Our heavily-customized vBulletin became too out of date and cumbersome to maintain and we went to our current XenForo bbs software in November 2016.  At least this time we were able to carry all our existing messages and user information over with us.


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## pedro47

I can remember Fern M and DaveM from Massachusetts when I joined  the #1 Timeshare Website in the USA and after Twenty-Five years TUG is still the #1 Timeshare Website in the USA.


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## mpizza

Happy Birthday!  

So grateful to TUG providing a forum the sharing of timeshare and travel and general life hacks!  I have been so fortunate to have met and even traveled with many timeshare friends.  

I believed I joined in 1999!!!!!!

Cheers to another 25 years of travel adventures!

Maria


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## Born2Travel

I don't remember the exact year I joined, but I do remember Ferns cafe though I was only able to visit a few times. I was able to meet Fern in person in Las Vegas, and have met and traveled with a few Tuggers.  Thanks to TUG all of our timeshare purchases were resale.  Thank you TUG and Happy Birthday!


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## arch53

Born2Travel said:


> I don't remember the exact year I joined, but I do remember Ferns cafe though I was only able to visit a few times. I was able to meet Fern in person in Las Vegas, and have met and traveled with a few Tuggers.  Thanks to TUG all of our timeshare purchases were resale.  Thank you TUG and Happy Birthday!



Congrats. TUG is always a site I visit when I am on the web. Not sure when I first joined probably sometime in early 2000s.  Cheap South African timeshares were all the rage.
I’ve always felt that TUG represented the internet at its best.


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## vacationtime1

Happy Birthday, TUG.

TUG has improved our vacationtime immeasurably -- by showing us how to buy TS cheaply and use TS wisely.  And made us Hawaii junkies in the process.


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## silentg

I used check the TUG prodigy site and joined TUG pretty much near the beginning.off and on and was around for Sunday Chats too.
They were fun, not sure why we don’t do them anymore?
Congratulations on 25 years TUG!
Silentg


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## Sugarcubesea

Happy Birthday Tug and thank you for being around... I'm new and joined in 2014 and I'm so happy that I did become a member. I have learned so much, purchased some great TS's thanks to all of the help I received and have had some awesome trades...Thank you, Brian for all of your efforts and time that you put into TUG.


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## billymach4

Poked my head in 2001. Went full time in 2006.


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## Fredflintstone

Happy Birthday TUG. I’ve been on the Internet since 1991. Before that I used dial up BBSs.

I knew of TUG since 1994 but was too cheap to join. It was only this year I joined. 


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk


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## joestein

Happy Birthday TUG!  I've been a member since 2005 when I went to a presentation at Powhattan Plantation in Williamsburg, VA and asked the sales people why I should pay $15K for a timeshare when they are on Ebay for much less(Actually brought the printout with me - I was already a TUGger in training).

Joe


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## AnnaS

Happy 25th Birthday TUG!! Thank you for this site and helping many here and for all the other great information.


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## Gemini Chica

Happy Birthday to TUG, it has been a complete godsend to me, I have learned about 90% of all I know about timesharing  from this site and the good people who take the time and plenty of patience to explain things to us newbies.

Thank you to those who run it! 


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## Luanne

I don't remember the year I joined, I just remember I found TUG when we were trying to sell a timeshare and got roped into one of the "pay us first" operations.  Thanks to TUG we were able to back out AND get our money refunded.  I've been a happy member ever since.


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## Luvtoride

Happy Birthday Tug 
What a unique community of knowledgeable and passionate members and guests who keep this forum and web site current, timely and full of invaluable information.  
I’ve learned so much not only about Timeshares but about traveling tips, loyalty programs, and restaurants (thanks Marty).
We should all proudly celebrate this milestone together.  Happy 25th and many many more


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk


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## pittle

Happy Birthday TUG!  I joined sometime in the 1990's.  I used the Prodigy BBS with dial-up AOL.  We bought our first timeshare in 1991 and I started looking for information.  I found Fern's Cafe because I was searching for Imperial Hawaii and she owned there and had information about it. I learned a lot about timeshares from Fern over the years - she would always willingly share information.  

I love TUG - you can always find helpful folks.  Lots of great information about pretty much anything from specific timeshares to recipes, good books, and various experiences.  If you need to know about something - just ask!


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## AwayWeGo

To celebrate, last night I re-upped for 3 more years. 

-- Alan Cole, McLean (Fairfax County), Virginia, USA.​


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## alexadeparis

Thank you TUG and Happy birthday. I know I have personally saved many thousands of dollars thanks to your boards!


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## CalGalTraveler

Congrats TUG on 25 years of public service. In only a few short years, you have saved us thousands and we know how to get the biggest bang for our buck thanks to your forums. 

P.S. I was involved with a BBS in 1983 for a major tech company.  We've come a long way!


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## LisaH

pittle said:


> Happy Birthday TUG!  I joined sometime in the 1990's.  I used the Prodigy BBS with dial-up AOL.  We bought our first timeshare in 1991 and I started looking for information.  I found Fern's Cafe because I was searching for Imperial Hawaii and she owned there and had information about it. I learned a lot about timeshares from Fern over the years - she would always willingly share information.
> 
> I love TUG - you can always find helpful folks.  Lots of great information about pretty much anything from specific timeshares to recipes, good books, and various experiences.  If you need to know about something - just ask!


i found TUG the same way by searching for Info for Imperial Hawaii.That must be in 1998 or 1999, after we bought at a resale store in Hanalei. One thing led to another, I quickly amassed a portfolio of 10-12 weeks at a time, many of which were in South Africa. At one point, my RCI and II had almost 20 years of membership and I wondered what I was doing. Before you know it, it has been almost 20 years and our RCI membership is up for renewal in 2020. Currently we are down to only four weeks and we may trim further to one or two. Thank you so much for providing us such a great place to hang out. Made some great friends and traveled with some of them. Looking forward to the next 25 years of TUGging.


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