Press

As the first and most heavily trafficked fansite for HBO’s True Blood, we are occasionally asked to comment on the show for other media. Who knew that when Mel talked a sleepless Liz into starting a fansite, we’d end up quoted in national press? Here’s a selection of clippings so far, and if you’re a reporter who wants to chat with us, drop us a line!

10 Vampires We Love, E! Entertainment Network, November 2009: True-Blood.net has a brief cameo during the first segment of this special about vampires airing on E!.

NYLON Magazine, September 2009: “True Blood is a grown-up show,” says Melissa Lowery, who, with Elizabeth Henderson, runs one of the most popular True Blood fansites, True-Blood.net. “Twilight is True Blood-lite. I don’t recommend True Blood for anyone under 21.”

Newsweek.com, July 16, 2009: If message boards, chat rooms, and fan clubs are any indication, the whole seduction, lose-control routine is a huge part of the fantasy. “I think a lot of women wouldn’t mind someone else taking control of things for a while,” says Melissa Lowery, 34, editor and co-owner of popular fan site true-blood.net. In the last 30 days, the site has had more than 140,000 unique visitors. And after wading through 3,700 comments, Lowery has noted at least one theme that keeps popping up: “Even if a vampire is your lover and gentle and kind, he still has the power to rip someone’s leg off,” she says. “Sometimes I think women just want to be protected, and that’s not so bad.”

USA Today, June 10, 2009: Elizabeth Henderson, co-owner of true-blood.net, got hooked on Harris’ books, which are told from Sookie’s perspective, largely for the humor, especially the notion of vampires “coming out of the coffin” and into the real world.

“What I like about the show is how Alan Ball has taken us out of Sookie’s head and put the focus on characters we didn’t know as well in the books,” she says.

Henderson and true-blood.net co-owner Melissa Lowery had to move their website to a dedicated server as visits increased by 50% in the last month, and daily traffic doubled this week alone.

AdvertisingAge.com, May 20, 2010: Online media promoting the new season of “True Blood” includes true-blood.net, the existing HBO fan site…

New York Mag. Vulture, July, 2010: This week we set out to find the biggest superfan of the addictive supernatural melodrama True Blood by contacting the main True Blood fan site, True-Blood.net; the moderators didn’t hesitate before pointing us toward…

Parade’s Season 2 True Blood Quiz: The world’s age-old fascination with vampires gets a modern twist in HBO’s hit series True Blood. But how well do you know Season 2? Sink your teeth into this 15-question quiz from True-Blood.net, the fansite for True Blood on HBO, and test your vampire IQ.

In February, 2011, we were asked to take part on a panel at SXSW in Austin, Texas. The panel was called “Fan to Fanatic: True Blood’s Marketing Hook“, and it took place on Friday, March 11, 2011. Joining me on the panel were HBO’s Sabrina Calouri and Zach Enterlin, Campfire’s Mike Monello, Digital Kitchen’s ToddBrandes. Moderating the panel was Erica Stall Wiggins from TODO Austin, who also presented the idea for this panel to SXSW, and then pulled it all together. We were covred by MethodShop.com, SXSW South Africa, and Austin 360.com.

More from SXSW. This one is from SmartBlogs.

In which Joe Manganiello credits True Blood fans on True-Blood.net with landing his job as Alcide!

USA Weekend: Were you a True Blood viewer before you were cast?
Joe: “I was. I watched the premiere episode when it came on, and a couple months after that, a friend of mine sent me a web link to a blog on True-Blood.net and that blog was speculating as to who would play Alcide when he showed up in the show. Fans of the books were posting pictures of who they think should play Alcide, and some were posting pictures of me. It was really cool so I saw that, and I thought, “A werewolf for True Blood? That’d be amazing!” So I ordered the books and started reading them, and the character was described as looking very similar to me: tall, dark hair, the whole deal. So I really got into the show and made sure I never missed an episode and really started following it online.”