'Officially Pronounced Dead' was born on the 2nd of July, 2000. Back then the site was called 'Paul is Dead - The Conclusive Evidence' and I wrote it when I was just 17 years old (I'm 25 now). On the left is a screen capture of how the website looked in its first guise, as saved by http://www.archive.org.

My interest in the Paul is Dead conspiracy started before then when my brother bought a book titled 'The Worlds Greatest Rock and Roll Scandals'. In it was a number of various chapters about this and that, but the one that kept catching my eye was the chapter that wrote about the Paul is Dead conspiracy, outlining some of the clues and how they affected the group and so forth. So, I decided to do a little more investigating and started to look around on the Internet for other sites that detailed the conspiracy. However, every one I found were total disappointments and simply stated a clue without either backing it up with audio / visual evidence or, more importantly, explaining why it was considered a clue. For example, something like "Paul's got black petals on his hat". No elaboration, no evidence.

So, I decided that since there was no definitive Paul is Dead sites out there, that I would be the one to provide it. I initially sat down with my Beatle albums (even back then I had them all) and meticulously went over each one trying to discover clues for myself. I created quite a few (which ones however I sadly cannot recall today) and slowly the site grew in content, covering all of the albums, single, EPs and lyrics. Initially its popularity only grew slowly, and for many months it did not get many hits, but as people linked to it it slowly and steadily became more widely known in the outside world.

This was all fine until early 2003 when I discovered that a large portion of my website had been copied and pasted onto another website without my knowledge. Thankfully the matter was resolved, but because of that I became a little paranoid and the website was temporarily closed down whilst I decided just what to do with it. It stayed dormant for the better half of a year until, one day, I was at a complete loose-end and it just clicked in me - redo the Paul is Dead site. That was when I decided to bring it back online. Not only that, but it was going to be completely and totally revamped, redesigned and completely rewritten. I poured over all 300+ clues, making sure that, where applicable, visual close-ups and audio clips were provided. Then, when it was complete, I copyrighted the entire thing to be on the safe side. The new website was retitled 'Officially Pronounced Dead?', and came back to life on the 22nd of January, 2004.

Since then the website has gone from strength to strength and to date has gone through two more re-designs, the first in June 2006 when the site underwent it's 3rd complete rewrite and, more recently, the site was completely redesigned in July 2007.

I still can't quite get my head around the fact that innumerable people cite OPD as the definitive Paul is Dead site. I know that this was my original intention back when I first started writing it but it's still very humbling to hear and each time I do I'm very honoured. I try my best to go out there and thank all the people who link to my site in PiD related posts and messages.