Absolutely Reliable News & Rumors.

Fansites of Third-Tier Parks Mix It Up

In a battle so intense that it evokes the debates over the relative merits of Magnum P.I. versus Simon & Simon, dedicated fans of The Great Escape in Lake George, New York, and Quassy Amusement Park in nearby Middlebury, Connecticut, have entered full-blown war on the web.

It all started when the operators of QuassyParkInfo.com started posting on TheGreatEscaperooni.com's forums, criticizing The Great Escape, a Six Flags property, for having derivative and boring coasters and being "under the thumb of the corporate pigs at Six Flags." They also started a thread on their own bulletin board mocking The Great Escape's new coaster, reported to be a mine train moved from a now-closed Indiana park, as "being so lame it wasn't even good enough for Old Indiana!"

TheGreatEscaperooni.com's tens of readers were not to take such an insult sitting down, however, except insofar as they were, in fact, sitting down, drinking a Big Gulp and finishing off a bag of Cheetos. In addition to noting that Quassy has only two "totally sucky" coasters of its own, the site's operators blocked access to their boards to all but four people, two of whom were the site's owners. "This site is for positive discussions of The Great Escape, and if we allow libelous statements like those made by the Quassy-heads to stand, we might not get all the inside news about the park," said the owners in a statement.

At press time, the dispute had consumed roughly forty hours of human time that will never be recovered.