Danny can correct me if i’m wrong
Oh bro. You KNOW I will.
At WBCN, Steve was a bouncer somewhere. He had a band! Foundry. Foundry had a website called FoundryMusic.com. Steve was an O&A fan and back in like, 1998 started hosting a /opieandanthony page on Foundry. It became the "unoffical home" of the show. This was fairly early mainstream internet. For a radio show to have their own web presence at that time was unheard of. Fan pages, sure. Simple HTML with some links and downloads, perhaps news.
Steve went to audio school and was hired at WNEW. Foundry persisted. It became the only place for O&A stuff. WNEW had a page sure, but Foundry had EVERYTHING. FoundryMusic.com kept O&A alive though the 2002-2004 non-compete. Any real news and updates could be found there.
The split happened during the CBS era. CBS management didn't want to promote Foundry because porn and ad revenue they weren't seeing. So Foundry was "split" into OpieAndAnthony.com which really was just the O&A side of Foundry and Foundry was that plus everything else. If titties happened, you'd have to go to Foundry.
The watermarking was justified at first. In the Fark and Newgrounds days, everyone was lifting material for views. The watermark ensured people knew where it came from. I think he started doing that with the best intentions, but as time went on he realized that the more traffic going to Foundry meant more ad revenue that he didn't have to share with anybody else. So, now, a Tonight Show appearance by Jimmy would be watermarked even though Foundry had nothing to do with it. Steve wanted people visiting Foundry for O&A content and nowhere else. Steve became an Amazon affiliate. Louis CK on the show? Buy his new CD here! Porn girl in studio? Buy her DVD here! This became more important to Steve than the on-air product. Foundry had been providing a very decent income for Steve with 100% of O&A traffic. Sure, he was also paying for hosting and front/back end work but Foundry was operating at major profits for Steve.
Now YouTube & Twitter happen. Opie, after 10 years realizes the dollar value of the web content and suddenly takes issue with Steve and Foundry. Nevermind this has been the only place for O&A shit for 10 years. But now that Opie sees views and revenue going to Steve...MAJOR PROBLEMS. OpieAndAnthony.com is launched. Steve is asked to give up his archive of tapes. Steve asks for $10,000, even after the previous decade of ad revenue eclipses that figure. O&A both take issue with the ask for the sale. Steve is fired not long after.
Steve lands a job with Danny Bonaduce. The show is cancelled 8 months later. Steve takes a production/on-air gig in Scranton, PA. Steve hangs himself in his basement.