nin.com is the official website for Nine Inch Nails. It has had a long and storied history. The domain had originally been registered and domain squat on by Sister Machine Gun since 1994. It was transferred to NIN's control, and a placeholder page was launched on May 25, 1999. [1] On June 17, the first piece of content was posted, which was a teaser snippet of "The Way Out Is Through", playing as background music. [2] The first Halo to mention the website was The Fragile.
Fragility
During the Fragility period, nin.com was designed with backgrounds and art in the style of the album artwork created by David Carson. The site contained journal entries which were posted on the site by Rob Sheridan, who had been newly hired to update and organize the site, detailing the progress of recording the album, as well as a discussion board. Sound loops from the songs "Starfuckers, Inc." and "The Day The World Went Away" were posted on the site prior to the release of The Fragile and are available here. Images, backgrounds, and screen shots of this version of nin.com have been archived at nindestruct.com here. See the Wayback Machine for nin.com circa 1999, 2000, 2001, and 2002.
Fragile-era nin.com screen-shots:
pre-With Teeth
From 2003 onwards, prior to the release of With Teeth, nin.com had a sparse and minimalist layout with a plain white background and black smudged typewriter font. The site contained a "Current" section that was updated occasionally with photos and information on the progress of the album, a "Body of Work" section with information on each of the Halos and a visuals section with music videos available for viewing. A Q&A section titled Access was also a feature of the site where members of NIN answered user submitted questions. See the Wayback Machine for nin.com circa 2003 and 2004.
nin.com front page
body of work page
With Teeth
In 2005 for the release of With Teeth, nin.com was updated with a front page with links to purchase the album and watch "The Hand That Feeds" video. Viral teaser trailers were also hidden pages on the site, named with lines from songs that would appear on the album.Later, the front page was changed to display photos taken at various destinations on the With Teeth Tour, and called the site "nin.com V6". The pages of the site which had previously had blank backgrounds were changed to With Teeth-style art and the font was also changed. A blog section titled "TR" was added, where Trent would post comments and messages. The Access section continued to be updated by Reznor, with Aaron North and Jerome Dillon answering a set of questions, titled "part one", however, due to Dillon's departure from the band, it was to be the last time the section was updated. The site also contained a downloads section containing desktop backgrounds. All With Teeth-related pages except the nin.com/visuals page had been removed as of March 24, 2008. See the Wayback Machine for nin.com circa 2005 and 2006.
nin.com V6 front page
nin.com index
performance page
Year Zero
Following the release of Year Zero, nin.com was updated to V6.9 with a YZ-themed background and font. All previous pages, apart from Performance and Merch were deleted, leaving a basic front page with a photo on. As the Performance 2007 tour began, more pages were added to the site, including a page written in Russian, a page in Chinese, and a page in Korean, added as the band performed in these countries for the first time. Links to the Year Zero site and NIN's official YouTube account were also added, the former is where live performance videos and video diaries were uploaded. A photo blog was also added to the front page and updated several times a day during the tour. The band were back in the studio and the front page of nin.com was updated periodically with messages from Trent, photos and YouTube videos showing work in the studio. Additionally, site visitors could comment on the current picture. See the Wayback Machine for nin.com circa 2007.
Here is the archive of all images posted on the 6.9 version of nin.com:
Front page
Front page
Tour page
Year Zero Korea
Ghosts I–IV
On announcement and immediate release of the new album, Ghosts I–IV, in March 2008, the site was altered so that it had an album-themed design. The site still contained links to all Year Zero pages as well as an additional Ghosts I–IV player and a link to the new official NIN flickr page and a page containing RSS feeds. See the Wayback Machine for nin.com circa 2008.
Here is the archive of all images posted on the Ghosts version of nin.com:
04/04/08: Welcome Back!
04/07/08: Today's News
04/07/08: Josh Freese In Action
04/08/08: Four Guys Up To Something
04/11/08: nin.com, the spiral, pre-sales
04/22/08: New single
04/23/08: The three of us will destroy you!
The Slip
After the digital release of The Slip in May 2008, the site was updated with a new album-themed design. As the new tour kicked off, the nin.com photoblog continued. See the Wayback Machine for nin.com circa 2008.
Following are some of the photographs that were posted to the front page:
07/16/08:The beginning and the end
07/16/08:The beginning and the end
07/23/08: And so it begins…
07/23/08: Tour Mood Check: Day 1
07/24/08: Pemberton
07/24/08: Pemberton!
07/24/08: Scenic Soundcheck
07/25/08: The Long and Winding Road to Pemberton
07/25/08: The FIrst Show Has Begun!
07/25/08: Canada Loves NIN
07/25/08: Terrible Lie
07/25/08: HLAH
07/25/08: One Down
07/25/08: Pemberton at Night
07/26/08: On the Road to Seattle
07/26/08: Working on Last-Minute Production Issues at Key Arena
07/26/08: Almost Time
07/26/08: Discipline
07/26/08: Gave Up
07/26/08: Hurt
07/26/08: Show's Over
The Slip-themed design of the site continued to be updated to the nin.com 7.0 layout; beginning on the 14th of August 2008 when Spiral and ETS members were informed by Rob Sheridan that a new beta of the site would be up shortly. The links to the new site were soon announced with a forum, IRC chat, and links hinting to future updates to the site. Subsequently, on the 3rd of September 2008, nin.com publicly launched the beta, with anyone who has a nin.com account able to use it, completely free, including full use of the forums, IRC chat, all sub-sites and a comprehensive links page, linking all official and non-official nin pages from the ninternet. Here is the official welcome message originally posted on nin.com by Trent Reznor:
Welcome to the beginning of the new nin.com! There’s a lot of new stuff here we’ve been working on for quite some time and MUCH more coming over the next few weeks. We’re aiming to create the ultimate community and resource for all things related to nine inch nails. Be sure to register to create your own profile and take full advantage of what’s here - it’s 100% free and will remain that way.
Once you’ve registered and logged in, you can set up your user profile by clicking on your username in the top right of the page. You’ll also have access to our new live chat rooms and our new forums, which are already active and filled with great content and discussion. Here are some useful forum destinations to get you started:
- Introduce yourself in the Community Forum, and please check this message before posting.
- Read what people have been saying about recent shows (and add your own thoughts if you’ve attended) in the Previous Shows Forum, and talk about future shows in the Upcoming Shows Forum.
- View and share photos and video from the Lights In The Sky Tour in this thread.
- Need help? Check the Tech Support Forum.
posted by trent reznor at 2:07pm (salt lake city, usa)
Early 2010
Beginning on February 9th 2010, photos titled "?" started being posted daily on the nin.com photoblog and then linked to via twitter and facebook. These photos may or may not be related to the How To Destroy Angels project.
2.9.10
2.9.10
2.10.10
2.11.10 (Appears to be Atticus Ross)
2.11.10
2.22.10
2.23.10
2.24.10
2.25.10
2.26.10
3.1.10
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Hesitation Marks
The 7.0 layout from Fall 2008 continued into the first half of 2013. In February when a new tour was announced, the site gained a simple no-frills black intro page with a graphic containing the NIN logo and the text 'nine inch nails' and 'twenty thirteen'. After clicking through to the main page, the 7.0 theme was still present. This layout continued until June, when Hesitation Marks was formally announced. It was then updated with visuals relating to that album. Links to the forum and the original user-populated photo/video sections were not present. A new fan content area for photo/video uploads was added to the tour.nin.com section in October. In 2014, the main page was set up to accommodate a feed from the official NIN tumblr account. As the tour progressed, a photo from each city would also display at the top of the page, much like what was done during the With Teeth tour.
March 2013
June 2013
2016-present
In December 2016, a fresh version of nin.com was launched with the announcement of Not The Actual Events. This time, a very clean minimalist approach was taken, with an all-white background, NIN logo and short menu on the left, and news items taking up the majority of the main space, per usual. The only other resources provided were a discography, tour dates, a link to the store, and social media links. The refresh was designed by The Creative Corporation with input from new NIN art director John Crawford.
Coinciding with the site refresh was a change in web hosting providers. All previous nin.com sub-sites and resources associated with the old design, such as the forums and user-populated media sections, were no longer available.
December 2016
July 2017
Sub-sites
Over the years, nin.com has had various sub-sites to coincide with releases. Here is a list of all sites linked with nin.com:
- thingsfallingapart.com - set up in 2000 to promote the release of Things Falling Apart.
- andallthatcouldhavebeen.com - set up in 2001 to promote the release of And All That Could Have Been.
- tds.nin.com - set up in 2004 to promote the re-release of The Downward Spiral.
- Nin.com/access - a page on nin.com V6 where Trent Reznor posted responses to questions.
- Nin.com/visuals - page from the With Teeth-era website which had numerous music videos and pictures.
- nin.com/with_teeth - set up in 2005 for the release of With Teeth.
- halo22.nin.com - set up in 2007 for the release of Beside You In Time.
- yearzero.nin.com - set up in 2007 to promote Year Zero (see also List of Year Zero pages).
- remix.nin.com (and yearzero.nin.com/remix) - set up in 2007 to coincide with the release of Y34RZ3R0R3M1X3D.
- ghosts.nin.com - created in 2008 for the release of Ghosts I–IV.
- discipline.nin.com - created April 22nd, 2008 for the free release of "Discipline", contained various pages for individual radio stations to link to.
- theslip.nin.com - created May 5th, 2008 for the free release of The Slip.
- member.nin.com - a page for viewing your nin.com account, once set up.
- member.nin.com/chat - the IRC chat room, can be accessed from external IRC clients at irc.nin.com
- ninja2009.com - a page set up in March 2009 to promote the NIN/JA 2009 tour and contained a free EP for download.
- nin.com/pub/strobelight/ created on April 1st, 2009 as an April Fools joke, promoting the fake Strobe Light album.
- lightsinthesky.nin.com - created June 5th, 2009 for the free promotional release of Lights In The Sky.
- access.nin.com - set up in 2009 for the NIN: Access application for the iPhone and iPod Touch.
- phm.nin.com - set up in 2010 to promote the re-release of Pretty Hate Machine.
Official Accounts
NIN has official accounts at the following locations: