Long before YouTube or TikTok, this groundbreaking web series made waves from a fictional beach house in Santa Monica. In 1995, Scott Zakarin, an aspiring filmmaker living in Hollywood, launched The Spot, the internet’s first episodic online series, specifically created for the web.
Equal parts soap opera and social experiment, The Spot gave its online audience a daily glimpse into the fictional lives of a group of twenty-somethings living beachside in Los Angeles—drama and all—through blog-style diary entries, photos, and short video clips.
If you’re fascinated by internet history or love the idea of a digital Melrose Place, here’s everything you need to know about The Spot.
Welcome to The Spot
Zakarin, inspired by his own experiences on message boards and AOL chat rooms, envisioned this series for the internet, blending elements of Melrose Place and MTV’s The Real World, which had first aired in 1992. The story took place in a beach house in Santa Monica, dubbed The Spot, where the housemates—or “Spotmates”—shared their lives through blog-style diary entries.
The cast was as chaotic as any reality show you’d see today: there was Tara, the short-tempered filmmaker; Michelle, the “hot one” who had a complicated love life; Lon, the aspiring actor; Jeff, the brooding one; and Spotnik, their house dog.
In The Spot, the characters were played by L.A. models and actors, while their diary entries were written by Zakarin, alongside contributions from his assistant and staff writers.
The original cast lineup from 1995 to 1997:
- Tara, played by Laurie Plaksin
- Michelle, played by Kristin Herold
- Jeff, played by Tim Abell
- Lon, played by Armando Valdes-Kennedy
- Carrie, played by Kristen Dolan
Each day, characters would post updates about their lives—sometimes spilling secrets, other times just gossiping about each other—like a mix between a reality show confession booth and a soap opera diary. Fans loved it. They could even send emails to their favorite characters, who would sometimes reply in character, creating an interactive experience that mainstream TV couldn’t offer.
Known as the “Melrose Place of the Web,” The Spot drew nearly 160,000 daily viewers. Some fans even traveled to Santa Monica hoping to find The Spot‘s beach house, convinced the Spotmates were real people.
In 1996, The Spot was awarded “Cool Site of the Year” (a predecessor to the Webby Awards). But by 1997, the project ended after creative differences between Zakarin and the site’s new owners. Despite this, The Spot remains an unforgettable piece of internet history, as a creative social experiment that showed the world what was possible on the web.
And, of course, if you’re an L.A. local or aspiring to be one, there are many things to be said about imagining this fictional beach house in Santa Monica as the internet’s representation of mid-90’s LA culture: Aspiring creatives, eccentric personalities, and larger-than-life drama, all playing out on our sunny coast.
Where can I check out The Spot?
The Spot was hosted on a now-defunct website, so although it’s impossible to fully relive The Spot as it originally lived online, thanks to digital archivists like History of the Web and Archive.org, you can explore some of the early entries and experience a small slice of 90’s internet culture.
So without further ado, if you’re fascinated by early internet culture, or just want a slice of messy 90’s drama, you can dive into The Spot’s archived episodes via Wayback Machine, and see how it all began.