::a timeline of Pete Townshend and the Internet::

This chronology records Pete Townshend’s statements about the Internet and against the child pornography widely available on it. His statements are presented along with the concurrent timelines of his music and performances, the Who’s activities, the Gary Glitter case, and the investigations of U.S. and U.K. authorities. It is intended to shed light on the “when and what” if not the “how and why.” It cannot, with its limited scope, cover everything relevant to the topic. As Roger Daltrey said recently, “you have to weigh up all he’s done against this.”

::1991::
September: Pete broke his right wrist in a bicycling accident on Friday the 13th. During his recuperation he visited with his Mother and discussed the period when he was a young boy and was left to live with his Grandmother. He learned that he was traumatized or perhaps sexually abused in some form at this time. His anger about it persisted for years and came out in his music and performances on stage. “For me,” he later wrote, “a few minor incidents seem to have created a dark side to my nature which thankfully emerges only in creative work like Tommy.”

::1993::
June: Psychoderelict released. In an interview that month, Pete talked about Lifehouse and was asked, “do you cruise the Internet?” He replied, “Oh sure, yeah. I have sex on computer all the time. I'm into putting my head on females’ bodies and all kinds of stuff. Out on the bulletin board I can wear whatever I like. Writers’ can’t catch me there. Well, the fact of the matter is that because the network is a network, everybody can catch anybody. Everybody knows what everybody else is doing.”

::1996::
Oct – Nov: The Who took Quadrophenia on tour in the U.S. Gary Glitter played the Godfather and was sacked after the tour. In December PJ Proby took over the role for shows in the UK.

::1997::
In “A Different Bomb” Pete stated that his attempts to write a document on the wide availability of child pornography on the Internet began in 1997.

Spring and Summer: Quadrophenia tour continued through Europe and the U.S. with Proby. In June Pete played a solo benefit concert for Chicago’s Maryville Academy, a children’s charity, at which he presented it with a check for $1,000,000.

November: Gary Glitter was arrested after a Bristol computer repair shop found child pornography on his laptop computer. He was released on bail after being questioned by detectives.

::1998::
It likely was in 1997 or 1998 that Pete encountered the shocking picture of child abuse that he discussed in “A Different Bomb.” He accidentally found it after he searched the Internet for information on Russian orphans, having seen a documentary on the topic directed by Ethan Silverman. This film, entitled “The Waiting Children,” came out in 1997 and was shown at various film festivals in 1998. On the advice of an attorney Pete did not download anything and did not report the incident. [note: In a statement to The Sun newspaper on 01/11/03 Pete recalled the events as occurring the winter of 1996/1997]

March: Gary Glitter was questioned again by police and charged with fifty counts of downloading and possessing child pornography between January and November 1997.

Sept - Nov: Glitter’s trial began on September 10th. On November 12th he was found guilty of possessing and making child pornography and was sentenced to four months in prison. His sentence started immediately and he was released for good behavior after two months.

With the massive publicity of the Glitter trial, Pete realized that he had to be cautious about sharing his alarm about what he had found. “It became clear very quickly that some people I spoke to were skeptical of me.” Very few people were aware of or willing to hear about the issue.

::1999::
In 1999 Pete and his team focused on preparing the Lifehouse radio play and the CD box set “Lifehouse Chronicles.” This revisited his 1971 project about people struggling to connect with one another in a future world where authorities held sway by offering “experiences” via a sensory-supply “Grid.”

In interviews throughout the year Pete drew parallels from the “compressed life experiences” sought on the Grid by characters in Lifehouse to the increasingly real experiences available on the Internet. He also pointed to activities far more disturbing than anything he had previously imagined. He told the BBC that any child innocently entering “naughty” words into a search engine could quickly be exposed to hardcore pornography. The Internet, he warned, is “a terrifyingly unpoliced medium… where your ten year old child, in my case - my ten year old child, could quite easily switch on and be subjected to the pornographic machinations of the Russian Mafia….”

September: Officers from the Dallas police, the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, and the Department of Justice raided Landslide Productions, Inc, a portal site in Texas that provided access to hundreds of child abuse web sites, including many based in Russia and Thailand. Landslide processed credit cards for over 300,000 subscribers. Investigators launched a follow-on investigation, named Operation Avalanche, that operated undercover for the next two years. Part of its work entailed deciphering the encrypted credit card files and assembling suspect lists of the thousands who paid to enter the web site. Pete’s credit card information, along with thousands of other UK citizens, was among those recovered and later sent to authorities in London.

Oct – Nov: The Who played several stunning concerts in small venues, reviving old songs and raising over $1,000,000 for children’s charities. “This is something I need to do,” Pete later wrote, “to placate my own uneasy soul.”

November: Pete opened the first version of his personal web site, including a chat room for fans.

December: The radio play of Lifehouse was broadcast on BBC3 Radio early in the month. On the 22d and 23d the Who played to ecstatic fans at Shepherds Bush Empire.

::2000::
February: Lifehouse Chronicles released as a six CD set of demos, experiments, and the radio play. EelPie.Com e-commerce site opened. Pete performed Lifehouse songs at Sadlers Wells.

March: The chat room on Pete’s website closed.

May: In a web chat on BarnesandNoble.Com Pete reported that actor Peter Gallagher and Ethan Silverman were developing a stage version of Psychoderelict. When asked if virtual encounters can substitute for real ones, he replied that he found email and web chat conversations more “disturbing” than real conversation. “If you mean however the AOL handjob, then I would prefer that to an encounter with a heroin-addicted hooker who was abused by her grandfather and thus believes all men are inherently evil.”

June – Nov: The Who toured the U.S. and UK featuring songs from Who’s Next and Lifehouse. At the end of the tour The Who and special guests played Royal Albert Hall to benefit the Teenage Cancer Trust. Throughout the tour Pete posted dozens of video diaries about the tour and MP3s of selected performances on his website.

December: The Associated Press reported on the conviction of the operators of Landslide Productions, Inc. in a U.S. court in Texas.

::2001::
June: Pete played two acoustic shows to benefit the La Jolla Playhouse. Between masterful sets he regaled the audiences with musings, anecdotes, and humor. In the Lifehouse story, he said, only a few things could counteract the “emotional, spiritual, and physical detachment from reality” imposed by the media-controlled “Grid.” Congregation, love, and music were among them. Real life today – in the face of huge media conglomerates – is not that different. “We still have the same desire for story, for love affairs, for the simple things, a good meal, a walk with a friend….” Our own media Grid takes many simple pleasures and exploits them: “The Internet has been really driven technically - hugely - by pornography. And my sense was that in Lifehouse one of the things that would happen to us all if we became subject to the will of all those people out there is that where they would try to get us is through our soft spots. You know, sexually – try to get inside us and move us and control us erotically. In a sense one of the things was to create really wonderful love stories in the piece and, you know, I’m not a really good dramatist so I found it very difficult. This is one of my attempts.” He then played the song “Greyhound Girl.”

August: The U.S. Department of Justice took the occasion of the sentencing of Thomas Reedy, the operator of Landslide Productions, to 1,235 years in prison to announce the existence of Operation Avalanche. Authorities had continued the investigation undercover, including sting operations against the most egregious customers of the site, and assembling lists of foreign subscribers for Interpol and other police organizations outside the U.S.

October: On the 20th, The Who played at the Concert for New York City to benefit the Robin Hood Relief Fund, providing aid to New Yorkers victimized by the September 11th terrorist attacks. It was John Entwistle’s last North American performance with the band.

::2002::
January: On the 16th of this month Pete first posted his essay “A Different Bomb.” In it he blasted the wide availability of child pornography on the Internet and called for its eradication by ISPs, government authorities, and watchdog groups. Much of the essay focused on the complex social and psychological issues that surround those who are ensnared by it – both as victims and consumers. As an addendum, Pete recommended software to filter and block out porn sites for home users: “Once it is running it begins to make the internet feel a much friendlier and safer place for our children.”

On January 29th Pete shut down his personal website “to concentrate on my writing this year. I need no distractions.” His commerce website EelPie.Com remained open.

February: The Who played several dates in the UK, finishing with two sold out nights at the Royal Albert Hall to benefit the Teenage Cancer Trust. It was their last public performance with John Entwistle.

June: Pete reopened his personal website on June 10th and included a Who section and chat room. He did not repost “A Different Bomb” at this time.

On June 27th John Entwistle died.

July-Sept: The Who carried on the U.S. tour as a tribute to Entwistle.

August: On August 12th Pete reposted “A Different Bomb” to his website along with a diary entry entitled “A Different Bomb – Revisited.” He noted that a UK newspaper reported that the FBI had sent to British police a list of some 7000 UK citizens who had subscribed by credit card to a web site in the U.S. that “they say” contained child pornography, as he put it. (His own credit card was, apparently, among those on the list.)

The large number of UK subscribers indicated plenty of demand for such material but he argued there was no point in “locking up internet porn addicts.” He urged attacking the problem from the supply side. He was at work on a follow-up essay called “Future Fear” which was to argue that “First World” or western ISPs who provided internet access and the banks that processed credit card payments must work to interrupt the widespread commerce in child pornography originating from the “Third World.” While the nature of the Internet was to allow the free circulation of information, opinion and media, the motive of this illicit commerce was profit and he felt it could be attacked through the mechanisms of commerce. “There is no reason I can see that this should be allowed to go on where sex-sites are operating outside the laws and accepted moral criteria of the West. Am I wrong?"

On August 24th Pete posted a short diary entry reporting that Alta Vista had shut down a number of its free services after complaints of abuse by those proclaiming interest in underage pornography. Would Google, another prime location for quick access to such material, do the same, he wondered?

During August Pete reportedly took his concerns to the UK’s Internet Watch Foundation, an industry-funded watchdog group that takes complaints about illegal content, via e-mail.

October: On October 12th Pete posted a lengthy diary entry about post-tour prospects for the Who. He also pointed to several other ongoing projects that kept him busy, noting “I also run a really good charity [Double-O] which keeps a low profile, but does a lot of valuable work with addicts, alcoholics and both the victims and 'recovering' perpetrators of sexual abuse. But I myself am always a Grade One addict-accident waiting to reoccur. I have to measure my lust for life very, very carefully and take impartial advice wherever I can on how to live a decent and relatively normal life. Like most people in the entertainment industry I'm a nut.” He planned to take it easy and “attempt to get out of my own way, and stay out of my own way.”

One day later, on October 13th, he came back to his diary with the intent of taking “A Different Bomb” down from the web site. But after hearing that a woman alcoholic and childhood sexual abuse victim in treatment at Double-O had relapsed he decided to keep it up. He reported that he had spoken to someone at Scotland Yard that week who stressed to him the magnitude of activity on sex-related groups and sites like Yahoo and Google and the impossibility of monitoring or controlling them. He was thinking now about addressing the demand side. He intended to speak to someone at a large UK children’s charity about creating an alternative “safe User Group forum for the rehabilitation of those who, addicted to internet porn, begin to be enticed into unacceptable stuff. I know that 'Just Say No' never worked with heroin, I didn't expect it to. But internet pornography depends on addiction for its massive profits.” Either way, his frustration was mounting: “Sometimes this all feels so bloody futile. But I am determined to do my bit. I made a lot of money out of that poor little sap in Tommy. Now I understand how easily he could be recreated as a real child in our present society. I feel driven to try to change things.”

Jackie Malton, formerly a Detective Chief Inspector based in London’s Fulham precinct, later confirmed an October discussion with Pete. In a statement issued Jan. 12, 2003, she said: "I told him he had two choices. He could contact a former colleague of mine who had joined the National Crime Squad as a computer expert, or contact the paedophile squad at Scotland Yard."

November: Pete sent follow-up e-mails to the Internet Watch Foundation.

December: On the 18th, detectives from the Serious Crimes Group of the Metropolitan Police executed search warrants throughout London and arrested dozens of men suspected of downloading and possessing internet child pornography. The action was part of a national police inquiry named Operation Ore, formed after the U.S. Postal Inspection Service provided British law enforcement agencies with a list of UK subscribers to Landslide Productions in 2001. The list, containing 7200 names, was said to consist of repeat users of the web site. The National Criminal Intelligence Service and National Crime Squad had sorted it into three categories based on suspects’ access to children and prior convictions for sex crimes. The list was then distributed to local police forces across the UK, who in May began to arrest suspects considered as the highest risk to children. Nationwide over 1,200 arrests had been made since with many more expected.

::2003::
January: On January 11th, the morning editions of UK newspapers The Daily Mail and The Sun reported that a rock star, “a household name both sides of the Atlantic,” was implicated in accessing online child pornography. His name, according to unnamed police sources, appeared on the Operation Ore list of credit card subscribers to Landslide Productions. Shortly before noon Pete stood on the porch of his Richmond home and told reporters that he was the one in the reports. “I am not a paedophile and I want to clear my name,” he said. “I toured with Gary Glitter in the past but I’m not him. I think paedophilia is appalling.” He continued that he had done a lot of work on the problem and highlighted it on his website. He had investigated the abuse of children from Chechnya and Kosovo and its portrayal on the Internet: “It appalls me.” A campaign he hoped to mount against it on the Internet had “fizzled out. To fight against paedophiles you have to know what’s out there.” Pete had worried that this might happen and that it could ruin his career. He had contacted Scotland Yard to tell them that he was doing research for a book but had not heard back from them. “I have not been charged with anything. I’m hoping this will go away. But I think I’m fucked.” Before leaving in a car, Pete said he was interested in adult pornography, adding, “I've always been into pornography and I have used it all my life. I’m going to talk to my lawyers to see what happens next.”

Later that afternoon, Pete issued a written statement:

I am not a paedophile. I have never entered chat rooms on the internet to converse with children. I have, to the contrary, been shocked, angry and vocal (especially on my website) about the explosion of advertised paedophilic images on the internet.
I have been writing my childhood autobiography for the past seven years. I believe I was sexually abused between the age of five and six and a half when in the care of my maternal grandmother who was mentally ill at the time. I cannot remember clearly what happened, but my creative work tends to throw up nasty shadows - particularly in Tommy.
Some of the things I have seen on the net have informed my book which I hope will be published later this year, and which will make clear that if I have any compulsions in this area, they are to face what is happening to young children in the world today and to try to deal openly with my anger and vengeance towards the mentally ill people who find paedophilic pornography attractive.
I predicted many years ago that what has become the internet would be used to subvert, pervert and destroy the lives of decent people. I have felt for a long time that it is part of my duty, knowing what I know, to act as a vigilante to help support organisations like the Internet Watch Foundation, the NSPCC and Scotland Yard to build up a powerful, well-informed voice to speak loudly about the millions being made by US banks and credit card companies for the pornography industry. That industry deliberately blurs what is legal and what is illegal, and different countries have different laws and moral values about this. I do not. I do not want child pornography to be available on the internet anywhere at any time. On one occasion I used a credit card to enter a site advertising child porn. I did this purely to see what was there. I spoke informally to a friend who was a lawyer and reported what I'd seen.
I have enclosed my website article about my friend Jenny who commit [sic] suicide because of sexual abuse she suffered as [a] child. [“A Different Bomb”]
I hope you will be able to see I am sincerely disturbed by the sexual abuse of children, and I am very active trying to help individuals who have suffered, and to prevent further abuse.

On the evening of January 11th, Pete spoke to show business editor Dominic Mohan of The Sun, trying to account for his actions and saying that he was “deeply wounded” at the inference he was a paedophile. He stressed again that he had come across the first image by accident, remembering it having occurred in the winter of 1996-1997. “It repelled me and shocked me to my very core.” Since then, he had visited child pornography sites three or four times, entering one time with his credit card. He repeated that he had never downloaded any images and had visited the sites only to see what kind of material was available and how accessible it was. It was intended as research for a book he was writing. “With hindsight it was very foolish but I felt so angered about what was going on it blurred my judgement.” He wanted to police to examine his computers and corroborate his story. He had assumed that they would not have targeted him because of his record of speaking out against abuse. He wanted to regain their trust and that of authorities involved in helping children and to assist them in bringing more light to the problem. “We must try to stop it but if we can’t do that we should invest our energy in helping victims of abuse.” He was waiting to hear from police. Pete ended by saying that he wanted to get back to his life, his family, and his work. “But if all I can do from now on is fight the sexual abuse of children, and to help those who become victims, well that wouldn’t be too bad a way of living the rest of my life.”

On January 12th, Pete’s troubles were headline news across the world. Most reports stayed with the facts but some sources, including the Associated Press, stated that he had actually downloaded child pornography. Mark Stephens, a board member of the Internet Watch Foundation, was widely quoted condemning Townshend’s account. The Associated Press later corrected its error but the IWF cited its confidentiality policy when refusing to publicly corroborate his claim of having reported to them the previous fall. Within a matter of hours family, friends, and others who know Pete well, including his mother, brother Paul, Jerry Hall, Elton John, Brian May, and Roger Daltrey all made public statements in his support.

“Pete was very angry about how easy it was to get hold of child pornography on the Internet,” said Daltrey. “My gut instinct is that he is not a pedophile and I know him better than most.”

On January 13th Pete’s solicitor John Cohen told reporters that they had contacted the police that morning and mutually agreed to allow a police search of his house. At approximately 3:00 PM police officers from Scotland Yard, Operation Ore, and the Child Protection Center, including computer forensics experts arrived and entered the house. About four hours later they emerged carrying several computers and other material. Pete left by a side entrance and went directly to nearby Twickenham police station. There, in the words of a police spokesman, he was “arrested under the Protection of Children Act 1978 on suspicion of possessing indecent images of children, suspicion of making indecent images of children and on suspicion of incitement to distribute indecent images of children.” After being questioned by police for an hour and a half, Pete was released on bail. He was not charged with any crime and was scheduled to visit with police again later in the month.

It should be noted that courts in the UK have interpreted the simple act of downloading an image on a computer the same thing as “making” it, since the image is electronically written to a drive on the end user’s computer after it is transferred from a server.

January 15: reports emerged that Pete had hired a team of ex-SAS soldiers to protect him from vigilantes. The team was seen patrolling his house and setting up equipment. Pete’s mother and wife were also said to be under protection.

January 19: The Sunday Herald reported that senior sources in British intelligence confirmed that high-profile former and current Labour Cabinet ministers and politicians were among Operation Ore suspects. A “rolling” Cabinet committee had been set up to deal with the ruinous fallout to the Blair government if arrests followed. Since the 13th other reputable news sources, including Reuters and The Guardian, had carried reports that UK politicians including members of Parliament had been implicated. On the 27th published accounts in the Sunday Times and Birmingham Post stated that the entire Operation Ore suspect list had been leaked. One senior police source said that if the prominent names on the list were divulged in full, “The Sun would be guaranteed a front page every day for the next year. ” No names were printed, however, and since then no further reports about highly-placed suspects have appeared.

January 28: Pete was scheduled to be questioned further by police. A spokesman from Scotland Yard announced on January 30th that the interview had been deferred until February.

January 29: Pete updated his website with an announcement that the IWF had provided him with copies of the emails that he had sent them in 2002. Pete stated that they had acknowledged that he had been in contact with them, contradicting statements he said they made to press earlier. His lawyers had also requested an explanation from Mark Stephens, IWF board member, as to why he denied having heard from Pete. The IWF has not, as of late-February, publicly acknowledged contact with him.

In an online report for CounterPunch.Org appearing the same day, independent journalist Mike James reported that the Blair government had imposed a press blackout to prevent the publication of Operation Ore suspects serving in government. The UK papers would not discuss the media blackout. According to Brian Cady, the report was originally titled “Smear Pete Townshend, Cover Up Blair's Cabinet: Alleged Pedophiles in Britain's War Room.”

February: On the 11th and 27th Roger spoke out again in Pete’s defense, saying Pete was arrogant and stupid but was no pedophile. He decried the unfairness of the press turning the matter into a “witch-hunt” while Pete was unable to defend himself. “I'm fine about it because I know he's innocent,” he told BBC2. Pete would be exonerated and the Who would return: “He won’t let you down.”

Compilation copyright © 2003

Compilation copyright © 2003 by Ken Hawkins.

Notes and sources
The copyright in quoted materials remains with the respective copyright holders.
Much of the information presented in the timeline is self-documenting, that is, the source and date are given in the entry. Pete’s essay “A Different Bomb,” posted in January 2002 but with sections apparently written earlier, is cited throughout the timeline. The Google archives of the alt.music.who newsgroup and the archives of the IGTC.Com Who mailing list at http://www.igtc.com/archives/thewho/ are also invaluable real-time sources.

1991: Pete gave the exact date of his wrist break in a diary posting Sept 29, 2000. He has spoken about the time spent at his grandmother’s, and his subsequent research into this period during his recuperation in 1991, a number of times: interview with Terri Gross, Fresh Air, on NPR, ca. 1996; interview on Guitar.Com titled “The Fine Art of Smashing Stuff,” by HP Newquist at: http://guitar.com/g2kfeatures/viewfeature.asp?featureID=18; Interview with Pete Townshend at Manchester Arena, England, 12 December 1996 By Stephen Gallagher (British Youth & Popular Culture Editor, Ubu, posted at: http://www.thewho.net/articles/townshen/pt_96.htm and at: http://www.igtc.com/archives/thewho/2003/Jan/msg00876.html; Psychoderelict press kit, online at: http://www.wdkeller.com/psychopk.htm
The quote is from “A Different Bomb,” hereafter ADB.

1993: This interview, apparently posted in 2000 but conducted in June 1993, is from Guitar.Com: http://www.guitar.com/g2kfeatures/viewfeature.asp?featureID=48

1997: November: the Gary Glitter case is detailed in “From PC World to jailbird: Gary Glitter interactive timeline,” by Simon Jeffery, Manchester Guardian, January 11, 2000, posted at:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,3604,245058,00.html; and at the news archive at VH1.Com.

1998: the information on Ethan Silverman’s film is from a Google search on him, showing links to the film’s screening at the Taos Film Festival and the Sundance Film Festival in 1998. Other information and quote from ADB.

1999: Pete’s comments on the Russian mafia and the Internet come from an interview he did with the BBC Radio 3 which broadcast it in early December. It was transcribed along with several other BBC interviews and posted at the time on: http://www.igtc.com/archives/thewho/1999/Dec/msg00206.html

The information throughout the timeline on Operation Avalanche is drawn from various news accounts and press releases from the Dept. of Justice and U.S. Postal Inspection Service.

Dates of the various openings, closings, and postings on Pete’s web site are drawn from the site itself, the IGTC archives, and the newsgroup alt.music.who archives at Google.

Pete’s quote on his motivation for playing the charity concerts in October and November is from his diary entry of August 26, 2000, preserved at: http://www.igtc.com/archives/thewho/2003/Feb/msg00015.html

2000: The quote from the BarnesandNoble.Com chat is taken from a transcript in the IGTC archives at: http://www.igtc.com/archives/thewho/2000/May/msg00433.html

2001: the quote from the La Jolla show of June 22 is taken from the Eel Pie CD of this show.

2002: Pete identified August and October as the months when he sent reports to the IWF in a news notice at PT.Com on Jan. 29, 2003.

Pete’s diary entries from 2002 were saved directly from his web site at the time they were posted.

The statement in the December entry that the list of subscribers consisted of repeat visitors is drawn from interviews with prosecutors and postal authorities associated with the Landslide case (Dallas Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Jan. 15, 2003) and The Times of London, Dec. 18, 2002.

2003: Much of the material describing the events of January are taken directly from the news sources cited, especially the online editions of The Sun, BBC News, the Manchester Guardian, and the Sunday Herald of Glasgow. Much of this material was quoted or copied to IGTC, where it can be viewed still at: http://www.igtc.com/archives/thewho/