I can't believe it's two decades now! In 2015 I said the following in
this thread to celebrate its 10th birthday - and what I said remains true:
h2005, 30 October 2015 wrote:
The show's changed many lives over the years in various ways and the community on here is as strong as ever when it comes to discussing all the nuances of the games. There's probably no other gameshow that has a community that is so dedicated to it.
Ok, the forum's quieter than it used to be back in the show's Edmonds era heyday but it's still fairly busy with a mix of old and new faces regularly posting.
I wrote the following post on 27 July 2006 in
this thread about why people started watching DoND (apparently I was comma-mad when I was 18!)...
h2005, 27 July 2006 wrote:
Here's my "experience"...
When I first heard, last October, about Noel Edmonds' comeback, I think I heard it on the radio, and when I heard "Deal or No Deal" being mentioned, I thought it was going to be an antiques programme, as in "Dealing with Dickinson" (David Dickinson) that was shown last summer on BBC 1.
How wrong could I have been? I vividly remember October 31st, too. I was planning to watch the first episode of Deal or No Deal, but then forgot all about it during that Monday as I had a disagreement about coursework at school (the teacher was in the wrong, of course), and I forgot all about DOND. Until I suddenly remembered at 4pm - "Noel Edmonds is on at 4:15pm!" - and from that moment, I was hooked.
When I watched the first episode, it only took me a few minutes to understand what was going on, but I admittedly did think, as I know others thought on this forum, how will this format last? But, then, the interaction between the banker, the contestant, Noel, other contestants and the audience formed.
I was diasppointed when I realised it wasgoing to only last for 66 episodes, but then C4 renewed its contract... twice... and it's with us until at least December 2007, as far as I know!