The DonnaCruz.com website started in 1996 as a fan site for Donna Cruz, started by a die-hard Donna Cruz fan, Cheryl Fuerte while she was still studying. The first website version was created and hosted in Geocities, a popular free website service in the 90s. It was the internet boom in the Philippines and the first filipino netizens were just discovering the joys of browsing the internet, and yes, leaving messages for Donna on the site’s old guestbook.

By 1997-1998 the site’s web address (URL) was changed to “donnacruz.home.ml.org”, and Donna Cruz has recognized the site to be her official website by then. Donna started communicating online with her website fans through the old guestbook in 1997, and via our first official website chat event. The messageboards also became a popular hangout place of her online fans. By the end of 1998 this website won People’s Choice award (Film/Celebrities category) from the 1st Philippine Web Awards.

In July of 1999, the website’s URL officially became DonnaCruz.com and started running on its own server. Official online chatsBy the end of the year it won the Most Outstanding Website Award  (Film/Celebrities category) in the 2nd Philippine Web Awards. 

The early success of this site was not just about the website itself but the community/ frequent visitors that interacted on it and of course Donna’s interaction with the visitors. Donna (sending pics, updates, participating on chats, answering her guestbook and messageboards etc.) plus her regularly-visiting fan community (some of whom shares pics, writing some articles, and actively participating on chats events and messageboards) have made this site a truly online platform that connects them all to each other. Some pioneer online supporters of this website, including Jiji F, Mike P, Sheloyn, John C., etc have contributed articles as well.

By the year 2000, the site was a finalist for Best Celebrity Website, and then a year after, it again won the Best Website Award (Celebrities/Entertainment category) from the 2001 Philippine Web Awards. Website features during that time available for fans and visitors such as free ringtones (for mobile phones), free @donnacruz.com email addresses, and free participation on live chats with Donna have truly made this site an online community platform.

Since then, this website has been one of the longest-running celebrity websites in the Philippines since the late ’90s.

WEBSITE AWARDS

• Best Website Award (4th Philippine Web Awards in 2001)
• Most Outstanding Website Award (2nd Philippine Web Awards in 1999)
• People’s Choice Award (1st Philippine Web Awards in 1998)

AWARDS NIGHTS IMAGES

A TRIP DOWN MEMORY LANE

If you’re in the mood, take a trip to the 1998 version of the Donna Cruz website: 1998.donnacruz.com

Shoutout to the online community members back then- there’s many, many of you who have contributed to this site then (John from Sydney, Mich N, Mike P from Alameda, RG of RGSoft, Jiji F, Andrea C, Tammers B, Sheila M from Seattle, Ernesto from San Diego, and many more!).

And of course with the advent of Social Media, a big shoutout to the social admins of Donna’s Official Facebook Fan Page after the rise of social media (Jocelyn Admin Jos, Joanne, etc) and to the Donnannians fan community.

If you have any comments or feedback please contact the webmaster below:

WEBMASTER

Cheryl Fuerte
cherylfuerte@protonmail.ch
Tel: +1 (858) 633-7333

ACKNOWLEDGMENT of COPYRIGHTED MATERIALS

All content, images, videos, sounds, written content, and everything else contained in this website are being used in compliance with Section 107 of the Fair Use Copyright Law (United States) and Section 185 of the Intellectual Property Code of the Copyright Law (Philippines).