David Angell used to post fairly regularly to the alt.tv.wings newsgroup, and I was involved in some of his threads. He seemed to be a very nice guy, and very respectful and appreciative of the fans. I was greatly saddened when I learned that he was a passenger on one of the planes which hit the WTC on 9/11.
Some of the show writers (and at least one of the novelists) for "Andromeda" participated pretty frequently in the Andromeda Usenet group also... (Not Robert Hewlett Wolfe, though...unfortunately.)
I know of many musicians who participate in message boards and Yahoo groups on a regular basis.
Greg: Have you looked into the state of the X-Men comics lately?
btw, Liefeld did take quite a bit of ribbing at Millarworld (from some of the mods, even), but took it fairly well, and was quite pleasant to the fans who engaged him in conversation. Eventually his official discussion thread was locked because his more sycophantic fans were being too disruptive, but he still posts fairly regularly.
Don't want to derail the thread, but was one of the fans named Christian? That guy was annoying. And, I stopped reading X-Men long ago. It got to be too much for me.
Um . . . celebrities I've encountered online . . . well, I posted to the guy who created the Munsters, but he didn't reply.
Kevin Smith was already mentioned, but he often participates in the forums at his own site (newsaskew.com etc.). During production of Jersey Girl, Ben Affleck posted their once to dispel some rumors; and others of his set have posted there from time to time.
Peter David (comics and TV writer) once emailed me, but he just wanted some photos I took of him and Harlan Ellison when they hosted the Iron Artist contest at Dragon Con about 4 years ago.
I run into Cully Hamner at the comic shop about once every 6 weeks, it seems.
Oh yeah John 'Bermuda'Schwartz, Weird Al Yankovics drummer was pretty active back in the day before alt.music.weird-al got taken over by spammers. I got an email from him once.
Ah, USENet! Robert H. Wolfe used to participate in the deep space nine USENet forum, and always was willing to discuss the episodes he wrote.. and what he thought of some of the other eps.
Before the release of Civilization II, Sid Meir used to hang out in one of the groups about his game (Civ I) and discuss his strategies.. and he was the one who initially posted how to cheat, open up the map, etc.
Frank John Huges, who played Wild Bill Guarnere in Band of Brothers, posted a couple of times over at wildbillguarnere com. Here is a link to the thread: forums wildbillguarnere com/index.php?showtopic=34 (cant post links yet).
Mike Portnoy (drummer for Dream Theater) is fairly active on his own site's forum. He'll post touring schedules, upcoming album info and sometimes jump into an active thread and disspell (or confirm) rumors.
Ive talked to some wrestlers through email when I got in contact with some of the people I trained with back in the day.
Though not online, heres the correspondence that made me happiest.I wrote to a band from california (who played on the same scene as Suicidal Tendencies) called Excel back in the mid90s saying I was looking for one of their albums which had gone out of print and was impossible to find(Adam, the guitarist also played with Infectious Grooves. Excel was getting popular in the late 80s and then imploded.Around 2002 or so Dirty Rotten rereleased their old albums remastered)
The singer Dan Clemens called me and we talked for like 2 hours.He said that the letter had cheered him up as he was going through a bad time as his lifelong friendship with Mike Muir had ended.
My brother and friend were playing video games at the time of the call and had answered the phone. After hanging up, he said to my friend "Dan Clemens...Dan Clemens?I think that was the singer from Excel" and my friend replied "Why would the singer from Excel be calling your brother? Shut up and play"
I just thought it was cool he'd take the time to bother calling a fan.
Bill Mumy regularly posts at a Barnes and Barnes site. He and his partner Robert Haimer frequenty bitch-slap each other online. It's a riot and clearly a joke but some seem to take it seriously when they "fight."
Over the past few days I exchanged a few e-mails with former Disney restorationist Scott MacQueen (who provided commentaries for Fantasia (along with the restoration), The Bride Of Frankenstein, The Phantom Of The Opera ('43), and did the digital restoration and provided commentary for the Image release of Chaney's 1929 Phantom from Photoplay).
We had some very interesting discussions, especially about the fact that the source video from Photoplay was extremely problematic before he did the digital frame cleanup, thanks to the variable frame rates they chose to use in creating their original presentation, also playing havoc with the synchronization of the Vitaphone soundtrack. So everybody be nice - it's not Mr. MacQueen's fault!
I pointed out to him that the 'flash' in the closing of the unmasking scene (as mentioned in the commentary) does indeed occur in the 1925 show-at-home as well as in the GEH version, they are (just like many shots between the two versions) simply shot from separate cameras at different angles, so the flash is not as visible but it is there. He was very gracious about the glitch. I greatly appreciated his taking the time to talk to me.