The Orange Room

The Orange Room is a popular Lebanese website that revolves around discussion forums.

Overview

Inception

The Orange Room was created by Hagop Vahan Manisajian aka "X". Earliest posts in The Orange Room (then known only as LFPM) are traceable to May 29, 2004. The popularity of the site has been growing since, reaching a peak number of simultaneous visitors (3,254) on June 13, 2007 at 5:42 PM. The website has over 20,000 registered members to date.

Mission statement

The Orange Room states it is "dedicated to bringing people together to promote free thoughtful dialog about issues that concern but are not limited to Lebanon".

Political affiliation

The Orange Room used to be a partisan website in that it was hosted under tayyar.org, the official website of the Lebanese Free Patriotic Movement Party, but in October 2012, it moved to its new independent host Oroom.org. Although reflecting the Lebanese political tensions at various times, the level of openness and the ability to voice dissenting opinions has gradually increased with time, and at one point it has been reasonably argued that users from any political affiliation have been able to freely express their thoughts and opinions. This openness, although still relatively present, has however decreased over the past few years. The Orange Room was closed by Tayyar.org on October 5, 2012 after almost 10 years of great success, 21000 members, 1,110,000 posts and millions of views.