Started in 2012 as the result of a corporate buy out of a previous venture, Punk Media gave life to something our CEO, Brad Trammell and VP of Operations, Mike Venezia, cared very much about, Digital Communications.
In August of 2012, Punk Media came online as Punk Media Networks, a radio broadcasting company that owned 2 radio stations, and 2 syndicated radio programs. The company had run out of a tiny 2 bedroom apartment in the village of LeRay, NY (about 10 minutes from Fort Drum Army Base, outside of Watertown, NY). The company continued to operate out of that location for several months despite a lack of space to grow. In December of that same year, Punk Media was given the chance to move further south and expand into Central New York. On January 1st, 2012, Punk Media networks opened it’s first mini data center just outside of Syracuse, New York.
In early 2013, Punk Media Networks purchased APS Productions (now part of Spark Rack), a digital media provider that focused on design, video and audio services. APS Productions had previously occupied the space that Punk Media Networks was utilizing. With the purchase of APS Productions, Punk Media Networks opted to restructure the company, which ultimately resulted in “Networks” being dropped from the name.
In the summer of 2013, Punk Media began testing new services to provide, and began to offer web hosting as a service (now Spark Rack). Punk Media fully launched it’s web hosting services to the public on December 20th, 2014 at 3:14pm EST.
Early in 2014, the company acquired DigitalHomepage.net (now part of Spark Rack), a Syracuse NY based web hosting company and merged it’s offices with Punk Media’s Syracuse based offices. Later in 2014, Punk Media also acquired ezSupport.net (a Support Provider based in Oswego, NY), which is now called “Premier Support”, a service offered by it’s hosting company, Spark Rack, and in 2021, will become a part of 1st Call Consulting.
By mid-2014, Punk Media was growing by leaps and bounds, which forced the company to look for a bigger space to house it’s operations. In October of 2014, Punk Media had secured a new home in the town of Cicero NY (approximately 3 miles south of it’s Brewerton location).
On December 21st, 2014, Punk Media moved it’s operations to a location just north of Interstate 481 in the town of Cicero. The space houses over 2300 sqft of innovative ideas, design suites, broadcast stations and studios, and an on site computer repair facility for both in house and local repair of IT equipment.
Additionally in 2015, Punk Media was working to restructure itself once more, to provide the best possible experience it could to it’s customers, listeners, and associates around the world. On March 1st, 2015, Punk Media’s radio broadcasting division became Icon Broadcasting Group (now Ventra Communications). The Video Game Hosting division Mine Punk (then Warptime Gaming), was set to merge with Spark Rack, however a decision was made to merge the gaming operations into it’s own company.
On July 19th, 2015 it was announced to all Punk Media customers that a massive company restructuring was about to take place. The company had restructured itself into a parent company of 5 subsidiaries: Icon Broadcasting Group (now Ventra Communications), Warptime Gaming (part of Spark Rack), Freedom Expressions (part of Spark Rack), BlueOnyx (now Ventra Networks), and Spark Rack.
Spark Rack was created as the successor to Punk Media’s popular web hosting service. The new company utilizes almost all of the original ideas that it started with as Punk Media, however with some updates and a new logo and website.
To complete the desired brands and service distribution, that customers had come to expect from Punk Media, the company purchased Ithaca based, Freedom Expressions after it closed in 2015, and began to to offer web site design and programming services to it’s Spark Rack customers, under the brand name. The brand continues to live on as a service provided by Spark Rack.
On January 1st, 2016, Spark Rack launched to over 500 former Punk Media, CNY Host, Digital Homepage and Freedom Expressions customers, making Spark Rack’s billing system the largest ever managed in the history of BeyondNerd.
Also on this date, Punk Media officially became the parent company of all 5 of it’s subsidiaries. On January 1st, 2018, Punk Media changed it’s name back to BeyondNerd, it’s original namesake prior to 2012, after the rights to the name were acquired by Punk Media in 2017.