Thanks for the warm welcome, everybody. I definitely plan to stick around.


So I have looked up certain sites describing what BBS is and they weren't
very clear, though they were very nostalgic. They mentioned that there were shareware, articles etc. shared on the BBS which they said was like an
actual bulletin board, only digital.

But this kind of left the whole issue vague, so I was hoping you guys could tell me what BBS is from a more personal point of view.

Thanks.


---
þ Synchronet þ SiliconUnderground - siliconu.synchro.net - Syracuse, Ny

Re: Tell me about BBS
By: Vistascan to All on Sat Mar 15 2014 04:56:23

So I have looked up certain sites describing what BBS is and they
weren't very clear, though they were very nostalgic. They mentioned that there were shareware, articles etc. shared on the BBS which they said
was like an actual bulletin board, only digital.

But this kind of left the whole issue vague, so I was hoping you guys could tell me what BBS is from a more personal point of view.

BBSes were basically small online systems - Somewhat like the internet but much scaled down. And rather than having a broadband (cable/DSL/etc.) connection that is always connected, you would typically use a modem on a telephone line to dial into a BBS. Once on the BBS, a BBS typically provided menus for doing various things, like reading email, playing games, downloading & uploading files, and reading & posting public messages. Other popular things to do included fun little things like a "wall", where people post short messages for other users to read - sometimes the wall was run during the login process. I'd say a BBS "wall" was similar to Twitter for BBSes.
Also, back in the day, there were thousands of BBSes around the country & around the world, and each had its own look & feel - basically, its own identity, depending on how the sysop (system operator) set it up. And since people had to make a phone call to log into a BBS, BBSes tended to have a community of mainly local users, since people often wanted to avoid paying long-distance phone charges.

Back in the day, when BBSes were the main way to be online, it was an interesting time. I think one of the biggest differences between then and today is that most people today have internet connections that are always connected; but back then, you couldn't always be connected to a BBS, for several reasons: BBSes had a small number of phone lines (many had only one line), so sometimes you couldn't get in to your favorite BBSes because other users were already logged on. Typically you had to set up your software to repeatedly dial in for a while until it got connected. However, I think it was pretty cool to be able to see many different BBSes with their own look & feel and interact with a local group of users.

A little while ago, I put up a video on YouTube describing BBSes for people who might not know what they are:
http://youtu.be/LD_Z9YsTK8g

Also, I would recommend taking a look at Jason Scott's "BBS: The Documentary". He went out and interviewed many people who were involved in BBSes back in the day, either as users or authors of BBS software, etc. His documentary is available as a DVD set which you can order from his site: http://www.bbsdocumentary.com/
I also recall seeing his licensing terms say that people are free to make copies of the DVDs, so you might also be able to get a copy of the DVDs from someone. Some of his BBS documentary videos are also available on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=BBS%20the%20documentary&sm=3

Nightfox

---
þ Synchronet þ Digital Distortion BBS - digitaldistortionbbs.com

Thanks for the warm welcome, everybody. I definitely plan to stick around.

Glad to hear it!

But this kind of left the whole issue vague, so I was hoping you guys could tell me what BBS is from a more personal point of view.

I'll try to type up my own story later when I get some time, but tonight I at least wanted to give you another resource, to build on the ones Nightfox suggested.

I have started a collection of BBS-related podcast episodes. I haven't "announced" it yet, because there are still a few loose ends to tie up. But
you may want to give some of these podcasts a listen:

http://breakintochat.com/collections/podcasts/index.html

--Josh


////--------------------------------------------------
BiC -=- http://breakintochat.com -=- bbs wiki and blog

---
þ Synchronet

Re: Tell me about BBS
By: Nightfox to Vistascan on Sat Mar 15 2014 08:55 am

Back in the day, when BBSes were the main way to be online, it was an interesting time. I think one of the biggest differences between then and today is that most people today have internet connections that are always connected; but back then, you couldn't always be connected to a BBS, for several reasons: BBSes had a small number of phone lines (many had only one line), so sometimes you couldn't get in to your favorite BBSes because other users were already logged on. Typically you had to set up your software to repeatedly dial in for a while until it got connected. However, I think it pretty cool to be able to see many different BBSes with their own look & fee and interact with a local group of users.

Thanks. I'll check out the links you gave. I think, from the impression I
get, that the BBS and the internet in general back then was a more "elite" place, mostly for the people now called "geeks". Using the net was more difficult and only a certain type of people, usually introverts got on. Also,
I feel like it was a more understanding community and there were less hostile people around. Is this accurate, or am I off base?


---
þ Synchronet þ SiliconUnderground - siliconu.synchro.net - Syracuse, Ny

Re: Tell me about BBS
By: Vistascan to All on Sat Mar 15 2014 04:56 am

i was a teen in the bay area and they had free computer magazines by the newspapers where there would be a list of about 2 pages of BBS's, basically classified ads. it was a way for ordinary people to run online systems when things like AOL, compuserve, and prodigy were typical.

you would run a terminal program back in the day, and you would enter a command that would tell your modem what number to dial and what parameters to type. since this was back when phone calls to certain distances for free. from palo alto you could to like mountain view to redwood city all the time for free, other times it depended on the hour. anyhow, these things are irrelevant mostly probably these days.

i remember when i first saw a web browser in maybe 1992 i thought it was pretty silly the concept of linking documents. the idea of putting images in there was beyond the bandwith of any mortal at that time. 14.4KbPs was awesome. while some BBS's had GUI's, usually they required a special client.

when i was a kid i spent a lot of time on one bbs that had 8 lines and ran the major bbs software by worldcomm i believe. good times. i was a cosysop of that board, so i got free time, but the idea was you'd pay for access as well. might seem absurd now, but if you had to pay another phone bill for each simultaneous user of your website for instance, you'd get the idea.|

but bbs's can be much more. i just started up a board recently and it's doing all sorts of things that weren't remotely possible back then. maybe it's a bit nostalgia, but i also think you can make some really cool functional things with it if you're creative.

---
þ Synchronet þ \1yF\1mU\1cT\1wU\1rR\1gELand : \1w find us through www.grudgemirror.com or grudg

Re: Thanks
By: Vistascan to Nightfox on Sun Mar 16 2014 02:36 am

Thanks. I'll check out the links you gave. I think, from the impression I get, that the BBS and the internet in general back then was a more "elite" place, mostly for the people now called "geeks". Using the net was more difficult and only a certain type of people, usually introverts got on. Also, I feel like it was a more understanding community and there were less hostile people around. Is this accurate, or am I off base?

well, you had to sit down and front of a computer and experience a BBS. no one was on cell phones texting people. but there were definitely some cliques
and hierarchies around the bbs's. rumors definitely spread about some people. things were said. people were crank called.

but at the same time you could put something like your address on a piece of shareware, your home address, and not stress about it. back then, you would have to invest in at least one map to find someone, and know how to read a map.

since everyone dialed in locally for the most part, we'd get together at the pizza place every month, what was called a user meet, but everyone called affectionately the 'loser meet'. everyone kind of has an idea of who everyone is before seeing them. you didn't really have much digital photography then, just scanners, which were expensive throughout the 80's, or at least to my pre-teen mind they were. but you'd have quite a few outcasts. but we kind of developed a network of friends that was cool because we met people at other schools that we wouldn't have come across. anyhow, that was one of the great things about bbs's, imho, was the forced locality, and something that seems hard to recreate in today's world unless the satellites fall from the sky and we have to use our landlines again.

---
þ Synchronet þ \1yF\1mU\1cT\1wU\1rR\1gELand : \1w find us through www.grudgemirror.com or grudg

Re: Thanks
By: Vistascan to Nightfox on Sun Mar 16 2014 02:36:39

Thanks. I'll check out the links you gave. I think, from the impression
I get, that the BBS and the internet in general back then was a more "elite" place, mostly for the people now called "geeks". Using the net
was more difficult and only a certain type of people, usually introverts got on.

I think that's true. Back then, some of the popular computers (IBM PC compatibles, for instance) didn't come with Windows installed, and many people used DOS (command-line OS), which on the surface is more complicated to use for many people than Windows. Also, much fewer people used computers in general. So, computers was more of a niche hobby back then - Used by fewer people, more for fun; so, most computer users back in the day were fairly technically proficient with them (unless, of course, they were just starting out in using computers).

Also, I feel like it was a more understanding community and
there were less hostile people around. Is this accurate, or am I off
base?

I'm not sure if that's necessarily true.. I think there were always flame wars that popped up in the message boards. I've heard that people tended to argue a lot on the FidoNet network (although I personally hadn't seen much of that). I've heard that due to that, some people started to refer to FidoNet as "Fight-O-Net".

Nightfox

---
þ Synchronet þ Digital Distortion BBS - digitaldistortionbbs.com

Re: Thanks
By: LaRRy LaGoMoRpH to Vistascan on Sun Mar 16 2014 02:29:45

since everyone dialed in locally for the most part, we'd get together at the pizza place every month, what was called a user meet, but everyone called affectionately the 'loser meet'. everyone kind of has an idea of who everyone is before seeing them. you didn't really have much digital photography then, just scanners, which were expensive throughout the
80's, or at least to my pre-teen mind they were. but you'd have quite a few outcasts. but we kind of developed a network of friends that was
cool because we met people at other schools that we wouldn't have come across. anyhow, that was one of the great things about bbs's, imho, was the forced locality, and something that seems hard to recreate in
today's world unless the satellites fall from the sky and we have to use our landlines again.

Although I never went to a BBS user meet, I do miss those days of forced locality. I think the closest way we could do that today would be forum web sites that have sections for regional users - but I still don't think that's quite the same.

Nightfox

---
þ Synchronet þ Digital Distortion BBS - digitaldistortionbbs.com

On 03-16-14, LaRRy LaGoMoRpH said the following...

i was a teen in the bay area and they had free computer magazines by the newspapers where there would be a list of about 2 pages of BBS's, basically classified ads. it was a way for ordinary people to run
online systems when things like AOL, compuserve, and prodigy were
typical.

when i was a kid i spent a lot of time on one bbs that had 8 lines and ranthe major bbs software by worldcomm i believe. good times. i was a cosysop of that board, so i got free time, but the idea was you'd pay
for access as well. might seem absurd now, but if you had to pay another phone bill for each simultaneous user of your website for instance,
you'd get the idea.|

I also lived in the bay area (I'm assuming the S.F. Bay area?) about that and also frequented a few MajorBBS boards in that area. What one are you
referring to. I would have to say tho, that the ones I frequented did not really cater to underage callers. It was called Inferno.

Oh Crap! I just went and looked at old BBS lists on textfiles.com. Too many memories flooding back at me.... nnooo... NOOOO!!!!

--- Mystic BBS v1.10 A38 (Linux)
* Origin: Cyberia BBS | Cyberia.Darktech.Org | Kingwood, TX

Re: Thanks
By: LaRRy LaGoMoRpH to Vistascan on Sun Mar 16 2014 02:29 am

anyhow, that was one of the great things about bbs's, imho, was the forced locality, and something that seems hard to recreate in today's world unless the satellites fall from the sky and we have to use our landlines again.

That was a big reason I wanted to stress the fact that I was in Washington, DC in my board's name. I wanted someone to see it on a list and say "Oh cool, that

board is in DC..." I was just explainign this very concept to be BF who never called boards - his only point of reference is web-based forums, etc... I thinkI referent to is as 'expected locality' hehe.

-nolageek


---
þ Synchronet þ Capitol Shrill BBS - Washington, DC - capitolshrill.com

Re: Re: Tell me about BBS
By: Gryphon to LaRRy LaGoMoRpH on Sun Mar 16 2014 04:52 pm

I also lived in the bay area (I'm assuming the S.F. Bay area?) about that and also frequented a few MajorBBS boards in that area. What one are you referring to. I would have to say tho, that the ones I frequented did not really cater to underage callers. It was called Inferno.

I remember the Inferno, run by Awesomebill if I recall. It was the first BBS I called IIRC and Awesomebill became my first enemy by banning me from his board. I don't know how long I lasted on the inferno, maybe a few weeks. Inferno had like 16 lines if I recall. I've got a user on my bbs that used to be on the inferno big time, i think his name on there was budman.

i eventually found Infodude, which had a modest 4 lines at the time, and directed people there, and i was the macintosh cosysop so i got free time and power. eventually we got to 8 lines. infodude was run by the manager of the computer attic super store on el camino, which imho, was the coolest computer store in the area (in redwood city, i think it's now a ferrari dealership or something by where mel's bowl used to be). anyhow, when you dropped by the computer store, you could also chat with the sysop and get treated pretty well for a punk ass kid messing with expensive computers after you rode up on your bike. good times. eventually infodude had to end, it was too expensive to have 8 phone lines and get kids to scrape their money together to pay, especially once they turn 16 and wind up with vehicles.

however, there still was kewl bbs in san carlos i might call, i'd say infodude users and kewl users had some similarities. inferno came first, then infodude, then kewl if i recall. I think kewl bbs was up until last year even (hopefully she went down gracefully). but i'd call kewl when infodude's lines got busy, although i was pretty good at making redial scripts to try to get in when the busy signal went away.

it's funny now that we can take all these users at the same time without the constraint of phone lines, how hard it is to get above a minor threshold of simultaneous users at any given time on any given bbs. one day though...

---
þ Synchronet þ \1yF\1mU\1cT\1wU\1rR\1gELand : \1w find us through www.grudgemirror.com or grudg

On 03-17-14, LaRRy LaGoMoRpH said the following...

Re: Re: Tell me about BBS
By: Gryphon to LaRRy LaGoMoRpH on Sun Mar 16 2014 04:52 pm

I also lived in the bay area (I'm assuming the S.F. Bay area?) about and also frequented a few MajorBBS boards in that area. What one ar referring to. I would have to say tho, that the ones I frequented d really cater to underage callers. It was called Inferno.

I remember the Inferno, run by Awesomebill if I recall. It was the
first BBS I called IIRC and Awesomebill became my first enemy by banning me from his board. I don't know how long I lasted on the inferno, maybe
a few weeks. Inferno had like 16 lines if I recall. I've got a user on my bbs that used to be on the inferno big time, i think his name on
there was budman.

I seem to remember the handles awesomebill and budman, so sure, I think I remember them. If you still have contact with budman, ask him if he
remembers Bitbox, or Masque. I used both of those handles back then, and I don't remember which one I used there.

i eventually found Infodude, which had a modest 4 lines at the time, and directed people there, and i was the macintosh cosysop so i got free
time and power. eventually we got to 8 lines. infodude was run by the manager of the computer attic super store on el camino, which imho, was the coolest computer store in the area (in redwood city, i think it's
now a ferrari dealership or something by where mel's bowl used to be). anyhow, when you dropped by the computer store, you could also chat with the sysop and get treated pretty well for a punk ass kid messing with expensive computers after you rode up on your bike. good times. eventually infodude had to end, it was too expensive to have 8 phone
lines and get kids to scrape their money together to pay, especially
once they turn 16 and wind up with vehicles.

however, there still was kewl bbs in san carlos i might call, i'd say infodude users and kewl users had some similarities. inferno came
first, then infodude, then kewl if i recall. I think kewl bbs was up until last year even (hopefully she went down gracefully). but i'd call kewl when infodude's lines got busy, although i was pretty good at
making redial scripts to try to get in when the busy signal went away.

I remember one other majorbbs board that I would call. It was called Virtual Pleasures, and it might have been hosted out of the east bay. I was in san jose but I think they had local 408 numbers to call in to. I was much older than most of the kiddies at the time, so this VP board was much more to my liking. I got my GF at that time (later she was my wife) to join VP, and we hooked up with some people there who became friends. My (then) wife and I
have since split up, but those friends are still around.

--- Mystic BBS v1.10 A38 (Linux)
* Origin: Cyberia BBS | Cyberia.Darktech.Org | Kingwo

Re: Re: Tell me about BBS
By: Kirkman to Vistascan on Sat Mar 15 2014 09:54 pm

I have started a collection of BBS-related podcast episodes. I haven't "announced" it yet, because there are still a few loose ends to tie up. But you may want to give some of these podcasts a listen:

that's a great collection. now if we could only change the name from 'podcasts' to something else. i always thought it was a stupid word for it.
---
þ Synchronet þ ::: BBSES.info - free BBS services :::

Re: Tell me about BBS
By: LaRRy LaGoMoRpH to Vistascan on Sun Mar 16 2014 02:05 am

newspapers where there would be a list of about 2 pages of BBS's, basically classified ads. it was a way for ordinary people to run online systems

if someone could only scan their copies of boardwatch.
that would be a great bbs treasure.

jason scott has them in his shipping crate but refuses to mess with the
stuff in there anymore. he's too busy growing weird facial hair, buying dumb tophats and wearing angel wings.
---
þ Synchronet þ ::: BBSES.info - free BBS services :::

if someone could only scan their copies of boardwatch.
that would be a great bbs treasure.

I definitely want to see Boardwatch digitized.

jason scott has them in his shipping crate but refuses to mess with the stuff in there anymore. he's too busy growing weird facial hair, buying
dumb tophats and wearing angel wings.

I know you don't like him, but he's been up to a lot more than you give him credit for: the JSMESS in-browser 8-bit emulator, terabytes of software and magazines added to the Internet Archive, etc, etc.

--Josh

////--------------------------------------------------
BiC -=- http://breakintochat.com -=- bbs wiki and blog

---
þ Synchronet

that's a great collection. now if we could only change the name from 'podcasts' to something else. i always thought it was a stupid word for it.

Thanks! If you (or anyone) know of other episodes that would be worth adding, give me a holler.

I just got the final permission I was waiting for, so I'm probably going to starting sharing this collection on Monday.

--Josh

////--------------------------------------------------
BiC -=- http://breakintochat.com -=- bbs wiki and blog

---
þ Synchronet

Re: Re: Tell me about BBS
By: Kirkman to Mro on Sat Mar 22 2014 04:56 pm

I know you don't like him, but he's been up to a lot more than you give him credit for: the JSMESS in-browser 8-bit emulator, terabytes of software and magazines added to the Internet Archive, etc, etc.

well, i dont know the guy, so i cant really like him or dislike him.
okay, i take that back. i think he's fucking ridiculious.

i'm not a fan of his kickstarters. but maybe i'm jealous.

he also takes a lot of credit for other people's work. most of textfiles.com is from other people's collections that are still avaliable online.
AND, is he really adding all that to the internet archive or is it teams of people? he has said in his blog that he had a disabled guy scanning stuff in for him.

the only person reporting on his work at archive.org is him, so who knows. i do recall him saying that he doesnt have full time hours there.

also i hate getlamp!

regarding jsmess, it's a port of the mess project. that type of stuff has been ported to the web before.AND, he's just one name of many people. if i remember correctly, he is not a programmer. his duties might just be to go around and get contributers [coders and money] and promote it. which is better than nothing.

But seriously, i would love to see all the boardwatches scanned.
i talked to him and he said he had them all, but he didnt have time to do it. That was like over 6 years ago, and a couple of times a year i post on his blog or whatever about it and it gets unanswered. i was even going to put a cash deposit down to ensure that i would return the mags after scanning. they're good stuff.


those boardwatch mags are a piece of history and the couple of them that i
have were enjoyable to look at.
---
þ Synchronet þ ::: BBSES.info - free BBS services :::

Re: Re: Tell me about BBS
By: Mro to Kirkman on Sat Mar 22 2014 07:36 pm

Re: Re: Tell me about BBS
By: Kirkman to Mro on Sat Mar 22 2014 04:56 pm

I know you don't like him, but he's been up to a lot more than you give h credit for: the JSMESS in-browser 8-bit emulator, terabytes of software a magazines added to the Internet Archive, etc, etc.

well, i dont know the guy, so i cant really like him or dislike him.
okay, i take that back. i think he's fucking ridiculios

Well, reading Scott's TextFiles site is what got me into BBS, so that's one thing that's good. I didn't know he was still active, though. Are there
others like him trying to keep the older era of the internet and BBS alive or at least archived somewhere?



---
þ Synchronet þ SiliconUnderground - siliconu.synchro.net - Syracuse, Ny

Re: Re: Tell me about BBS
By: Mro to Kirkman on Sat Mar 22 2014 01:40 pm

that's a great collection. now if we could only change the name from 'podcasts' to something else. i always thought it was a stupid word for it.

I agree. I still refer to non-streaming audio content on the Internet by its original name, webcasts.

---
þ Synchronet þ Sent from The Lillypad BBS - lillypad.synchro.net:2323

Re: Jason Scott
By: Vistascan to Kirkman on Sun Mar 23 2014 12:21 am

thing that's good. I didn't know he was still active, though. Are there others like him trying to keep the older era of the internet and BBS alive or at least archived somewhere?

He's not really trying to keep the older era of the internet and bbs alive. that's kind of wishy washy.

and like i said, most of his sources for textfiles and programs are still on the internet. they are rarely credited, though.

what 'jason scott' is good at is organizing it all. a lot of these people didnt really have what it takes to make things presentable and easy to access by everyone.
---
þ Synchronet þ ::: BBSES.info - free BBS services :::

Re: Tell me about BBS
By: Vistascan to All on Sat Mar 15 2014 04:56 am

Thanks for the warm welcome, everybody. I definitely plan to stick around.

So I have looked up certain sites describing what BBS is and they weren't very clear, though they were very nostalgic. They mentioned that there were shareware, articles etc. shared on the BBS which they said was like an actual bulletin board, only digital.

But this kind of left the whole issue vague, so I was hoping you guys could tell me what BBS is from a more personal point of view.

Thanks.

Nice question Vistascan!

Imagine a time when things weren't connected. The Internet didn't really exist (to most people), and home computers were more of a hobby than a necessity. If you wanted to meet people, you met them through school, a coffee shop, a library, or a sport.

You'd hear about local activities from the local newspaper, or the local bulletin boards at the schools, libraries and coffee shops.

Now, you hear about this thing called an eletronic bulletin board system (BBS), and you hook up your noisy modem and dial the number with your computer. A menu shows up telling you that it is a local bulletin board for your area. You create an account and find out there are several other people logged in from your county.

It offers chat, so you can get to know the user you keep seeing logged in. So you invite him or her to the chat room. You find out you have a lot in common!

Then you play some door games, usually in a turn-by-turn fashion, which encouraged people to login multiple times a day to see the progress.

And then, you spent 20 minutes browsing the message boards. Oh neat, there are people from BBSes all over the world! Now you're learning about politics of Norway.

Before you log off, you decide to download a few text files from the file board. One file teaches you about how to find other BBSes. Another has detailed instructions on how to knit. Another one details the reallife experiences of a person's UFO sighting. Erie stuff!

Later, you get so hooked on the message boards that you download the messages in bulk with a QWK reader. That allows you to read the messages one by one in a n easy to use local program and reply offline. Later you reconnect and upload your replies.

For me it was a magical time in my life. Because it opened up the doors beyond my little neighborhood, into neighboring cities and eventually BBSes all over the United States. Once the Internet came around, getting realtime access to people all over the world was next. But BBSes offered a lively local community of people that were often likeminded.

I'm not sure I did such a good job giving you the feeling of the experience. Perhaps I will write more about it later.

Cheers, and welcome to the scene again,
Knight

---
þ Synchronet þ The Phunc BBS -- Back from the dead!

Re: Thanks
By: Vistascan to Nightfox on Sun Mar 16 2014 02:36 am

Re: Tell me about BBS
By: Nightfox to Vistascan on Sat Mar 15 2014 08:55 am

Back in the day, when BBSes were the main way to be online, it was an interesting time. I think one of the biggest differences between then an

d

today is that most people today have internet connections that are always connected; but back then, you couldn't always be connected to a BBS, for several reasons: BBSes had a small number of phone lines (many had only o

ne

line), so sometimes you couldn't get in to your favorite BBSes because ot

her

users were already logged on. Typically you had to set up your software

to

repeatedly dial in for a while until it got connected. However, I think

it

pretty cool to be able to see many different BBSes with their own look &

fee

and interact with a local group of users.

Thanks. I'll check out the links you gave. I think, from the impression I get, that the BBS and the internet in general back then was a more "elite" place, mostly for the people now called "geeks". Using the net was more difficult and only a certain type of people, usually introverts got on. Also

,

I feel like it was a more understanding community and there were less hostil

e

people around. Is this accurate, or am I off base?

That's interesting. Yes, there were definitely a higher concentration of people who were more technically inclined, mainly because you needed to know what a computer was and how to use one in order to get onto BBSes. A lot of young people got on BBSes because computers were less threatening to young people to learn.

But there were a lot of scientists, business men, and children of parents who knew technology that got onto BBSes. I often ran into people with very limited BBS and computer experience, who were really curious about what this BBS thing they kept hearing about.

There were also a lot of "underground" BBSes... places for people in various subcultures who wanted to connect. Some of these dealt in pirated software, some in pornography, and others were more into strange topics and geekery. It really allowed people to push the boundaries of Freedom of Speech. And it still does to this day.

Knight

---
þ Synchronet þ The Phunc BBS -- Back from the dead!

Re: Tell me about BBS
By: LaRRy LaGoMoRpH to Vistascan on Sun Mar 16 2014 02:05 am

Re: Tell me about BBS
By: Vistascan to All on Sat Mar 15 2014 04:56 am

i was a teen in the bay area and they had free computer magazines by the newspapers where there would be a list of about 2 pages of BBS's, basically classified ads. it was a way for ordinary people to run online systems when things like AOL, compuserve, and prodigy were typical.

you would run a terminal program back in the day, and you would enter a comm

and

that would tell your modem what number to dial and what parameters to type. since this was back when phone calls to certain distances for free. from pa

lo

alto you could to like mountain view to redwood city all the time for free, other times it depended on the hour. anyhow, these things are irrelevant mostly probably these days.

i remember when i first saw a web browser in maybe 1992 i thought it was pre

tty

silly the concept of linking documents. the idea of putting images in there was beyond the bandwith of any mortal at that time. 14.4KbPs was awesome. while some BBS's had GUI's, usually they required a special client.

when i was a kid i spent a lot of time on one bbs that had 8 lines and ran t

he

major bbs software by worldcomm i believe. good times. i was a cosysop of that board, so i got free time, but the idea was you'd pay for access as wel

l.

might seem absurd now, but if you had to pay another phone bill for each simultaneous user of your website for instance, you'd get the idea.|

but bbs's can be much more. i just started up a board recently and it's doi

ng

all sorts of things that weren't remotely possible back then. maybe it's a

bit

nostalgia, but i also think you can make some really cool functional things with it if you're creative.

Those free magazines and newspapers were awesome here in the Bay Area! I use to get them near the train stations. They sure did have a large circulation!

I even use to write articles for West Coast Online magazine.

Yeah, some BBSes had a GUI using "RIP" --- It was a way to let the BBS do both terminal and graphical interfaces at the same time. It never really caught on that much unfortunately.

Which BBS was that in the Bay Area that ran Major BBS that you co-sysoped. Was it California Online? Tele-Arena and the chat link was so fun there.

Knight

---
þ Synchronet þ The Phunc BBS -- Back from the dead!

Re: Thanks
By: LaRRy LaGoMoRpH to Vistascan on Sun Mar 16 2014 02:29 am

Re: Thanks
By: Vistascan to Nightfox on Sun Mar 16 2014 02:36 am

Thanks. I'll check out the links you gave. I think, from the impression

I

get, that the BBS and the internet in general back then was a more "eli

te"

place, mostly for the people now called "geeks". Using the net was more difficult and only a certain type of people, usually introverts got on. Also, I feel like it was a more understanding community and there were less hostile people around. Is this accurate, or am I off base?

well, you had to sit down and front of a computer and experience a BBS. no

one

was on cell phones texting people. but there were definitely some cliques and hierarchies around the bbs's. rumors definitely spread about some peopl

e.

things were said. people were crank called.

but at the same time you could put something like your address on a piece of shareware, your home address, and not stress about it. back then, you would have to invest in at least one map to find someone, and know how to read a m

ap.

since everyone dialed in locally for the most part, we'd get together at the pizza place every month, what was called a user meet, but everyone called affectionately the 'loser meet'. everyone kind of has an idea of who everyo

ne

is before seeing them. you didn't really have much digital photography then

,

just scanners, which were expensive throughout the 80's, or at least to my pre-teen mind they were. but you'd have quite a few outcasts. but we kind

of

developed a network of friends that was cool because we met people at other schools that we wouldn't have come across. anyhow, that was one of the grea

t

things about bbs's, imho, was the forced locality, and something that seems hard to recreate in today's world unless the satellites fall from the sky an

d

we have to use our landlines again.

I agree! It is so hard to recreate that sense of community on the Internet. BBSes were a great way to make locality. I would like to see that happen again, somehow.


---
þ Synchronet þ The Phunc BBS -- Back from the dead!

Re: Thanks
By: nolageek to LaRRy LaGoMoRpH on Sun Mar 16 2014 04:54 pm

Re: Thanks
By: LaRRy LaGoMoRpH to Vistascan on Sun Mar 16 2014 02:29 am

anyhow, that was one of the great things about bbs's, imho, was the for

ced

locality, and something that seems hard to recreate in today's world unless the satellites fall from the sky and we have to use our landline

s

again.

That was a big reason I wanted to stress the fact that I was in Washington,

DC

in my board's name. I wanted someone to see it on a list and say "Oh cool, t

hat

board is in DC..." I was just explainign this very concept to be BF who ne

ver

called boards - his only point of reference is web-based forums, etc... I thinkI referent to is as 'expected locality' hehe.

-nolageek

Exactly! There was something magical about seeing a BBS in a list in some far away state, and then you getting up the nerve to call it long distance, potentially angering your parents later when they saw the phone bill (I was a teenager then).

And then you'd connect and the BBS introduction banner made in pretty console graphics using ASCII/ANSI might show a farm, giving you a hint at where the BBS was in some rural area. It really let your imagination run wild. Most kids didn't get to travel to places outside of their city back then (I think people are becoming more well traveled these days; I take my kids everywhere for instance).


---
þ Synchronet þ The Phunc BBS -- Back from the dead!

Re: Re: Tell me about BBS
By: LaRRy LaGoMoRpH to Gryphon on Sun Mar 16 2014 07:37 pm

Re: Re: Tell me about BBS
By: Gryphon to LaRRy LaGoMoRpH on Sun Mar 16 2014 04:52 pm

I also lived in the bay area (I'm assuming the S.F. Bay area?) about th

at

and also frequented a few MajorBBS boards in that area. What one are y

ou

referring to. I would have to say tho, that the ones I frequented did

not

really cater to underage callers. It was called Inferno.

I remember the Inferno, run by Awesomebill if I recall. It was the first BB

S I

called IIRC and Awesomebill became my first enemy by banning me from his boa

rd.

I don't know how long I lasted on the inferno, maybe a few weeks. Inferno h

ad

like 16 lines if I recall. I've got a user on my bbs that used to be on the inferno big time, i think his name on there was budman.

i eventually found Infodude, which had a modest 4 lines at the time, and directed people there, and i was the macintosh cosysop so i got free time an

d

power. eventually we got to 8 lines. infodude was run by the manager of th

e

computer attic super store on el camino, which imho, was the coolest compute

r

store in the area (in redwood city, i think it's now a ferrari dealership or something by where mel's bowl used to be). anyhow, when you dropped by the computer store, you could also chat with the sysop and get treated pretty we

ll

for a punk ass kid messing with expensive computers after you rode up on you

r

bike. good times. eventually infodude had to end, it was too expensive to have 8 phone lines and get kids to scrape their money together to pay, especially once they turn 16 and wind up with vehicles.

however, there still was kewl bbs in san carlos i might call, i'd say infodu

de

users and kewl users had some similarities. inferno came first, then infodu

de,

then kewl if i recall. I think kewl bbs was up until last year even (hopefu

lly

she went down gracefully). but i'd call kewl when infodude's lines got busy

,

although i was pretty good at making redial scripts to try to get in when th

e

busy signal went away.

it's funny now that we can take all these users at the same time without the constraint of phone lines, how hard it is to get above a minor threshold of simultaneous users at any given time on any given bbs. one day though...

There was definitely some excitement just exploring your favorite BBSes every day. You'd rush home from school to login and see if you were kicking ass on LoRD. By 7PM, all the boards lines were busy, so you'd have to cycle through them all using your terminal client, which could sometimes be programmed to cycle the calling automatically for you and make a sound when you connected to one successfully.

InfoDude was busy, so you'd call Kewl, and then you'd call the local library (to search their index), and then you'd call a LD bbs to quickly download a QWK packet (so the call was short and you would save money). And then maybe connect to one of the NirvanaNet nodes to read about some underground stuff (half of hich would get you on some FBI list now).

It was like exploring caves from the comfort of your chair.

And later, you'd print out files you downloaded, on your dot matrix printer. Those were such loud printers. But you got excited by reading long books printed on the paper which each sheet was connected to the next (they were perforated, and you had to tear off the sides and each page to the other).

Yeah, that store in redwood city sold mac clones! I remember browsing them, and chatting with the sysop.

For a while I only had a single dedicated phone line for my BBS, so I'd have to take it down so I could connect to all the other Bay Area bbses. Later I made it a 2-line bbs, so people could still connect to it while I was connecting to others. That was all kind of expensive for a teenager, and I was always jealous of the other boards that had subscriptions from users and could afford more lines, modems, and better computer hardware. My BBS was always free.

---
þ Synchronet þ The Phunc BBS -- Back from the dead!

Re: Thanks
By: Knight to LaRRy LaGoMoRpH on Sun Apr 13 2014 00:26:01

I agree! It is so hard to recreate that sense of community on the Internet. BBSes were a great way to make locality. I would like to see that happen again, somehow.

I've given thought to possible adding a home phone line for my BBS so that people with dialup modems can call in.. But then, I'm not sure if there would be enough dialup users to justify the cost of the phone line. However, it might be interesting if adding phone lines could bring back some sense of locality due to local phone calls being free vs. long distance calls costing money.

Nightfox

---
þ Synchronet þ Digital Distortion BBS - digitaldistortionbbs.com

Re: Tell me about BBS
By: Knight to LaRRy LaGoMoRpH on Sun Apr 13 2014 12:24 am

Which BBS was that in the Bay Area that ran Major BBS that you co-sysoped. Was it California Online? Tele-Arena and the chat link was so fun there. Knight

hehe, it was Infodude, you was there!

---
þ Synchronet þ telnet to utureland.grudgemirror.com and check out our website for a sneak pre

Re: Tell me about BBS
By: Knight to Vistascan on Sun Apr 13 2014 00:17:32

For me it was a magical time in my life. Because it opened up the doors
my little neighborhood, into neighboring cities and eventually BBSes al
the United States. Once the Internet came around, getting realtime acc people all over the world was next. But BBSes offered a lively local co
of people that were often likeminded.

I'm not sure I did such a good job giving you the feeling of the experi Perhaps I will write more about it later.

Man you hit the nail right on the head with everything you said
there. :) That was a pleasure to read, please do write more. :)

-- guh up the effbomb down wif yr bad self


---
þ Synchronet þ Tinfoil Tetrahedron BBS telnet://bismaninfo.hopto.org:8023/ 1:282/1057

Re: Thanks
By: Knight to Vistascan on Sun Apr 13 2014 00:21:46

There were also a lot of "underground" BBSes... places for people in var subcultures who wanted to connect. Some of these dealt in pirated softwa some in pornography, and others were more into strange topics and geeker really allowed people to push the boundaries of Freedom of Speech. And i does to this day.

Hell yeah. The esoteric information is a goldmine, and it should
be known by every man, woman, and child on this planet by the time they're
old enough to comprehend it.

-- guh up the effbomb down wif yr bad self


---
þ Synchronet þ Tinfoil Tetrahedron BBS telnet://bismaninfo.hopto.org:8023/ 1:282/1057

Re: Thanks
By: Nightfox to Knight on Sat Apr 12 2014 11:05 pm

Re: Thanks
By: Knight to LaRRy LaGoMoRpH on Sun Apr 13 2014 00:26:01

I agree! It is so hard to recreate that sense of community on the Internet. BBSes were a great way to make locality. I would like to see that happen again, somehow.

I've given thought to possible adding a home phone line for my BBS so that people with dialup modems can call in.. But then, I'm not sure if there wou

ld

be enough dialup users to justify the cost of the phone line. However, it might be interesting if adding phone lines could bring back some sense of locality due to local phone calls being free vs. long distance calls costing money.

Nightfox

It is crazy what synchronicity occurs with fellow BBSers. I was thinking about that very thing before I just read your message.

I was considering the idea of terminating voip lines (SIP) on the BBS server and attaching some virtual modems to it. Some Google searching really quick didn't help much. But I know it's possible. I've made modem calls over VoIP in the past (although I guess there is some problems getting two modems to handshake properly when both ends are VoIP).

But getting the VoIP to terminate on the BBS itself and then attach a virtual modem is going to be a challenge. If we can get past that, then VoIP lines are *cheap*. In bulk we could get it for less than $5/mo each line (perhaps having an Asterisk PBX setup centrally to support all of our BBSes).

Granted, this doesn't help in a SHTF scenario, but it would allow us to setup cheap dialin lines.

Knight

---
þ Synchronet þ The Phunc BBS -- Back from the dead!

Re: Tell me about BBS
By: LaRRy LaGoMoRpH to Knight on Sat Apr 12 2014 09:59 pm

Re: Tell me about BBS
By: Knight to LaRRy LaGoMoRpH on Sun Apr 13 2014 12:24 am

Which BBS was that in the Bay Area that ran Major BBS that you co-sysop

ed.

Was it California Online? Tele-Arena and the chat link was so fun there

.

Knight

hehe, it was Infodude, you was there!

I was there! You is right!

---
þ Synchronet þ The Phunc BBS -- Back from the dead!

Re: Thanks
By: Nightfox to Knight on Sat Apr 12 2014 23:05:20


So I added a ringmate number to my home phone for my BBS. The USR Courier is set to detect that and answers when that pattern rings. I don't actually use my home phone for anything, simply have it as part of my internet/tv/phone package from Verizon. So it works out well.

That being said... I get about 4 - 10 calls on the dialin each week. Usually the same few handful of users that most of the time use a VoIP phone jack service to make the long distance call at VoIP rates. What's spiffy is most of the calls come in around 22k - 26kbps which I didn't think was really possible over VoIP.

--Chris

I've given thought to possible adding a home phone line for my BBS so that people with dialup modems can call in.. But then, I'm not sure if there wou be enough dialup users to justify the cost of the phone line. However, it might be interesting if adding phone lines could bring back some sense of locality due to local phone calls being free vs. long distance calls costing

------------------------------------------
| Chris Trainor - FleetHQ BBS
| telnet://bbs.fleethq.org
| http://www.facebook.com/FleetHQ
| +1-401-949-0465 (V.34/HST/CrankyAtTimes) ------------------------------------------

---
þ Synchronet þ FleetHQ BBS - Greenville, RI

For me it was a magical time in my life. Because it opened up the doors beyond mylittle neighborhood, into neighboring cities and eventually
BBSes all over the United States. Once the Internet came around, getting realtime access to people all over the world was next. But BBSes offered
a lively local community of people that were often likeminded.

O.k. Time for honesty... For myself, I really didn't get along with the kids in my school, nor did I have any desire to. Most where dope heads, and had serious behavior problems. I really didn't spend much time outside,
except when I'd ride my bike. To be honest, I'm lucky riding my bike didn't get me killed! I'd often drive through streets without stopping at intersections, and in fact many times my brakes got messed up so bad, I'd
just disconnect the brakes. But beyond that, I often stayed in my room, on
the computer. When in school, I'd stay up late at night on the computer, talking to guys older than me. Some would let me into their porn sections, despite my being under-age. I got interested in how a BBS runs, so I downloaded various BBS packages and ended up starting my own BBS. I soon discovered that most of my users would call and attempt to chat with me,
spend all their time chatting, logoff and find another sysop to chat with! Especially young girls. There was a young kid that I got quite attached to. His dad was into ham radio, and he had a Mac. He wanted to run a BBS so
badly, but macintosh BBS software was expensive and not very friendly. And, when your the only mac in town, it's hard to find someone to help you out! Every so often, I'd call long distance, and if I found something about a mac, I'd download it and pass it along to him...

---
John Guillory [KF5QEO]
westlakegeek@yahoo.com
KF5QEO@1:396/60

Re: Thanks
By: Chris Trainor to Nightfox on Thu Apr 24 2014 02:26 pm

So I added a ringmate number to my home phone for my BBS. The USR
Courier is set to detect that and answers when that pattern rings. I don't actually use my home phone for anything, simply have it as part of my internet/tv/phone package from Verizon. So it works out well.

What's a ringmate number?

That being said... I get about 4 - 10 calls on the dialin each week. Usually the same few handful of users that most of the time use a VoIP phone jack service to make the long distance call at VoIP rates. What's spiffy is most of the calls come in around 22k - 26kbps which I didn't think was really possible over VoIP.

That's great, not a bad number of calls considering the state of the scene.

I've actually had 56kbps connections over VoIP in the past, when only my end was VoIP. Having both ends on VoIP often introduces so much latency that makes modem sync very error prone.

My main motivation for wanting VoIP terminated BBS lines is because I run my
my BBS on a server hosted in a server farm I have no access to. I couldn't have a landline on it if I wanted, nor can I use any custom hardware. I know the option are limited. But, I know that Asterisk and other PBX software has
the potential to do it, but I've never found a reliable solution.

The fact that people no longer need dialup modems reduces the demand for such a solution, so no one has really mastered it. I keep hoping for some smart guy to come along and see it as a fun hobby project and develop a killer solution. Knight

---
þ Synchronet þ The Phunc BBS -- Back from the dead! -- telnet to bbs.phunc.com

Re: Tell me about BBS
By: Vistascan to All on Sat Mar 15 2014 01:56 am

Thanks for the warm welcome, everybody. I definitely plan to stick around.

So I have looked up certain sites describing what BBS is and they weren't very clear, though they were very nostalgic. They mentioned that there were shareware, articles etc. shared on the BBS which they said was like an actual bulletin board, only digital.

But this kind of left the whole issue vague, so I was hoping you guys could tell me what BBS is from a more personal point of view.

Thanks.

The BBS that can be explained is not the true BBS. You must experience it to understand it. Nah, I'm just being pretentious and paraphrasing the Tao Te Ching by Lao Tzu.
For me it was especially exciting in the context in which I first experienced it. I was 15 and we had no money for America Online or CompuServe or whatever and then someone gave me the number for a local bbs. It opened a whole world
to me that was so mysterious and alluring. Before you had facebook and google you would ask questions on the message boards and pore over endless .txt files to answer random queries.
The sysops (people who run the bbs) were likely to thank you personally for frequenting their bbs and people respected each other a tad more on the message boards since we appreciated having someone to talk to online. Keep in mind that the year was around 1994, which is not the "golden age" of the bbs. It was starting to wane around the time I got into it. Because of that and the fact
I loved it so much it was a poignant thing, discovering and using a bbs.

---
þ Synchronet þ The Phunc BBS -- Back from the dead! -- telnet to bbs.phunc.com

Re: Tell me about BBS
By: Notyetfood to Vistascan on Mon Jul 14 2014 07:34 pm

The sysops (people who run the bbs) were likely to thank you personally for
frequenting their bbs and people respected each other a tad more on the message
boards since we appreciated having someone to talk to online. Keep in mind that
the year was around 1994, which is not the "golden age" of the bbs. It was starting to wane around the time I got into it. Because of that and the fact I loved it so much it was a poignant thing, discovering and using a bbs.

Definitely a different era in computing.

You're mostly right. If you entered BBSes in 1994, that actually was the height of
BBSes. It was 95-96 that BBSes really started declining, as Windows 95 was becoming
widely adopted, more computers were shipped with internal mdoems, and people discovered the web.

For perspective, the inital release of Netscape was the last weeks of 1994, and
IE was initially released close to 1996. Nearly twenty years ago now...wow.


---
þ Synchronet þ Sovereign State BBS

Re: Re: Tell me about BBS
By: Greywolf to Vistascan on Tue Jul 15 2014 04:18 am

BBSes are a niche hobby among most of us now. I run mine on an old desktop sitting on my desk. And that's how most of our systems are. And while it may not have pictures and fancy graphic web-pages (like my generation does, being 16) we still have fun. So with that, I'd like to welcome you to DOVE-net and I hope you have fun.
May the Terminal Live Forever,
~Greywolf (Netsplit BBS)


---
þ Synchronet þ Netsplit - netsplitbbs.ddns.net

Re: Tell me about BBS
By: Dreamer to Notyetfood on Mon Jul 14 2014 10:55 pm

I got online around '92 or '93 and BBSes were secondary for me. My primary connection was to the Prodigy service. I worked a second shift job at the time, so many nights I didn't get online until 1 or 2 AM. The Prodigy service would shutdown nightly between 3 and 4 AM. After I got disconencted from Prodigy is when I would dial-up to local BBSes.

Also remember when Win 95 came out it was bundled with the Microsoft Network. If memory serves they had a one month free trial. I do remember not liking it.

Anyways, when Prodigy started creating web sites for all their content is when I left that service for AOL. A lot of people were leaving Prodigy at that time anyway and their message boards and chat rooms turned into ghost towns.

I couldn't even tell you the BBSes I dialed in to 20 years ago. I doubt any of them are still around.

---
þ Synchronet þ Capitol Shrill BBS - Washington, DC - capitolshrill.com

I got online around '92 or '93 and BBSes were secondary for me. My primary connection was to the Prodigy service. I worked a second shift job at the time, so many nights I didn't get online until 1 or 2 AM. The Prodigy service would shutdown nightly between 3 and 4 AM. After I got disconencted from Prodigy is when I would dial-up to local BBSes.

Also remember when Win 95 came out it was bundled with the Microsoft Network. If memory serves they had a one month free trial. I do remember
not liking it.

Anyways, when Prodigy started creating web sites for all their content is when I left that service for AOL. A lot of people were leaving Prodigy at that time anyway and their message boards and chat rooms turned into ghost towns.

I couldn't even tell you the BBSes I dialed in to 20 years ago. I doubt any of them are still around.

It's interesting to hear peoples' stories from back in the day. BBSes were my primary connection back then, mainly because I was still young, had received
my computer & modem as a gift, and didn't have an income yet to pay for online services. I knew people who used Prodigy, AOL, CompuServe, etc. back then but never really used those myself.

Based on your message subject ("Tell me about BBS"), did you have a question about BBSes?

Nightfox

---
þ Synchronet þ Digital Distortion BBS - digitaldistortionbbs.com

Re: Re: Tell me about BBS
By: Greywolf to Vistascan on Tue Jul 15 2014 04:35 am

Re: Re: Tell me about BBS
By: Greywolf to Vistascan on Tue Jul 15 2014 04:18 am

BBSes are a niche hobby among most of us now. I run mine on an old desktop sitting on my desk. And that's how most of our systems are. And while it

not necessarily. this bbs here is running on a rented dedicated server.

And while it
may not have pictures and fancy graphic web-pages (like my generation does, being 16) we still have fun. So with that, I'd like to welcome you to

we have fancy web pages too

and html5 web clients.
---
þ Synchronet þ ::: BBSES.info - free BBS services :::

Re: Tell me about BBS
By: Notyetfood to Vistascan on Mon Jul 14 2014 19:34:04

The BBS that can be explained is not the true BBS. You must experience it to understand it. Nah, I'm just being pretentious and paraphrasing the Tao Te Ching by Lao Tzu.

I really should crack open my copy tonight. It's been like 5-10 years since I've read much of anything out of it. I could use some work on my pretention abilities. :)

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

This need not feel so strange; pay attention to Lady
Liberty's Anklets, if you're so inclined.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

---
þ Synchronet þ Tinfoil Tetrahedron BBS telnet or ssh: tinfoil.synchro.net

Re: Tell me about BBS
By: Nightfox to Vectorgamer on Tue Jul 15 2014 12:42 pm

For some reason the editor isn't quoted text in replies, so "no" I did not have a question about BBS.

One additional thing I remember was dialing-up to the Delphi service which at the time was the only *online service* that offered chat. Delphi had no GUI at the time and was text based navigation.

---
þ Synchronet þ Capitol Shrill BBS - Washington, DC - capitolshrill.com

Re: Tell me about BBS
By: Vectorgamer to Nightfox on Thu Jul 17 2014 11:21:30

For some reason the editor isn't quoted text in replies, so "no" I did
not have a question about BBS.

Not sure your sentence is clear, do you mean the editor isn't quoting messages? What editor are you using? Some editors let you choose which lines to quote, so if you don't select any lines, then it won't quote any part of the message you're replying to.

Nightfox

---
þ Synchronet þ Digital Distortion BBS - digitaldistortionbbs.com

Re: Tell me about BBS
By: Nightfox to Vectorgamer on Thu Jul 17 2014 05:54 pm

Whenever I use this particular BBS it never quotes messages I reply to. Don't know what the dealio is.

---
þ Synchronet þ Capitol Shrill BBS - Washington, DC - capitolshrill.com

Re: Tell me about BBS
By: Vectorgamer to Nightfox on Fri Jul 18 2014 21:50:01

Whenever I use this particular BBS it never quotes messages I reply to. Don't know what the dealio is.

Some message editors don't automatically quote the message you're replying to - They let you manually choose which part(s) of the message to quote. What message editor are you using?

Nightfox

---
þ Synchronet þ Digital Distortion BBS - digitaldistortionbbs.com

Re: Tell me about BBS
By: Nightfox to Vectorgamer on Fri Jul 18 2014 08:29 pm

Whatever Capitol Shrill BBS uses - says "SlyEdit v1.39"

---
þ Synchronet þ Capitol Shrill BBS - Washington, DC - capitolshrill.com

Re: Tell me about BBS
By: Vectorgamer to All on Sat Jul 19 2014 14:59:31

Whatever Capitol Shrill BBS uses - says "SlyEdit v1.39"

You can quote messages in SlyEdit by pressing Ctrl-Q, or by typing /q on a line by itself and pressing enter.

Nightfox

---
þ Synchronet þ Digital Distortion BBS - digitaldistortionbbs.com

Re: Tell me about BBS
By: Vectorgamer to All on Sat Jul 19 2014 02:59 pm

Hello Vector - you can quote with SlyEdit by pressing Control-Q, it will let you select the lines you want to quote, then you can press Esc to get back to the editing mode. :)

|01-|03nolageek


---
þ Synchronet þ Capitol Shrill BBS - Washington, DC - capitolshrill.com

Re: Tell me about BBS
By: Nightfox to Vectorgamer on Sun Jul 20 2014 08:47 am

You can quote messages in SlyEdit by pressing Ctrl-Q, or by typing /q on a line by itself and pressing enter.

Ah! Thanks


---
þ Synchronet þ Capitol Shrill BBS - Washington, DC - capitolshrill.com

Re: Tell me about BBS
By: Nightfox to Vectorgamer on Sun Jul 20 2014 08:47 am

or by typing /q on a
line by itself and pressing enter.

(testing)

I did not know that!


---
þ Synchronet þ realitycheckBBS -- http://realitycheckBBS.org

Thanks Bro :)

Nick

---
þ Synchronet þ THE-BBS - thebbsuk.ddns.net

Thanks for the nice letter Raven, I`d love to have a chat sometime, it would be fun!

Regards,
Nick

---
þ Synchronet þ THE-BBS - thebbsuk.ddns.net

Hey Nick,

Np any time im normaly on the bbs somewhere I saw u connect today

All the best :)

RaVeN

Thanks for the nice letter Raven, I`d love to have a chat sometime, it would
be
fun!

Regards,
Nick

---
þ Synchronet þ THE-BBS - thebbsuk.ddns.net

---
þ Synchronet þ MickyBay - mickybay.com

Re: Re: Jason Scott
By: Wolfy to Gryphon on Sun Jan 27 2013 11:32:19

Re: Re: Jason Scott
By: Gryphon to Wolfy on Sun Jan 27 2013 07:29:00

On 01-27-13, Wolfy said the following...

Perhaps it is time that those of us who don't have dialup nodes on ou BBS's start thinking about dusting off the modems we have stored in t attic :)

Don't forget about having to have muliple phone lines installed. I have phone lines. All my phones are mobile phones.

There are a lot of things that we have now that we didn't have back then, such as wifi. We also have packet radio.

One of my current projects is setting up a completely wireless network for m neighnourhood which is completely seperate from the internet. In the future, it would be nice to have a network that is completely free from government meddling and scrutiny. My little experiment is set to work but in the not to distant future, I want to expand its scope somewhat.

It's not a new concept. "Metropolitan Area Network". The "Internet" is simply many interconnected MAN's and WAN's.

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