Re: Geek Reminiscing

[Jeff Kidd <jeffkidd@mindspring.com>]

Hmmm.....  Lets see my mind can't go that far back...

How about Commodore 64 (original not the 64-C) with a 1541 disk drive,
tape drive, and a 300 baud Commodore modem.
I use to call PC Computers, ORC, North GA BBS, ComfyChair BBS...

The Old GCedunet 1-800 line.
The University of Georgia's 1-800 school of Ed. number...
The Hayes 1-800 BBS number.

Ascii Downloads, Kermit, Xmodem, Ymodem, Ymodem-G, Zmodem, Bimodem,
HyperModem, HSlink  ( I still have all of these on my PC)

zoo, lha, lhz, zip, arj  ( still have all of these compression tools..)

Fidonet, Wildnet, Usenet

PCboard BBS, TriBBS, Wildcat BBS

GCNeXT

SLMR, Nupop

Mike Murphy, Bobby, Dev


Just some thoughts for those that have traveled the long road with me...


Jeff Kidd
System Administrator
Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corp.
Macon, Ga



Robbie Honerkamp wrote:

> Everywhere you turn today people are shouting about the Internet
> and computers and how cool they are and how you have to have one.
> While in the timeline of the Internet I'm just a newbie
> (I got my first shell account in 1990) it's scary to think that
> compared to the general populace of today's Internet I'm an oldtimer.
> So, even though I missed net.events like the Great Renaming on
> Usenet or the conversion from NCP to TCP, I've been thinking
> recently about the good old (recent) days of my memory..
>
> I miss..
> -sitting up all night in front of my Apple IIgs with
>  a 2400bps modem, calling long lists of BBSes to leech files.
> -being a sysop and using Waffle to get netnews.
> -Using batch Zmodem to download large batches of files while
>  I slept.
> -Getting into flamewars with the moderator of the Fidonet
>  humor group.
>
> Remember..
> -when gopher was cool?
> -when spam was something that came in a can?
> -Canter and Siegel?
> -Serdar Argic / Zumabot?
> -Joel Furr's tshirts?
> -When Windows users had a hard uphill battle ahead of them
>  to get on the Internet? (early winsock problems)
> -When the Macintosh was the best thing outside of Unix to
>  use on the 'net?
> -When Netscape was called Mozilla?
> -When Mosaic was really, really cool?
> -Predicting the imminent death of the net when you came across
>  a site that you had to pay for or a banner ad?
> -Using Veronica to search for web pages?
> -..and Archie to look for software?
> -Some guy named Linus posting to get people to try his new
>  operating system?
> -Robert McElwaine?
> -Predicting the imminent death of the net when we heard in
>  news.admin.misc that AOL was about to get USENET access?
> -Telnetting to a server and logging in as 'gopher' to use
>  gopher?
> -Telnetting to a gopher server and finding a link that
>  dropped you to a shell?
> -People dreading the annual fall influx of college newbies
>  onto USENET?
> -Dick Depew and his original cancelbot? *
> -Fingering the Internet Coke Machine?
> -The Internet Refrigerator?
>
> Servers of yore..
> -http://akebono.stanford.edu/  (Yahoo's original URL)
> -gopher://compass.gac.peachnet.edu/  (The Internet Compass)
> -gopher://wiretap.spies.com/  (Spies) (A really cool gopher site)
> -That server at MIT that archived late show monologues and
>  streamed the video to you on demand (in 1993)
> -CU-SeeMe reflectors back when you could actually find intelligent
>  non-naked people on them?
>
> Instead of trying to get people _on_ the Internet, I think
> we should be spending our energies to get people _off_ the
> Internet! Bring back the Internet of five or six years ago!
> Give me gopher! Bring back the NSF T1 backbone that restricted
> commercial traffic! End spam! Woo Hoo!
>
> Robbie
>
> *: I actually remember _flaming_ Dick Depew for cancelling other
> people's articles. If he ever sees this post, I apologize.
> God Bless The Spam/Binary Cancelbots.