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Best BBS Memories?

Posted by Cliff on from the reminiscing-on-the-new-year dept.

TerryAtWork asks: "What are Slashdot readers' best BBS memories? The BBS ruled before the common man got on the Internet and a lot of older Slashdot reader's first on-line experiences were with them."

4 of 154 comments (clear)

  1. CONNECT 1200 by gnudutch · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Creating and sharing ANSI graphics made with TheDraw. Also that "Mad Max" feeling you get from playing Operation Overkill...

  2. Trade wars 2002 by Basje · · Score: 2, Insightful

    nuff said.

    --
    the pun is mightier than the sword
    1. Re:Trade wars 2002 by Sparr0 · · Score: 2, Insightful

      I'll see your TW2002 and raise you a Barren Realms Elite. Or Solar Realms Elite, or Falcon's Eye. Take your pick :-p

  3. A major high point of my life ... by daviddennis · · Score: 3, Insightful

    was designing and running David's Amazing BBS, which existed in its best form from 1987-1991. As the "big fish in a small pond", I made a lot of friends and even got a couple of good relationships out of it.

    I wrote my own software that ran on a Microport Unix system. I had an assistant named REM, and he kept on telling me SCO was better, but I could never afford it. Considering current developments, I thought that was worth noting.

    My system was always crashing because I was running it on flaky hardware. Unfortunately, revenues from my rates ($7.50/month, $35/6months, $60/year) were enough to pay the phone bill and maybe give me a few bucks in spending money, but not nearly enough to replace the hardware.

    I wrote the software myself, including a very nice WELL-like public board system. The boards would be intelligent one day and horrible flamewars the next. I never figured out how to balance free speech versus flames, a problem that I think was solved pretty well on Slashdot. Perhaps if I'd had the time to think things through instead of having a real job, I could have figured it out. But of course there were no revenues.

    I had a fancy dating questionnaire system, which I still think was the best in the industry. It let you answer questions multiple choice and by writing essays, whichever you liked better. Unfortunately, with only five phone lines plus one "secret" one outside of the rotary, there weren't enough lines for a real chat board, and I didn't have the bucks to expand.

    When the hardware finally died, so did the system. A few years later I became a minor-league ISP but things were never the same. The BBS world was a lot more fun.

    I got spoiled by the local nature of the BBS, where everyone knew your name, and you could put together parties at local restaurants and the like. It was so much nicer then than the current, more anonymous and harder to crack, community. Even after 1,500-odd posts on Slashdot, I don't feel I really know anyone; it's just too big.

    But on the BBS, I knew everyone.

    My love life never recovered from dropping out of the BBS world :-(.

    D