The movie War Games inspired me to get a 300 baud modem, and one of my first memories of using one was to play Adventure (one of the first text adventure games) on a BBS. I war dialed like there was no tomorrow, and racked up huge phone bills downloading wares from across the country. 300 baud modems were super slow. You could literally watch a line of text be typed across the screen in front of you, one letter at a…
I played MUDs on a 1200 baud modem, and I was at a distinct disadvantage. Going to 9600 was incredible.
I lived out several years of my youth at 1200 baud. The word "U.S. Robotics" was like porn to me.
The movie War Games inspired me to get a 300 baud modem, and one of my first memories of using one was to play Adventure (one of the first text adventure games) on a BBS. I war dialed like there was no tomorrow, and racked up huge phone bills downloading wares from across the country. 300 baud modems were super slow. You could literally watch a line of text be typed across the screen in front of you, one letter at a…
> Even at 9600 baud, I seem to recall that downloading one single mp3 (once those fancy high tech music files were invented) would take something like half an hour. I downloaded the original Command & Conquer demo over a 2400 baud connection. I had a 33.6 kbps modem, but the modem pool for the VM/CMS system I could connect to only allowed for 2400 baud connections. IIRC, it took most of a weekend to download that 10…
I remember downloading the complete Dune 2 from a BBS. We were visiting a friend of my dad, and his son showed it for me (he had quicker access to the sources from his uni). By the time it was downloaded it was long in the evening, and I was tired (being about 10 years old or so), but it was super cool seeing the game. Or maybe it was just the demo because the download took too long, I can't remember.
Like so many of us, I miss the days of the BBS. But I think I know precisely why I do. BBS systems and Usenet were plain-text communications which were fast and open. There wasn't much space for user tracking, analytics, etc. There just wasn't much corporate space. Yes, there were corporate BBSes and public FTPs; but by and large they couldn't pull your call log and see what you'd been up to. There was a sense of pri…
Indeed plain-text BBS (over a slow modem) were faster than loading 10 MB of javascript over an ADSL.
Also the information density and signal-to-noise ratio was higher. Even if you use ad-blockers.
The movie War Games inspired me to get a 300 baud modem, and one of my first memories of using one was to play Adventure (one of the first text adventure games) on a BBS. I war dialed like there was no tomorrow, and racked up huge phone bills downloading wares from across the country. 300 baud modems were super slow. You could literally watch a line of text be typed across the screen in front of you, one letter at a…
> Even at 9600 baud, I seem to recall that downloading one single mp3 (once those fancy high tech music files were invented) would take something like half an hour. I downloaded the original Command & Conquer demo over a 2400 baud connection. I had a 33.6 kbps modem, but the modem pool for the VM/CMS system I could connect to only allowed for 2400 baud connections. IIRC, it took most of a weekend to download that 10…
When downloading files via command line my hands still type 'wget -c', even though it's been many years since my last interrupted download.
Nostalgia time... I remember when my grandparents tried to help their misbehaving grandson by buying him a C=128-D at Toys "R" Us along with a 1200 baud modem. I quickly grew bored with Q-Link and found about the network of BBSes which existed in the late 80's. It wasn't long before I had ran up an $800 phone bill, and for the next 20 years my grandpa wouldn't talk to me. I found friendship and mischief, a world of w…
A port scan could be illegal in your jurisdiction, but it doesn't have to be. There's much cooler things to try out IMO such as SDR. One thing I know very sure though: if you want to do all the things not legally allowed, go work for the cops or a 3 or 4 letter agency.
BBSs are still alive; mostly accessed over amateur radio.
I ran a Utah BBS in the late 80's on a phone line I "found" in my childhood bedroom. I've thought, a bit, about setting up a "BBS" hosted on any computer connected to any WiFi access point. Here are my initial ramblings about the idea. https://blog.joeldare.com/wireless-bbs/
What was the name? I remember Raistlins Castle and stargate but I can not recall the names of the others. I spent a LOT of time back then playing barren realms elite.
I used to be a sysop and made some of my deepest friendships that way. One-to-one chatting via fullscreen realtime updated text with no other distraction has some magical quality to it that makes you talk about all manner of things in depth with another person.
I started coding by doing C for ProBoard BBS plugins! I wrote SMURf CHaT back in 97!
How we used to marvel at bidirectional transfers. x-modem, y-modem, x-modem, q-modem. I can hear the handshaking as shrilly as they ever were. Good time.