Haven't been disconnected since. Ran a for-fee BBS in the early days where we sold fiction stories (don't ask) & drink recipes (we were underage). People would mail us a $5 bill in the mail for monthly access. Every month I'd go through a Lotus 123 spreadsheet to mark who stayed on and who got kicked off.
The whole racket was run after hours in my job's server closet – also doubling as the actual janitor closet. During the day the equipment was used by employees to access the Internet (via Rutgers) and email (most of which they wanted me to download, print, and postal mail to them!!!) Everything sat idle at night, so we snuck in our own homegrown machine and ran a BBS. I think the whole thing lasted for nearly a year before it was too much to manage.
I remember the World Wide Web being born (HYPERLINKS FTW.) I remember the very first computer virus. I also remember the three dozen or so of us in 2004 that started podcasting and foolin' round with something called RSS to swap MP3 files… but that's another story.
O.M.G. I'm old. Get off my lawn.
(PS – Collecting $5 per person, my partner and I cleared about $400 cash EACH per month. Entrepreneur in training… Hell yeah I think so.)
#blog ?
Embedded Link
How I Grew Up On The Internet
The internet is IRL. It always has been.
Google+: Reshared 7 times
Google+: View post on Google+
Wow, time for you to write a book. haha, was just thinking. I even remember by compuserve account numbers and password.
Makes me think back on my Commodore 64 days, my Tandy 1000 days and my first Mac in 1994. Wow we've come far!
Totally awesome.
Wow what a story. I love it.
Nice imac
Back in the day, our local library ran a 10-line, dial-up BBS. After about a year, they added Internet access via Telnet. That was our first contact with the Whirled Wild Web. What an awesome ride!
Nice Bondi Blue iMac! Had one of the first ones of those in town. It later suffered from GLOD (Green Light of Death). It was revived by a new analog board, but it took the techs a few tries to find my HD unit so I could take it home.
Awesome story
Thats so true. .. re – living the BBS days and the beginning of www access was a time to savor as everything now a days is simply to easy as it were… i've been fortunate enough to have my Homepage securely memorialized forever @ the wayback machine (a internet archive of the early days) check it out and do a search of http://www.hal4000.com it looks really arcaick!!! LOL
I had a mac like that
The other day I read this: "We are the only generation with a 'before' & 'after' experience of the Internet". And yes, CompuServe … Who remembers "Worlds Away"?