BBS: The Documentary

I got my first modem (300 "baud") when I was about 12 years old (I'm 25 now) and started BBSing from my DOS-based monochrome IBM PC XT with a 10MB HD. Whoa, acronyms. WTF is a BBS? A BBS is a bulletin board system, a precursor to online services like America Online and Prodigy. More or less, anyone with enough time on their hands and the technology at their disposal could set up one of these so-called BBSs on their home computer and allow people from the neighborhood to dial in to their computer and post messages, send e-mail, and trade files with other users. Most of these BBSs just permitted one user at a time, though, over time, some software made it possible for several users to be online at once. However, with the advent of services like AOL, and subsequently the opening of the Internet to the public sector, BBSs went the way of the dinosaur.

I should note, by the way, the reason that I know Julian Sanchez, Aphid, Martin O, Ray, and several others friends and associates of the Jakeneck crew is BBSing. We all used to frequent the same "boards" as we were all in the same local calling range, and that's where we got to know one another. In fact, I made the ANSI login screen for Julian's board, Surreality, long before we'd ever met in person, which transpired at random years later at a Rushkoff reading at KGB Bar.

Ah, the days of WWIV, PC Board, Renegade, Telegard, Vision-X, Hermes, Wildcat, and Waffle... "Door" games like Foodfight and TradeWars... FidoNet and WWIVnet (primitive messaging networks like UseNet which linked the message boards of various BBSs together). However could we forget?

Welp, those looking to reminisce further about the good old days of "0-day warez" downloaded with 9600 baud momo's (that'd be 9.6kbps compared to today's 56kbps standard), long before the age of MP3s, when e-mail was still clandestine, and we cranked out ASCII-zines like "Popular Perversity" for fun; or for those whose curiosity is now piqued by this simply flabbergasting post, a new seven-part documentary film about the history of BBSing is currently wrapping up, and pre-orders are now being taken for an exceptionally swank three DVD box set, which will be released in December.

Someone wanna buy me a nifty Chanukah present?