WEBVTT - What happened to BBSes? 0:00:00.280 --> 0:00:02.840 Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera. 0:00:03.160 --> 0:00:08.880 It's ready. Are you get in touch with technology? With 0:00:09.039 --> 0:00:17.840 text style from how stuff works dot com. Hello again, everyone, 0:00:17.920 --> 0:00:21.119 welcome to text stuff. My name is Chris Poulett, and 0:00:21.120 --> 0:00:23.480 I am an editor at how stuff works dot com. 0:00:23.480 --> 0:00:27.760 Sitting across from me, curiously as usual, is senior writer 0:00:28.280 --> 0:00:33.040 Jonathan Strickland. Dust machine is niched for a finger, pokin 0:00:33.200 --> 0:00:37.280 ont mitten grabbin, It's easy schnapping the spring work blow 0:00:37.320 --> 0:00:40.720 and fuels in ont popping corkin Mitch spits and sparking. 0:00:41.159 --> 0:00:45.520 Its niched for verkin by dust doom coffin, dust robin 0:00:45.600 --> 0:00:50.840 nickensight zerin keeping hands in dust pockets, reluxant ont vatch 0:00:50.960 --> 0:00:55.280 dust blinking lights. I love dust blinken lights. Shouldn't that 0:00:55.320 --> 0:00:57.720 be de blinken lights. Well, I'm sorry that's the way 0:00:57.760 --> 0:01:00.280 it was written. I know on what we are about 0:01:00.280 --> 0:01:03.480 to talk about. UM, we have a little listener mail. 0:01:07.680 --> 0:01:12.120 This listener mail comes from Patch, actually comes from several people, 0:01:12.160 --> 0:01:15.000 but Patch wrote the first one. Hi, I found your 0:01:15.000 --> 0:01:16.920 podcast a few days ago and really like it, and 0:01:16.920 --> 0:01:18.760 I was wondering if you could do one on the 0:01:18.800 --> 0:01:23.000 old b b s S. I'm building one myself. Thanks, Well, Patch, 0:01:23.000 --> 0:01:25.360 we're going to talk about bbs is. And indeed, that 0:01:25.440 --> 0:01:28.000 quote was not from a movie, It was not from 0:01:28.000 --> 0:01:32.200 a song. That was a text file that was uploaded 0:01:32.240 --> 0:01:35.680 to BBSs and made its way through various bbs is 0:01:36.160 --> 0:01:41.440 in the in the eighties. Of course that was fake German. 0:01:41.880 --> 0:01:47.880 It's not real German. Yeah, I remember frong leis And yeah, anyway, 0:01:48.360 --> 0:01:51.720 I don't know what you would call it English, English, Deutsch, 0:01:51.720 --> 0:01:55.920 in English, dout English, I don't know anyway. Um, Yeah, 0:01:56.040 --> 0:02:00.200 And it's funny because the old bbs is, what ever 0:02:00.280 --> 0:02:04.600 happened to those? They're still around, not all of them, 0:02:05.440 --> 0:02:08.120 but yeah, Patch is apparently trying to build an old BBS, 0:02:08.200 --> 0:02:12.440 but then would be a new BBS. Just confused, that's 0:02:12.480 --> 0:02:16.960 a good question. It stands for bulletin board System and 0:02:17.040 --> 0:02:19.920 it really is sort of the computer version of the 0:02:19.960 --> 0:02:23.440 old bulletin boards that you would see in dormitories or 0:02:23.680 --> 0:02:27.480 office buildings or even homes where people would just put 0:02:27.560 --> 0:02:30.040 up a little note and for other people to see, 0:02:30.280 --> 0:02:32.840 maybe they had something that they wanted to sell or 0:02:32.880 --> 0:02:36.440 they were looking to buy, or just a cute joke 0:02:36.560 --> 0:02:38.320 or something you just want to pop it up there 0:02:38.320 --> 0:02:40.400 on the bulletin board. Same sort of thing, except in 0:02:40.400 --> 0:02:44.040 this case it's all going to be located on a computer. Now, 0:02:44.040 --> 0:02:46.520 the important thing to remember is this is taking place 0:02:46.680 --> 0:02:49.760 that the era of the BBS is takes place before 0:02:49.880 --> 0:02:55.400 the public era of the internet. Right, So, uh, taking 0:02:55.440 --> 0:02:57.920 it down to bare bones, basically, what you've got is 0:02:57.960 --> 0:03:01.840 a computer running a piece of software. They will allow 0:03:01.919 --> 0:03:06.600 you to post and read messages. That's that's the simplest 0:03:07.120 --> 0:03:09.360 form of what a BBS is. You have had one 0:03:09.400 --> 0:03:15.120 more element. It allows you allows remote users to post 0:03:15.200 --> 0:03:17.480 and read message. I was going to add that, I 0:03:17.520 --> 0:03:22.080 mean without without the modem attached to it and a 0:03:22.160 --> 0:03:24.519 phone line. Yeah, it would just it's essentially yeah, I 0:03:24.520 --> 0:03:27.280 mean it's a bulletin board for one person, which is 0:03:27.360 --> 0:03:30.840 kind of silly. But the BBS, Uh, yeah, you had 0:03:31.040 --> 0:03:34.200 a computer that you could dial into so and and 0:03:34.960 --> 0:03:37.800 the BBS is that I think of our sort of 0:03:37.840 --> 0:03:41.000 if you will, hyperlocal. Yes, they didn't necessarily have to be, 0:03:41.080 --> 0:03:44.000 but you know it would be you know, Bob's computer 0:03:44.120 --> 0:03:47.000 over here. Remember Bob. We talked about Bob before. He's 0:03:47.080 --> 0:03:49.840 very generous with the you know, allowing us to use this. 0:03:49.880 --> 0:03:53.680 I've been told that I have to call him Robert. Now, yeah, okay, 0:03:53.680 --> 0:03:56.960 So Robert has this computer and he's got a modem 0:03:57.080 --> 0:03:59.000 and a phone line that you can use and h 0:03:59.240 --> 0:04:03.600 Robert hosts messages about I don't know, role playing games 0:04:03.880 --> 0:04:07.240 for example, and uh, well it's good because you have 0:04:07.320 --> 0:04:09.760 your community that the people he wants to play with, 0:04:10.080 --> 0:04:12.000 you know, and get together on Saturday night and spend 0:04:12.000 --> 0:04:17.280 a couple of hours playing Dungeons and Dragons or uh, 0:04:17.520 --> 0:04:20.279 ponds are blitz. That's not role playing game, but you know, 0:04:20.360 --> 0:04:22.680 you could get people around the table to actually put Yeah, 0:04:22.680 --> 0:04:24.240 that kind of thing. You have a group of people 0:04:24.240 --> 0:04:26.520 who enthusiasts who want to play these games with you, 0:04:26.640 --> 0:04:30.359 and you want to share tactics or messages about it 0:04:30.480 --> 0:04:35.440 or body jokes. Right, dial up, We're not even there yet, 0:04:35.520 --> 0:04:38.159 let's keep going anyway. So that's the thing he's got. 0:04:38.240 --> 0:04:41.320 Roberts got this computer with a modem, and so uh, 0:04:41.520 --> 0:04:45.440 Jeff and Steve want to hook up well on onto 0:04:45.440 --> 0:04:48.159 the bulletin board, so they Jeff calls in the number 0:04:48.240 --> 0:04:52.760 for the modem on Robert's computer, so he dials in 0:04:52.839 --> 0:04:55.560 and he can see anything that Steve or Robert have 0:04:55.680 --> 0:04:58.680 posted on their Jeff is reading messages. Uh wants to 0:04:58.720 --> 0:05:01.800 comment on something. You post a comment on there and 0:05:01.920 --> 0:05:05.359 hangs up the modem and then you know, whomever else 0:05:05.520 --> 0:05:08.479 is in this group can dial up and see what's 0:05:08.480 --> 0:05:12.480 on the bulletin board and post messages. However, Uh, generally speaking, 0:05:12.560 --> 0:05:14.680 I would I think you probably agree with me. Generally speaking, 0:05:14.720 --> 0:05:17.760 we're talking one person at a time, Yeah, especially the 0:05:17.800 --> 0:05:21.120 early bbs is where they were limited to a single 0:05:21.279 --> 0:05:24.120 user at a time. So yeah, again, this is a 0:05:24.120 --> 0:05:27.400 precursor to the Internet, so you don't have any Internet 0:05:27.400 --> 0:05:30.080 that you can log into. Uh, this was kind of 0:05:30.120 --> 0:05:33.559 these these regional networks really, and not even a network, 0:05:33.560 --> 0:05:36.839 because you're talking about just a one single machine that 0:05:36.920 --> 0:05:39.800 you could dial into. So I guess you could call 0:05:39.839 --> 0:05:43.160 it a network of two machines at any given time. Yeah, 0:05:43.160 --> 0:05:45.760 because you have the one that is programmed to receive 0:05:45.839 --> 0:05:49.320 the call. It's the host. Yeah, the host, which you know, 0:05:49.360 --> 0:05:52.640 the client calls in and and and logs in with 0:05:52.680 --> 0:05:56.600 the user name and password. Um, I'm assuming that you 0:05:56.640 --> 0:05:59.640 would want to do that anyway, despite the fact that 0:06:00.000 --> 0:06:02.720 as people aren't going to know how to do this, 0:06:04.279 --> 0:06:06.400 you know how to do this let alone that. But 0:06:06.920 --> 0:06:09.600 they're not gonna necessarily know where the BBS is and 0:06:09.680 --> 0:06:12.080 what phone number to call to get there and have 0:06:12.200 --> 0:06:14.400 the equipment to do it. But you still, you know, 0:06:14.480 --> 0:06:18.600 have the client log into the host and check and 0:06:19.080 --> 0:06:23.000 post most messages to it and in some cases files. Yeah. 0:06:23.640 --> 0:06:26.080 Do you know when the very first Bolton board system 0:06:26.200 --> 0:06:29.719 launched or who did it? I do? I don't. Okay, 0:06:29.760 --> 0:06:32.640 So I asked you a question, and I drop a 0:06:32.640 --> 0:06:34.440 bomb on you and you have no way of answering it. 0:06:34.520 --> 0:06:38.000 That's an awesome co host, Jonathan Um, I'm thinking it 0:06:38.120 --> 0:06:41.760 probably now that I've actually looked at my notes, would 0:06:41.800 --> 0:06:46.160 be in Yes, that's correct. Ward Christensen and Randy Seuss 0:06:46.200 --> 0:06:49.880 built the first Bolton Board system as the computerized bolletin 0:06:49.960 --> 0:06:54.080 Board System. They created it out of Chicago. Well they 0:06:54.200 --> 0:06:57.719 built they took down Chicago and built a bulletin board system. Well, 0:06:57.760 --> 0:07:01.400 I mean, if you're gonna replace Chicago with some then anyway, 0:07:01.480 --> 0:07:06.600 the Bolton Board System, well you know it's there, used 0:07:06.600 --> 0:07:10.440 a smaller city to build a BBS anyway, Well they tried. 0:07:10.520 --> 0:07:12.720 Never mind, I can't make jokes about that city anymore. 0:07:12.760 --> 0:07:15.520 I was told not to. Uh. The so Chicago. Heck 0:07:15.560 --> 0:07:18.240 of a town. Uh. The the these guys. What they 0:07:18.240 --> 0:07:21.240 did was they built up the system. They designed a 0:07:21.600 --> 0:07:27.080 program using assembly language actually eight assembly language. They designed 0:07:27.120 --> 0:07:29.800 this program where it was it would allow people to 0:07:29.840 --> 0:07:33.880 come in and post and read messages and that's essentially 0:07:33.920 --> 0:07:36.200 all it could do when it first launched, and it 0:07:36.280 --> 0:07:38.360 launched it was built in nineteen seventy eight, but it 0:07:38.440 --> 0:07:42.640 launched in publicly in nineteen seventy nine, and um, well 0:07:42.680 --> 0:07:45.120 there was. They did announce what they had done in 0:07:45.200 --> 0:07:50.680 the UH and BITE magazine in November. Um so they 0:07:50.880 --> 0:07:54.240 you know, Bite was. If you're not familiar with Bite, 0:07:54.320 --> 0:07:56.160 how would you describe by I would say it's a 0:07:56.160 --> 0:08:00.440 computer enthusiast magazine, but it was really um for serious 0:08:00.480 --> 0:08:04.320 computer enthusiast. These are people who are interested in programming 0:08:04.400 --> 0:08:06.360 and hacking in the classical I think these are the 0:08:06.400 --> 0:08:11.600 same people who would order computer building kits that they 0:08:11.600 --> 0:08:14.680 would build their own personal computers. Yeah. Sorry, I didn't 0:08:14.680 --> 0:08:17.120 mean interruption. Go ahead, but it's not like, for example, 0:08:17.160 --> 0:08:20.280 a PC world would be where you're reading about software 0:08:20.320 --> 0:08:21.920 and things. These are people who would want to make 0:08:21.960 --> 0:08:24.080 their own software and build their own It was it 0:08:24.120 --> 0:08:28.080 was written by and four hackers. That's what you can say. 0:08:28.400 --> 0:08:30.320 And we're talking about hackers in the sense of people 0:08:30.320 --> 0:08:33.960 who programmed, not necessarily people who are trying to break 0:08:33.960 --> 0:08:37.840 into security systems or create malware. UM. That's a that 0:08:37.960 --> 0:08:41.679 was something that hacker came to be known for UM 0:08:41.800 --> 0:08:45.320 later on. But originally hackers were programmers. There are guys 0:08:45.360 --> 0:08:47.520 who were trying to end women, trying to figure out 0:08:47.559 --> 0:08:50.680 how to make a computer program do a certain task. 0:08:51.400 --> 0:08:54.960 And UM, they often weren't really worried about how pretty 0:08:55.000 --> 0:08:57.679 it looked at the end of the day. So the 0:08:58.200 --> 0:09:00.880 c b b S, which was the the Computer bulletin 0:09:00.960 --> 0:09:05.400 Board System, UM, it launches it and and people users 0:09:05.400 --> 0:09:07.719 think it's really cool, but it's it's in Chicago. It's 0:09:07.800 --> 0:09:10.480 using you have to dial in, right, so unless you're 0:09:10.880 --> 0:09:15.320 local to Chicago, it's a long distance call, so you 0:09:15.360 --> 0:09:18.040 can't you know, you can't just call in and not 0:09:18.120 --> 0:09:21.920 and not worry about charges. Uh. And it wasn't distributed. 0:09:21.960 --> 0:09:23.720 It was just that, you know, they talked about how 0:09:23.760 --> 0:09:26.640 they did it, and some people read it and thought, hey, 0:09:26.640 --> 0:09:29.720 this is a great idea, and they attempted their own version. 0:09:30.280 --> 0:09:35.000 And among those was a guy named Bill Blue. He 0:09:35.040 --> 0:09:39.520 wrote a b B S really which one I don't know. 0:09:39.559 --> 0:09:43.440 He wrote a b B S ABS and it was 0:09:44.080 --> 0:09:47.160 it was kind of followed. It followed along with the 0:09:47.200 --> 0:09:51.439 c BBS system. But he built it so that anyone 0:09:52.200 --> 0:09:55.600 who had an Apple too, and anyone who had the 0:09:55.800 --> 0:10:00.920 d C. Hayes m M modem very specif think, could 0:10:01.960 --> 0:10:08.080 could run the the program. So the CBBS one was 0:10:08.200 --> 0:10:11.559 particular to Chicago, but Bills was one that if you 0:10:11.720 --> 0:10:14.760 got that code and you had an Apple computer and 0:10:14.800 --> 0:10:17.680 you had this modem, you could run this and create 0:10:17.720 --> 0:10:21.080 your own Bolton board system. And so people started to 0:10:21.120 --> 0:10:23.240 do that. And uh, back in the day, you know 0:10:23.320 --> 0:10:26.679 what the fastest or what was considered a fast modem 0:10:26.679 --> 0:10:30.520 back then, right, Yeah, three D bad. If you don't 0:10:30.559 --> 0:10:32.920 know what bad is, that means that it could transmit 0:10:33.080 --> 0:10:37.520 three hundred symbols in a second. That's not fast people, 0:10:38.480 --> 0:10:42.840 It's yeah, it's you can't and you can't easily translate 0:10:42.960 --> 0:10:46.000 BAWD to bits per second. It it's not it's not 0:10:46.160 --> 0:10:49.720 it's not analogous exactly. It's not analogous. But by the 0:10:49.840 --> 0:10:52.200 by the time of the well actually that I guess 0:10:52.200 --> 0:10:55.480 technically literally, the standard is still the same the fastest. 0:10:55.520 --> 0:10:58.760 About the fastest you can go on a phone line 0:10:58.800 --> 0:11:04.760 in the United States is uh yeah, is it fifty two? Yeah, 0:11:04.840 --> 0:11:07.160 because it was supposed to be fifty six, But there 0:11:07.200 --> 0:11:13.520 is a legal limitation. I was about to say technical specification, 0:11:13.559 --> 0:11:15.440 but it's not the actual speed. But yeah, when I 0:11:15.440 --> 0:11:19.920 started using a dial up modems the standard and then 0:11:20.000 --> 0:11:25.680 shortly after that, uh, back back when they stopped being 0:11:26.240 --> 0:11:29.960 as common, probably in the late nineties early two thousand's, 0:11:30.720 --> 0:11:33.240 modems hit a practical limitation that there's a limit to 0:11:33.280 --> 0:11:35.440 the amount of bandwidth you can send over phone line 0:11:36.800 --> 0:11:40.120 because it's using audio to do this rather than the 0:11:40.440 --> 0:11:43.040 bandwidth on the other side of the audio space in 0:11:43.080 --> 0:11:46.880 a phone line. So um, yeah, due to practical limitations. 0:11:46.880 --> 0:11:50.000 But yeah, three bod that can you imagine trying to 0:11:50.040 --> 0:11:54.800 transfer something like a YouTube video or a flash animation 0:11:54.920 --> 0:11:59.000 at three You might not want to have anything scheduled 0:11:59.040 --> 0:12:01.600 for the next year. It would take you a very 0:12:01.640 --> 0:12:04.320 long time the and and that kind of brings us 0:12:04.360 --> 0:12:07.400 to one of the reasons one of the limitations, or 0:12:07.440 --> 0:12:09.640 if you will, one of the features of bbs is 0:12:09.679 --> 0:12:13.640 they were text based. Yes, they had usually some sort 0:12:13.679 --> 0:12:16.679 of file structure system that you can navigate so that 0:12:16.720 --> 0:12:20.439 you could read things that are similar to today's message 0:12:20.440 --> 0:12:24.840 boards on internet UH sites, websites, UM. So you had 0:12:24.880 --> 0:12:27.720 the message boards where you could converse with other people 0:12:27.760 --> 0:12:30.360 who would visit this BBS again, not in real time, 0:12:30.840 --> 0:12:34.520 but for the most part, because usually at least for 0:12:34.640 --> 0:12:38.320 the smaller bbs is, you're the only one on that system. 0:12:38.400 --> 0:12:40.200 You might be on at the same time as the 0:12:40.240 --> 0:12:44.440 system operator that's the owner uh systems. That's where sissop 0:12:44.559 --> 0:12:47.200 comes from. If you've heard that term. It comes from 0:12:47.480 --> 0:12:51.240 the old BBS days. Actually, a lot of the acronyms 0:12:50.920 --> 0:12:55.000 and that we see online they have their origin back 0:12:55.000 --> 0:12:59.160 in the old bbs is. So yeah, you you normally 0:12:59.200 --> 0:13:04.040 would be having asynchronous conversations, right you would post something, 0:13:04.240 --> 0:13:06.960 you would log off the BBS. You might check the 0:13:07.040 --> 0:13:09.599 next day and see that someone's replied to you. It 0:13:09.640 --> 0:13:13.600 wouldn't be this instant message uh that that we've become 0:13:13.679 --> 0:13:15.959 used to on the internet. And now. Some bbs is 0:13:16.000 --> 0:13:17.760 did eventually get to the point where they had multiple 0:13:17.760 --> 0:13:19.959 phone lines. So if you would called one and got 0:13:19.960 --> 0:13:22.000 a busy signal, you could call the next phone line 0:13:22.000 --> 0:13:24.080 for the same BBS and connect to it and they 0:13:24.120 --> 0:13:26.480 could actually have multiple users online at the same time, 0:13:27.000 --> 0:13:29.640 but that that was not the case for your average 0:13:29.679 --> 0:13:31.480 BBS because you know, if it was just some guy 0:13:31.559 --> 0:13:34.240 running it out of his um, you know, his his den, 0:13:34.840 --> 0:13:36.640 it may be that there's just one phone line that 0:13:36.640 --> 0:13:38.880 he could even dedicate to it. And of course, if 0:13:38.920 --> 0:13:40.920 if he's not there at the time, there's always the 0:13:41.000 --> 0:13:43.240 chance that the BBS would crash. You would call, you 0:13:43.240 --> 0:13:46.959 couldn't connect, and you know, you you'd be stuck without 0:13:47.000 --> 0:13:50.200 that BBS until he came back home and fixed it 0:13:50.920 --> 0:13:53.120 or she. I shouldn't just say he. I mean I 0:13:53.160 --> 0:13:55.560 always say he because I think that's probably the majority 0:13:55.600 --> 0:14:00.000 of the users, but it wasn't total all male. Uh. 0:14:00.760 --> 0:14:03.280 And on these bbs is you could find things besides 0:14:03.320 --> 0:14:06.200 the message boards. You could find other things like you 0:14:06.200 --> 0:14:08.560 you mentioned files. That was That was a little later, 0:14:08.720 --> 0:14:12.360 but not by much. We talked about shareware and how 0:14:12.360 --> 0:14:16.240 that that model developed and how games used to spread 0:14:16.360 --> 0:14:20.200 that way. Um. But yeah, I think that's true. I mean, 0:14:20.200 --> 0:14:23.000 we're talking about again, we're talking about physical limitations, and 0:14:23.000 --> 0:14:26.760 in the nineteen eighties we're not talking about you know, 0:14:26.840 --> 0:14:32.040 gigabyte hard drives or terabyte hard drives. Hard drives. Yeah, 0:14:32.240 --> 0:14:35.400 if there were hard drives at all. Um, so we're 0:14:35.440 --> 0:14:40.440 not talking about anything too particularly large. But people did, um, 0:14:40.640 --> 0:14:46.160 you know, share information and pirate software, pirate software uh 0:14:46.160 --> 0:14:48.440 to to a lesser extent. I think that probably, I 0:14:48.440 --> 0:14:50.760 think you're right. I think that was probably more along 0:14:50.800 --> 0:14:55.160 the lines of when these systems became more sophisticated. But 0:14:55.440 --> 0:14:57.880 you know the things that you do on for example, 0:14:58.000 --> 0:15:01.400 use net groups or I r C now or even 0:15:01.440 --> 0:15:06.480 back in the earlier days of public uh Internet, Um, 0:15:06.520 --> 0:15:08.800 you know you didn't. You couldn't really do that because 0:15:08.800 --> 0:15:12.240 you just didn't have the hardware to make that happen. 0:15:12.840 --> 0:15:15.240 It was on a much smaller scale now. They didn't 0:15:15.280 --> 0:15:17.760 have games. Um, there are a lot of games that 0:15:17.800 --> 0:15:21.000 you could play on a BBS Many of them had 0:15:21.440 --> 0:15:25.840 specific limitations on how long you could play, because you 0:15:25.880 --> 0:15:30.360 don't want to have one user dominate that phone line, 0:15:30.600 --> 0:15:32.720 right right, So most of the time these bbs is 0:15:32.720 --> 0:15:36.640 would have a as a timer, and once you exceeded 0:15:36.640 --> 0:15:40.520 the limit on that timer, you would get disconnected and 0:15:40.760 --> 0:15:44.280 someone else could call in sorry go ahead. Um No. 0:15:44.520 --> 0:15:48.400 There were also turn based games, if I'm not mistaken, um, 0:15:48.400 --> 0:15:51.000 where you could you know, log in, play your turn, 0:15:51.760 --> 0:15:54.520 and log back out and wait for somebody else to 0:15:54.880 --> 0:15:58.120 the I mean chess was very popular on bbs is. 0:15:58.520 --> 0:16:01.320 But one of the games that is incredibly popular in 0:16:01.400 --> 0:16:05.320 bbs is And yes I did play this game, Legend 0:16:05.720 --> 0:16:09.200 of the Red Dragon, which was often known as just 0:16:09.600 --> 0:16:13.760 Lord l O R d UM. It was created by 0:16:13.840 --> 0:16:17.480 Seth Robinson and it was It was a game where 0:16:17.520 --> 0:16:22.880 you created a character that um developed skills and prowess, 0:16:22.960 --> 0:16:25.880 and the goal was to defeat the Red Dragon that 0:16:26.120 --> 0:16:29.680 is terrorizing this one town. And the way the game 0:16:29.680 --> 0:16:32.320 worked was it would work in cycles. The game would 0:16:32.400 --> 0:16:35.520 start and everybody would be on equal ground, and all 0:16:35.520 --> 0:16:37.840 the people who are playing the game have the same goal. 0:16:37.960 --> 0:16:39.840 They want to be the one to defeat the dragon. 0:16:41.000 --> 0:16:42.840 When a player got to the point where he or 0:16:42.880 --> 0:16:46.560 she could defeat the dragon and the dragons defeated, new game, 0:16:47.160 --> 0:16:50.040 I see and everyone starts again at the bottom. Uh. 0:16:50.120 --> 0:16:52.800 It had other features in it where you could challenge 0:16:52.840 --> 0:16:56.120 other players to fight, but they were um they were 0:16:56.200 --> 0:17:00.080 usually it was automated, so when you weren't online and 0:17:00.120 --> 0:17:02.480 someone else was playing, they could challenge your character to 0:17:02.520 --> 0:17:05.320 a duel and the computer would run your character as 0:17:05.359 --> 0:17:07.960 if you know you were doing it. Uh. You could 0:17:07.960 --> 0:17:12.200 also flirt with other characters, and there were consequences to flirting, 0:17:13.600 --> 0:17:17.959 including things like you might be greeted with a child 0:17:18.560 --> 0:17:22.560 within the game. I won't go into any more detail 0:17:22.600 --> 0:17:26.159 on that. Yeah, So anyway, it was actually kind of interesting. 0:17:26.160 --> 0:17:28.200 I had a little bit of a complex social structure 0:17:28.240 --> 0:17:30.280 to it. Um And some of the other games were 0:17:30.320 --> 0:17:33.680 really cool too, like the Trade Wars twenty twenty two 0:17:33.760 --> 0:17:36.639 or two thousand two. That was a good one. Barren 0:17:36.720 --> 0:17:41.679 Realms Elite was amazing, really. Yeah. Barren Realms Elite was 0:17:41.760 --> 0:17:46.760 a multiplayer strategy game and if you could have twenty 0:17:46.800 --> 0:17:49.520 five people playing this game, and the way the game 0:17:49.560 --> 0:17:52.320 worked was that would pitt bbs is against each other. 0:17:53.280 --> 0:17:57.399 Each BBS would essentially be a planet in a in 0:17:57.440 --> 0:18:01.280 a galaxy of planets, and so you were trying to 0:18:01.320 --> 0:18:03.960 have your planet come out on top of all the 0:18:04.040 --> 0:18:08.240 other planets. So it was this neat competition between BBS 0:18:08.359 --> 0:18:12.000 is UM And I'm sorry, go ahead, I was gonna 0:18:12.040 --> 0:18:14.520 say just that that that was kind of interesting because 0:18:14.600 --> 0:18:17.240 you could you know, BBS is not like the Internet. 0:18:17.280 --> 0:18:18.960 You know, you log into the Internet. The Internet is 0:18:19.000 --> 0:18:23.680 one gigantic network you could visit as many bbs is 0:18:23.720 --> 0:18:27.320 as you liked. Uh, we were really only limited by 0:18:27.520 --> 0:18:30.840 your phone bill and the amount of time you had 0:18:30.880 --> 0:18:34.880 at your disposal. Because each bbs was its own distinct 0:18:35.040 --> 0:18:37.679 thing with its own community, and some of the communities 0:18:37.720 --> 0:18:40.639 had multiple liked, some of the communities overlapped, right, and 0:18:40.920 --> 0:18:43.560 you would find the same people going to maybe three 0:18:43.680 --> 0:18:46.119 or four of the bbs is in their local area, 0:18:46.920 --> 0:18:49.280 but some of them would be more niche oriented, and 0:18:49.280 --> 0:18:51.680 you would really just see a certain group of people 0:18:51.720 --> 0:18:54.960 just stay there, like especially the ones that were centered 0:18:55.000 --> 0:18:59.439 around a very specific topic like dungeons and dragons, right, 0:18:59.480 --> 0:19:02.520 and yeah, there are a lot of the bbs is 0:19:02.600 --> 0:19:07.040 that I was familiar with had a specific slant to them, 0:19:07.040 --> 0:19:11.800 like they were specifically geared toward a particular interest. Um. 0:19:12.000 --> 0:19:14.960 I know, I know there were plenty of general topic 0:19:15.480 --> 0:19:18.760 bbs is, but it's you know, the ones that I 0:19:18.800 --> 0:19:20.960 was familiar with. Now, I didn't I admit I never 0:19:21.160 --> 0:19:24.359 actually dialed into a bbs I was, um just I 0:19:24.400 --> 0:19:27.080 didn't really become aware of it until after I had 0:19:27.080 --> 0:19:31.600 already started using the Internet or actually bitten net technically. Um, 0:19:31.680 --> 0:19:33.520 And you know, I was vaguely aware of it, but 0:19:33.520 --> 0:19:36.919 I didn't have a modem, so I didn't really participate 0:19:37.000 --> 0:19:38.840 for about five or six that I used to lug 0:19:38.880 --> 0:19:42.919 into pretty regularly. But um, yeah, I mean and in 0:19:42.960 --> 0:19:45.639 a lot of cases, I think this is this is 0:19:45.680 --> 0:19:49.840 sort of what evolved into the online service provider was, 0:19:50.160 --> 0:19:54.040 you know, the the gradual interest in people of logging 0:19:54.080 --> 0:19:57.399 into these systems and they became more complex. Uh, we 0:19:57.520 --> 0:20:01.240 had lots more people than you have companies looking to 0:20:02.240 --> 0:20:05.879 uh develop something more robust like a CompuServe or in 0:20:05.960 --> 0:20:10.040 America online before you know, the Internet became more of 0:20:10.040 --> 0:20:13.320 a public sphere when it was still dominated by government 0:20:13.400 --> 0:20:16.639 and academic interests, and you also had at this point 0:20:16.720 --> 0:20:20.320 the technology for modems has evolved as well, so that 0:20:20.760 --> 0:20:24.040 you could include things like some graphics in your in 0:20:24.080 --> 0:20:27.639 your system, like as we said before with BBS, as 0:20:27.680 --> 0:20:30.760 it was mostly text based or symbol based stuff because 0:20:31.000 --> 0:20:34.520 the well, for multiple reasons, One you have limited amount 0:20:34.560 --> 0:20:38.399 space on the computer that's hosting the BBS, but for another, 0:20:38.560 --> 0:20:41.919 it's just the limitation of how fast your modem can 0:20:42.440 --> 0:20:46.760 can conduct data through it. And at that speed you 0:20:46.840 --> 0:20:50.959 just couldn't do graphics. Um, that didn't stop people from 0:20:51.000 --> 0:20:53.320 creating as key art. They started doing that. They would 0:20:53.400 --> 0:20:58.080 use as key symbols to create uh uh sketches. Really 0:20:58.440 --> 0:21:00.879 I love as art. Well is interesting is they kind 0:21:00.920 --> 0:21:04.159 of became a currency on bbs is. People would build 0:21:04.320 --> 0:21:08.640 a design and they could trade it for other designs 0:21:08.800 --> 0:21:11.480 or sometimes for other programs things like that. It was 0:21:11.560 --> 0:21:14.879 kind of interesting that that became currency on BBSs or 0:21:14.960 --> 0:21:18.560 magic beans or magic beans. I wanted to read a 0:21:18.560 --> 0:21:20.800 little bit or or refer a little bit to an 0:21:20.840 --> 0:21:24.880 interesting document I found at text files dot com, which 0:21:24.920 --> 0:21:29.280 is a it's an archive of BBS text files. This 0:21:29.359 --> 0:21:33.040 is a text file called what has Killed BBS Systems. 0:21:33.400 --> 0:21:36.000 What I find interesting about this is that it was 0:21:36.040 --> 0:21:42.000 written in nineteen eighty two eight two What has Killed 0:21:42.000 --> 0:21:45.800 BBS Systems? That, keeping in mind the first public bbs 0:21:45.880 --> 0:21:49.040 is nineteen seventy nine. Yes, it did not take long 0:21:49.080 --> 0:21:51.880 to kill the bbs is according to this guy, Well, yes, 0:21:51.920 --> 0:21:53.840 but I I have a theory on this, but go 0:21:53.880 --> 0:21:56.600 ahead and make here. So the points that he made 0:21:56.720 --> 0:21:59.920 was that he said that the uploading and downloading program 0:22:00.119 --> 0:22:02.359 was killing bbs is because people would just come in, 0:22:02.760 --> 0:22:05.159 get whatever they wanted, and go, and they wouldn't they 0:22:05.160 --> 0:22:09.320 wouldn't participate in the community. Um. They said that there 0:22:09.359 --> 0:22:11.800 was a retaliation that was getting very cliquish, and people 0:22:11.800 --> 0:22:16.680 were retaliating against folks who were there just to communicate 0:22:16.800 --> 0:22:21.800 and to make friends and to exchange information. UH. He 0:22:21.920 --> 0:22:25.919 also blamed the proliferation of bbs is in a single area, 0:22:26.160 --> 0:22:28.800 in any given area. That was one of the things 0:22:28.840 --> 0:22:31.040 I talked about. How you could be on several bbs is, 0:22:31.119 --> 0:22:32.840 you know, you would go from one to the other. 0:22:33.280 --> 0:22:36.399 He he was saying that that's a problem. Um. He 0:22:36.440 --> 0:22:38.760 says that in places where there were only a couple 0:22:38.800 --> 0:22:42.400 of bbs is, things were going great. UM. He said 0:22:42.440 --> 0:22:44.920 that the loss of anonymity was a big problem, which 0:22:44.960 --> 0:22:47.560 is interesting because that's something that you hear on internet 0:22:47.560 --> 0:22:53.120 forums where people are reluctant to tie their own name 0:22:53.359 --> 0:22:57.080 to an online handle. You know that there's a lot 0:22:57.119 --> 0:23:01.320 of that still going on today. UM. The anti hacker movement, 0:23:01.359 --> 0:23:03.680 he said, was a big problem, which was the whole 0:23:03.720 --> 0:23:08.160 idea of UH. The hacker in the sense of programmer, 0:23:08.280 --> 0:23:11.879 not in the sense of phone freaker or or malicious hacker. 0:23:12.680 --> 0:23:16.359