[Infowarrior] - The Dial-Up BBS Revisited

[Richard Forno]

The Dial-Up BBS Revisited
August 30th, 2006 by RedWolf

BBS enthusiasts know that the last outpost for BBSes has been, for some time
now, through telnet on the Internet. There was a time, however, when when
dial-up BBSes over analog phone lines were the rule, not the exception. And
believe it or not, there are still a handful of BBSes out there that have
not modernized and switched over to the ŒNet. The only way you can get to
them, though, is through an old fashioned analog phone modem, regular ole Ma
Bell lines, and a little patience.

Visiting such old BBSes is incredible ‹ it¹s like traveling back in time to
the early-mid 1990s. Each BBS is a unique a time capsule, stocked with
trinkets and ephemera from the period. On message boards, you¹ll find posts
from 1994 about the O.J. Simpson trial and which player-made Doom levels are
best. In file transfer sections you¹ll run across large archives of
long-forgotten Windows 3.1 screen savers. In door sections (online games),
you¹ll find abandoned TradeWars 2002 games, still in progress, that haven¹t
been touched in eight years. And of course, the Ferrengi have completely
taken over.

< - >

http://www.vintagecomputing.com/index.php/archives/161