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[12/04/86]
The History of BBS's
And How They Came to be in
The Hopeful State That They are in Now.
As you may, or may not know, BBSs evolved from office, and school
computers. Many people simultaneously dawned upon the fantastic idea that it
would be great fun to be able to exchange information and ideas in an easy and
relatively new fashion, using God's gift to man, the modem. Originally,
office computers had BBS's to allow office people to communicate their ideas,
and schools had BBS's because a bunch of egghead kids decided that it would
piss the hell out of teachers to see them having fun instead of doing their
programming homework; needless to say, they were right.
It is from these simple beginnings that the USER evolved. Users, as the
name wittily implies, are those who use BBS's. In days long since past, they
were adult, mature computer owners who enjoyed intelligent conversation with
other adult mature computer owners. You see, in humbler times, when 48k was
enough for ANY application, computers cost lots of money. This brings us to
the crux of our conversation: Kids couldn't afford them. Kid's parents
didn't want to afford them (because G.I. Joe was ever so much cheaper), and so
kids didn't have them. Now, on the other hand, a computer can be had for as
little as 500 dollars, which is plenty cheaper than the complete Transformers
collection of guns, trucks, lazer pistols, attack ships and the like.
Armed with modems, and lists of thousands of interesting places to call,
they began to dial havoc into unsuspecting systems everywhere. Much to their
shock, the message bases were all filled with this stuffy drool about things
like ADA and SNOBOL. Obviously, computer users weren't good at spelling.
Intent on bringing some life to the rather dull party, Indiana Jones, a
typical 13 year old with a truly original alias, decided to get some of his
school buddies (all of whom were dweebs like himself) to log on as well.
Now, as a result of this wonderful happening, systems became overpopulated
with the likes of Jack the Dripper, Mike Hammer, The Equalizer, Eddy Murphy,
and the Amazing Spiderman...to name just a few. All of them -- every last one
doing exactly what his or her favorist Sysop requests: Posting Lots of
messages. What the sysop didn't ask for is a bunch of meaningless pigeon shit
to clutter up his disk space, which is all too precious to be wasted.
mIKE: cALL ME IN 5 MINUTES!!!!!!!!!!
oooPPPS!!!!!!HAD THE UPPER CASE ON!!!!!!!!BuT iM NOT TURNING IT
OFFF JUST TO BUG U'z HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!!!!!!!!!!!
AZ i WUZ SEYING.!!!!
jIMMY: I HIT MY BRUTHER WITH DA FONE BECUZ HE WUZNT BEE'NG A
K00L DUDE!!!!!!!!!!HAHAH!!!!!! U SHUDA SEEN HIM
SCREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEM!!!!!!!!!!!!HAHAHAHAH MY PARENTS EVEN
LAFFED!!!!!!!HOHOHOHOHO LOTZA LARFS FOR ALL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
tHE oNE, tHE oNLY
The BEST IN THE WORLD.
IT
'S
ME
THE BEST SUPERHERO IN THE WORLD
S N
U A
P M
ER
YA!!! YOU HEARD GOOD!!!! THIS MESSAGE
WAS BROUGHT TO YOU BY
YOUR FAVORITE PERSON
SUPERMAN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!YAYAY!!!!!!!!!!!
Let's look this over bit by revolting bit. Firstly, "mike: call me in
five minutes" is ridiculous, because as every sysop knows, Mike hasn't been on
in weeks, and time will show that he won't be on for another week or two.
Next, this silliness about upper case. Writers, lawyers and doctors write in
lower case, and I'm sure you can too, that is, if you can find the [CAPS_LOCK]
button (Inability to do so proves an obvious lack of intelligence). Notice
also the absurd use of abbreviations and indecipherable contractions; all in a
vain attempt to hide an obvious inability to spell and punctuate. I find it
hard to believe that Superman, who's mother tongue is English cannot read or
write in it. I would also like to know the proper english pronunciation of
"YAYAYAYAHAHAHAHAYTAHHGATAJHAHAHAHAHHA!!!!!!". Could it be that this is the
way these people were tought to speak? Doesn't say much for the parents.
Maybe it's genetics...
To make matters worse, these same children, egos inflated like balloons
open "kiddie boards" so they can be just as cool as the next guy. It is
reasonable to suspect that anything named "Cobra's Fortress of Terrible DOOM!"
is a kiddie board, and should be avoided at all costs.
As we should have realized from the start, kiddies should be barred
access to mature conversation, and left to their own "mountains of death"
where they can pester their own kind and leave all of us alone. But then
again, we all have 20/20 hindsight, don't we? It's unbelievable that this
policy hasn't been implemented universally on all intelligent systems yet.
I'm trying to change all that. Any self respecting sysop should get these dip
shit excuses for people off his board immediately, and give himself, and his
REAL users some peace of mind. Some sysops find this to be in poor taste, so
they set up "rules" to try and alleviate the situation. Be advised, though
that this is only a temporary solution; it will ease the pain but not get rid
of the infection. The only logical practice is true correction. Get them
off, and get them off now. We don't want to see them any more, and we're sure
you don't either.
I hope that this SoftDoc clarifies some of the inherent problems in
giving expensive toys to children, and allowing them free, irresponsible reign
of smart and intelligent establishments (if you are reading this, the system
you are on cares, and is obviously run by a being of higher understanding).
Outa here,
Thomas Ark.
(have a snappy day!)