Karen Gregory
Imagining a Better Internet: https://issues.org/imagining-better-internet-driscoll-forum/
Imagining a Better Internet

The modem-based communities of the early internet were very different from the commercial social platforms of today.

Issues in Science and Technology
Nov 2, 2022 at 8:31amWeb
Show threadSteve YelvingtonNov 2, 2022

@karengregory
My start was with discussion-focused BBS sites in Minneapolis that were networked (Citadel). Each had a distinct community flavor, even though most users had accounts on multiple sites and some discussion "rooms" were shared. There were Fido sites as well, but they tended to be more focused on software downloads and computer topics, not the casual chatting of Citadel.

Naturally I wound up running one.

Show threadSteve YelvingtonNov 2, 2022

@karengregory Offline meetups were common -- at restaurants, parties, even a cliff climbing campout.

Over time there was some limited integration with Usenet newsgroups and UUCP email.

At one point I counted 110 dialup BBSes in the toll-free phone service area.

The end of the restrictive Internet user policies and the sudden creation of dozens of local ISPs brought about the end of all that.

Show threadKaren GregoryNov 2, 2022
@Yelvington I love these histories and we teach some of this this community/network moment in the MSc but very hard for students to grasp how much has changed (and why)