Hello, All.

I was reading an article the other day titled "What Makes a Great Online Community". It actually was primarily an extended advertisement/invitation for a Twitter discussion scheduled for later today.

While I have very little interest in that. The article did raise some points of interest to me.

The author mentions being introduced to online communities in 2007. Specifically, having just recently joined Facebook, and learning of a new thing called Twitter.

Also around that time, they discovered message forums on a website they were subscribed to.

This is the highlights of what they took away from those communities:

Even though one community was on a private platform and the other was a public and global event, both expected participants to be respectful toward others.

Community members offered two-way feedback. There was (and still is) a wonderful balance between giving and taking, asking and answering.

The members created tight-knit, global communities that supported people despite living miles apart or in different time zones.

I felt that both communities were safe, nonjudgmental spaces.

It gave me the opportunity to network with like-minded people.

Learning from people from all over the world is an enriching experience. 


While I'm reading that, I find myself thinking that this is exactly what I found more than 20 years prior to that in the BBS community and eventually Fidonet.

So why is it the online forums and things like Facebook and Twitter are such huge presences in the world, but Fidonet, and the BBS community in general, aren't?


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Hi Charles!

06 Nov 20 09:19, you wrote to All:

I was reading an article the other day titled "What Makes a Great
Online Community"...

[snip]

While I'm reading that, I find myself thinking that this is exactly
what I found more than 20 years prior to that in the BBS community and eventually Fidonet.

That is what I found the various message boards and echomail to be.

So why is it the online forums and things like Facebook and Twitter
are such huge presences in the world, but Fidonet, and the BBS
community in general, aren't?

That has been debated before. Opinions varied from "the eenernet is sexier", less dialup wait times or faster connections of internet, lots of purty pictures and graphics.

I wouldn't know if newsgroup use has waned over time since then (more spam and trolls), but even participation in a newsgroup had a faster and more broad response than an isolated BBS or a hobbiest echomail network.

Myself, my community for fast answers and interesting conversions included Compuserve for at least 3 or 4 years.

Web forums also evolved out of a need to build communities with special interests. I joined a few when I needed info on Thinkpads and Macs. I still have the Thinkpad one in my back pocket.

Meanwhile, FTN echomail has found a way to participate in similar web forum style too (eg Synchronet's eWeb thing?)

Along the way, people have probably grown accustomed to using the browser that often would come included with their computer purchase and not learn about the FTN/BBS options out there. BBSing is probably still strongly associated with dialup.

As for Facebook and Twitter, they address the short term memories and fickle approach of communication (memes, pics, one-liners, forwards of other people's pics/memes/jokes) to the vast majority of computer users, I guess.

I think Facebook made it easy for an individual (and now companies and groups) to establish a presence and have pretty good control of content and promotion. No fancy web-page coding required. People on Facebook are not interested in conversations as much as they are interested in telling the world about themselves. It really upped the anted on blogging, I think.

Twitter, I won't comment on, except to say that I don't like the hashtag mess that the tweets become.

And now over time, people are migrating to using different devices to access their Facebooks and Twitters via "apps".

Where does all this leave the Fidonet and BBS community? ..probably in the dust. Perhaps if there was a consistent approach to reacquaint the ex-BBS user and the new generation of conversationalist to the Fidonet and BBS communities then maybe we'd notice some increased presence by their participation.


--- GoldED+/W32-MINGW 1.1.5-b20180707
* Origin: ----> Point Of VeleNo BBs (http://www.velenobbs.net) (2:333/808.7)

Hello, August Abolins.
On 11/7/20 1:46 AM you wrote:

So why is it the online forums and things like Facebook and
Twitter are such huge presences in the world, but Fidonet, and
the BBS community in general, aren't?

That has been debated before. Opinions varied from "the eenernet
is sexier", less dialup wait times or faster connections of
internet, lots of purty pictures and graphics.

I remember the initial participation fall off of some of the echos I most actively participated in. At the time, connecting to the internet was primarily dialup, so I don't really accept that.
I did see it as being something shiny and new, so obviously people were going to look around. But I also expected them to eventually come back around the echos. Perhaps not as often as before, but consistently.

Obviously I was wrong.

I wouldn't know if newsgroup use has waned over time since then
(more spam and trolls), but even participation in a newsgroup had
a faster and more broad response than an isolated BBS or a
hobbiest echomail network.

I tried newsgroups now and then. I didn't care for them. It seemed a cheap imitation of echomail.
Email group lists were better, but many of the lists I was on then were primarily by people coming from a Fidonet background, and the lists reflected that.

Myself, my community for fast answers and interesting conversions included Compuserve for at least 3 or 4 years.

I never did find anything like that on Compuserve or AOL.

Web forums also evolved out of a need to build communities with
special interests. I joined a few when I needed info on Thinkpads
and Macs. I still have the Thinkpad one in my back pocket.

Specialized forums like that I understand. It makes sense. In some larger companies I've worked at, they had them set-up as a sort of peer to peer help system to spread everyone's knowledge and experience around.

Meanwhile, FTN echomail has found a way to participate in similar
web forum style too (eg Synchronet's eWeb thing?)

It has. But it's also had a tendency to be very insular. There is very little, if any promotion of what it has to offer.

Along the way, people have probably grown accustomed to using the
browser that often would come included with their computer
purchase and not learn about the FTN/BBS options out there.
BBSing is probably still strongly associated with dialup.

I actually think more in terms of Telnet these days, the local BBS's I called on dialup vanished long ago. I'm sure there are some still, but I no longer even have a landline phone.

If you mention BBS to the average person these days, they are as likely to associate the term with thise web forum things, which can tend to be as badly infested with bots and spam as usenet ever was.

As for Facebook and Twitter, they address the short term memories
and fickle approach of communication (memes, pics, one-liners,
forwards of other people's pics/memes/jokes) to the vast majority
of computer users, I guess.

For all that might be said now, Facebook basically can be broken down to being started as a computer nerd online frat party.

I think Facebook made it easy for an individual (and now companies
and groups) to establish a presence and have pretty good control
of content and promotion. No fancy web-page coding required.
People on Facebook are not interested in conversations as much as
they are interested in telling the world about themselves. It
really upped the anted on blogging, I think.

Facebook does have groups, which can imitate echos. But for the most part, you're correct.

Twitter, I won't comment on, except to say that I don't like the
hashtag mess that the tweets become.

I don't get the hashtags. I mean, I understand what the intent was, but I don't get it.

And now over time, people are migrating to using different devices
to access their Facebooks and Twitters via "apps".

Apps are easy. They're convenient. But then again, I'm a software geek.

Where does all this leave the Fidonet and BBS community?
..probably in the dust. Perhaps if there was a consistent approach
to reacquaint the ex-BBS user and the new generation of
conversationalist to the Fidonet and BBS communities then maybe
we'd notice some increased presence by their participation.

There is the issue in a nutshell. But it's more than that.
The BBS community is where I've met some of the most innovative people in computers.
Terminal programs, BBS programs, offline readers, door programs, FTN and other style networks.... while there is commercial software, for the most part it was done by individuals, or groups of people, creating these wonderful programs because they could.

You don't see very much of that now. Now, the BBS community seems more about preserving the history.

Why can't it be both?

I think I was around 12 years old when we got our first home computer. Younger if you include things like Atari games.

Now, there is an entire generation that a computer in the home is like a television or a stove. You yourself have referred to your computer as an appliance.

Smart phones and tablets have been around for over a decade.

But look what happens when the conversation comes up about software for these mobile devices to connect with FTN networks. There is very little interest, if not outright hostility to the idea.

Recall the reactions to my idea of running a BBS on a smartphone or Tablet?

At best, my ideas have been met with a response that is basically, "Yes it is possible, but I have no interest in using that myself. Good luck with that."

Like it or not, you're going to have little, if any growth in the BBS network community without adapting to new technology. This doesn't mean discarding the past. But existing BBS software can be adapted to mobile device technology without making the existing tech obsolete.

The proof of concept exists in the program I am using now. It's just not being supported.



--
Best regards!
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* Origin: Houston, Tx (2:221/6.21)

On 06/11/2020 10:28 p.m., Charles Pierson : August Abolins wrote:

I did see it as being something shiny and new, so
obviously people were going to look around. But I also
expected them to eventually come back around the echos.
Perhaps not as often as before, but consistently.

Obviously I was wrong.

This article seems to analyse the trend and reasoning from BBS to
internet use too:

https://www.zdnet.com/article/before-the-web-online-services/


--
__/|ug

--- TB(Stealth)/Win7
* Origin: nntp://rbb.fidonet.fi - Lake Ylo - Finland (2:221/360.0)

Hello, August Abolins.
On 11/7/20 8:18 PM you wrote:

This article seems to analyse the trend and reasoning from BBS to internet use too: https://www.zdnet.com/article/before-the-web-online-services/

I didn't get any reasoning on BBS's decline. It was more of a footnote of also was...

I do remember checking out most of the services they talk about. GEnie and WELL I didn't. But it was in addition to BBS, not in place of.



--
Best regards!
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--- Hotdoged/2.13.5/Android
* Origin: Houston, TX (2:240/1120.976)

Hello, August Abolins.
On 11/7/20 8:18 PM you wrote:

This article seems to analyse the trend and reasoning from BBS to internet use too: https://www.zdnet.com/article/before-the-web-online-services/

I didn't get any reasoning on BBS's decline. It was more of a footnote of also was...

I do remember checking out most of the services they talk about. GEnie and WELL I didn't. But it was in addition to BBS, not in place of.

--
Best regards!
Posted using Hotdoged on Android

I only skimmed over it quickly. I want to re-read it. It was nice to read that Fidonet was remembered and with a link to the "official" domain.

--- tg2fido gate v0.6.1
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Hello, August Abolins.
On 11/8/20 12:14 AM you wrote:

I only skimmed over it quickly. I want to re-read it. It was nice
to read that Fidonet was remembered and with a link to the
"official" domain.

I see articles every now and again about BBSes. They even give links to some now and then. It's usually nostalgia type pieces though.

--
Best regards!
Posted using Hotdoged on Android
--- Hotdoged/2.13.5/Android
* Origin: Houston, TX (2:240/1120.976)

Hi Charles!

07 Nov 20 05:28, you wrote to me:

I remember the initial participation fall off of some of the echos I
most actively participated in. At the time, connecting to the internet
was primarily dialup, so I don't really accept that.

There were a lot of different BBSes (mostly single POTS) to choose from in the early days. As the AOL, Prodigy, and public uucp services emerged, busy signals were probably a rarity for those well supported systems with multiple lines. Hence, users gravited towards systems where they could get on right away. That's how I felt with Compuserve; I don't recall ever getting a busy signal with that. Meanwhile, supporting multiple lines for a hobby-based BBS was expensive. The other services mentioned above were all $'s supported.

I did see it as
being something shiny and new, so obviously people were going to look around. But I also expected them to eventually come back around the echos. Perhaps not as often as before, but consistently.

To come back? Why would they do that, when they get pretty graphics and colours (html) and buttons to click on the screen? It's so much more fun.

Obviously I was wrong.

:)

I tried newsgroups now and then. I didn't care for them. It seemed a cheap imitation of echomail. Email group lists were better, but many
of the lists I was on then were primarily by people coming from a
Fidonet background, and the lists reflected that.

I thought ngs where quite amazing - before my regular hangouts started getting trolls and spam.

Myself, my community for fast answers and interesting conversions
included Compuserve for at least 3 or 4 years.

I never did find anything like that on Compuserve or AOL.

I hung around the areas for music and film primarily. The odd technical place for Windows and OS/2 was pretty good for questions and answers.

FTN echomail... web forum style too (eg Synchronet's eWeb thing?)

It has. But it's also had a tendency to be very insular. There is very little, if any promotion of what it has to offer.

Sysops do there best with listings on TelnetBBS Guide, getting noticed on places like ipingtherforeiam, creating Welcome webpages that offer fTelnet connections, and even some Facebook presence to make announcements and try to inform new visitors.

But, for the most part Fidonet (or any othernet for that matter) remains obscure to the average user out there.

BBSing is probably still strongly associated with dialup.

I actually think more in terms of Telnet these days, the local BBS's I called on dialup vanished long ago. I'm sure there are some still,
but I no longer even have a landline phone.

Precisely. So, the average person thinks that BBSes are quite dead since many people don't use dialup for their internet/computer activity anymore.

Twitter, I won't comment on, except to say that I don't like the
hashtag mess that the tweets become.

I don't get the hashtags. I mean, I understand what the intent was,
but I don't get it.

They are a way to categorize a message. Clicking on the tag in the message shows you other messages that contain the same tag.

Apparently Telegram has something similar but I haven't studied that.

...Perhaps if there was a consistent
approach to reacquaint the ex-BBS user and the new generation of
conversationalist to the Fidonet and BBS communities then maybe
we'd notice some increased presence by their participation.

There is the issue in a nutshell. But it's more than that.
The BBS community is where I've met some of the most innovative people
in computers. Terminal programs, BBS programs, offline readers, door programs, FTN and other style networks.... while there is commercial software, for the most part it was done by individuals, or groups of people, creating these wonderful programs because they could.

The ZDnet article mentioned The Well. The internet presence for The Well looks amazing and well organized. It's basically the same thing as Fidonet, but webbased forums. Not sure if there is an offline option for messages. Its philosophy of real names, etc... reads very much like the Fidonet BBSses of old.

You don't see very much of that now. Now, the BBS community seems more about preserving the history.

Why can't it be both?

I dunno. I think the preservation part is due in part to the necessity of sticking to minimum FTN standards? But Fidonet (and its counterpart othernets) have done a pretty good job being accessible via nntp, qwk, and other means.

Smart phones and tablets have been around for over a decade.

But look what happens when the conversation comes up about software
for these mobile devices to connect with FTN networks. There is very little interest, if not outright hostility to the idea.

I don't sense hostility as much as I sense apathy. Time and money could be limiting factor. Producing an app for the MacOS requires some kind of upfront fee, I think. WRT time, there is probably the notion that something like Fidonet is dying anyway, so why bother?

Recall the reactions to my idea of running a BBS on a smartphone or Tablet?

You would encounter critics wherever you go.

At best, my ideas have been met with a response that is basically,
"Yes it is possible, but I have no interest in using that myself. Good luck with that."

At the moment you haven't met the right individual that shares your vision.

Like it or not, you're going to have little, if any growth in the BBS network community without adapting to new technology. This doesn't
mean discarding the past. But existing BBS software can be adapted to mobile device technology without making the existing tech obsolete.

The proof of concept exists in the program I am using now. It's just
not being supported.
--
Best regards!
Posted using Hotdoged on Android
--- Hotdoged/2.13.5/Android

Yes, Hotdoged seems to be a fine adaptation for Android devices. But is that the one where the code is not available?







--- GoldED+/W32-MINGW 1.1.5-b20180707
* Origin: ----> Point Of VeleNo BBs (http://www.velenobbs.net) (2:333/808.7)

Hello, August Abolins.
On 11/8/20 1:22 AM you wrote:

Hi Charles! 07 Nov 20 05:28, you wrote to me:

I remember the initial participation fall off of some of the
echos I most actively participated in. At the time, connecting to
the internet was primarily dialup, so I don't really accept that.

There were a lot of different BBSes (mostly single POTS) to choose
from in the early days. As the AOL, Prodigy, and public uucp
services emerged, busy signals were probably a rarity for those
well supported systems with multiple lines. Hence, users gravited towards systems where they could get on right away. That's how I
felt with Compuserve; I don't recall ever getting a busy signal
with that. Meanwhile, supporting multiple lines for a hobby-based
BBS was expensive. The other services mentioned above were all $'s supported.

I remember with AOL, it would cycle through local numbers until it connected. The others I don't recall.

But as far as single line BBSes, I had several different systems in my terminal program. At least 20-30 local one's during the height of popularity. With autodial, the terminal program would simply go down the list until a system connected. I primarily logged on transferred QWK or BW packets and logged off. A few systems, I would play a few door games. Primarily league games.

Once Telnet became more common, it was much the same, but more globally as far as BBS systems were concerned.

I did see it as being something shiny and new, so obviously
people were going to look around. But I also expected them to
eventually come back around the echos. Perhaps not as often as
before, but consistently.

To come back? Why would they do that, when they get pretty
graphics and colours (html) and buttons to click on the screen?
It's so much more fun.

True, you could see things that you couldn't on a BBS, but why is it either/or?

For the most part, with a few exceptions, you still have far better quality discussions on Fido than elsewhere online.

Obviously I was wrong.

:)

I tried newsgroups now and then. I didn't care for them. It
seemed a cheap imitation of echomail. Email group lists were
better, but many of the lists I was on then were primarily by
people coming from a Fidonet background, and the lists reflected
that.

I thought ngs where quite amazing - before my regular hangouts
started getting trolls and spam.

Maybe I was late to it, but i generally saw more spam than anything on usenet.

Myself, my community for fast answers and interesting
conversions included Compuserve for at least 3 or 4 years.

I never did find anything like that on Compuserve or AOL.

I hung around the areas for music and film primarily. The odd
technical place for Windows and OS/2 was pretty good for questions
and answers.

Fidonet had a Message area for nearly any topic you could imagine.

The only difference was that until internet packet transfers became more common, a conversation took days or even a couple of weeks, depending on routes. Now instead of everything in North America have to go system to system usually during an overnight mail hour, until reaching a system who volunteered a good hit to their phone bill to call overseas to a similar system in Europe or Asia or Australia or Africa or South America, then hop system to system again until the end. Then replies come back the same way.

Now systems either can send packets as soon as there is new mail or hourly, as they choose, so you can have back and forth in a conversation several times a day.

FTN echomail... web forum style too (eg Synchronet's eWeb
thing?)

It has. But it's also had a tendency to be very insular. There is
very little, if any promotion of what it has to offer.

Sysops do there best with listings on TelnetBBS Guide, getting
noticed on places like ipingtherforeiam, creating Welcome webpages
that offer fTelnet connections, and even some Facebook presence to
make announcements and try to inform new visitors. But, for the
most part Fidonet (or any othernet for that matter) remains
obscure to the average user out there.

Exactly. How many of those things would someone not part of the BBS community even know exist?

Even with Facebook, I belong to a Group called FidoNet TREK Echo.
It was supposedly set up to mimic it's namesake. There are about 175 members in the Group. Besides myself, I know 3 members that were for certain part of Fidonet in the past.

Even if more were in FidoNet before, as far as I can tell, I'm the only one still actively participating in FidoNet.
As far as the content of that group, people share articles related to various Star Trek related shows, movies, events, actors. Occasionally, someone will post an opinion on an episode. But there is no discussion to speak of.

It hardly reflects what the Echo it's named after was.

My point is that if you have something like that, wouldn't you want to promote where it came from?

BBSing is probably still strongly associated with dialup.

I actually think more in terms of Telnet these days, the local
BBS's I called on dialup vanished long ago. I'm sure there are
some still, but I no longer even have a landline phone.

Precisely. So, the average person thinks that BBSes are quite dead
since many people don't use dialup for their internet/computer
activity anymore.

The average person has no idea what a BBS is, or if they do, it's a vague idea of what computer geeks did in thier spare time when not running away from dinosaurs going to and from school.

Twitter, I won't comment on, except to say that I don't like the
hashtag mess that the tweets become.

I don't get the hashtags. I mean, I understand what the intent
was, but I don't get it.

They are a way to categorize a message. Clicking on the tag in the message shows you other messages that contain the same tag.
Apparently Telegram has something similar but I haven't studied
that.

I know what hashtags are and their purpose. I don't get the need for them.

...Perhaps if there was a consistent approach to reacquaint the
ex-BBS user and the new generation of conversationalist to the
Fidonet and BBS communities then maybe we'd notice some
increased presence by their participation.

There is the issue in a nutshell. But it's more than that. The
BBS community is where I've met some of the most innovative
people in computers. Terminal programs, BBS programs, offline
readers, door programs, FTN and other style networks.... while
there is commercial software, for the most part it was done by
individuals, or groups of people, creating these wonderful
programs because they could.

The ZDnet article mentioned The Well. The internet presence for
The Well looks amazing and well organized. It's basically the
same thing as Fidonet, but webbased forums. Not sure if there is
an offline option for messages. Its philosophy of real names,
etc... reads very much like the Fidonet BBSses of old.

The Well is a commercial BBS, more or less.

You don't see very much of that now. Now, the BBS community seems
more about preserving the history. Why can't it be both?

I dunno. I think the preservation part is due in part to the
necessity of sticking to minimum FTN standards? But Fidonet (and
its counterpart othernets) have done a pretty good job being
accessible via nntp, qwk, and other means.

I wasn't clear enough, I guess.

History is important. FidoNet showed what a bunch of regular people are capable of. Linking thousands or more people together worldwide talking about things. Not governments, not corporations, not Universities. People. On their own time, out of their own pockets.

Different computer systems, it didn't matter.

Different OSes, no problem. We have this program in DOS, let's make it available for people that use OS2 or Linux. Or vice versa.

You have a C=64? No problem, join in the fun.

If I'm not mistaken, every model of home computer there was could participate.

Smart phones and tablets have been around for over a decade. But
look what happens when the conversation comes up about software
for these mobile devices to connect with FTN networks. There is
very little interest, if not outright hostility to the idea.

I don't sense hostility as much as I sense apathy. Time and money
could be limiting factor. Producing an app for the MacOS requires
some kind of upfront fee, I think. WRT time, there is probably the
notion that something like Fidonet is dying anyway, so why bother?

Maybe hostility wasn't the right word.

Apathy fits a lot of it. But there is more than that.

How many BBS related programs are there that have versions for multiple operating systems? What if those programmers thought, "I only use X OS. I don't need to port it to Y." ? Or release the code so someone else can.

That's exactly what this is here. Android is simply a different OS.

But there are negative reactions to the idea.

Recall the reactions to my idea of running a BBS on a smartphone
or Tablet?

You would encounter critics wherever you go.

True. Criticism if fine, expected even.

It's the negativity.

"The screen is too small"
"The Keyboard is too small"
"It's too hard to read on it"

Ok, in your particular situation, any or all of these comments might be true. But that doesn't make it universally true. Millions of people use tablets and smartphones on a daily basis.

A few months ago, I saw a guy testing a connection with a software he's working on. I thought it was along the line of what I'm looking for, but it's more a remote connection to his home system. It's not something that I necessarily would use myself, but I'm fully supportive of his efforts.

My more current discussion in Asian Link. His idea works. It's more programmer heavy than I'm looking for. But it's there, and if it works for people, I'm in full support.

The general public aren't big programmers. But they can install an app. They can type an address. They can fill out a form.
So the typical BBS related software, a decent Telnet that supports ANSI graphics and BBS transfers for Mail Packets, seem a very good thing to me.

A point system that has the features that one on a PC does seems even better. Once you're set up, it's only a matter of sending and receiving mail.

As far as the BBS on Android idea? It's definitely not for everyone. But it's something that I see potential for.

At best, my ideas have been met with a response that is
basically, "Yes it is possible, but I have no interest in using
that myself. Good luck with that."

At the moment you haven't met the right individual that shares
your vision.

I've seen some alternative ideas.

I may not ever find that person. That's fine.

Like it or not, you're going to have little, if any growth in the
BBS network community without adapting to new technology. This
doesn't mean discarding the past. But existing BBS software can
be adapted to mobile device technology without making the
existing tech obsolete. The proof of concept exists in the
program I am using now. It's just not being supported.

Yes, Hotdoged seems to be a fine adaptation for Android devices.
But is that the one where the code is not available?

The Fido provider portion of HotdogEd is based on jNode. I'm not sure about the other portions.

Aftershock I don't know about,

--
Best regards!
Posted using Hotdoged on Android
--- Hotdoged/2.13.5/Android
* Origin: Houston, Tx (2:221/6.21)

Hi Charles!

07 Nov 20 17:10, you wrote to me:

I only skimmed over it quickly. I want to re-read it. It was
nice to read that Fidonet was remembered and with a link to the
"official" domain.

I see articles every now and again about BBSes. They even give links
to some now and then. It's usually nostalgia type pieces though.

Good point. Most stories and reports seem to refer to fidonet/bbs in the past tense.

Perhaps an article that summarizes the current status and the availability to participate with the fidonet community (and othernets) TODAY could be created and posted in places where conversationalists reside: reddit?


--- GoldED+/W32-MINGW 1.1.5-b20180707
* Origin: ----> Point Of VeleNo BBs (http://www.velenobbs.net) (2:333/808.7)

Hello, August Abolins.
On 11/9/20 12:36 AM you wrote:

Hi Charles! 07 Nov 20 17:10, you wrote to me:

I only skimmed over it quickly. I want to re-read it. It was
nice to read that Fidonet was remembered and with a link to the
"official" domain.

I see articles every now and again about BBSes. They even give
links to some now and then. It's usually nostalgia type pieces
though.

Good point. Most stories and reports seem to refer to fidonet/bbs
in the past tense. Perhaps an article that summarizes the current
status and the availability to participate with the fidonet
community (and othernets) TODAY could be created and posted in
places where conversationalists reside: reddit?

Add it to the list.

--
Best regards!
Posted using Hotdoged on Android
--- Hotdoged/2.13.5/Android
* Origin: Houston, TX (2:240/1120.976)

Hi Charles!

Answering a msg of <08 Nov 20>, from you to me:

those well supported systems with multiple lines.
Hence, users gravited towards systems where they
could get on right away..

I remember with AOL, it would cycle through local
numbers until it connected. The others I don't
recall.

The others had little to no busy signal issues. Even IBM had its own BBS. That was fun to connect to and get info about OS/2 updates and post messages in the online community. From the latter, I learned about an OS/2 user group that would meet every month in downtown Montreal in one of the IBM buildings. They featured guest speakers (programmers, designers..), door prizes. I won an OS/2 Warp T-shirt one evening - that was cool.

But as far as single line BBSes, I had several
different systems in my terminal program. At least
20-30 local one's during the height of popularity.
With autodial, the terminal program would simply
go down the list until a system connected.

I had much the same. I just robo-dialed my usual BBSes.

But TODAY, that dial-n-wait process is obsolete. I don't think the prospective public knows that BBSes are accessible via Telnet (with their exisiting internet service) and the waiting queue is practically non-existent.

I primarily logged on transferred QWK or BW
packets and logged off. A few systems, I would
play a few door games. Primarily league games.

Same here. I wasn't too much into the games, but it was a nice diversion at times.

To come back? Why would they do that, when they
get pretty graphics and colours (html) and
buttons to click on the screen? It's so much more
fun.

True, you could see things that you couldn't on a
BBS, but why is it either/or?

For the most part, with a few exceptions, you
still have far better quality discussions on Fido
than elsewhere online.

The target audience is jappers like you and I. I don't need the graphical distractions that online web interfaces provide.

Obviously I was wrong.

:)

I tried newsgroups now and then. I didn't care
for them. It seemed a cheap imitation of
echomail.

On that, I concur.

Fidonet had a Message area for nearly any topic
you could imagine.

Over time, the majority of active echos reduced to areas geared for sysop/bbs interests.

Now systems either can send packets as soon as
there is new mail or hourly, as they choose, so
you can have back and forth in a conversation
several times a day.

This is what today's Fidonet ought to leverage and promote for the user's advantage.

Sysops do there best with listings.. But, for the
most part Fidonet (or any othernet for that
matter) remains obscure to the average user out
there.

Exactly. How many of those things would someone
not part of the BBS community even know exist?

Word needs to be seeded outside the Fidonet realm.

Even with Facebook, I belong to a Group called
FidoNet TREK Echo. It was supposedly set up to
mimic it's namesake. There are about 175 members
in the Group. Besides myself, I know 3 members
that were for certain part of Fidonet in the past.

I hung out in the fido PHOTO group. Then, when internet came along, someone built a Facebook group and everyone went there. The FB solution was pretty good considering that echo was primarily about each other's photos. FB made it easy to share images. BUT... I noticed that the converstional content degraded to zero. The FB group maybe had a brief description (or none at all) for an initial photo, but the rest of the content was just the "thumbs-up" thing, or one-liners like "great photo".

The group even experimented with scheduled audio chat events (think Zoom, but for audio-only). That was rather cool, except for me still on dialup at the time, it was a brutal experience. Group audio could get confusing.

... people share articles related to various Star
Trek related shows, movies, events, actors.
Occasionally, someone will post an opinion on an
episode. But there is no discussion to speak of.

It hardly reflects what the Echo it's named after
was.

Same result as PHOTO echo.

My point is that if you have something like that,
wouldn't you want to promote where it came from?

That is a good point. A shout-out to a sister "disscussion" group on Fidonet could appeal to some of the FB TREK users too, like you.

Twitter..

I don't get the hashtags. I mean, I understand
what the intent was, but I don't get it..

They are a way to categorize a message...

I know what hashtags are and their purpose. I
don't get the need for them.

It is a way to attempt to build a community of likeminded people on a particular topic. Case in point: #metoo And look how that sky-rocketed into media fame.

The ZDnet article mentioned The Well. The
internet presence for The Well looks amazing and
well organized. It's basically the same thing as
Fidonet, but webbased forums. Not sure if there
is an offline option for messages. Its philosophy
of real names, etc... reads very much like the
Fidonet BBSses of old.

The Well is a commercial BBS, more or less.

Was it always commercial? One of the history articles in WIRED didn't quite cover that aspect. But it did primarily focus on an LA community. No mention of anything like echomail connecting people worldwide.

I wasn't clear enough, I guess.

History is important. FidoNet showed what a bunch
of regular people are capable of. Linking
thousands or more people together worldwide
talking about things. Not governments, not
corporations, not Universities. People. On their
own time, out of their own pockets.

I sense a fine Fidonet article in the making!

Different computer systems, it didn't matter.
Different OSes, no problem. We have this program
in DOS, let's make it available for people that
use OS2 or Linux. Or vice versa.

You have a C=64? No problem, join in the fun.

If I'm not mistaken, every model of home computer
there was could participate.

Yes.. there was excitement to accomodate the caller/user.

Apathy fits a lot of it. But there is more than
that.

How many BBS related programs are there that have
versions for multiple operating systems? What if
those programmers thought, "I only use X OS. I
don't need to port it to Y."? Or release the code
so someone else can.

That's exactly what this is here. Android is
simply a different OS.

But there are negative reactions to the idea.

Age? I think the sysops/progammers of yesteryear are tired, satisfied to just dwell in nostalgia.

It's the negativity.

"The screen is too small"
"The Keyboard is too small"
"It's too hard to read on it"

Those are user's/sysop's comments. What is lacking is a programmer/visionary.

Ok, in your particular situation, any or all of
these comments might be true. But that doesn't
make it universally true. Millions of people use
tablets and smartphones on a daily basis.

Except for the tried and true genuine BBS interface experience, there is no real reason NOT to embrace supporting echomail on a smartphone/tablet. Some of the NNTP apps are pretty good. They just need cooperating sysops to provide the server-side for that - which there is. JamNNTP goes a step further and tries to mimic the FROM:/TO: in the typical nntp field so that you can see both names in a conversation.

My more current discussion in Asian Link. His idea
works. It's more programmer heavy than I'm looking
for. But it's there, and if it works for people,
I'm in full support.

Which discussion is that? I think I missed it. Short-lived? Was it just a comment or two?

The general public aren't big programmers. But
they can install an app. They can type an address.
They can fill out a form. So the typical BBS
related software, a decent Telnet that supports
ANSI graphics and BBS transfers for Mail Packets,
seem a very good thing to me.

That is all good. Keep expressing it. If you could draw in someone who can explore your ideas futher, it could get traction.

As far as the BBS on Android idea? It's definitely
not for everyone. But it's something that I see
potential for.

I'm reminded of the BBS-on-a-Stick project.

Yes, Hotdoged seems to be a fine adaptation for
Android devices. But is that the one where the
code is not available?

The Fido provider portion of HotdogEd is based on
jNode. I'm not sure about the other portions.

I see lots of tutorials and info on jNode. Sounds good.

___/|ug

--- GoldED+/W32-MINGW 1.1.5-b20180707
* Origin: ----> (2:333/808.7)

Hi Charles!

07 Nov 20 17:10, you wrote to me:

I only skimmed over it quickly. I want to re-read it. It was
nice to read that Fidonet was remembered and with a link to the
"official" domain.

I see articles every now and again about BBSes. They even give links
to some now and then. It's usually nostalgia type pieces though.

I've read the ZDnet article properly now. You are right. It reads more like a nostalgia piece afterall. But I think it has a few things wrong w.r.t Fidonet. I'll share that in a post in FUTURE4FIDO.



--- GoldED+/W32-MINGW 1.1.5-b20180707
* Origin: ----> Point Of VeleNo BBs (http://www.velenobbs.net) (2:333/808.7)

Hello, August Abolins.
On 11/9/20 2:42 AM you wrote:

Hi Charles! Answering a msg of <08 Nov 20>, from you to me:

those well supported systems with multiple lines. Hence, users
gravited towards systems where they could get on right away..

I remember with AOL, it would cycle through local numbers until
it connected. The others I don't recall.

The others had little to no busy signal issues. Even IBM had its
own BBS. That was fun to connect to and get info about OS/2
updates and post messages in the online community. From the
latter, I learned about an OS/2 user group that would meet every
month in downtown Montreal in one of the IBM buildings. They
featured guest speakers (programmers, designers..), door prizes. I
won an OS/2 Warp T-shirt one evening - that was cool.

That could be a difference in location. At that time, Houston and Philadelphia, PA were playing ping pong with being the 4th and 5th largest cities in the US. Houston had a larger population than the State of Kansas.

I'm not sure where you are located, but I would guess Eastern Ontario, or now I suppose Quebec, since you mentioned Montreal.

Based on the populations of these areas, I suspect more callers in the Houston area than in either of those, just based on density. The Houston metro area population is about 3/4 of the population of Quebec, and close to half of Ontario's.

But AOL had enough lines available that I never could not connect.

But TODAY, that dial-n-wait process is obsolete. I don't think
the prospective public knows that BBSes are accessible via Telnet
(with their exisiting internet service) and the waiting queue is practically non-existent.

True. But you have to explain Telnet.

I primarily logged on transferred QWK or BW packets and logged
off. A few systems, I would play a few door games. Primarily
league games.

Same here. I wasn't too much into the games, but it was a nice
diversion at times.

I liked checking them out. Like I've said I'm a software geek. I like seeing what's out there.

To come back? Why would they do that, when they get pretty
graphics and colours (html) and buttons to click on the screen?
It's so much more fun.

True, you could see things that you couldn't on a BBS, but why is
it either/or? For the most part, with a few exceptions, you still
have far better quality discussions on Fido than elsewhere
online.

The target audience is jappers like you and I. I don't need the graphical distractions that online web interfaces provide.

Exactly.

Obviously I was wrong.

:)

I tried newsgroups now and then. I didn't care for them. It
seemed a cheap imitation of echomail.

On that, I concur.

Fidonet had a Message area for nearly any topic you could
imagine.

Over time, the majority of active echos reduced to areas geared
for sysop/bbs interests.

Because for the most part, that's what's still here.

So the issue there is get the other echos listed if they fell off, BBS's carrying them, and ensuring the various uplinks are linked correctly.

Much like is being done with the echos being linked into Telegram.

Now systems either can send packets as soon as there is new mail
or hourly, as they choose, so you can have back and forth in a
conversation several times a day.

This is what today's Fidonet ought to leverage and promote for the
user's advantage.

That's what I've been thinking.

Sysops do there best with listings.. But, for the most part
Fidonet (or any othernet for that matter) remains obscure to the
average user out there.

Exactly. How many of those things would someone not part of the
BBS community even know exist?

Word needs to be seeded outside the Fidonet realm.

Even with Facebook, I belong to a Group called FidoNet TREK Echo.
It was supposedly set up to mimic it's namesake. There are about
175 members in the Group. Besides myself, I know 3 members that
were for certain part of Fidonet in the past.

I hung out in the fido PHOTO group. Then, when internet came
along, someone built a Facebook group and everyone went there.
The FB solution was pretty good considering that echo was
primarily about each other's photos. FB made it easy to share
images. BUT... I noticed that the converstional content degraded
to zero. The FB group maybe had a brief description (or none at
all) for an initial photo, but the rest of the content was just
the "thumbs-up" thing, or one-liners like "great photo". The group
even experimented with scheduled audio chat events (think Zoom,
but for audio-only). That was rather cool, except for me still on
dialup at the time, it was a brutal experience. Group audio could
get confusing.

... people share articles related to various Star Trek related
shows, movies, events, actors. Occasionally, someone will post an
opinion on an episode. But there is no discussion to speak of. It
hardly reflects what the Echo it's named after was.

Same result as PHOTO echo.

My point is that if you have something like that, wouldn't you
want to promote where it came from?

That is a good point. A shout-out to a sister "disscussion" group
on Fidonet could appeal to some of the FB TREK users too, like
you.

Unfortunately, in this case, the former Fido folks I still am in contact with outside of Fido have little interest.

Twitter..

I don't get the hashtags. I mean, I understand what the intent
was, but I don't get it..

They are a way to categorize a message...

I know what hashtags are and their purpose. I don't get the need
for them.

It is a way to attempt to build a community of likeminded people
on a particular topic. Case in point: #metoo And look how that sky-rocketed into media fame.

It got media attention because famous people, or people used by famous people used it. If not for the celebrity connection, it would have been relegated to a "trending now" type of report.

The ZDnet article mentioned The Well. The internet presence for
The Well looks amazing and well organized. It's basically the
same thing as Fidonet, but webbased forums. Not sure if there is
an offline option for messages. Its philosophy of real names,
etc... reads very much like the Fidonet BBSses of old.

The Well is a commercial BBS, more or less.

Was it always commercial? One of the history articles in WIRED
didn't quite cover that aspect. But it did primarily focus on an
LA community. No mention of anything like echomail connecting
people worldwide.

I believe so.

I wasn't clear enough, I guess. History is important. FidoNet
showed what a bunch of regular people are capable of. Linking
thousands or more people together worldwide talking about things.
Not governments, not corporations, not Universities. People. On
their own time, out of their own pockets.

I sense a fine Fidonet article in the making!

I still owe an article to Fidogazette.

Different computer systems, it didn't matter. Different OSes, no
problem. We have this program in DOS, let's make it available for
people that use OS2 or Linux. Or vice versa. You have a C=64? No
problem, join in the fun. If I'm not mistaken, every model of
home computer there was could participate.

Yes.. there was excitement to accomodate the caller/user.

There was a much wider selection of computers and operating systems.

Apathy fits a lot of it. But there is more than that. How many
BBS related programs are there that have versions for multiple
operating systems? What if those programmers thought, "I only use
X OS. I don't need to port it to Y."? Or release the code so
someone else can. That's exactly what this is here. Android is
simply a different OS. But there are negative reactions to the
idea.

Age? I think the sysops/progammers of yesteryear are tired,
satisfied to just dwell in nostalgia.

Not all of them. Otherwise you wouldn't see anything being updated. Look at MysticBBS, or Synchronet for examples.

It's the negativity. "The screen is too small" "The Keyboard is
too small" "It's too hard to read on it"

Those are user's/sysop's comments. What is lacking is a programmer/visionary.

Look at your comment here. If users and sysops are saying those things, how many programers are going to make the effort?

At this point, I pretty much resigned myself to the fact that I will have to muddle through myself to get to an Alpha or Beta phase at least.

Ok, in your particular situation, any or all of these comments
might be true. But that doesn't make it universally true.
Millions of people use tablets and smartphones on a daily basis.

Except for the tried and true genuine BBS interface experience,
there is no real reason NOT to embrace supporting echomail on a smartphone/tablet. Some of the NNTP apps are pretty good. They
just need cooperating sysops to provide the server-side for that -
which there is. JamNNTP goes a step further and tries to mimic
the FROM:/TO: in the typical nntp field so that you can see both
names in a conversation.

I'm not sure what you mean. Tried and True genuine BBS interface? Other than a lack of a good, reliable ANSI telnet, I can connect to BBSes on my phone. Obviously I can exchange messages through points and nntp. I just think it can all be better. You can have the same experience, and use the newer technology.

My more current discussion in Asian Link. His idea works. It's
more programmer heavy than I'm looking for. But it's there, and
if it works for people, I'm in full support.

Which discussion is that? I think I missed it. Short-lived? Was
it just a comment or two?

It was a short exchange just after the Telegram link was announced but not yet active. Maurice wrote a BASH script he used in Termux to do mail exchange.

The general public aren't big programmers. But they can install
an app. They can type an address. They can fill out a form. So
the typical BBS related software, a decent Telnet that supports
ANSI graphics and BBS transfers for Mail Packets, seem a very
good thing to me.

That is all good. Keep expressing it. If you could draw in someone
who can explore your ideas futher, it could get traction.

My problem is my brain goes several times faster than I can explain. You see how long it takes sometimes to understand what I'm talking about.

I also make leaps in logic sometimes that make perfect sense to me, then spend days having to figure it out backward so I can understand the steps i mentally skipped to get there.

As far as the BBS on Android idea? It's definitely not for
everyone. But it's something that I see potential for.

I'm reminded of the BBS-on-a-Stick project.

I'm guessing some sort of USB flash drive?

Yes, Hotdoged seems to be a fine adaptation for Android devices.
But is that the one where the code is not available?

The Fido provider portion of HotdogEd is based on jNode. I'm not
sure about the other portions.

I see lots of tutorials and info on jNode. Sounds good.

Other than the issues I have mentioned before, it us a decent program,


--
Best regards!
Posted using Hotdoged on Android
--- Hotdoged/2.13.5/Android
* Origin: Houston, TX (2:240/1120.976)

Hello Charles!

** On Sunday 08.11.20 - 14:21, Charles Pierson wrote to August Abolins:

Twitter, I won't comment on, except to say that I don't like the
hashtag mess that the tweets become.

I don't get the hashtags. I mean, I understand what the intent
was, but I don't get it.

They are a way to categorize a message. Clicking on the tag in the
message shows you other messages that contain the same tag.
Apparently Telegram has something similar but I haven't studied
that.

I know what hashtags are and their purpose. I don't get the need for
them.

In review, I see that hashtags can act as a subject for a
message in a traditional sense. They are also clickable. By
clicking the hashtag, you follow the "thread" of everyone else
who uses the hashtag and any addtional comments they might
have.

--
../|ug

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