2022-10-24

I was browsing some gopher phlogs and I saw a link to a BBS on one
of the entries. It was a link to The End of The Line BBS
[https://endofthelinebbs.com/].

I've known as an abstract concept that there was a dedicated
community of BBS fans that were keeping the BBS scene alive and
making those BBSs available via telnet but I never really bothered
to log into one and create a user. Well I guess I was feeling super
nostalgic because I did end up creating an account at The End Of
The Line and spent a few minutes looking around and playing door
games.

I know there are a lot of people that are super duper nostalgic
about BBS systems but for me personally, I just didn't have enough
exposure to the community aspect of BBS systems to gain a lot of
cherished memories about them. Certainly not in the same way that
I cherish my memories of the early web 1.0 communities I was a part
of. It could just be do to my youth at the time.

However, that doesn't mean that I don't have *any* fond memories
of using BBS systems. I'm actually old enough to have actually
logged into BBS systems for a couple of years at the twilight years
of dial-up BBS systems. I figure that I'd share 3 of these memories
in this here phlog of mine.

I will set the stage. It's 1994 and my family has purchased our
very first home computer with a modem. It was an Acer computer with
an Intel 486 CPU, 8MB of RAM, a Soundblaster, 540MB hard drive, 2X
CD-ROM and a 2400bps modem. I'm in the 7th grade and I thought this
machine was an absolute beast. In fact this computer was hugely
influential for me. It was the first real computer where I learned
to game, learned how to program, and generally become a complete
computer nerd.

The only thing that I cared about was that this computer could play
ALL of the latest and best MS-DOS games at the time which was the
only reason I even cared about computers. I learned batch file
programming, QBasic programming, and C programming almost as a
trivial side effect just to support my gaming addiction which is
hilarious in retrospect since it would pave the way for my working
career a decade later.

In particular, like everyone else in the world, I was obsessed with
Doom and Doom 2. I played it all the time and me and my friends
were just ravenous for downloading WAD maps and Total Conversion
mods and anything to do with Doom. Back in those days, to get Doom
mods, you really had 3 options: get them from your friends on
floppy, computer magazine discs, and of course the wonderful world
of the BBS.

And this is where my 1st of 3 fond memories of BBS systems begin.
There was a widely renowned local BBS in my hometown of Houston
called Doom Central that had a massive collection of Doom WAD files
and mods and texture packs. I used to login to that BBS all the
time to download files over my anemic 2400 baud modem. It's so
mundane nowadays to download computer files over the network but
to my child self, actually getting files onto my computer by dialing
a BBS and downloading it was so mind blowing and magical that I
can't even describe the feeling. Actually downloading my first map
WAD file from that BBS was so amazing that I had to disconnect from
the BBS and call my best friend immediately and have his mom drive
him over to my house so I could actually show him and play the map.
LOL.

My 2nd of 3 fond BBS memories is actually the fact that I downloaded
my first ever digital porn image from a BBS. Of course "porn" is
probably too strong of a term in comparison to today's definition.
You see back in those days, every BBS had an area where users could
upload files and all other users could see any new files to download.
And of course aside from pirated software (we'll come back to that)
the most popular files were picture files of naked women! Now in
those days, it wasn't like people were uploading X-rated movies or
even X-rated pictures. At the time, playboy magazines and calendars
were the most accessible "porn" that any average BBS user would
have IRL. So a lot of the images were just laughably poor quality
scans of playboy centerfold models.

The first nudie picture I ever downloaded was off some random BBS
and I spent what seemed like hours tying up our actual house phone
to download a ridiculously dithered PCX file of a playboy centerfold!
I think the PCX file had like 256 colors or something. I mean, you
could definitely tell it was a naked woman but it was about as far
away from HD quality as you can get haha. But of course I had to
share that with my buddies as well as any middle school boy would
do.

Imagine putting 1 picture, yup just 1 due to to filesize, of a
playboy centerfold on floppy disk and giving it to your buddies.
Compared to the boys that had access to actual Playboy magazines
that we could sneak peaks at, the whole idea of downloading naked
woman pictures was just such a useless novelty that I actually
never downloaded a picture again.

So finally, we come to the 3rd fond memory of BBS systems. And this
memory has to do the BBS being my entry into the crazy world of
the warez scene and demo scene. I mentioned that the most popular
files that BBSs had were software files and a lot of BBS systems
provided a lot of pirated software. This particular memory concerns
a local Houston BBS called Outlaw BBS which was essentially a BBS
that was providing access to the entire warez scene. If razor1911
means anything to you dear reader, then you know what kind of files
this BBS had.

So anyways, one day me and my best friend were at my house logged
into Outlaw BBS hanging around looking for pirated games. You would
go and download huge text listings of warez releases that the sysop
had in his possession. I mean these text listings were literal file
directory listings of the RAR files and file_id.diz and NFO files
for the game releases.  So the way it worked was pretty crazy
looking back on it.

Me and my friend were on a downloading spree for these file listings
when the sysop pulled us into a chat and asked us what we were
looking for.  We told him that we were looking for some games. So
the sysop, in an interactive chat session, just straight up tells
us that he would burn a CD for us for $20 bucks and we could put
whatever files or games fit on that one 650MB CD. This was amazing
since at the time CD-burners were extremely rare and expensive. He
then gave us the address to send the money to.

The absolute craziest part of the whole story was that we ACTUALLY
sent this sysop the money. We literally wrote down all the games
we wanted on a piece of looseleaf paper, put in two 10 dollar bills
(one from me and the other from my friend) and mailed a letter to
this completely RANDOM STRANGER sysop from this shady ass BBS. We
then left a message for him on the BBS that we mailed in the money
and a list. And I shit you not, 2 days later we got a burned CDROM
filled with warez games!

Honestly this story is so ridiculous from today's perspective. The
sysop literally just gave us his home address and we literally sent
him cash and OUR home address just so he could send us a CD full
of pirated games that he burned. I guess it's just so hard to
believe nowadays but computer nerd-dom was really still such a
niche thing back in the day that the sense of community among
computer nerds on a BBS engendered enough trust to even break
international copyright laws.

Phew that was a lot of words.  All in all I came into the BBS world
really at the beginning of the end of the BBS era. I was a huge
BBS user from 1994 until 1996 when at the end of 1996, I got a
regular dial-up internet account. Even as young as I was, I knew
that the BBS days were numbered. Getting a dial-up internet connection
meant going to websites, and FTP sites, and using IRC.  All of
those things really readily replaced any service that the BBS
provided.  And thus, sadly, I left the BBS world never really
learning or appreciating the long history of the BBS and its
community.

Anyways, I hope you guys enjoyed the memories!