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132 lines
5.9 KiB
Plaintext
132 lines
5.9 KiB
Plaintext
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My "Old Days Rant"
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by Patrick Guenette
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June 18, 2001
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I received my first computer from my grand-mother when I was 12.
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A 486sx25 with 2MB of RAM oh baby! (in 1991)
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I had never touched a computer before in my life (except for those Unisys
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computers we had at school) It came pre-equipped with Windows 3.1 over
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DOS 5.0. I accidentaly erased windows (I don't know to this day how I did
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it .. hehe). But I ended up with only DOS.
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A command prompt for me who had never touched a computer before. Some of
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my friends had IBM computers too, so they taught be how to install
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games from disks. (it was funny over the phone the first time when they
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said BACKSLASH and I kept typing in "backslash" instead of the "\". After
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a few weeks, I became a pro and was using DOS smoothly! I got some games
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(KQ5, Stunts etc) that I played alot!
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For my 13th birthday, I received a multimedia kit! A CD-ROM and a sound
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card! WOW!
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(installing it was hard and I had to go to the computer store so that
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they could put the proper string in the config.sys and the autoexec.bat
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too heheh.
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I eventualy learned how to do this, and got interested in creating
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batch files! (came in handy for copying files, uptimising conventional
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memory with modified startup batch files).
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Later that year, I got a new 486dx2/50 with 4mb ram and guess what..a
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2400 baud MODEM!! So I learned to use TERMINAL!
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I was currently signed up for those "PC computing" magazines and looked
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at the back for BBS numbers :) Me being in canada, I was too young
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to realise thos boards in New York were long distance! After a big
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phone bill and my mom screaming really loudly, I gave up BBSES for about
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6 months!
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My friends at school were talking to me about LOCAL bbses here in Ottawa
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(Canada), and they told me about this awesome datacom called Terminate4.
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<br>I installed it, and looked in our local computer magazine (www.monitor.ca)
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for local bbses...there were about 350 bbses in Ottawa back then!
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I started calling them and learning a bit about the diffrent kinds (and
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yes, I had FULL ANSI compatibility with Terminate4!!).
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I began to learn more and more and soon tried out my own bbs! (terminat
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host mode) and learned the diffrent modem commands, ansi creation etc)
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my BBS was awesome, I managed to get a database of over 1500 users!
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I started getting into Underground BBSes and that's what I BBS slowly
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became. HPAVC is what they called it back then. Hacking Phreaking
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Anarchy Viruii and I forget what the "C" stands for :)
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I began to learn the security flaws in Renegade, Maximus, PC Board etc
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and was having alot of fun playing tricks on those dumb sysops :)
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By the time I turned 15, I discovered "CHAT" BBSES! WOW! I met
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MANY friends from those, including my current GF of 5 years (fiancee now).
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I used to go on at 11pm and go to school at 8am :) It put a big
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strain on my schooling, all that hacking and learning and yes...CHATTING
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:)
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during the summer, a group of friends from school were on our so called
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"hacker diet". If there's light outside, SLEEP! When it gets
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dark, it's time to get up and eat some pizza and POP and get online!
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<br>I soon had a HUGE collection of hacking files, HPAVC files, jokes,
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stories etc and was having alot of fun running my new BBS that I proudly
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called "The Dark Portal", running off some software called "Iniquity".
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One day, during my usual weekly glance at my local computer magazine
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for BBSES, I noticed one that said "25 modes" .........WOW! I called
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it, and yes there was 25 diffrent users online at all times! This
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BBS was the best!! It's where I met ALOT of friends, and eventualy had
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GTs (Get Togethers) at our local Malls and restaurants.
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I met my current GF from this BBS after over 1 year of chatting it
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up and learning all the chat jargon and meeting so many interesting people
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in my local area!.. ( <grin> <hugs> <smile> :) :( etc..)
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Well, by the time I turned 16, the internet had gotten a bit popular
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with some EXPENSIVE local ISPs. But I managed to get an acount to
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check it out! The internet was much less "personal" and MUCH too
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slow with my 14.4k modem. BBS ANSIs were much faster to load, and
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I could download any files I wanted from all the many BBSES around!
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So I did not continue to explore the internet at the time!
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By the time I turned 18, There were only a mere few BBSES left here
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in Ottawa.
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No more "l33t" bbses ..with NUPS (New User Password ..and questions
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to make sure you are elite enough to join). There were however some
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boring BBSES left, and yes the 25 node bbs was still there (ChatCan) Although
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they were now providing Internet Access via SLIP/PPP aswell.
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Me and my GF started getting more serious, I graduated HS and got a
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job (in computers of course) and I stopped going on BBSES! My life
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was just too busy!
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Last year (I was 20), I opened up my Terminate4 (yes, I copied the info
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from new computer to new computer..I still have ALL my old files) and tried
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to go on some BBSES. THERE WERE NONE LEFT!! NOT EVEN ONE!!
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<p>I occasionly meet some old friends on IRC, but 99% of the people I used
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to talk to every night and used to feel a kind of bond with, are all gone!
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:(
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The BBS scene was what really got me into computers and programming
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(C++, Pascal, Basic) and it's what allowed me to have a good job today,
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but I miss the good old days so much! Looking back, those were the
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best years of my life!
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To those of you who never experienced the BBS scene, and use IRC, I
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can tell you by experience, IRC is sooo IMPERSONAL. You are talking
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to people from accross the world, there is no sence of "belonging to a
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group". And that's what I miss most. Being part of something..something
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great! Something that helped shape the world of today...
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I have so much to say and skipped so many details, but this email is
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getting VERY long, and I'm a VERY bad writer so I will end it here.
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I will sign this letter with my old user names : Striker, Evil_Guy and
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DarkShade.
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To anyone who see's this and remembers me, I miss you too!
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