hey steve, wassup?Rigoletto wrote:Well where does one start? I've been lurking around here for a week or so and have noticed that the activity level has dropped off significantly since the website first went online. Still with that said, 'Here we go!'
I started the BBS'ing scene late in life by most standards, I was already the father of three and married for more than a decade before I bought my first computer. I was the 'Director of Driver Training' for a local taxicab company here in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area. I borrowed a typewriter to start working on a manual for new drivers. I first started by doing a complete Hotel/Motel list that was 6 pages long. Within 3 weeks several entries had either closed or changed names. Over the course of the next 4 months I redid this list 4 times. When the fourth edition became inaccurate within days of my finishing it, I couldn't take it any longer and started looking for a laptop computer so that I could edit the list without having to start from scratch every time. I bought a Zenith 8088, w/640KB of RAM and two 720KB floppy drives. Within a year I bought a 80286 system and was given a 1200 baud modem from a friend. I still remember calling ChannelOne out in Boston to download files.
As I became more proficient with the modem I started calling local BBS'es, and there was lots to choose from with more than 100 listed in the local computer user newspaper. I settled on calling one in particular 'PC-Library BBS Telecom Systems' a MajorBBS v4.?. I went into Teleconference and saw users disappearing into this addon called Tele-Arena. From there on I was hooked.I watched Tele-Arena go from a chatroom addon to its own standalone program. Over the course of several years I became one of several Co-Sysops of the BBS and the Tele-Arena GameOp. I called Sean's BBS in Florida and received a few tips from one of his Co-Sysops. I dressed the game up by adding more colors to the MSG file.
BBS'ing became an addiction to me and Tele-Arena the fix. I would spend hours upon hours playing it. Going to the GT's was an added benefit, to put faces with the names of the players I lived with in the game. Then along came TW2002 and again I was hooked. My life's energy came from the respect and desire of other players in the games I played, for me to play with them. (I had a very unhappy childhood, with an abusive alcoholic father that told me how worthless I was and beat me with anything imagineable that was within reach. He committed suicide 3 days before my wedding day.) All this pain and agony went away while playing online in the games.
Then I heard that the BBS was in trouble financially, and I started putting together a proposal to buy the BBS. The Sysop sold it the day before I got my financing finalized. It ended up that the BBS was running cracked copies of a lot of stuff. But the person that bought it was an ISP provider and just wanted to try to make money off the BBS and started charging $20 a month unlimited usage. Membership dropped like a rock, and there wasn't any other local MajorBBS boards that had Tele-Arena. Then I found Metropolis and WOW it was amazing to call a BBS in Kansas from the Twin Cities on a local call. I developed quite a friendship with the players in the Tele-Arena game on Big10, but having promoted several players on PC-Library I started experimenting with the PASCAL scripting language of Tele-Mate. Soon I had some amazing scripts that allowed me to grow my player while I was at work. I was amazed at this, though I enjoyed playing real-time more. However there was this one guy from Colorado that had about nine players in the game that made it his mission in life to kill my scripting player at all costs. But alas the local call to Big10 went away and PC-Library still had the exclusive rights to Tele-Arena for the Twin Cities.
So then I started playing Swords of Chaos developed by Mark Peterson right here in the Twin Cities. After getting the hang of Swords of Chaos, Tele-Arena just seemed to play to slow, and by Telnetting into a BBS, I wasn't able to use my helper program to play TW2002 any longer. So Swords has been my game of choice for the last decade plus, been the SoC-Op or setup the game parameters on many boards. I know several of you that post in here, including frcorey that I met in Las Vegas with my son a few years back. You can search this user-id on www.bbsmates.com and see the list of BBS'es all over North America that I have had an account on. If your BBS has a Swords of Chaos game on it, there a 95% chance I have a player in the game. There are 2 games I currently boycott.
I have just recently discussed with Questman the fact I have a valid copy of MBBS 6.25 2 line client.I have a spare P3 667MHz system I could put it on, Just not sure what operating system to use. Window 98 SE or Windows 2000 Professional. I would need to add two user six-packs at most as I would never plan on running MMUD. Then there is the question of should I stick with 6.25 or go up the chain a bit.
Anyways that was long winded, even though I could have gone into more detail on several items listed above. I want to be a hobby BBS operator someday soon. Maybe after Questman gets the rights to Swords from Gameport. I hope I did this right and it doesn't show up as its own topic. I hope to get the chance to know more of you better.
Steve
Official Introduce Yourself Thread
Moderator: Mod Squad
Re: My Introduction
Re: My Introduction
Welcome!Rigoletto wrote:Well where does one start? I've been lurking around here for a week or so and have noticed that the activity level has dropped off significantly since the website first went online. Still with that said, 'Here we go!'
I started the BBS'ing scene late in life by most standards, I was already the father of three and married for more than a decade before I bought my first computer. I was the 'Director of Driver Training' for a local taxicab company here in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area. I borrowed a typewriter to start working on a manual for new drivers. I first started by doing a complete Hotel/Motel list that was 6 pages long. Within 3 weeks several entries had either closed or changed names. Over the course of the next 4 months I redid this list 4 times. When the fourth edition became inaccurate within days of my finishing it
As I became more proficient with the modem I started calling local BBS'es, and there was lots to choose from with more than 100 listed in the local computer user newspaper. I settled on calling one in particular 'PC-Library BBS Telecom Systems' a MajorBBS v4.?. I went into Teleconference and saw users disappearing into this addon called Tele-Arena. From there on I was hooked.
BBS'ing became an addiction to me and Tele-Arena the fix. I would spend hours upon hours playing it. Going to the GT's was an added benefit, to put faces with the names of the players I lived with in the game. Then along came TW2002 and again I was hooked. My life's energy came from the respect and desire of other players in the games I played, for me to play with them. (I had a very unhappy childhood, with an abusive alcoholic father that told me how worthless I was and beat me with anything imagineable that was within reach. He committed suicide 3 days before my wedding day.
Then I heard that the BBS was in trouble financially, and I started putting together a proposal to buy the BBS. The Sysop sold it the day before I got my financing finalized. It ended up that the BBS was running cracked copies of a lot of stuff. But the person that bought it was an ISP provider and just wanted to try to make money off the BBS and started charging $20 a month unlimited usage. Membership dropped like a rock, and there wasn't any other local MajorBBS boards that had Tele-Arena. Then I found Metropolis and WOW it was amazing to call a BBS in Kansas from the Twin Cities on a local call. I developed quite a friendship with the players in the Tele-Arena game on Big10, but having promoted several players on PC-Library I started experimenting with the PASCAL scripting language of Tele-Mate. Soon I had some amazing scripts that allowed me to grow my player while I was at work. I was amazed at this, though I enjoyed playing real-time more. However there was this one guy from Colorado that had about nine players in the game that made it his mission in life to kill my scripting player at all costs. But alas the local call to Big10 went away and PC-Library still had the exclusive rights to Tele-Arena for the Twin Cities.
So then I started playing Swords of Chaos developed by Mark Peterson right here in the Twin Cities. After getting the hang of Swords of Chaos, Tele-Arena just seemed to play to slow, and by Telnetting into a BBS, I wasn't able to use my helper program to play TW2002 any longer. So Swords has been my game of choice for the last decade plus, been the SoC-Op or setup the game parameters on many boards. I know several of you that post in here, including frcorey that I met in Las Vegas with my son a few years back. You can search this user-id on www.bbsmates.com and see the list of BBS'es all over North America that I have had an account on. If your BBS has a Swords of Chaos game on it, there a 95% chance I have a player in the game. There are 2 games I currently boycott.
I have just recently discussed with Questman the fact I have a valid copy of MBBS 6.25 2 line client.
Anyways that was long winded, even though I could have gone into more detail on several items listed above. I want to be a hobby BBS operator someday soon. Maybe after Questman gets the rights to Swords from Gameport. I hope I did this right and it doesn't show up as its own topic. I hope to get the chance to know more of you better.
Steve
a new version of Tele-Arena is also in the words where you can do all additions from within thegame sort of like SOC's game editors.
Daniel - Owner/Sr. Developer - ArcticZone Internet Solutions
Wow... so many people I used to talk to all the time... and the mention of Sylvain still brings up a nasty taste in my mouth. Perhaps some of the devs will remember me... I'd like to THINK I was generally a good customer =)
I setup a BBS back in 1989... using Telegard 2.7 and then quickly realized MajorBBS was the way to go. I worked in the shadows of a 65-line monstrosity (the previously mentioned Argus BBS out of Arlington, MA) and eventually got myself up to about 26 lines with The IMPosium BBS before I got taken out of business by a bad string of events.
One of the parents of a member of my board got upset when she saw the contents that were mailed to her 13-year old son from another member on my BBS. Somehow I got investigated as being the hub of a child pornography ring.. and the legal and telco costs were certainly far above my means at the time... so the BBS basically died overnight back in.. 1995.
A friend of mine, Marek (who went by Programmer) wrote a couple of cute utility mods for MBBS/Worldgroup back in the day.. unfortunately, my legal issues scared the hell out of him and I haven't heard from him since.
During those years I was never able to get TeleArena (Sean had sold it with exclusive rights to Argus), but I sure got MajorMUD up and going. We were a HUGE BBS for Galactic Empires, Mutants and oh so many other mods out there.. and I remember to this date the average line was in use over 19 hours a day. I don't even want to THINK about the amount of money I spent on doors/mods back then.. =)
We used to have semi-regular gatherings with members actually getting out of their chairs and meeting in person (food courts, parks, etc).. and I like knowing that I played a big part in building that community.
I'll have to go digging through my boxes/papers to see what I can find for Reg Codes, etc.. but I'm fairly sure I don't have much in the way of files/media leftover from those days.. /sigh.
Since then I've always found work with systems in one way or another and currently work for a rather well known publisher of MMORPGs.. so really, I guess things haven't changed that much. Still.. it's awesome seeing how these old roots are good and strong.
So hello, everyone (if you're still checking in)
--Micah
Micah "Impy" or "The Imp" Imparato
SysOp, The IMPosium BBS...rip =(
I setup a BBS back in 1989... using Telegard 2.7 and then quickly realized MajorBBS was the way to go. I worked in the shadows of a 65-line monstrosity (the previously mentioned Argus BBS out of Arlington, MA) and eventually got myself up to about 26 lines with The IMPosium BBS before I got taken out of business by a bad string of events.
One of the parents of a member of my board got upset when she saw the contents that were mailed to her 13-year old son from another member on my BBS. Somehow I got investigated as being the hub of a child pornography ring.. and the legal and telco costs were certainly far above my means at the time... so the BBS basically died overnight back in.. 1995.
A friend of mine, Marek (who went by Programmer) wrote a couple of cute utility mods for MBBS/Worldgroup back in the day.. unfortunately, my legal issues scared the hell out of him and I haven't heard from him since.
During those years I was never able to get TeleArena (Sean had sold it with exclusive rights to Argus), but I sure got MajorMUD up and going. We were a HUGE BBS for Galactic Empires, Mutants and oh so many other mods out there.. and I remember to this date the average line was in use over 19 hours a day. I don't even want to THINK about the amount of money I spent on doors/mods back then.. =)
We used to have semi-regular gatherings with members actually getting out of their chairs and meeting in person (food courts, parks, etc).. and I like knowing that I played a big part in building that community.
I'll have to go digging through my boxes/papers to see what I can find for Reg Codes, etc.. but I'm fairly sure I don't have much in the way of files/media leftover from those days.. /sigh.
Since then I've always found work with systems in one way or another and currently work for a rather well known publisher of MMORPGs.. so really, I guess things haven't changed that much. Still.. it's awesome seeing how these old roots are good and strong.
So hello, everyone (if you're still checking in)
--Micah
Micah "Impy" or "The Imp" Imparato
SysOp, The IMPosium BBS...rip =(
Hi all - Introduction
I used to be Co-SysOp of an 8-line MajorBBS v5 called The Sages Hut II based in New York City... I've recently come across old backup files and chats that brought back the BBS fire in me and I decided to try to put the board back up.
I'm glad there are like-minded people still in the scene - I never imagined I'd come across so many people that still love it.
I have recently been given information on how to download the software from Questman so I will be working on trying to get my old site back to the way it was... if you have any suggestions on where I can read up on what steps I need to take/etc. please let me know - I'd appreciate it.
I look forward to getting to know all of you - thanks.
I'm glad there are like-minded people still in the scene - I never imagined I'd come across so many people that still love it.
I have recently been given information on how to download the software from Questman so I will be working on trying to get my old site back to the way it was... if you have any suggestions on where I can read up on what steps I need to take/etc. please let me know - I'd appreciate it.
I look forward to getting to know all of you - thanks.
Re: Hi all - Introduction
a version 5? that version had to have the source code for all of it. it was pre-dll. all the addons had to be compiled into it. I had 5.10.Locutus wrote:I used to be Co-SysOp of an 8-line MajorBBS v5 called The Sages Hut II based in New York City... I've recently come across old backup files and chats that brought back the BBS fire in me and I decided to try to put the board back up.
I'm glad there are like-minded people still in the scene - I never imagined I'd come across so many people that still love it.
I have recently been given information on how to download the software from Questman so I will be working on trying to get my old site back to the way it was... if you have any suggestions on where I can read up on what steps I need to take/etc. please let me know - I'd appreciate it.
I look forward to getting to know all of you - thanks.
Re: Hi all - Introduction
aka Version PITA!frcorey wrote:a version 5? that version had to have the source code for all of it. it was pre-dll. all the addons had to be compiled into it. I had 5.10.Locutus wrote:I used to be Co-SysOp of an 8-line MajorBBS v5 called The Sages Hut II based in New York City... I've recently come across old backup files and chats that brought back the BBS fire in me and I decided to try to put the board back up.
I'm glad there are like-minded people still in the scene - I never imagined I'd come across so many people that still love it.
I have recently been given information on how to download the software from Questman so I will be working on trying to get my old site back to the way it was... if you have any suggestions on where I can read up on what steps I need to take/etc. please let me know - I'd appreciate it.
I look forward to getting to know all of you - thanks.
My Introduction
Hey all,
My name is Jason, or better known on my BBS as 360. I was an MBBS/Worldgroup sysop for many years back in the day. Sadly I was victim to a fire and lost all my hardware and data.
Found this site literally just a few days ago, and have spent the last couple of days reading. I am in awe seeing how active this community is. I'm so glad I ran into this site.
I'm very eager in getting my system configured and deployed and be part of this exciting community. However, I'm not looking forward to starting from scratch. Man if anyone knew the work I put in modifying my 2.00 WG System, it took months. Oh well, gonna have to saddle up and dive right in, lol.
So, I'm going to be building from a virgin WG v3.30. Any tips and tricks anyone cares to share? Been a good minute since I last played with this stuff.
I see we have a few ISV's around as well. Will be doing business with you guys at some point. I had so many mods back in the day, sucks I lost the codes to em. Oh well, I believe in supporting this project so not much of an issue.
-Jason
My name is Jason, or better known on my BBS as 360. I was an MBBS/Worldgroup sysop for many years back in the day. Sadly I was victim to a fire and lost all my hardware and data.
Found this site literally just a few days ago, and have spent the last couple of days reading. I am in awe seeing how active this community is. I'm so glad I ran into this site.
I'm very eager in getting my system configured and deployed and be part of this exciting community. However, I'm not looking forward to starting from scratch. Man if anyone knew the work I put in modifying my 2.00 WG System, it took months. Oh well, gonna have to saddle up and dive right in, lol.
So, I'm going to be building from a virgin WG v3.30. Any tips and tricks anyone cares to share? Been a good minute since I last played with this stuff.
I see we have a few ISV's around as well. Will be doing business with you guys at some point. I had so many mods back in the day, sucks I lost the codes to em. Oh well, I believe in supporting this project so not much of an issue.
-Jason
Re: My Introduction
cool, im still working on my archive server i got tons of software you can use, some free, some not, i also develop modules.JLittge wrote:Hey all,
My name is Jason, or better known on my BBS as 360. I was an MBBS/Worldgroup sysop for many years back in the day. Sadly I was victim to a fire and lost all my hardware and data.
Found this site literally just a few days ago, and have spent the last couple of days reading. I am in awe seeing how active this community is. I'm so glad I ran into this site.
I'm very eager in getting my system configured and deployed and be part of this exciting community. However, I'm not looking forward to starting from scratch. Man if anyone knew the work I put in modifying my 2.00 WG System, it took months. Oh well, gonna have to saddle up and dive right in, lol.
So, I'm going to be building from a virgin WG v3.30. Any tips and tricks anyone cares to share? Been a good minute since I last played with this stuff.
I see we have a few ISV's around as well. Will be doing business with you guys at some point. I had so many mods back in the day, sucks I lost the codes to em. Oh well, I believe in supporting this project so not much of an issue.
-Jason
azonebbs.dyndns.org