Arlen Holder
2020-05-25 17:12:26 UTC
Thank you all, for providing what we all love & enjoy, which allows us to
anonymously communicate, as best we can, on the Internet, via Usenet!
My off-the-cuff history with Usenet... (please add your experiences so
that, as always, all benefit from your every action on the Internet).
When I joined a Silicon Valley startup, just out of grad school, decades
ago, the IT guy eventually implemented this "new" free communication
system, called "Usenet" where we could discuss technical things on this
thing called the "Internet" using our DEC, Masscomp, SunOS, and eventually
Solaris machines (well before Linux took off I think).
We installed this freeware thing called "rn" and then later, "tin", and it
just worked fine, where we even used our real names, and real email
addresses (by then we didn't even need to bang the path through the net to
our smtp mail servers).
Over time, Mac & Windows PC's arrived (where we were forced to use Samba
and CAP just so that they could all read the same files as PCs did) as did
graphical newsreaders like Pan or Dialog, where, at some point, we even had
this "Internet" at home, via ISDN the phone company, which the company paid
for because it was a "business need" to be connected at all times.
Moving onward, at some point, AT&T had sbcglobal Usenet server settings,
which was the first time our Usenet was divorced from the company servers
(in those days, you didn't worry about what you said on the net, even at
work as the IT guy, maybe two guys by now, was a rebel like the rest of us
were).
This weird thing called 'spam' showed up one day, out of the blue, where we
actually _responded_ to it telling people to stop it, and even complained
to their admin about them sending unwanted advertisements in our email
(where we started with 'mail -s "subject" ***@where.com < body' but now we
had graphical MUAs such as "Eudora").
At some point, we were forced to implement procmail filters (this is before
Google existed), and even mailbombs to stop what we began calling
"spammers" at some point in time.
At some point Usenet became politicized, where Mario Cuomo and AT&T decided
to kill it once and for all, one for purely political gain, while the other
for cost shaving reasons... and they ended "free Usenet" via your local
phone company (at least via mine).
At that point, I needed a Usenet server, where Paolo Amoroso instantly came
to our rescue, and then, over time (I don't remember the order), Ray
Bananna, Alexander Bartolich & Sabine Schultz, and then Roman Racine, Alex
de Joode, Steve Crook, Jessie Rehmer, Daniel & Monika Weber & Benjamin
Gufler, Neodome Admin, & Steen Jensen, et al. (whom did I miss?)
Thank you all, for providing what we all love & enjoy, which allows us to
anonymously communicate, as best we can, on the Internet, via Usenet!
anonymously communicate, as best we can, on the Internet, via Usenet!
My off-the-cuff history with Usenet... (please add your experiences so
that, as always, all benefit from your every action on the Internet).
When I joined a Silicon Valley startup, just out of grad school, decades
ago, the IT guy eventually implemented this "new" free communication
system, called "Usenet" where we could discuss technical things on this
thing called the "Internet" using our DEC, Masscomp, SunOS, and eventually
Solaris machines (well before Linux took off I think).
We installed this freeware thing called "rn" and then later, "tin", and it
just worked fine, where we even used our real names, and real email
addresses (by then we didn't even need to bang the path through the net to
our smtp mail servers).
Over time, Mac & Windows PC's arrived (where we were forced to use Samba
and CAP just so that they could all read the same files as PCs did) as did
graphical newsreaders like Pan or Dialog, where, at some point, we even had
this "Internet" at home, via ISDN the phone company, which the company paid
for because it was a "business need" to be connected at all times.
Moving onward, at some point, AT&T had sbcglobal Usenet server settings,
which was the first time our Usenet was divorced from the company servers
(in those days, you didn't worry about what you said on the net, even at
work as the IT guy, maybe two guys by now, was a rebel like the rest of us
were).
This weird thing called 'spam' showed up one day, out of the blue, where we
actually _responded_ to it telling people to stop it, and even complained
to their admin about them sending unwanted advertisements in our email
(where we started with 'mail -s "subject" ***@where.com < body' but now we
had graphical MUAs such as "Eudora").
At some point, we were forced to implement procmail filters (this is before
Google existed), and even mailbombs to stop what we began calling
"spammers" at some point in time.
At some point Usenet became politicized, where Mario Cuomo and AT&T decided
to kill it once and for all, one for purely political gain, while the other
for cost shaving reasons... and they ended "free Usenet" via your local
phone company (at least via mine).
At that point, I needed a Usenet server, where Paolo Amoroso instantly came
to our rescue, and then, over time (I don't remember the order), Ray
Bananna, Alexander Bartolich & Sabine Schultz, and then Roman Racine, Alex
de Joode, Steve Crook, Jessie Rehmer, Daniel & Monika Weber & Benjamin
Gufler, Neodome Admin, & Steen Jensen, et al. (whom did I miss?)
Thank you all, for providing what we all love & enjoy, which allows us to
anonymously communicate, as best we can, on the Internet, via Usenet!
--
Usenet is one of the last free bastions of public polite discussion!
Usenet is one of the last free bastions of public polite discussion!