Quoting Ole Juul to Nancy Backus on 03-04-10 03:53 <=-
Actually, outside of Fido it appears that almost everyone
uses an alias. Check out the larger boards where Fido is
not the central feed such as the Diskshop or Vertrauen.
Now that I know some of the aliases used there, I see them
all over the place. It is not a particularly friendly
crowd and the talk is mostly about games they used to play
when they were younger. Definately a sociologically
interesting group, but I don't think they "get scared off"
by using real names. It's just the way it works in that
culture.
Ok, perhaps "scared off" isn't precisely accurate... But a place where
their aliases (which they are most comfortable with) aren't welcome
isn't necessarily a place they'd want to be. I'm fully aware that some networks are essentially alias-using places... and I choose not to hang
out there. :)
message area
where there was role-playing going on, to get into the game
of it... but
I think there is a lot of role playing going on these days.
Far too many adults are playing games and by doing that
learn undesirable behaviour. Perhaps it's my artistic/autistic
side, but I don't feel at home or even welcome in that
environment. Although I did spend many years with actors
and on the stage. Somehow the non-artistic role players
don't come off as friendly. A lot of games seem to center
around clearly unfriendly themes like competitive violence.
I'm certainly in agreement with you there... and the only place I even
felt comfortable being a part of something in that genre was a local
area on my primary board (way back when), themed with the board, and a
very friendly place (kept so by the sysop who was certainly in evidence
in that area as well as the rest of the board... he was the "bartender")
so I didn't mind getting into the spirit of the thing. Otherwise, I
just stay out of such. :)
Yeah, well... ;) BBSing tends to be a stress-relief for me...
except for when things get too busy, and I get more brain-dead...
less fun then, of course... ;)
I wish I could say that. So far BBSing has been quite
stressful. The jerkie cursor, the slow boards, the varying
interfaces, the sometimes dysfunctional editors, and
sometimes unfriendly people, makes it a difficult world
for me. Anyway, I'll get there. Although I am very
fluent and relaxed on the web, I want to embrace many
channels of communication so I persevere with the BBS.
It also works well in my command line only world.
I never left the BBS world, so I've evolved as necessary with it.
Learned many bbs interfaces over the years anyway, as I was going to
multiple bbses from the start, and have had a few sysops that kept
trying out new ones, besides. Mostly the evolving has been using telnet instead of dialup, though... :) And I just stay away from the places
the unfriendly people are (or at most, quietly lurk, using the [next]
key as necessary).
I didn't think it would be necesary, but perhaps the
only really functional way to use a BBS is with an off
line reader. With telnet it should not be needed because
there is no "time" in the sense that we used to have with modems.
The offline reader is still most useful, even though there isn't the
speed or the time issue any more. I don't have unlimited time for
myself, so getting on and grabbing packets lets me visit my usual places nightly, and take the time to answer when I do have a little more time
and/or energy. So the packets stay a reasonable size (important when
one's machine isn't huge like modern ones), and they can sit and wait
for me. :)
In fact there is no reason to not stay logged in for days like on a
web forum, however the writing (like this) is very difficult because
the server is not well suited for it. Luckily Waldos gives ample
time to write. Other boards dump you uncerimoniously back on the
command line before you can save a long post.
On the first... my computer isn't ON for days, it gets turned off when
I'm done, and certainly overnight and when I'm not at home. Generally I
save long posts to do offline, and only write the short need-to-tell-the- sysop-something posts online. So I haven't run into the dumping back,
unless the board isn't working right. But then, I'm also not checking
out dozens of boards, either... I have my list of 8-10 that I call
regularly, only adding when there's some good need or reason, or if I've
lost some... ;)
Anyway thats a topic for (perhaps many) other posts. :)
No doubt... (G)
ttyl neb
... Am sure writing used to be larger, and stairs less steep!
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