TL;DR below. When we [announced the BotDefense project in 2019](https://www.reddit.com/r/BotDefense/comments/e18056/ann
    • TimeSquirrel@kbin.social
      1·
      1 year ago

      Going to guess you were cruising BBS, FTP, and Telnet sites? I was just an ignorant preteen coding Qbasic garbage trying to learn programming on my Dad’s PC that year. When I read back on Internet history I was a little surprised it was already so active when most people weren’t even aware of it yet.

      At least now I know how Dad got all them free DOS games.

      • Madison_rogue@kbin.socialOP
        1·
        1 year ago

        I did interact with a BBS site or two, but then got caught up in the AOL wave. I used their platform, Geocities, and a few other chat sites. Once ditching AOL around 1999 I ended up on a local forum we used for electronic music, and then in 2003 made my way to a Star Wars fansite forum called BlueHarvest (I moderated there the last couple of years before the admin shut it down in 2008 or 2009). A couple friends and I then communicated via a forum we made for ourselves. Then Facebook, then Reddit…now here.

        EDIT

        I also had accounts with MySpace and Friendster too…Twitter for a few years around Arab Spring, but I didn’t like it. Even back then The Bird was a toxic mess with rare moments of humanity. I think my avatar is still shaded green…if my account still exists.

      • SickIcarus@sh.itjust.works
        0·
        1 year ago

        Shit, I used to run a WWIV 4.23 BBS back in the day. First modem was 9600 baud. Then 14.4k, 28.8k, and lastly 56k - screaming fast! Nothing like watching boobie pics loading one line at a time…

        Edit: I remember signing up with Prodigy and participating in my very first AMA, with Quark and Dax from DS9. Good times.

        • KalChoedan@kbin.social
          1·
          1 year ago

          Man, the nostalgia is real. It was Gopher and Usenet via CIX and Compuserve for me from around '88, and eventually “proper” dial-up via Demon Internet (in the UK) in '92. 9600 baud, 14k4, 28k8, 56k and eventually dual ISDN. I still have a 28k8 modem in a drawer in my PC parts graveyard.