Picked up the absolutely beautiful "Crackers" two book set by Marco Breddin. Extensive history of software cracking and cracktros (and BBSes, the demoscene, etc). Some small errors here and there but overall a great history and amazing photos and screenshots. So many good memories - can't wait to dive in more!

there were dozens of bulletin board system software packages available in the 90s, but for a fourteen year old kid with warez scene aspirations, there were two that stood above the rest for wannabes like me:

oblivion/2 and iniquity

each grew out of the same software: Telegard (which itself inherited the WWIV source code)

aside from technical and QoL improvements, the most obvious differences for teenagers were the kinds of prepackaged ANSI art the boards came with. you could start an elite board overnight with a careful selection of menus and login screens.

here are two of the best from each bbs

It's really fun adding content into Cloudburst Connection (BBS themed RPG), I'm really trying to get a demo out soon. The graffiti wall on BBSes the player dials into is one way of discovering secrets and game lore. Here the player found out a new secret number to call that somebody posted on the wall.

i am in love with a piece of absolute potato electronics

for the past year i've been experimenting with many different ways of streaming my plex collection to this 9-inch trinitron. you'd think this would be a solved problem in 2025, but modern software/hardware doesn't really understand 4:3 tv out over composite video anymore.

after trying various ipad/iphone tv cables - all of which failed to produce a stable image, i stumbled upon a tiny potato dvr device at a local auto parts store. for $6, I had nothing to lose

sold as the "QFX CV-103 Digital Converter Box" in Can/US under various white label names, it was designed to record OTA 1080i broadcasts in mpeg. (and it did that job surprisingly well)

as it turned out, it not only did a great job recording, but a great job playing back video from its usb mass storage port. in fact, not only did it play back anything i threw at it, but it had a specific 4:3 aspect ratio setting too.

i dumped 300+ hours of the BBS Documentary interviews on to a usb stick, and here it is running like a champ. this beat out every single device i've thrown at this little tv.

Vintage Hardware Find Includes Time Capsule of Data https://hackaday.com/2025/07/16/vintage-hardware-find-includes-time-capsule-of-data/ #Retrocomputing #retrocomputing #virtualization #messageboard #vaxstationii #emulator #hardware #SIMH #bbs #DEC

Vintage Hardware Find Includes Time Capsule of Data - Before social media brought the Internet to the masses, and before even Napster, I... - https://hackaday.com/2025/07/16/vintage-hardware-find-includes-time-capsule-of-data/ #retrocomputing #virtualization #messageboard #vaxstationii #emulator #hardware #simh #bbs #dec

Tauche ein in eine Zeitreise der besonderen Art: Mein über 30 Jahre alter #Amiga 1200 kämpft sich mit Mühe und CF-Card über Umwege zur fast 40 Jahre alten #commodore64 Snobsoft #BBS mit einem 2400 Baud Modem!

Dabei zeige ich dir nicht nur, wie ich dem Amiga ein Terminal-Programm verpasse, sondern auch wie störrisch er sich dabei verhält.

Vor dem erfolgreichen Dial-Up gibt’s als Bonus einen Abstecher in die Welt der Amiga Demos, mit Nexus 7.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zde7coGoxcA

Today I learned about #GeminiProtocol and #GemLogs

If it was possible to make an even more obscure way to #blog -- I'm pretty sure this is it.

Kinda reminds me of an old school #Citadel #BBS

Maybe I'll make one.

https://geminiprotocol.net/
https://gemlog.blue/

IMPULSE: We Resurrected Underground 1990s BBS Software in 2025.. with Do...
https://youtube.com/watch?v=YaYAEtwE8Es

How the Grateful Dead built the internet

the Dead popularised what some call the first real online community. Many fans were technologists and engineers themselves, working in Silicon Valley or at universities around America with access to early internet technology.

#GratefulDead #TheDead #Deadheads #TheWell #BBS #SiliconValley #music #socialmedia #internet #technology #tech #innovation

https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20250618-how-the-grateful-dead-shaped-social-media

ANSI art bbs ad found inside of STNT11.ZIP - Stunts v1.1, as released by an unknown piracy group

the blackice #BBS is back online!

Tonight the Router stopped working at the BlackICE #BBS Network. A replacement is on location but needs time to set up. 10 Years of uninterupped service. o7 for the zywall usg 200. the BBS should back online in a few hours

Who are some folks that are in to #BBS #retrocomputing #C64 that are catching up on missed experiences from earlier in life?

I previously was a senior/lead programmer, sysadmin, and dba. Now I'm a pentester.

Going backwards to simpler times and an Internet experience that isn't dominated by a handful of tech fat cats.

I want to connect with you and expand my social circle some more :)

I'm building a BBS having not logged into one in 30 years, and also learning as I go about BBS things and culture.

I know I'm longing for a time that is long past, but I'm OK with that if you are :)

[2025-07-02 13:18:48]: k9zw has just launched Multi Relay Chat #retrocomputing #bbs #mrc #mysticbbs #tqwNet

growing up on the internet story time

when i was 14 years old, i made my first homepage using my mom's university shell/webspace allotment (5 megs) which was supposed to be for posting homework and email storage

there was no such thing as a profile pic in 94, but i decided that i should have a photo of me at the top of the page. i inexplicably decided that instead of scanning in a school photo, it made more sense to post a gif of some kid i found on a bbs with Night Owl cd-roms. today, i found that exact photo - it is uncredited sadly - just "boy eating watermelon"

for my bio, instead of writing about my hobbies and interests, i proceeded to fabricate an entire identity that claimed i was the captain of the volleyball team, a straight-A student, and one of the coolest kids in my school. 0/3 of those things were even close to reality. i figured - hey, who cares? no one's ever gonna see this.

a year later, my junior high school got its first internet connection - a 28.8k modem shared among 20 macintosh LC's in the lab. my computer ("information processing") teacher decided that our class should learn how to make a web page as a unit project.

i told him that i had already made a homepage ages ago, and wanted to submit that as my final assignment so i could go play Bolo instead. he asked me to show him the site.

the entire class crowded around my monitor as it loaded the page a few bytes at a time. i was feeling pretty smug until i saw the straw hat, and realized that the bio was pure bullshit. i tried to turn off the monitor but it was too late - 20 kids and my teacher got to read how this bony kid in front of them was apparently a world class athlete, One Of The Cool Kids, and future valedictorian.

i deleted the entire site the second i got home

That's the vibe at the BlackICE #BBS today #hot

Yay! Or maybe AIEEE! Seems like I'm giving a talk at #EuroBSDCon again this year!

Anyone who has been following me here for a while will know I'm a hopeless #retrocomputing nerd, and I will make no attempt at hiding it during my talk:

Dirty Tricks: Using nginx and Lua to thwart bots and skript kiddies

I'll (try to) show how you can protect your #BBS from drive-by portscans and your production systems from #DDoS attacks using all the wrong tools.

Dietary warning: may contain traces of floppies.

https://events.eurobsdcon.org/2025/talk/review/RHDFBQWZEVC833T3WDLDEXYFQVRWJKMN #FreeBSD #BSD #Unix #DOS #RunBSD

Lovely video from The Serial Port on getting PC based Impulse #bbs software up and running in 2025 <3 :) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YaYAEtwE8Es

Unerwarteter Besucher in der #C64 #BBS + Akustikkoppler a la #CCC im Unboxing. Beim Login in meine 40 Jahre alte Commodore 64 BBS „Snobsoft“ fällt mir plötzlich etwas Ungewöhnliches auf – der Cursor bewegt sich von selbst im Admin-Menü. Nach und nach wird klar: Ich bin nicht allein im System. Ein User auf einem CBM8032 ist plötzlich „mit eingeloggt“

Im Unboxing gibt ebenfalls ein unerwartetes wiedersehen mit meinem #Amiga 1200 und dem Dataphon s21-23d .

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DZXYm7z-vBo