# Your first contact with any message board- When, where, why? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [December 18, 2003, 6:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-contact-with-any-message-board-when-where-why/219812 "2003-12-18T18:32:13Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![alice\_in\_wonderland](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alice_in_wonderland/32/176_2.png) [@alice\_in\_wonderland](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alice_in_wonderland)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2003, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-contact-with-any-message-board-when-where-why/219812/21 "2003-12-18T22:58:03Z")
1990 - Chat Line (It was a local, now defunct board where I live.) I actually met one of my best friends through it. The friend of a friend paid for the service and you could get a month free trial membership which I took advantage of on a whim. After that I took a sabatical until I started here. I had a question that I e-mail Cecil and was refered to the board (I don’t remember what the question was.) ---
**Author:** ![A\_Curious\_Writer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ed8c4c/32.png) [@A\_Curious\_Writer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/A_Curious_Writer)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2003, 11:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-contact-with-any-message-board-when-where-why/219812/22 "2003-12-18T23:05:22Z")
Wow, I wondered after I posted if anyone dated fromt he middle 1980s. I googled once the earliest posts - weird to see stuff from 1981! I was in like 6th grade, the earliest they have, and I thought computers were so Star-Trekkish. ---
**Author:** ![7\_up\_yours](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/7/919ad9/32.png) [@7\_up\_yours](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/7_up_yours)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2003, 11:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-contact-with-any-message-board-when-where-why/219812/23 "2003-12-18T23:17:24Z")
A band’s (which will remain nameless for I am deeply ashamed I ever liked them) message board. I joined in '99 and it was the best board ever, but it slowly went downhill and met it’s end in '01. ---
**Author:** ![Rabid\_Squirrel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e0b2c6/32.png) [@Rabid\_Squirrel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rabid_Squirrel)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2003, 11:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-contact-with-any-message-board-when-where-why/219812/24 "2003-12-18T23:23:56Z")
Used to lurk about alt.fan.prachett and the [Utopia](http://games.swirve.com/utopia/) boards. ---
**Author:** ![Giraffe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/giraffe/32/129_2.png) [@Giraffe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Giraffe)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2003, 11:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-contact-with-any-message-board-when-where-why/219812/25 "2003-12-18T23:38:04Z")
Like **cowgirl** , I found the boards by following a Threadspotting link. I still remember the thread – it was the one where **Satan** talked about his girlfriend at the time wanting to fuck him in the ass with a strap-on dildo. It was a hilarious thread, and I immediately knew this would be a good place to hang out. ---
**Author:** ![jackelope](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/a6a055/32.png) [@jackelope](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jackelope)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2003, 12:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-contact-with-any-message-board-when-where-why/219812/26 "2003-12-19T00:10:30Z")
This one. I’d played around with some of the old MUDs in the early 90s at a friend’s place, but never had much interest. And I am somewhat abashed to admit that to this day, even though I actually earn my living working for a Web site, I am totally unable to figure out how to view a “newsgroup.” I’ve never seen one. ---
**Author:** ![Ringo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/779978/32.png) [@Ringo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ringo)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2003, 1:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-contact-with-any-message-board-when-where-why/219812/27 "2003-12-19T01:57:20Z")
Really? Pre-web, the telephone company (SW Bell here) tried us out on a version of the French electronic directory system. I can’t recall its name, although I want to say it was something like Nextel (isn’t that a current telcom?). It was a text message monitor, with keyboard, that ran on your phone line. I was as intrigued by its mass communication potential as I had been by the boom in CB radio many years before. And the result was the same: very low signal to noise ratio. Lots of drunk 17 year olds signing on as SYSOP69, etc. It was more like chat, a venue with which I’ve about 15 minutes of experience - as it doesn’t fit me very well - and I abandoned it within a year. That would have been about 1988 or 1989. On the WWWeb, I had only spent some serious time at Hardware Central’s board before I came here, and subsequently abandoned them. I’m registered at some other boards, including our outliers, but I rarely attend anywhere else. ---
**Author:** ![Lsura](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7993a0/32.png) [@Lsura](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lsura)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2003, 3:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-contact-with-any-message-board-when-where-why/219812/28 "2003-12-19T03:46:46Z")
First ever? Back in college ('91-95), I got involved fairly heavily with a couple of BBS systems - under a name that I can’t even remember now. I just know it wasn’t Lsura because the comments that led to this name hadn’t been made yet. Junior year I got a computer and signed up with AOL, and used their message board things for a while. Then I went for several years without internet access, and once I got back online I found several boards that I liked, but the main ones were the Auelboard and the Left Behind message boards (those led me here, and I ditched those completely). ---
**Author:** ![Sm\_e](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/da6949/32.png) [@Sm\_e](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sm_e)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2003, 6:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-contact-with-any-message-board-when-where-why/219812/29 "2003-12-19T06:31:18Z")
comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.strategic or alt.tasteless or alt.drunken.bastards or rec.games.muds.diku This board? No idea. Still just lurk for the most part. ---
**Author:** ![Sm\_e](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/da6949/32.png) [@Sm\_e](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sm_e)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2003, 6:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-contact-with-any-message-board-when-where-why/219812/30 "2003-12-19T06:53:53Z")
alt.tasteless gave me the best .sig line ever. “If it were not for physics and law enforcement, I’d be unstoppable.” Good stuff. ---
**Author:** ![LorieSmurf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/a587f6/32.png) [@LorieSmurf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LorieSmurf)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2003, 7:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-contact-with-any-message-board-when-where-why/219812/31 "2003-12-19T07:17:43Z")
First message board was a Lois and Clark fanfic site five or six years ago, then a post on _that_ site led me to snopes, then a post on \*that \* site led me here. Now this is my primary place to go when I’m on the net. ---
**Author:** ![Lynn\_Bodoni](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e47c2d/32.png) [@Lynn\_Bodoni](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lynn_Bodoni)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2003, 7:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-contact-with-any-message-board-when-where-why/219812/32 "2003-12-19T07:48:06Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Ringo \* > \*\*Really? Pre-web, the telephone company (SW Bell here) tried us out on a version of the French electronic directory system. I can’t recall its name, although I want to say it was something like Nextel (isn’t that a current telcom?). > > It was a text message monitor, with keyboard, that ran on your phone line. I was as intrigued by its mass communication potential as I had been by the boom in CB radio many years before. And the result was the same: very low signal to noise ratio. Lots of drunk 17 year olds signing on as SYSOP69, etc. > > It was more like chat, a venue with which I’ve about 15 minutes of experience - as it doesn’t fit me very well - and I abandoned it within a year. That would have been about 1988 or 1989. > > On the WWWeb, I had only spent some serious time at Hardware Central’s board before I came here, and subsequently abandoned them. I’m registered at some other boards, including our outliers, but I rarely attend anywhere else. \*\* It was probably U.S. Videotel, which I was also on. I enjoyed many of its areas, including several message board areas and a RPG area. Before that, I was on QuantumLink, as someone else noted above, though I was mostly doing chat then, and only a very little message board involvement. QLink was pay-per-minute for premium stuff like chat and email. I don’t want to think about how much money I wasted on that service. I learned my lesson, though…I only signed up for Videotel because it was flat-rate, and when it went to metered rate, I turned in my little box set. The set was a monitor with a keyboard that folded into the monitor, and a short phone line. It was something like WebTV is now, I imagine. It was a lot of fun while it lasted. Now I have broadband and I’m VERY happy with it. ---
**Author:** ![clayton\_e](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c57346/32.png) [@clayton\_e](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/clayton_e)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2003, 8:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-contact-with-any-message-board-when-where-why/219812/33 "2003-12-19T08:17:55Z")
This board, 1-1-01 early hours of the a.m. I had looked through the archives for a few weeks after googling something about the song American Pie. I eventually stumbled onto the boards. ---
**Author:** ![Dragonnmann03](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/c67d28/32.png) [@Dragonnmann03](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dragonnmann03)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2003, 8:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-contact-with-any-message-board-when-where-why/219812/34 "2003-12-19T08:26:57Z")
This is my second post to this message board. but this is the first time I have ever registered to a message board. Hoping to figure out how it works. Any hints and help would be appreciated. ---
**Author:** ![yola](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/48db29/32.png) [@yola](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yola)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2003, 12:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-contact-with-any-message-board-when-where-why/219812/35 "2003-12-19T12:24:19Z")
I had just got on-line 9/10/01. One of the first things I did on the internet was type in keyword: marajuana and of all places it brought me to straightdope. Been here ever since. ---
**Author:** ![pullin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c57346/32.png) [@pullin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pullin)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2003, 12:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-contact-with-any-message-board-when-where-why/219812/36 "2003-12-19T12:44:10Z")
Straight Dope reader since 1985. (Friend showed me Cecil’s 1st book). Got curious about a year ago and just typed [www.straightdope.com](http://www.straightdope.com) in the url window to see what would happen. Lurked for a year and registered yesterday. Pullin ---
**Author:** ![AmbushBug](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ambushbug/32/4600_2.png) [@AmbushBug](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AmbushBug)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2003, 4:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-contact-with-any-message-board-when-where-why/219812/37 "2003-12-19T16:49:33Z")
October, 1982. I was introduced by a school friend (whose father is presently the mayor of Las Vegas) to a local BBS in Las Vegas, NV, a 300-baud Commodore-based homegrown system by the name of “Art’s War Room”. Sysop’s name was Art Bell. Yes, _that_ Art Bell. Message board content was similar to present-day Usenet’s alt.flame newsgroup. I had a Timex/Sinclair 1000, a TI 99/4A, and a Commodore Vic-20 with Vicmodem. I soon got a C64 with an actual floppy disk drive and a “Westridge” modem (it could dial the phone! …unlike the Vicmodem). By late 1983 I’d written my own BBS, an endeavor which was online all of six weeks. Don’t know if I even had six callers. Computers, BBS’s, and modem communications led to my programming career. Art’s War Room survived until sometime in 1986, IIRC. ---
**Author:** ![gotpasswords](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/c57346/32.png) [@gotpasswords](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gotpasswords)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2003, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-contact-with-any-message-board-when-where-why/219812/38 "2003-12-19T17:06:31Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Ringo \* > \*\*Really? Pre-web, the telephone company (SW Bell here) tried us out on a version of the French electronic directory system. I can’t recall its name, although I want to say it was something like Nextel (isn’t that a current telcom?). > \*\* The original French system is [Minitel](http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/3142862.stm) ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2003, 8:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-contact-with-any-message-board-when-where-why/219812/39 "2003-12-19T20:27:21Z")
Got you all beat. My first was pad on the Plato system, when I was at the University of Illinois in 1974. Quoting posts was a new thing for pad. Plato also had term talk, basically a one line instant message, lessons anyone could look at much like web pages, and interactive multiplayer games and MUDs. Practically everything on the internet, except spam, was on Plato first. I first used usenet within Bell Labs around '84, with a tape of the distribution from the U of I. I remember when alt.sex was a single group, low volume! Who here had an email address before domain addressing? Who here had a business card with it on it? Mine was {decvax, ucbvax,ihnp4}!erc3ba!sd ---
**Author:** ![AskNott](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asknott/32/5790_2.png) [@AskNott](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AskNott)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2003, 8:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-contact-with-any-message-board-when-where-why/219812/40 "2003-12-21T20:25:34Z")
Long ago, when this board was on AOL, there was a link on Aol’s welcome screen. When the SDMB came here, I followed. I have tried some other mb’s, but I got tired of wading kneedeep through spam and bitter venomous flaming. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-contact-with-any-message-board-when-where-why/219812.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-contact-with-any-message-board-when-where-why/219812.md?page=3)