Your First Experience Communicating On A Computer?

Zach — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 08:05:05 +0000

Talking to clients and fellow social media enthusiasts has forced us to think harder about the nature of communication. What goes into encouraging discourse amongst people with very different relationships? From business <-> customer to collegaue <-> colleague. My brain wandered to internet communication at its base and how it all started for me.

What were some of your first experiences communicating over a computer?

My story starts a lot later than some being in my mid twenties. There was a Hewlett Packard 386 sitting on my family’s kitchen table. The 2400 baud modem connected to the Prodigy online service. It was a frustrating experience, a lot of dialing and busy signals. When it worked it really drew me in. There were message boards where I learned a lot about music. It is interesting to think about now because in the early days people were just figuring it all out before everyone was fully concious of the reletive anonyminity things like chat rooms and messages boards gave you. Everything was very friendly. I would play checkers against people one winter during snow days and thought that was the most amazing thing.

One of my good friends who would grow up to start JCHost (the fantastic web host of Ideas and Angles) ran a small BBS that you dialed into through telnet. Call back verifiers, door games, and everything. The whole process was fascinating to me but not everyone shared the feeling. I got on the phone and called my friend asking him if he wanted to chat online, he laughed at me for calling him to chat. Some of those early experiences were the start of a life spent online.

What is your story? Any Gopher or Telnet stories? How did it all start for you?

Ideas And Angles » Communication

Your First Experience Communicating On A Computer?

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