[Info-vax] [OT] Eternal September, was: Re: backups and compaction or nocompaction might be better

[Paul Sture]

In article <keb5j3$m06$1 at dont-email.me>,
 Simon Clubley <clubley at remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP> wrote:

> On 2013-01-30, Paul Sture <nospam at sture.ch> wrote:
> > In article <ke91fv$ap$1 at dont-email.me>,
> >  Simon Clubley <clubley at remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP> wrote:
> >
> >> On 2013-01-29, pcoviello at gmail.com <pcoviello at gmail.com> wrote:
> >> > ok first what is endless september?
> >> >
> >> 
> >> It's a play on a name for a service called Eternal September which is a
> >> free NNTP service. The implicit suggestion from Hoff was that you should
> >> switch from using Google Groups (which is just a very poorly written web
> >> based Usenet client) to using a real Usenet client.
> >
> > Background to the name "Eternal September":
> >
> > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternal_September
> >
> 
> AOL has a lot to answer for, not only for what they did, but also because
> they were the first major commercial organisation to do so and so they set
> the de facto standard for what many other commercial newcomers considered
> to be acceptable. :-(
> 
> I started out with standalone BBS boards in the early 1980s as a teenage
> kid, before moving to FidoNet based systems when they became established
> and then onto systems with various Internet based interfaces so I can
> clearly remember the time before AOL and what happened when AOL let their
> customers loose.

My first taste of being online didn't come until 1995, when modem prices 
came down to acceptable prices, at least in part due to the impending 
relaxation of BT's grip on certifying devices they allowed to be 
connected.  As it happens I chose CompuServe and was delighted to find a 
VMS presence there in the form of VAXFORUM.  I really wished I had come 
across that earlier, for folks were already leaving for web based forums 
and by 1998 it was dead.

But yes, for years after, whenever I came across a suspected troll I 
would look at the posting address and it was surprising how often AOL 
featured there. :-)

The cable provider for internet services in my area of Switzerland was 
run by a subsidiary of AOL and apparently security was somewhat lax too; 
someone sent a CD full of login details to a Sunday newspaper...

I avoided using them for internet up to the point where I realised I 
could save a significant amount by dropping my landline completely. By 
that time it was under non-AOL ownership and they had improved things.

-- 
Paul Sture