Subj : Re: This Area Pt2 01/02 To : Yl112@cornell.edu From : Ed Williams Date : Mon Oct 09 2000 08:52 am To: YL112@CORNELL.EDU Subject: Re: This Area Pt2 Hello, Y>Problems with this for my particular situation (though I'd love to see Y>fidonet revived--and to see if the military history echo is at all around Y>anymore!): Certainly didn't mean to indicate that it's a thing for anyone to do, opening a public BBS and all. But one could certainly become a POINT off any of the many nodes in Fidonet and be able to do mail in a fashion that would be more compatible with the BBS systems you're posting to, and I think that's worth the trouble any day. Y>4. xD&D is almost dead at Ithaca. There are other systems that people Y>like a lot better, not to mention systems that people play because they Y>have great settings. The big ones in our area are GURPS, Champions, any Y>of the World of Darkness games, and Legend of the Five Rings. Not to Y>mention the occasional crazy one-shot in Over the Edge. xD&D works Y>as a system 'cause it's well-known, but I remember seeing a bunch of Y>people getting together at gamer's a couple weekends ago and settling on Y>a game of Mage: the Ascension instead of xD&D. OC this will vary from Y>locale to locale, but if I tried to gather together *only* xD&D gamers in Y>the area, I wouldn't find as many people. I've personally always liked Y>hearing about different systems and settings, and have never been Y>enthusiastic about xD&D mechanics or the horrible worldbuilding. It is a shame, although I think that TSR will do some publicity stuff soon for their movie, and I think that will bring about a lot of interest in the game again. Y> Well, I do miss the personal feel of BBS's, but I like also Y>having the internet around. I like the fact that hundreds of constructed Y>languages pages and resources on linguistics are easily found online. I Y>like the fact that I can look up physics/math pages on kink and antikink Y>solitons (and yes, that's a technical term) on the web. I like the fact Y>that you can find amazing fantasy art and lurk on the archives of some Y>active, passionate and astoundingly well-written play-by-email campaigns. I miss the sound of a waterwheel in my backyard too, but then again, I also like having electricity in my home. Didn't make much sense? Well comes out the same as you stated above. What BBS's do, and what they do best, the internet CANNOT do. Now that's not to say that someone can't dumb down a BBS to Internet standards, although they would be hard pressed to come up with such an incredibly unresponsive menu system as that mastered on the Internet. So, while a waterwheel might make electricity, I like it for different reasons. Same for BBS's. Y>As a math major, I feel that anecdotal evidence doesn't constitute Y>proof... But honestly--while there *is* a ton of crap out there, Y>there are also the harder-to-find, very worthwhile websites. Whether Y>mine is one of them is debatable, but I'm a writer and I like sharing my Y>few experiences so others might see some use in them, just as other Y>writers before me put their experiences and advice on the web. (The SFWA Y>homepage and its various links is a great example of this.) I've also Y>seen some great rpg resources online. Well I've not really gotten into the things a BBS can do so well. I've been over here yelling it so much at these web faced dolts I run into that nothing seem's to make a difference to them. So I don't really have at hand any one thing that makes people go "Oh Yeah, that's true", except to say that there are significant differences in the way the two engines run, which bring out pretty major changes in the way people act when on either system. ON the internet changes in personality are very well hidden behind form factor result exchange, whereas on a BBS people feel much more like a part of something. At any rate I have proved it, it just takes far more time to explain than it does to show someone. Y>> But for now, I will gladly search the nodelist for anyone who want's and tell Y>> them of BBS's in their area they can call, and help a Sysop out who cares, or Y>> who can hook them up as a Point or a full fleged node in Fidonet. Y>If you know of a BBS in the Palo Alto, California area I'd love to hear Y>it--I'm planning to go thereabouts for grad school since my kid sister's Y>at Stanford. Finding an Ithaca, NY area BBS is pretty moot since Y>I'm going to leave in less than a year. Specifically to that area there is only one: Olympus Hermes II Project, Palo Alto CA. Run by MichaelAlyn Miller In the surrounding area there are: MicroBBS, San Jose California 408-865-1560, run by Doug Coatney LadyColt Womens Forum, San Jose CA, 408-246-2837, run by Masako Young The Information Exchange, San Jose CA, 408-288-6298, by Alfred Roth South Santa Clara County BBS, San Martin CA, 408-683-0338, Bob Shelton Escape to Other Worlds, Milpitas CA, 408-956-1750, by Brett Frymire HomeSpun Images, San Jose CA, 408-269-6636, by Ben Pumpelly (Continued to next message) --- þ OLXWin 1.00b þ "... and this only my TENTH cup of coffee ..." # Origin: The Goblin Reach BBS/www.goblinsreach.org/719-522-1488 (1:128/148) * Origin: ConchGate (1:106/357.0) .