Subj : BBS Promotion
To   : ED KOON
From : Ingo Juergensmann
Date : Sat Jun 10 2017 11:08:32

Hi ED,

 In a message dated 07 Feb 17 you wrote to ALL :

 EK> Just a one time post to hopefully bring more bbs callers to our hobby.

 EK> Doc's Place BBS has been online since 1991 and was one of the first
 EK> internet bbses when dial up bbses were going offline.
 EK> http://www.was-ist-fido.de/doks/fnews/fido1733.txt
 EK> A post similar to this one back in 2000 revived a dead board, and I'm
 EK> hoping to attract new callers.

Well, although itīs very unlikely that Iīll follow your invitation to visit
your BBS, I think you bring up an interesting point: Advertising Fidonet in
general.

Iīve been thinking about advertising Fidonet for some days before your
post. What is written in that Fidonews article fido1733.txt is still true
today: the Internet is more of a global community, whereas Fidonet and
BBSes are more of a local community. I really enjoyed meeting up with my
points and other sysops in the 90s on a monthly basis.
I think this local community thing is something that can be advertised,
although I donīt know yet how to do this in a good way that really attracts
people.

For example I thought of placing BBS ads in local newspapers. Often
newspapers offers small advertisments for free. Why not use that and place
ads there from time to time?
Maybe you can get more attention by this kind of ads than posting to a
website. I did so on Debian Planet (see original articles on my blog:
https://blog.windfluechter.net/category/344/tags ), but in contrast to
other Debian related posts, I only got a few reads on them while Linux
related articles usually get hundreds of reads in short time. So, maybe the
Internet has not the right audience to place ads.

Additionally, and I included those arguments in my second blog post as
well, Fidonet offers some advantages over the Internet in these times were
some regimes think you can shutdown the Internet in their countries if the
like. Fidonet with dialin access and bundled messages can offer those
people in those countries an alternative to access free and uncensored
media.

And although most traffic in Fidonet is nowadays handled by Internet
connections, nobody needs to fear the cost implications anymore, even when
they are using dialin connections. At least over here in Germany most phone
carriers provide flat rates for national calls.

And yes, I really love that sound of my modem when someone connects. Still
today! :-)

-- 
Ciao...             //    email: ij@2017.bluespice.org
      Ingo        \X/     mobil: 0172 - 274 1 275  

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 * Origin: AmigaXess - back in FidoNet after 17 years (2:2452/413.2)

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