Subj : Re: how did you come into computers?
To   : tendim
From : DragonLord
Date : Wed May 23 2018 19:32:40

On Sunday, 24 October 1999 03:00:00 UTC-4, tendim  wrote:
> My memory is really fuzzy about a lot of things, but I'll remember what
> I can.
>
> Grade 3 or 4, which was about, ohh, 1985, my parents bought me a
> complete Commodore 64C (the old style 64C -- a breadbox 64 in a new
> case) for christmas.  Within a week I was already playing with the BASIC
> tutorials that came in the guide, and teaching myself stuff.  My
> original C64C System Guide still has little sketches that I was making
> on the sprite grids that they supplied.
>
> A lot of kids at my school had C64's, so I was always trading games and
> stuff wtih them.  Soon though, games became boring, but not after
> devouring games like Beach Head II and Giana Sisters.  My best friend
> eventually got a C64C as well, and his cousin/uncle had a lot of games,
> so a lot of my stuff was piped through him.
>
> When I joined boy scouts, my scout master told me he was also into
> computers, and told me what a modem was.  In dreamland, I started saving
> money from my paper route and finally had enough to buy myself a 1670
> Modem 1200 (four-dip version).  My scout master gave me my first BBS
> phone number, but since he was Atari, the first board I called was
> Atari.
>
> At the time, the handle I selected for myself was "Skyfox", based after
> the EA game I had rented from the library!  Amazing game!!!  :)
>
> I eventually got more and more BBS numbers, and upgraded from the Common
> Sense terminal to TouchTerm, and from there to DarkTerm.  I still didn't
> know what the difference between an Atari and C64 were though!  This all
> changed when I found BBS' running off of the M1 BBS program, which was a
> very popular ASCII program in Toronto at the time.  This also lead me to
> other BBS' running the Midgard program.
>
> Eventually I bought a copy of Midgard BBS, and set up my own board.  The
> original BBS program was 300 BPS only, so I had it modified by Jason Mac
> Innes who ran TOTEOI (Tiptoeing On The Edge of Insanity) BBS for 1200
> BPS.  The board flopped though, but I still have the original copies of
> the BBS program -- I _still_ play with it, adding to it, removing parts,
> etc.  (Written in BASIC).
>
> Anyways.  Eventually I hooked up with this guy named Mainframe who lived
> in my neighbourhood.  He introduced me to DARKSTAR BBS', and got me onto
> my first PIRATE BBS!  Ooooh!  The suspense!  This BBS was HQ for TGI
> (The Guardians International), the NEC Canada associate.  The name of
> the BBS escapes me now, but it ran off of IMAGE 1.02 and had a whopping
> 20 MB of storage!
>
> When I logged on for the first time though, I didn't want my Public
> Domain buddies knowing that I was a pirate, so I made up a new handle:
> Eternal Death.  As E.Death I started up my own graphics group, EDP --
> Eternal Death Productions.  I also hooked up with a guy named
> AngelRipper (Dan) who taught me how to code.
>
> From there, it fast tracks.  I changed my handle to Riff Raff, and then
> to Dark Lord, and finally to Cyberad.  Became cosysop of Aftermath BBS,
> one of the dominant Colour64! boards in Toronto.  Eventually I started
> calling out to the states, legally, too chicken to phreak, and got
> called THE BEYOND, HAVOK HQ..  Got hooked up with Wraith and Warnock of
> then RPG, and joined RPG!
>
> The rest, is history.
>
> I learned a lot on the C64, and bought a C128 somewhere along the way,
> and now have two C128D's, a stack of C128's, 1571's, C64's, 1541's,
> REU's and the like.  In my first year at university though, I went
> Macintosh for the Photoshop capabilities (I take photography/digital).
> The C128D is still beside me though, and I _still_ use it about once a
> week.  When I have money, I'll be upgrading it a little w/ a SuperCPU..
>
> Dat's all I can remember..
>
> -Cyberad/RPG!  :)

Wow!  Was feeling nostalgic and decided to surf the forums on Commodore 64
BBS's.  I used to be the Sysop of Aftermath BBS.  If you're still reading this,
 great to read your story!

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