On Wed, 16 Nov 2005, Tony Baechler wrote:
Hello all and especially Greg. Sorry for the off topic post but I was shocked to see this in the header of your message to the list.
X-FTN-Sender: Greg Newby <Greg.Newby@p999.f83.n421.z2.fidonet.org>
Having grown up on Fidonet, I can't help but ask how things are. I see the network is still limping along, even though zone 1 is basically dead as of a couple years ago. I've read that Europe is still fairly active in Fidonet so I'm curious. Also, if you don't mind my asking, how do you happen to be using a Fidonet point to send out at the supercomputing conference?
In a feeble attempt to keep on topic, I would like to say that one of my earliest exposures to PG was via BBSs, many of which were on Fidonet. At one time, many new PG posts went through the various file networks and showed up on BBSs all over the world. I wonder how many people knew about PG just because of that. It was still a luxury to get Internet access in those days unless you were at a university. Although I often grow nostalgic for the old days of the BBS, I've long since realized that those days are past. That's too bad since Fidonet was much friendlier and more personal than the Internet. Ah well, sorry for my nostalgia trip.
When I was a BBS sysop 20 years ago, we posted the early Project Gutenberg efforts on various BBSs, including some FidoNet sites, and they propated there quite well, thanks for asking. I also recall FidoNet as being very friendly, much moreso than PLATO, NOVANet, etc., though I suppose we should also think about uunet. Speaking of uunet, was there something else with a similar name in Europe? eunet, or something? Thanks! Michael