The Year Was 1978 by The Question The year was 1978, led watches were all the rage. Bat Out of Hell was gaining popularity and a massive following, as two boys wandered through the Newmarket Mall when suddenly their eyes are drawn to a desk in the Radio Shack store. Sitting upon this small worn desk was a Tandy TRS-80 computer drawn by some unseen force we were dragged before this new altar to . Many an afternoon was spent, me and Butterballs aka Froggy (for his love of turkey, not some sexual fetish) in front of that computer, learning the ins and outs.. pokes and peeks of BASIC. But alas all good things come to an end, and eventually the management took away the endless public access to this wonderful device, perhaps to encourage the nagging of parents to purchase this to ease their ringing ears. The fever was further fueled by a visit to a large insurance company in down- town Toronto where my mother worked, it was a bring your brat in day and I starred in wonder at the banks of Univac computers.. their tape drives spinn- ing, a large disc platter/cartridge being inserted into its housing, the hum of electronics like a chorus. It was not to be, and time passed by... 1981 rolled in, Butterballs family gave into the nagging first and he was the proud owner of a VIC 20. Shortly after, I too got lucky at Christmas time and Satan Claws brought me my very own VIC. Countless hours were spent, Jim Butterfield became our digital Prophet and Compute Magazine was the written word. The time spent, turned out well for when we entered Sutton District High, we took grade 11 and 12 comp classes in grade 8 and 9 and the rest of the schooling was pretty much a bore after that.. except Chem class.. how we liked fire and things that went boom (but that is many other stories). The benefit of having pre experience in Commie Basic, the high school comp studies were all Commodore Pets, 4032 and 8032's, and the class consisted of programming in BASIC, at the end we got to learn a bit of FORTRAN and do our own hello world program, punched into cards to be read by the card reader on the mainframe in Markham. Do you want to play a game? The movie War Games came out in 1983, and that was a major inspiration to explorers of the new frontier. Shortly after we both upgraded to Commodore 64.s and much tinkering was to be had. This is also the time we started experimenting with electronics, first with a Radio Shack 100 in 1 kit, and how to hook stuff up to the expansion ports on the VIC.s and 64's. (Timer circuits were also found to be of use for those other stories). The teen years were drawing closer to their end, High School was over and we entered the work world. By this time Butterballs had moved to Markham, his father having passed away in Keswick a while back. Money was made, but our involvement with the computers slowed down and moved into other things, like firearms, Black Badge pistol shooting, and well fire and things that go boom stuff. One day I awoke and heard a voice, GO WEST YOUNG MAN. and I did so, to Alberta I drove, three and a half days and I found myself at my uncles place, who to my surprise had just purchased a new type of computer I had never touched. An Intel 286, with a modem, running DOS. A new intense addiction started and all the hours that I could spend on it I did, for after gaining a understanding of how the system worked, and how to get the terminal program going. I found the BBS scene. Williams BBS, was the first and for the longest time the main BBS I called in the Edmonton area. It ran Maximus by Scott Dudley, and I began to find the love of Fidonet Mail and a good file base. The rest of the family moved out from Ontario, and I had saved enough to get myself a 386 and a phone line. After much downloading over days due to time limits on the various BBS accounts, I was busy installing my own copy of Maximus, and FrontDoor and the various door games of the time, Solar Realms Elite etc. The board opened as a RPG (Advanced Dungeons and Dragons, War- hammer) hangout. Over time, I explored other BBS packages that I found as I dialed about North America, till one day I came across the Vine BBS, in Cicero Illinois, run by a fellow named Michael Paris.. (who after some research seems to have gotten himself in much trouble). At this time, the Vine BBS was a pro H/P/V with emphasis on the V system. It was like a new realm of computing had opened to me. Being somewhat foolish I got a second line for wardialing after finding THC Scan, reliving the heady days of dreaming after War Games had come out. At least I didn't sequentially dial an exchange at a time.. sigh. Eventually I decided to change the name of my BBS, and switch formats. I had made some connections among several .Private.. 31337 Boards. bah. the type running Vision/X and Oblivion.. it was fun then but when looking back upon it.. too too snarly. Switched the home BBS software to VBBS, filled the file base up with every c00l haxor zine of the time, utilities.. viral code etc, joined NukeNet for one of the message bases and Miskatonic University was opened. Those days in the early to mid 90s were fun to explore, the idea of system security was not on the top of the agendas of many connected systems. The wonders of getting my first U of Eh shell account and this whole internet thing was dazzling to say the least. One day a new user appeared on the board, Cyb0rg/ASM, eventually we met and things seemed to go click. I was once again lucky to hook up with a talented and incredibly smart person with whom our shared interests would allow us to build a friendship. Eventually Wizbone and The Clone joined the ranks and the rest is history. For those who know me, or suffered through a rant session when I couldn't feel my fingers on irc. I spent a lot of time as a Genie trapped inside a Bottle. Those days are gone, and I am moving forward and hope to see the h/p scene become as active as it was a few years back. Rumour has it that Lord Phungus might be opening the Hack Canada bbs up just for fun. Shouts out to the entire HC/Nettwerked Crew and those others who I have met along the way. Special shouts out to MsO and Cyb for finnaly making me rea- lize how stupid I had become. P.S On a odd note, those who know Alan, my younger years friend Butterballs went on to do some programming for Major BBS. Years back Alan was a Major BBS sysop and had met Butter. small fucking world or what. TQ out, keep safe. 2007/06/11 www.hackcanada.com