Re: I miss everrybody

On 2024-07-08, xyzzy <xyzzy.dude@gmail.com> wrote:

Con Reeder, unhyphenated American <constance@duxmail.com> wrote:

On 2024-07-06, Joe@mich.com <Joe@mich.com> wrote:

On Thu, 4 Jul 2024 22:28:49 -0000 (UTC), "Con Reeder, unhyphenated
American" <constance@duxmail.com> wrote:
 

On 2024-07-03, joe@mich.com <joe@mich.com> wrote:

 
So sad.

 
Yes, me too. Here is some nostalgia:
 
https://pmarca.substack.com/p/the-true-story-as-best-i-can-remember
 
Remembering the first days of the Internet when we were a million of the
smartest engineers and scientists connected by Usenet. Posting to newsgroups
where you might get an answer from the most accomplished person in the
world on a particular subject.
 
I was at Andreesen's first public demo of Mosaic, and came back to my
company telling everyone we had to do this. I'd been on Usenet for 4 years,
getting only a few newsgroups via a feed from UIUC. I didn't hit RSFC until
just before eternal September, because I didn't pull anything from rec.*,
only news.*, sci.*, and comp.*.

 
I first saw the internet about 1990, when when my company gave engineers Sun workstations,
along with usenet, email, and ftp,. Usenet was pretty well deveoped by then, I read
groups in almost every category. Usenet was useful as well and
entertainment, but email and ftp were invaluable.
I thought that was the extent of the internet.Then in 1995 or so I was
listening to the radio "Hearts of Space" and in his slow
deep drawl, he said more info could be found on the "World Wide Web".
What the f*** was that?
Within 6 months we all had Netscape.Coincidentally, I tried to order a
book from B&N, it would be 5 weeks
and only if their distributor carried it.Tried the WWW and discovered a
small bookstore name Amazon, book
was 30% cheaper and delivered to my door in 3 days. That was when I
began to think change was in the air,
and when AMZ bought Tool Crip, that confirmed it,
 
Sears as always special to me, it always angered me that if I could see
what was coming, that their professionals
couldn't. Sears could easily have out Amazoned Amazon,or even bought and
renamed AMZ but they had the same
management type as A&P and mnay others.
 
Was your company in Brevard at the time?

 
No, I was at a company in Champaign, which is how I got connected to
the internet so early. Arguably my greatest contribution was to
register cd.com when those opened up, which ended up being one of the
largest assets of the company when it was sold.
 
I went technical and started writing an e-commerce program which
eventually got successful enough to be bought by Red Hat. All
because I got connected to the internet at UIUC and went to see
Andreesen demonstrate Mosaic. I used BBS systems, Gopher, and WAIS
before I used www.
 

>
As you know my wife went to UIUC. She did work-study at the supercomputing
center there,  during which she wrote the documentation for FTP. 

Small world, indeed! She would have (probably) known another denizen
of the froups, Milt Epstein. I have met Milt only briefly IRL; he is
also a bridge player. He briefly went to work for the same company I worked
for, after I left.

--
Lucky people are skilled at creating & noticing chance opportunities, make
lucky decisions by listening to their intuition, create self-fulfilling
prophesies via positive expectations,  & adopt a resilient attitude that
transforms bad luck into good.
-- Richard Wiseman