Posted on 12/23/2019 8:36:51 AM PST by jonatron
Randy Suess, a computer hobbyist who helped build the first online bulletin board, anticipating the rise of the internet, messaging apps and social media, died on Dec. 10 at a hospital in Chicago. He was 74.
His death was confirmed by his daughter Karrie.
In late January 1978, Mr. Suess (rhymes with “loose”) was part of an early home computer club called the Chicago Area Computer Hobbyists’ Exchange, or CACHE. He and another club member, an IBM engineer named Ward Christensen, had been discussing an idea for a new kind of computer messaging system, but hadn’t had the time to explore it. Then a blizzard hit the Great Lakes region, covering Chicago in more than 40 inches of snow.
As the city shut down, Mr. Christensen phoned Mr. Suess to say that they finally had enough time to build their new system. Mr. Christensen suggested they get help from the other members of the club, but, as he recalled in an interview, Mr. Suess told him that would be a mistake because others would just slow the project down.
“Forget the club. It would just be management by committee,” Mr. Christensen recalled Mr. Suess saying, noting that he was a self-taught computer technician whose decisions typically came hard and fast. “It’s just me and you. I will do the hardware, and you will do the software.”
The Bits newsletter will keep you updated on the latest from Silicon Valley and the technology industry.
The idea was to build a central computer that club members could connect to, using their own computers and telephone lines. They thought of it as an electronic version of the cork bulletin boards on the walls of grocery stores where anyone could post paper fliers.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
So, global warming is the cause?
Ah, yes. I remember RBBS.
He was a doctor wasn’t he?
I thought that Al Gore invented computer bulletin boards.
A true pioneer. Randy with CBBS and Ward with Xmodem. Wonder how much time was spent with CBBS on re-dial....
Never heard on Mr. Suess, but Ward Christensen I remember. IIRC, he wrote the BBS software and the first file transfer protocols for uploading and downloading files to a BBS.
RIP, Mr. (not Dr.) Suess.
One thing interesting about bulletin boards was the forums that reached out across the nation and the world. I think the bulletin board owners uploaded forum packages to each other. I also remember my computer’s phone directory having all the bulletin boards I could find in town plus the library and university computers.
R.I.P
Never trust a computer tech whose experience doesn’t include surfing the BBSes on a 1200-baud Hayes POTS modem.
Oh, the places you’ll go! There is fun to be done!
There are points to be scored. There are games to be won.
And the magical things you can do with that ball
will make you the winning-est winner of all.
Fame! You’ll be as famous as famous can be,
with the whole wide world watching you win on TV.
I was in that club at the time as a broke hobbyist; he was a good and helpful guy. What we are using right now is basically a TCP/IP Internet version of a BBS.
“Never trust a computer tech whose experience doesn’t include surfing the BBSes on a 1200-baud Hayes POTS modem.”
Youngster! Try 110 on a Teletype ASR-33.
those were the good old days. Fidonet, ThousandOaks, X/Y and then Z-modem vs. Kermit transfer protocols. I loved Kermit when talking to dissimilar systems. I laughed when I think IBM put Kermit and XModem on their systems.
How about all the unarchiving - Arc, Uncompress, PKZip.
Modems from 300->1200->2400->9600->14.4/bis, 33 then monster 56k. I can still remember the sounds of training...
Anyone still remember Hayes command set?
I still have a 1200baud modem.
The BBS was an exciting time.
“Try 110 on a Teletype ASR-33.”
At this point I should confess and repent. I think I started something which can’t be stopped now. When I got the holes punched into the paper tape to come out roughly in the female hour glass shape.
Hot damn!
The later high-tech flashy world of BBS with unbearably slow and incredibly low-res image files totally ruined the glory days of paper-tape porn.
No, it was the telegraph.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.