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My thought: The Web is just slowly reimplementing the social features from multi-user Unix systems.

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So my premise goes like this:  The Web (what people think the Internet 
is now) is slowly becoming a feature-crippled, slow, high-overhead 
version of a multi-user Unix system attached to the Internet circa the 
early to late 1990s.

I consider myself lucky.  I'm in my mid-thirties, but I was introduced 
to a Unix (AIX) system attached to the Internet in mid-1992.  I had 
been participating in BBS's for a couple of years by that time, and as 
a younger lad had a brief infatuation with The Sierra Network mainly as 
a way to play the awesome multi-player dogfighting game Red Baron.  In 
1992 my friend's older brother, who only used his internet connection 
to register for classes, gave me the dial-up number, login and 
password, and told me the five commands he knew - ls, cd, nn, irc, and 
man.  That was enough to bootstrap my knowledge of Unix.

Back then there were many different facilities that people who did not 
live through the era would be quite surprised by.  Talk (SMS / Jabber / 
iChat / AIM) provided two-way, real time simultaneous chat (something 
still lacking on today's chat programs, that I shall call line-based 
because you type out what you wish to say and then hit enter, as 
opposed to talk which showed everything as you type).  IRC of course 
provided real-time multi-user chat.  Finger (Facebook status updates 
and Twitter), a fun service with a name that sounds like it could be 
even more fun than it is, provided people the ability to 'update their 
status' and provide contact information, and others to query those they 
were interested in.  Usenet (Forums) connected you to a legion of 
knowledgable people and taught you the fine art of trolling.  CUSeeMe 
(Video chat and virtual presence) allowed you to finally realize the 
dream promoted by AT&T ("http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5MnQ8EkwXJ0") 
of seeing the ugly mug of others, as well as having virtual presence 
capability for meetings and classes.  PGPfone (Skype) allowed you to 
talk, for free, with anybody connected to the internet instead of using 
your expensive long distance minutes.  Binary groups on Usenet and 
anonymous FTP (Bittorrent / Mega / Filefront) allowed you to not only 
snag the latest warez, but also get ahold of juicy leaked documents and 
other digital files that were super secret, commercial, or just crazy 
awesome such as pornographic .dl and .gl files (REMEMBER THOSE?).  Muds 
(World of Warcraft) allowed you to engage other humans and 
computer-controlled monsters in battle, make alliances, and hone your 
role playing skills while exploring vast and interesting worlds born 
out of the pure substance of human imagination.  Xconq (Civilization) 
allowed you to engage the enemy in a battle of wits and mettle.  
Xscrabble (Words with Friends) allowed you and your online buddies to 
have a bit of wordplay.  Bzflag (Call of Duty) let you twitch your arm 
and defeat the other bastards!

I think people can see where I am going with all this.  Almost 
everything people are accustomed to today was available in the old 
days, often in more efficient, interoperable, and sometime even more 
friendly packaging.  This brings me from the above premise, to my 
conclusion:  Are there any handy features from either multi-user Unix 
systems, early internet programs, or early online games that haven't 
been cloned into a web-3.0-ified business model web site?  I could make 
a billion dollars here with your help!

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My thought:  The Web is just slowly reimplementing the social features from multi-user Unix systems. Oregonian Haruspex <bob_davis_retired@yahoo.com> - 2014-02-08 16:10 -0800
  Re: My thought:  The Web is just slowly reimplementing the social features from multi-user Unix systems. RS Wood <rswood@therandymon.com> - 2014-02-09 15:17 +0000
    Re: My thought:  The Web is just slowly reimplementing the social features from multi-user Unix systems. Michael Black <et472@ncf.ca> - 2014-02-25 23:54 -0500

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