RIP: Ward Christensen, aged 78

[thewayne]

And everybody is asking who the heck is Ward Christensen?

Ward invented, or co-invented, two little computer programs, or systems. They were kind of foundational to a lot of pre-internet culture. XModem in 1977 and the BBS system in 1978.

What would social media have been without them? Would there have been social media without BBSes?

Ward and his collaborator wrote the original CBBS code in TWO WEEKS. Then they told people it took them four so they wouldn't think it was rushed!

I remember in the early '80s dialing in to boards with my TRS-80 Model 100 (built-in 300 baud modem, runs off of 4xAA batteries and I still have it and it still works) and screaming in fury inside whenever someone picked up the phone and disconnected me.

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2024/10/ward-christensen-bbs-inventor-and-architect-of-our-online-age-dies-at-age-78/

https://tech.slashdot.org/story/24/10/15/002203/ward-christensen-bbs-inventor-and-architect-of-our-online-age-dies-at-age-78

Comments

[richardf8]

screaming in fury inside whenever someone picked up the phone and disconnected me.


Good times, good times.

[ranunculus]

I had a TRS-80. That was a very long time ago.

[disneydream06]

RIP to a quiet genius.
Hugs, Jon

[silveradept]

Without the BBS, much of the Internet as we know it would not exist, and so wouldn't many of the flame wars, either, so I suppose you have to take the bad with the really, really excellent.

[lilfluff]

Being 90% of the way through downloading a multi megabyte file at 300 baud and then someone picks up the phone. That should be on those, "Things kids today won't understand," lists. Then being so happy when the BBSs started offering file transfer protocols that could continue an interrupted download from where you were cut off rather than having to start all over again. Actually, add that to the list. Being asked what file transfer protocol to use when you ask to download a file. "Download game.exe via: Kermit, xmodem, ymodem, or zmodem? (kxyz?)"

I don't miss having to use the phone line to get online, but I do miss the days of using a dozen BBSs each with it's own niche culture. Web forums can be similar but aren't really the same.

[thewayne]

It was fun times.  Felt like more of a community in some ways.

[garote]

Mastodon has resurrected some of that niche feel... And of course, there's good ol' DW right here...

[warriorsavant]

Everyone builds on the foundations of (an)other(s). So let's not Christensen's distant predecessor, Telemachus, who invented indexing.

[moxie_man]

There were only 2 or 3 BBSs in my area back in both Grad School and soon after in the early days of the Internet. And I was too poor to look further afield 'cause long distance charges. The few I could access weren't very busy.

[thewayne]

It was always interesting trying to get in when the board wasn't busy.  Yeah, long-distance charges were killer back then!