Bulletin board system: Difference between revisions
Created page with "{{Infobox | name = Bulletin board system | 1 AKA = BBS, CBBS | 2 Developers = Hobbyist sysops; early pioneers Ward Christensen and Randy Suess | 3 Year = 1978 (first public dial-up BBS) | 4 Platform = Microcomputers with modems; later Telnet/SSH }} A '''bulletin board system''' ('''BBS''') is a computer server that users call with a modem (or today reach via Telnet/SSH) using a terminal program to read and post messages, exchange files, and, on multi-line syste..." |
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Revision as of 18:33, 2 October 2025
| Bulletin board system | |
|---|---|
| AKA | BBS, CBBS |
| Developers | Hobbyist sysops; early pioneers Ward Christensen and Randy Suess |
| Year | 1978 (first public dial-up BBS) |
| Platform | Microcomputers with modems; later Telnet/SSH |
A bulletin board system (BBS) is a computer server that users call with a modem (or today reach via Telnet/SSH) using a terminal program to read and post messages, exchange files, and, on multi-line systems, chat in real time. In the early–mid 1980s BBSes linked into store-and-forward networks such as FidoNet to move private “NetMail” and public “Echomail” between cities and countries, anticipating later internet forums and email.
History
Experiments in public computer messaging predate home microcomputers: Community Memory (1973–1975) in the San Francisco Bay Area ran on a mainframe with coin-operated terminals. The first widely accessible dial-up BBS, CBBS, went online in Chicago on 16 February 1978, created by Ward Christensen and Randy Suess during a snowstorm; it ran on an S-100 bus system with an early Hayes modem and was patterned after a corkboard at their computer club.[1][2]
A key accelerator was the Hayes Smartmodem (1981), whose command set let software answer, dial and hang up standard telephone lines without manual handset juggling. Faster modems (1200, 2400, later 9600–56k bit/s) and cheap hard disks in the late 1980s expanded BBS file libraries and multi-line chat. By 1994, the U.S. had tens of thousands of boards and an estimated user base in the millions, rivaling commercial services such as CompuServe.[3]
Networks and software
FidoNet standardized addressing and nightly dial-up relays, letting small local boards participate in global discussions and email without leased lines. Tools such as FrontDoor and BinkleyTerm (mailers) and Squish/FastEcho (message tossers) automated the flows; QWK offline readers sped message handling for users on slow links. Popular packages included PCBoard, RemoteAccess, Wildcat!, Maximus, TBBS and MajorBBS on MS-DOS; TeleFinder and FirstClass on Macintosh; C-Net/Color64 on Commodore; and various Amiga and Atari systems. Many boards hosted “doors”—external games and apps—alongside file areas and themed message bases.
Decline and legacy
From late 1994, consumer dial-up Internet and graphical web browsers (e.g., Mosaic) offered one connection to the whole world and true multitasking. Thousands of BBSes shuttered or morphed into early ISPs; several software vendors went bankrupt as users migrated to the Web and internet email.[4] BBS culture survives as a hobby: many boards are reachable over Telnet, often with ANSI art, doors, and nostalgia file libraries; Taiwan’s PTT Bulletin Board System remains a major text-based community.[5][6]
Features
Typical capabilities included message forums, private mail, file upload/download (X/Y/ZMODEM), doors for games and utilities, and sysop pages for live help. Presentation was primarily text (ASCII/ANSI); many systems embraced ANSI art and, on some platforms, richer proprietary graphics.
References
- ↑ Ward Christensen and Randy Suess, “Hobbyist Computerized Bulletin Board System,” Byte 3(11), Nov. 1978, pp. 150–157. Archived PDF: vintagecomputer.net (accessed 16 Feb 2019).
- ↑ Peter Zelchenko, “Jack Rickard … saw it coming,” Chicago Tribune, 30 Oct. 1998 (on early BBS history).
- ↑ InfoWorld estimates circa 1994 reported ~60,000 U.S. BBSes serving ~17 million users.
- ↑ “Bulletin-board system,” Encyclopaedia Britannica (last updated 20 Mar 2023).
- ↑ Randy Bush, “FidoNet: Technology, Use, Tools, and History,” 1992, fidonet.org (archived 2003).
- ↑ “Chinese BBS – The Social Activity that Never Grows Old,” thinkingchinese.com (accessed 14 Apr 2018).