Hi Jack,

I had originally intended just to send you email, but I decided, what the
heck, your reader's might be interested in this, so I guess you can consider
it a letter to the editor.

Obligatory nice (but true) stuff first. I really like your magazine. It is
one of the two magazines that I buy EVERY month (the other being Analog
Science Fiction). You do a MUCH better job than that "other" mag whose title
seems to indicate it caters to "callers", but actually features the most
blatant commercial appeals to Sysops, while being pretty boring to the rest
of us. Guess it helps to love your work.

The one very mild criticism I have of Boardwatch is that you seem
ideologically dedicated to the idea that the online environment is there to
make money off of. Admittedly you temper this with the realization that a
financially sound BBS requires much more than a desire to make money (quite
true!), but still, I get the vague feeling that you think the sysop with only
one line and no ambition to expand is living somewhere in the dark ages of
the previous decade. I guess my concern is that if the online environment
becomes commercial, all the free stuff will be driven out of the market
place. Oh well, I guess we'll see how it goes.

What I'm actually writing to you about was the article on Denver FreeNet,
which coincidentally I had just discovered online the night before reading
about it in Boardwatch. In the article you mention how networked Colorado is,
but I'm not sure you realize just how true that is. Did you know that
Cleveland FreeNet is accessible from CARL? Well, not many people do, since
the access is indirect and you have to know where to look. Under the "Other
Systems" menu option on CARL is a link to MELVYL at U of California. Once you
are on MELVYL, just hit Enter to get into the Database Selection Menu and
then type CFN as your choice. It will telnet to Cleveland FreeNet. (This
choice is actually found on the fourth screen of database options, oddly
tucked away under "Library Catalogs Outside California". I guess it takes a
librarian.

Note that this is not of as much practical value as it would have been even a
couple of months ago. As CFN has become more popular it has become VERY
crowded. 250 users on at once is not uncommon, and really slows the system
down. Often the system is so crowded it just refuses connections. I've found
the wee morning hours are usually best to get through. (But note they go down
for backups 4:00 A.M. Fridays).

It's a very worthwhile system if you can get through. There is a good
selection of Usenet groups, and 1 Meg Internet mailboxes. And of course all
services are free.

Best wishes, and thanks for an excellent magazine. It's one of the few
sources of info about the on-line environment available off-line that is
actually interesting and useful.

 Steve Crocker
 aq817@cleveland.freenet.edu

 Steve:

Thanks so much for the note. I wish all of our Letters to the Editor had a
little tidbit of how-to-connect-to-what in them. I knew you could connect to
CARL from Cleveland FreeNet, but no, I was completely unaware CARL callers
could reverse the connection to Cleveland. Since CARL is a free local
telephone call here at (303)758-1551 in a local dialing area of over 100
square miles, I would imagine your note will cause some traffic.

With regards to the "for profit" bias, I hope not.  I think we'll see the BBS
industry mature in much the same fashion most industries have, and yes, it
will become more commercial.  We cover whatever we find of interest and
fairly regularly cover some very small single line systems if they are doing
something interesting.  But for many of us, the days of innocence will be
viewed with nostalgia, and I think this was common in automobiles, radio, and
many other developing fields historically.  I do have to point out that
software was either $100,000 or totally free not so long ago.  There was a
strong PD community a decade ago and most all PC software was of this nature.
Today, we have a very strong commercial software market and indeed the
richest man in America is Dollar Bill Gates.  But at the same time, there are
still PD software titles and a very active shareware market operating in
parallel with this commercial software industry.  I think we will see a very
similar parallel development in bulletin boards.  Ten years from now the
online industry will have its own Bill Gates, and there will still be
interesting single line bulletin boards run out of bedrooms.

Any relation to the Stephen D. Crocker of PEM with MIME fame in our article
on Privacy Enhanced Mail - this issue?

 Jack Rickard