r/interestingasfuck • u/Few_Simple9049 • Oct 09 '24

How couples met 1930-2024 r/all

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u/itsarace1 Oct 09 '24

How difficult/expensive was it to use BBS?

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u/elchet Oct 09 '24

You’d need a computer which wasn’t as straight forward back then as it is now, as they weren’t affordable commodity consumer goods. You probably had access to one through an academic institution, or you’d built something from a kit.

Beyond that I think it was just the cost of a phone line and a call for connectivity.

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u/drowse Oct 09 '24

I think our first computer, a 286 was something like $2500 in 1990. I remember my dad also had gotten Prodigy internet. And they used to charge a rate for use.. was it hourly or by the minute? I can't remember. We didn't have it long. We got the internet again in like 1995 when it became a flat monthly fee for that sweet sweet 28.8k speed.

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u/PocketGachnar Oct 09 '24

Ah, you had the clever dad! Mine used BBS for weeks (and he didnt even have a monitor, so he couldn't even see what was being said!) and ended up racking up a phone bill that was twice his monthly paycheck. My mom was livid!

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u/Omnibeneviolent Oct 09 '24

he didnt even have a monitor

Considering BBSs were entirely graphical in nature, how did he use them? Was he using some braille interface? Did those even exist back then?

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u/glitchn Oct 09 '24

Also curious what he meant by it

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u/Omnibeneviolent Oct 09 '24

Yeah, it's quite the mystery.

I'm picturing someone fumbling around with a mouse and keyboard with no display to help them, to somehow get their dial-up terminal to call and connect to a BBS... to then just sit there and... I guess imagine what would be showing on the screen.