cellio | net-history meme

I swiped this meme from

1. When did you first connect ("go online"), and how?

If by "go online" we mean participating in any computer-based community, fall 1979 while taking a philosophy course at CMU. (I was a bored high-school student at the time.) I had taken a programming course at CMU that summer, but there were no communal/networking aspects to it.

If "go online" means extending beyond the university community, that would be in (I think) 1982 when I got access to ARPAnet email.

2. What was your first communications program?

I think it was just called "mail". It was a program that ran under TOPS-20. It would be another year or so before I heard of Unix.

3. When did you first chat over the internet, and how?

I was never a big fan of the real-time stuff, so I didn't follow up opportunities to chat via BITnet. So my first brush with this might have been ICQ in 1995, when a coworker introduced me to it. We were two floors apart and it was more convenient than the phone. :-)

4. What chat type program(s) do you use now?

I often have ICQ running, but I rarely use it.

5. Who was your first service provider?

CMU. :-)

6. Did you ever use AOL?

Nope. Helped relatives set it up once; they really have done almost everything they can to make assimilation painless and even comfortable.

7. Do you admit using AOL in public?

N/A.

8. Who is your current ISP?

Home DSL provider is Telerama. Unix shell account (where I do email) is JTAN. I think highly of both.

9. What was the first computer that you used to access the 'net?

CMU-C, a DEC-10 (?) running TOPS-20.

10. What computer do you use to access the 'net today?

Reasonably current Windows box at home, less-current Windows box at work, both running Win2000 Professional. I run web browsers there; for email I use SSH to get to a Unix machine and run pine.

11. What was your first 'net handle?

I guess technically it would have been CELLIO@CMU-C.

12. Did you use any other handles for any length of time? If so, what were they?

Variations on my user name ("mjc", "cellio", and CMU's cryptic "mc1p"). I sometimes used the nickname "Dragon", and once had that as a login name (seismo!lll-crg!dragon). I no longer remember quite why that seemed like a good idea, other than that I was about 18 years old and hanging out with gaming and SF geeks. :-)

13. What 'net handle do you normally use now?

I use my last name.

14. Are you active on any websites other than LJ? If you're willing to say, what ones?

Not web sites, but several mailing lists, mostly related to religion and the SCA (not at the same time). The net is about communication; web sites are one way to do that, but rarely the best way.