Anyone here experience the late 90s wild west Cowboys Internet?

[Zaxor]

I did the newsgroup thing and it was a lot of fun....

the first Fax I got was on silver paper that looked like a etch o sketch

the first computer I worked on was an IBM main frame that was Huge with 9" floppy's and giant 850 bit memory cards

than I worked on WANG well they had to change all that cause you just couldn't have 9" floppy Wangs all over the place... I think I still have some programs I written in the "glossary" anybody that worked on Wang would know what the heck I am talking about

worked on a philips next totally different language

shoot as far as I know the first modem we got wasn't even know as a certain baud speed like 720 it was just a modem and very slow even for text

I learned Fortran, Pascal, Cobal, Cobal II and all of them are as dead as a doornail now

also remember downloading a picture that someone took on a 9600 Baud modem that took 2 and 1/2 hours to get and it was little more than a big thumbnail size picture ...remember phone bills being way high cause of it too.

 

[YosemiteSam]

also remember downloading a picture that someone took on a 9600 Baud modem that took 2 and 1/2 hours to get and it was little more than a big thumbnail size picture ...remember phone bills being way high cause of it too.

When I downloaded Wolfenstein 3D (the original) back around 1992. I started the download then went to bed. :laugh2: I think I had a 9600, maybe a 1200 baud modem.

You can download it here. It's only 712kb. I think there are web pages that exist that are larger than that these days.

 

[TNCowboy]

Ha! Those dudes thought Drew Henson was destined for greatness because he was handsome. I miss Pierdon and Cowboy Roy.

Cowboy Roy_ was a trip. I think various message boards I've visited have had like 10 imposters of him.

 

[JustDezIt]

I did the newsgroup thing and it was a lot of fun....

the first Fax I got was on silver paper that looked like a etch o sketch

the first computer I worked on was an IBM main frame that was Huge with 9" floppy's and giant 850 bit memory cards

than I worked on WANG well they had to change all that cause you just couldn't have 9" floppy Wangs all over the place... I think I still have some programs I written in the "glossary" anybody that worked on Wang would know what the heck I am talking about

worked on a philips next totally different language

shoot as far as I know the first modem we got wasn't even know as a certain baud speed like 720 it was just a modem and very slow even for text

I learned Fortran, Pascal, Cobal, Cobal II and all of them are as dead as a doornail now

also remember downloading a picture that someone took on a 9600 Baud modem that took 2 and 1/2 hours to get and it was little more than a big thumbnail size picture ...remember phone bills being way high cause of it too.

:laugh2:

 

[CowboyMcCoy]

Anyone remember the message board, .. "Austin360" ?

I think only a few of us here used to post there. Funny, we had a lot of fun on that board.

 

[Idgit]

Here's a glimpse of that DMN forum from February 1998 --

http://web.archive.org/web/19980207055212/http://football.***BANNED-URL***/forums/cowboys/

Some of us around here have been posting on various forums since before that.

Man, those thread titles are amazing. Somethings never change.

Like this one:

Jerry, You are losing me!

Posted by No other Chucka on Friday, 6 February 1998, at 6:25 p.m.

We have problems with the team. You do not know what you are doing. When we lost our last football man, the team started going into a decline. I am talking about Jimmy. We need another football man, not another figurine. Not another College Rah Rah guy, who is a alcoholic in hiding or a coach who wonders if he wants to coach anymore. Sherm Lewis knows offense and is devoted to it, just give him a chance. George Seifert knows defense and has stayed in the NFL the past year, give another chance. If your mystery candidate is Ray Rhodes, do whatever it takes to pry him away from Philly.

PLEASE NO MORE BOZOS
Tom Landry and JJohnson knew Pro Football can our next guy know it, too.

Or this one...

quit whining!

Posted by Conan on Friday, 6 February 1998, at 5:34 p.m.

Everyone is all to anxious to blame J.J. for any unfortune that befuddles the Cowboys.
Hey,Jerry!Where were you during the floods in California?!?Give me a break!
If Donahue can't see the potential and oppurtunity in a marquee position like this,then good ridance!Coaches at every level only dream of coaching America's Team.
As for my personal choice: Of the Big 3, Donahue was my last choice.

Good stuff.

 

[JBond]

Here's a glimpse of that DMN forum from February 1998 --

http://web.archive.org/web/19980207055212/http://football.***BANNED-URL***/forums/cowboys/

Some of us around here have been posting on various forums since before that.

Ha ha ha, good job. The old wayback machine. I'm trying to remember the URL for Star Power's Cowboy board. I did remember that Star Power's name was Robert Trevino, but I can't seem to remember his URL.

In fact, my handle is a holdover from the wild west days. I used to have multiple handles before that was frowned upon. Reverend Conehead was a preacher who had a Dallas Cowboys church and screamed hallelujah to the Holy Blue Star. I had another handle named Bolshevik Pack Fan, who was a commie Packer fan who yelled about exploiting the proletariat. I had a photoshopped image of the Red Army marching with cheese on their heads. I'll have to search to see if I still have that.

I was a longtime standing member and admin on that board.

"Star Power" (real name is Robert) is a friend of mine.

Man, do I feel old. I have been conversing with some of you for over 15 years.

Robert is a great guy. I was active on his political site also. How is he doing? Does he post here?

Reverend...you were the Bolshevik Pack Fan? I loved that persona. I laughed my *** of at your posts.

 

[big dog cowboy]

Man, do I feel old. I have been conversing with some of you for over 15 years.

Robert is a great guy. I was active on his political site also. How is he doing? Does he post here?

Very true. Those days were just gold. Sadly, Robert isn't active on this site. I'll never forget we went to the Minny game when Moss lit us up. At least the beer was cold.

 

[JBond]

Very true. Those days were just gold. Sadly, Robert isn't active on this site. I'll never forget we went to the Minny game when Moss lit us up. At least the beer was cold.

We spent hours talking on his old site. I would love to find an archive of it, to see how many of our predictions regarding politics and the world in general came true. Next time you talk to him, let him know JBond (John) says hi. You should drag him over here.

 

[notherbob]

I was on most of those old boards, too, but mostly as a lurker. I didn't own a big enough gun to be a poster.

 

[YosemiteSam]

I was on most of those old boards, too, but mostly as a lurker. I didn't own a big enough gun to be a poster.

Your old *** was posting on stone tablets back in the Moses days. :laugh2:

 

[Cajuncowboy]

When the Internet was new and most of us were using dialup with Windows 95 and huge CRT monitors, the Dallas Morning News set up a Cowboys forum. It was the old wwwboard system where you didn't register to post. You just typed a name and said what you wanted. This meant anyone else could type that same handle to impersonate you. There were multiple ad hominem attacks, impersonations, multiple handles, flooding, and screaming fights. It was the wild west on this new thing called the Internet. Cowboy hater trolls would come in guns a blazin' with sheer gems of wisdom like accusing Cowboy players or fans of engaging in gay sex or just yelling, "Cowboys suck." It was before people had figured out how to run a civilized fan forum or how to stop trolling. It was especially a mess after any loss with haters inundating the place with cat calls and floods.

The DMN board was such a mess that a fan who went by "Star Power" set up his own board. It was still wwwboard, but it showed IP addresses and IP blocked trolls. Even so, it was still pretty wild. Both those boards are now long gone, but I'm curious if anyone here was part of them. Nowadays I laugh at how ridiculously out of control fan boards used to be. Not that I want to return to those days. Today you can actually have intelligent conversations about the team and can find out good info. But it's fun to laugh at what a mess it used to be.

Star Power. Wasn't that the SportsOnly board?

 

[Blast From The Past]

I used to post on http://web.archive.org/web/20000817090052/http://www.texnews.com/cowboys/chat.html
but was a lurker, mostly like here. Their was a very knowledgeable man on that board who went by the name Hitman, who was a mainstay there before he sadly passed on; the place really was never the same afterwards. Then the board got hit by trolls and bots and is, in fact, still getting hit by bots at http://www.texnews.com/cowboys/started2blank.html Most other regulars moved on to another board or boards. I was asked to either post more or go away on the new one that the majority started up. So I went away and came here. They had a Flameroom on the old board that was supposed to eliminate fighting in the main chat room, but it wasn't effective as it usually still happened on the main chatroom/board anyway as most people stayed on the main board. They also had a Troy Aikman chat room to talk about Troy...lol. And of course that had chatrooms/boards for all the other NFC East teams all together, which probably was a good ideal in the beginning and sometimes worked as intended but also made trolling really easy for the Cowboy haters to come over and start trouble. Lots of good memories of those olden times were brought back by the OP.

 

[Viper]

Anyone remember the message board, .. "Austin360" ?

I enjoyed Austin360, it's been a long time.

 

[Reverend Conehead]

Man, do I feel old. I have been conversing with some of you for over 15 years.

Robert is a great guy. I was active on his political site also. How is he doing? Does he post here?

Reverend...you were the Bolshevik Pack Fan? I loved that persona. I laughed my *** of at your posts.

Yeah, that was me. I had a blast posting all that crazy ****. After Star Power's board closed, I got into trouble trying to post that persona on newer boards where it was easier for admin to catch you using multiple handles. I found some of my old Bolshevik Pack Fan images:

http://img27.*************/img27/763/bolpacksoldier6.jpghttp://img27.*************/img27/763/bolpacksoldier6.jpg

http://img862.*************/img862/3268/bolpackfan.gifhttp://img862.*************/img862/3268/bolpackfan.gif

Star Power. Wasn't that the SportsOnly board?

It was SportsOnly. Thanks for reminding me. If anyone knows Star Power/Robert Trevino, please invite him here. He was a good guy.

 

[Alumni2k11]

I remember the AOL message boards were pretty active back in the day. Those were really the only ones I went on in the late 90's.

 

[Yeagermeister]

I remember Austin360 and the Star Boards. I used to lurk and post a little on them until Dale told me about this board (actually the old board). So he's too blame for me being here.

I got my start on boards/chatrooms in the mid 90's in the old NFL.com chatroom also know as "Hat Chat" because you could choose the helmet of your team as a sort of avatar when you logged in. It was a nice chatroom until people got stupid and it got shut down.

 

[Boom]

I enjoyed reading alt.sports.football.pro.dallas-cowboys on usenet until spam, trolls and politics made it impossible to navigate.

 

[YosemiteSam]

I enjoyed reading alt.sports.football.pro.dallas-cowboys on usenet until spam, trolls and politics made it impossible to navigate.

Then you moved on to alt.hamster.ducttape.

 

[Yeagermeister]

Then you moved on to alt.hamster.ducttape.

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