response 20 of 40:

Oct 31 22:29 UTC 2016

I'm not sure that I understand your comments on web-based BBS. I note that
this one is available both on the command line and on the web; take a look
at http://www.cyberspace.org and follow the link for agora.
 
As for the content, well, it's what people are writing.

response 22 of 40:

Dec 4 17:50 UTC 2018

It might be time to revive the perennial discussion on how to spice things
up at grex. If you read this thread, you might enjoy an update on the bbs
question: cross let me put gboard into action, and it got some use. It's still
live now, and still gets a tiny amount of use (less than
fronttalk/backtalk/bbs if that tells you anything.)

So, a different bbs maybe didn't help much. 

In the same time period, several of us users have tried to be present in
party, and contributing *something* to the conversation. We learned how to
extend and use functionality in the old beast, and had some kicks. Party has
been at least mildly active over the past year, I'd say. At times there is
an actual conversation. Mostly, people pop in and out.

I'd say, our efforts have helped. It's nice to see recent conversation in
there.

Another thing that grex did in this same time period (approximately) was to
add a gopher server. I don't know how many people on here are watching gopher,
but it is a hotbed of activity in pubnix space right now. People are getting
outside of their normal haunts and exploring. They're signing up for new
systems. They're doing interesting things. They're producing content, and
participating.

One example is over at circumlunar.space, a public access gopher server with
limited resournces. Shell accounts and sftp accounts were available, and the
32 slots open quickly filled up. People have been producing content, writing
projects together, coming up with ideas, and even writing and using their own
'party' equivalent called schat. Now, more users are connecting with
circumlunar.space to created a multi-server, related experience for users.
The domain owner is helping subdomains develop and grow. It's an interesting
time.

Grex, with gopher, dived in with one toe. That is OK, as it reflects a
different mindset that is equally valuable: a careful, cautious, and hesitant
administration. I'm not sure you could have anything else from a system that
has been around so long. I could be wrong, I'm making this stuff up as I go
(something, I gather, that isn't done as much here at grex.)

The point is: grex isn't going to be like the other systems out there. Nothing
they're doing is going to work here. There has to be some other way forward...

So, hopefully some long-time grex folks will chime in on this thread again,
with some old, solid ideas. Perhaps grex needs to focus on stability and
performance. Perhaps fundraising is needed. Maybe the offering needs to drop
the presense of being a wide-open party for the dial-in masses, and develop
into a niche. It might be time for the bbs to die. It might be time for party
to die. It might not be, but I think an open discussion is the only way
forward, and the only way to find out.

response 24 of 40:

Dec 5 20:38 UTC 2018

I'm about to get on an airplane and fly halfway around the
world, so this will be brief.

I've long felt that the Grex BBS community was holding Grex
back, and whether I was right or not, that's kind of
irrelevant now as that community has mostly disappeared.

If Grex is to survive, it clearly has to change.  What should
it evolve into?  I doubt that's for me, or any of the other
"long-term Grex" folks to decide.  It's there; it's open; we
give out accounts, we can do kind of whatever.  Take it and
make it what you want.

The only real wrench I'll throw into those works is gopher:
it's an antiquated protocol, little supported, and really
should be allowed to die a dignified death.  My challenge to
folks who want to us it is: Come up with something better.

I don't see why a small static site generator built on, say,
markdown couldn't be made that would generate content served
via HTTP and interpreted by a simple command-line client.  I
understand the desire to get away from the heavy-weight
technology of the commercial web, but don't throw out the
baby with the bathwater: the protocol is there, it works,
everything in the world understands it, and that's really
all you need.  Put another way, the folks who are advocating
for Gopher (to me) seem to be doing so because they like the
presentation of gopher content and its simplicity, but that
is independent of the underlying protocol.

Take that model and make it work with HTTP/2.0 and you're
really onto something.

response 26 of 40:

Dec 7 21:34 UTC 2018

I would like Grex to flourish, and I would like to see more public access
computing communities flourish as a more interesting and edifying alternative
to popular social media.

However, we have to admit 1) we are a niche that appeals to only a small
minority of Internet users, and 2) there is no certain formula do this, do
that, then flourish.

Also, I think most of you are like me in that even though we would like to
help Grex grow, the fact is that Grex only occupies a small portion of our
attention, which it shares with a variety of other Internet and computing
interests, other hobbies, studies, work, family and the rest of life.

So while I am not giving up hope for Grex, I don't see a specific solution
to the problems that have been brought up. I recommend that we who care about
Grex should try to drop in to party as regularly as possible, keep trying new
stuff, keep talking about it, and God willing something may catch fire again.

response 28 of 40:

Dec 13 15:42 UTC 2018

I think the most exciting thing i have heard on Grex, was from Cross - talking
about building a 'secure' modern text based system. As a layman / half a
Geek,so to speak - i can still see the attraction in old protocols and
technology, but a museum is not the creative, usefull, social community that
Grex seems about. The internet as a meritocracy is all about doing, and freely
sharing; at least the kind of internet that communities like this are about.
So so apart from making virtual friends, what do we do - or share? 

response 30 of 40:

Jan 2 20:21 UTC 2019

I'll reply again soon. Suffice it to say I've returned to the
states, with only a mild case of Delhi belly that just don't
seem to wanna go away.... "Oh hi, Delhi Belly; what are YOU
doing in Bombay?"

response 32 of 40:

Jan 4 00:14 UTC 2019

Resp:#29 Well put tod. Yes! Conferences, UNIX and terminal socializing. We
build community, an international community of like minded people. The
conferences reflect the people who manage them, and the expertise and interest
of the userbase. UNIX  is about programmers, community building and learning
from our peers -- it seems to me (?). 
Something cross said the other day made me think. He said "at least do
security pretty well here". It seems to highlight the difference between Grex
and some of the newer Pubnixs; Grex was built to cater for a very large
audience, and the system has seen alot of people trying to break it, aswell
as contribute. Their must be alot of lessons to be learnt from this and their
must be alot of people running even their own unixlike o/s at home who could
learn alot, and would be interested in being part of a community that they
could not only learn about, then from, and then be part of. 

response 34 of 40:

Mar 26 18:07 UTC 2019

Mention it wherever Bernie Sanders advertises

response 36 of 40:

Jun 8 07:03 UTC 2019

We ran out of flyers.  I asked my mom to pick up more at Staples.

response 38 of 40:

Jun 14 13:02 UTC 2019

"memories of the University of Michigan are NOT pleasant ... the fact that
I not only passed my courses (except one physics course) but got quite a few
As, shows how wretchedly low the standards were at Michigan."
 -T.J.Kaczynski

response 40 of 40:

Jul 25 18:21 UTC 2019

re #39
Not to mention FB and Cambridge Analytica's original customers of political
data from FB personal profiles.