News for hackers. Stuff that matters.

A comment on The four ways that ex-internet idealists explain where it all went wrong. Parent comment

Re:The four ways that ex-internet idealists explain where it... by RRRA on Saturday August 25, 2018 @12:42AM (#17839581)
The internet apolitical? When what where... Before DNS?
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:The four ways that ex-internet idealists explain where it... by reaperducer on Saturday August 25, 2018 @02:30AM (#17839840)
Since DNS is didn't go live until 1984, and didn't hit Windows until 1987, pretty much.

I was thinking pre-web. When most personal communication over the internet was via e-mail, usenet, and finger. I don't remember ever seeing politics on Gopher, but I could have just missed that.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:The four ways that ex-internet idealists explain where it... by dragonwriter on Saturday August 25, 2018 @03:14AM (#17839947)
> I was thinking pre-web. When most personal communication over the internet was via e-mail, usenet, and finger.

Even aside from overtly political newsgroups like talk.politics.misc, and talk.abortion, politics was all over Usenet.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:The four ways that ex-internet idealists explain where it... by alxlaz on Saturday August 25, 2018 @03:04AM (#17839917)
Maybe not political debates per se, but I definitely remember many posters' political views being easy to decipher behind their USENET posts.
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:The four ways that ex-internet idealists explain where it... by TheOtherHobbes on Saturday August 25, 2018 @06:04AM (#17840272)
In the late 90s, parts of Usenet and IRC made modern Twitter look like a polite lunch date with your accountant.
[ Parent | on HN ]