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- \Q\You unopen the carton, and notice it contains a black box of electronics,
- and a few other items.
-
- \A\You hunt down the instruction manual and start to read it.
- \A\You plug the modem into your computer and see if it works.
-
- \N\Are you joking? The instruction book contains a wealth of information on
- general computer communications. You can't fill your Nerdy head with all that
- sort of information so soon.
- \Y\You plug the power lead into the serial port and blow up your computer.
- Fortunately, the Genie re-appears and restores everything to normal.
-
- \Q\You decide you better read the manual. From the first chapter you learn
- you need to get a serial cable to connect the modem and the computer.
-
- \A\You decide to make your own.
- \A\You race down to the electronics shop and buy one.
- \A\You borrow a friend's.
- \A\You yell for the genie!
-
- \N\That's pretty Nerdy, but you blew your modem up as soon as you plugged your
- cable in.
- \N\I am impressed by your desire to evaluate a sensible and practical solution
- to the problem. However, it is certainly *not* a Nerdy act. Accordingly, I
- have to disqualify you for non-compliance with the spirit of the game.
- \N\Your friend has a Zorro 8 computer. Apparently the cables were not compatible
- and you blew your computer up.
- \Y\Of Course! Now you're getting it! That's what a BBS Nerd would do!
-
- \Q\The Genie provides you with a cable to use, AND shows you how to plug it in.
- You start typing away at the computer, but nothing happens. This is strange.
- On reading more of the modem manual you discover you might happen to need a
- terminal program to link the computer and the modem.
-
- \A\You call for the Genie again.
- \A\You ring up your friend who also has the same computer as yours and ask
- him if he's got a 'terminal program'.
- \A\You look up a few BBS numbers in the phone book and call them up voice
- hoping the sysop will answer and help you out.
- \A\You ring up a computer shop, and tell them the situation, asking for help.
-
- \Y\Yep, the only way out of this is to call the Genie. He appears and gives
- you a copy of 'JRTelNComMate', and shows you how to use it properly.
- \N\Your friend says, 'Sure, drop over, I have exactly what you want.' And so
- you do. Unfortunately, while you are visiting, you also find your friend has
- many more programs you want. So you start copying. The programs happen to be
- copyright programs, and you don't hear the knock on the door from a F.A.S.T.
- agent who happens to have heard the drives whirring from about 3 miles away.
- You are arrested for software piracy and spend three years in prison. Even
- the genie doesn't want to know about you.
- \N\Unfortunately, all you heard from the numbers was a funny squealing sound
- and a loud "Kshhhhhh!!". You have no idea what to do.
- \N\The computer shop listened to you rave on about comms, but after 15
- minutes hung up in your ear.
-
- \Q\You boot up JRTelNcomMate and enter in a number to dial. It gives you a
- BUSY signal.
-
- \A\You hangup and call it again.
- \A\You ring telephone service and ask them to check the number.
- \A\You call for the Genie.
-
- \Y\Next time you rang, you actually got through, and heard the modem making a
- funny noise, which stopped after a while.
- \N\Telephone Service checked the number for you and said, "Yes, well there's
- nothing wrong with the number." The operator who was in a real nasty mood
- decided she can't have annoying calls from the likes of you, and made sure
- to disconnect your phone line.
- \N\The Genie appeared in a puff of smoke, and said "Even I, the Genie of the
- Lamp cannot render a BBS available. You have proven yourself unworthy of the
- modem." The Genie then took the modem back, as well as your computer. (He
- wanted to call a few BBSs himself).
-
- \Q\You see from the modem a 'CONNECT 2400' message. All you get from the
- screen is a heap of garbled text - weird looking characters.
-
- \A\You realise the speed of the terminal is set to 1200, and so hangup and
- call back again at 2400.
- \A\You realise the speed of the terminal is set to 1200, and so change the
- baud rate on the terminal to 2400.
- \A\You think there is something wrong with the BBS, and so hangup and call
- another.
- \A\You call for the Genie.
- \A\You press on and madly press the 'return' key about 50 times.
-
- \N\This was exactly the way a normal BBS user would work. However, it was NOT
- a Nerdy thing to do. Sorry.
- \N\Yes, well, that would be a logical solution to the problem, wouldn't it?
- Your aim, however, is to be a NERD!!!
- \Y\You dropped carrier on the BBS, and never call it again. The next number
- you ring only has 1200 baud, so you connect okay.
- \N\The Genie appeared and loudly screamed "What the **** do you think you're
- doing? I can't keep coming back and helping you all the time. Get lost!" And
- he turned you into a salamander. As a salamander, you found it very
- difficult to type without pressing more than 1 key at a time with your fins.
- \N\The BBS crashed because of your mad keypressing. Unfortunately the sysop
- was in, saw what you had done, and traced your call (he worked for the phone
- company and so had connections). With the same connections, he managed to
- get your phone cut off.
-
- \Q\You connect to 'Jim's Mega-Mighty Remote BBS' (at 1200 Baud). The BBS
- asks you whether or not you are a new user.
-
- \A\You say 'No' and try to login.
- \A\You say 'Yes' and see what happens.
- \A\You have no idea what 'New User' means, and so just hangup.
-
- \N\The BBS then asked you for your user number and password. It disconnected
- you after you tried to enter a password 4 times, but got it wrong.
- \N\Well that would be a logical thing to do, wouldn't it? Sorry!
- \Y\Yes, you are becoming a true BBS Nerd. The only solution to a question
- you don't understand is to ignore it.
-
- \Q\You find another number, this time it's (011-61-49-683100)
-
- \A\You give it a ring, even though having to dial 13 digits sounds a bit like
- a long distance number.
- \A\You decide any number that long mustn't be worth calling, and so discard it.
- \A\You decide to wait until the early hours of the morning when calls are a bit
- cheaper.
- \A\You find you can't fit that number in your dialling directory, and so go on
- to try to find more numbers.
-
- \Y\You connected with the Inquestor BBS in NSW, Australia. The world's best
- BBS. Finally you realised you were starting to get somewhere.
- \N\You missed a golden opportunity to call the world's best BBS, and live the
- rest of your life sadly inadequately.
- \N\We had thought you'd have been geting the idea of it now. BBS Nerds don't
- pay phone bills! What were you worried about? You missed a golden opportunity
- to call the world's best BBS, and live the rest of your life sadly
- inadequately.
- \N\You missed a golden opportunity to call the world's best BBS, and live the
- rest of your life sadly inadequately.
-
- \Q\After the CONNECT 1200 message, the BBS says "Press Any Key To Continue".
-
- \A\You press a key on the keyboard.
- \A\You press the return key a dozen or so times.
- \A\You go make coffee while the BBS decides to do something.
-
- \N\Was that really a nerdy thing to do?
- \Y\Because the BBS had a 4,096 character buffer, all your return presses
- were interpreted as commands. Congratulations, this was a very nerdy act.
- You missed getting the ANSI graphics, but finally got to the stage where you
- were asked to enter your name.
- \N\While you were out making coffee, the BBS idle timer disconnected you.
-
- \Q\The BBS asks you for your name or user number.
-
- \A\You type in your real name.
- \A\You type in someone else's name.
- \A\You type in 'Sadam Hussein'.
- \A\You enter a user number of '1'.
-
- \N\Honestly, that was a disgrace to a BBS nerd. Fancy telling ANYONE your
- real name, least of all a computer.
- \Y\Of course. You filled out the rest of the introductory questionaire in
- a similar way.
- \N\The Sysop had this name stored in his 'not allowed' file and so you were
- promptly disconnected.
- \N\When the BBS asked you for the password, all you could do was guess three
- times. Unfortunately, the sysop didn't really have his password set to
- anything really obvious like 'Fred' or 'Password'.
-
- \Q\When you hit the main menu what do you do?
-
- \A\Fill in the user questionaire on the Questionaires Door by Mark D Turner,
- so the sysop has some relevant details on you that may help him to assist
- you in your use of the system.
- \A\Have a browse through the message areas trying to discover what the guys
- on this BBS are usually on about.
- \A\Go and take a look at the file areas to see if your computer is well
- supported or not.
- \A\Have a look at all the online games.
- \A\Read the text "New Users Please Read This" on the textfiles menu.
-
- \N\What are you trying to do to your Nerdy reputation? This act was a useful
- and sensible one. You were a disgrace to nerds around the world.
- \N\This seemed to be a good idea, but is in no way anything remotely resembling
- what a BBS nerd would have done.
- \N\This was starting to become nerdy, but a BBS nerd doesn't know how to unarc
- files, so it didn't serve much purpose at all.
- \Y\Of course. I know of no other way in which a BBS user can be so nerdy as to
- try to play online games and not succeed.
- \N\What are you trying to do to your Nerdy reputation? This act was a useful
- and sensible one. You were a disgrace to nerds around the world.
-
- \Q\When you get to the Doors Menu you have access to about 6 games. Which one
- do you play first?
-
- \A\The Multi Adventures Door because it sounds weird.
- \A\The Stats Door to find out the 'big' users of this BBS.
- \A\The Outer Limits Demo to have a look at how well other players are going.
-
- \W\Of course. It was such a nerdy thing to start off a cyclical system like this.
- You are now playing this door, and you've actually gotten here!! This is such
- a paradox that you do, in fact, WIN THE GAME!!!
- \N\I didn't think that the useful information inside this sort of a door was
- going to be of much interest to a BBS Nerd. Sorry!
- \N\This door was too good for you. You couldn't practice nerdiness in this
- door because it was too complicated for you.
-
- \END\
-