• The History of HobbyNet

    From Mike Dippel@3:712/1321.5 to ALL on Mon Sep 25 09:01:38 2023
    Back in the late 80's, I had a subscription to Prodigy. When it expired, I did some
    research and purchased the DOS version of Mustang's BBS software and ran 4 phone
    lines into my house.

    My wife loved to write in Prodigy's Cross-Stitch echo, so I decided to make my own
    Prodigy and devote it to hobbies.

    I lived in Broward county and found various other dialup systems that were willing to
    carry my feeds. The feed went as far as south Dade county and as far north as Palm
    Beach county.

    I even included a conference area devoted to Business Advertisers because I found that
    I could charge them to advertise, knowing that their ad would touch 3 nearby counties.
    I also found that I could charge my dial up users and give the paid ones a card that
    would give them a discount at any of the paid advertisers that I had on my system. I
    called it the HobbyNet Discount Card.

    Back then, BBS users expected everything to be free, and it was. But the paid members
    got the discount bonus feature with my business advertisers.

    That's my trip down memory lane. I'm sure everyone has a great story that you could
    share.

    If you are interested in carrying this 40 year old feed, go to: https://hobbynet.hobbyline.com
    for more information. The is a signup form link there.

    Mike Dippel

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    * Origin: The Hobby Line! Internet hobbylinebbs.com (3:712/1321.5)