A recent mention of Kevin Mitnick not being allowed back onto the Well started one of those memory avalanches...
OK, it wasn't as much an avalanche as a few memory stones loosing themselves and dropping into my head.
The Well was how I was indoctrinated into the internet. I think it was in 1987 or '88. I remember connecting with my Mac II. That's right kids, 20 years of wondering if I really wanted to write that for an international audience. (I started bashing my head against BBSes 25 years ago, and got on my first computer about 36 years ago (I remember being FASCINATED by ASCII art printouts and wasting a whole lot of paper on Mom's typwriter trying to copy them.) ) I was off the Well and "in the wild" by Mitnick's intrusion.
The other memory stone was dropped by a name mentioned in an associated story. I'm keeping it vague here because I'm kind of ashamed of my reaction to his name after all this time. I met him when I was an early teen, and he was already a succesful adult. He found out I was an Apple user and mocked me. it shamed me and pissed me off and I still think of hime as "That Asshole..." Come to think of it, he taught me a lasting lesson. I came away thinking how immature he seemed and from then on I've had no patience for computer "holy wars". Not that I don't take sides sometimes, but I know that my opinion is really only just that. I guess I should thank him after all...
