Modern Vespa

Like Reddit, our moderators also work for free. Unlike Reddit, though, I will take this (and every other) opportunity to point out that our moderators deserve the lion's share of the praise for keeping MV running. Without our moderators, Modern Vespa literally would not exist.

I just pay the bills. Which is the easy part.

Please thank a mod today.

Yes! They're the halon systems of online discourse.

And yet…they toil in anonymity….

The only one I still follow with any regularity is Uk.rec.motorcycles, though that has a Facebook group to go with it for people who have moved on. Uk.media.tv.scifi.startrek was my main home for many years and I'm still in touch with many of the people after more than 20 years.

Don't blame the dogs and cats! Some of them are already living together!

But, yes, single-threading forever! (Want a sub-thread? Start a new thread -- you can even cross-link it so others can find where you split off the discussion!)

It works perfectly fine having multiple threads on a single discussion on Reddit (which is the closest to a successor to newsgroups IMO) but that has a UI designed to show you the full tree. For a more traditional forum like this, with lower posting volumes then single thread with nested quotes works just fine.

No. No it does not. Not even a little bit. Reddit may be vaguely forum-like, but the conversations are NOT linear.

Is anyone doing WT.Social? I've been a member since the early days but have yet to actually participate. Which, I suppose, doesn't actually make me a member if I'm not participating.

As my parents aged my brother set up a Facebook page where only my siblings and select others could join. We are seven so phone or email could be cumbersome. Of course we didn't tell our parents but as problems developed it made communication and consensus easier. They are gone now but we post family news, photos and other tidbits.

As my wife lives far from family, and her dad seemed reticent to have long phone conversations, she thought getting her dad on FB would be a wonderful way to share family photos and the like. As he'd recently lost his second wife, he thought it would be an effective way to meet women...having failed that, he got disgusted and quit.

Jess I agree with everything you have posted . Thank you for the Forum. It has been apart of my life for along time.

nope

nope

in lieu of Facebook, I have a number of Apple Messages groups that I'm a part of that are regularly or semi-regularly used to share news, photos, and so on. Some of these are extended family, some are with former colleagues that I'm close to, some are close friends.

This works for me because almost everyone I know uses an iPhone. There's only one Android user in the whole family, and he also thinks WiFi is killing us, so I can't be bothered.

For people in mixed iPhone & Android environments, WhatsApp is probably preferable to Facebook for this kind of communication. Yes, same parent company, but it's far less intrusive.

I joined FB for the marketplace. I only had 3 family contacts. Then a nephew sent a friend request. I accepted and he's one of those that is addicted to FB and posts large amounts of stupid shit. I can't find my other family's posts and I don't have the heart to block him. I don't visit much anymore.

You don't need to block, just unfollow. The endless stream of junk they post won't show up in your feed but you can look to see what they are posting periodically. And then feel bad because amongst all that junk was an actual important life event.

nope

Meh. It's still just an Android phone. If it's not part of the Apple ecosystem, then it's a nonstarter for me.

Butbutbut…
It's gots lights on the back and a toggle switch that has no purpose! And proudly non waterproof because do you know how much it costs to make a phone waterproof and why on earth would you want to go swimming with a phone anyway?
Isn't that enough to change ecosystems?

Yeah no.

Using Facebook was an easier way instead of the Herculean task of phone calls all over the Country (one brother lives on Long Island, another in Washington State) In May of 2018 Mom fell and broke her hip. Calling the rest of the family took two days.

Used properly FB is a pretty good medium. On another level it stinks. There's a Facebook page now called GY6-Scooters. It's like the old Scootdawg with "I'm smarter than you are" comments all over the place.

I was an early adopter of Twitter so I could follow Dave Hamilton, John F Braun, Jeff Gamet and Bryan Chaffin. I think I still do, but I haven't checked in a long time. As a sidenote, the Atomic Love Bombs rock.

I joined FB for the express purpose of entering a contest in which I could have won dinner with Rik Mayall. RIP, good sir. I didn't win, BTW.

Reddit I've stumbled across a few times, but meh.

I miss USENET. But I miss AOL, too. I know ... I know. But there aren't any internet services anymore that give out free coasters like they did.

It wasn't until I took a cruise on the Information Superhighway with AOL that anyone would give me a credit card. Back then I think they figured that anyone who had a computer was a good enough risk so I was finally let in.

I also remember buying one of those single-issue magazines at Fry's called something like, "The Internet and World Wide Web Explained" because, well, I couldn't exactly go on the internet to figure out how the internet worked if I had no idea how it worked. That was, apparently, a long time ago.

AOL and Usenet never did mix well - today's date is September 10914 1993...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternal_September

nope

There's an eBook out there called "Approaching Zero" by Paul Mungo. It's a history of hacking up to the early '90s, I believe.

Oh, look ... here it is.

Approaching Zero

I sold my Vespa.

Came here to check up on this oasis of sanity just to bask in the nostalgic glow.

I love MV even without my Vespa.

Well, hi David. Welcome back!