This past weekend, I attended the wedding of two former classmates. The bride chose not to shy from the fact that her groom shares the moniker of Nintendo's famous plumber, carving these wedding cake figurines for the reception. She further exemplified her geekiness by setting their retrospective slideshow to the music from "The Inner Light". And now, all the good ones are taken…
Sadly, at this same wedding, I was seated next to a woman who had nothing but contempt for gamerkind. When a friend mentioned the lines of people who had waited for the PlayStation 3, she angrily demanded why these people couldn't just wait until the PS3 was more available. When I described the Wii as an alternative and how much more energetic an experience it was, she asked, her voice dripping with disgust: "Why not just play real sports?"
I'm so glad there are people out there who don't let a lack of understanding stop them from demeaning people who passionately pursue and derive joy from life's pleasures. However has she made it this far in life without encountering people who are - gasp! - different from her? How sad to be so angry all the time…
I was much more heartened when I stopped by a local salon (not a saloon, unfortunately) to visit a relative. This conversation also touched upon people waiting in line for the PS3. A little old lady overheard us and chimed in, "Those people are sick and depraved," referring to gamers who sell such wares on eBay. Before I could either defend or condemn capitalism, she continued: "Besides, they should be getting a Wii. It's a much more fun system." Whoa! Will you be my grandma??
Conversely, when I spotted a friend in his forties using some sort of cell phone-PDA, my query of whether it had Tetris was met with, "What's that?" I guess I've been immersed in this culture I call "America" for so long that my small mind is boggled by the existence of people - adults! - who've successfully cloistered themselves from such popular elements as even who Luke Skywalker's father is…
Tomorrow marks the closing of Syndicomm Online.
Syndicomm Online opened in December 2000 as a refuge for Apple II users fleeing Delphi, another online service that, after welcoming refugees from GEnie (then Genie), decided to drop the text-based access that many vintage computers require. I launched Syndicomm Online's first non-Apple forum - Gamebits - in May 2001. I opened Prolific Quill, a literature and composition forum, in November 2001; took over the Singles forum in January 2002; launched a movie/television/theater forum, Showbits, in September 2003; and helped reorganize the RPG Forum in June 2004. (Ironically enough, it was being single that granted me the time to enjoy all those other pastimes - making me varingly qualified for either all or none of these fora.)
Syndicomm was not my first experience as a sysop: I ran my own BBS from 1993 - 1997, and I was a sysop on CompuServe from 1994 - 2004. But this was my first time as contract holder (CH). And I loved the service, running on software written by Sydicomm proprietor Eric Shepherd and programmer Dave Miller. It was modeled after GEnie, and its bulletin board structure allowed each forum to host 999 general categories with 999 specific topics within each and 999 messages per topic (these may be low estimates). I gleefully, almost obsessive-compulsively exploited its orderly nature for a variety of discussion subjects.
Moreover, I appreciated the opportunity to bring my sysoping experience to the Apple II community. I am not an expert in either the hardware or software of the machine, but I have some felicity both with people and with moderation and maintenance. I used these traits to provide the venues in which this unique neighborhood could discuss something less nerdy than vintage computers - like Star Trek, for example - and get to know one other in these alternative capacities.
The thousands (which may not sound like much in today's age) of messages accumulated on those message boards are a valuable resource; importing them to another system is beyond my ken. Besides, without the Apple II community, there would be little to distinguish such a service from the plethora of other boards out there on the Web. So I will be archiving text captures of those fora and making them available for download; this is all that will come of our time together.
Sayonara, Syndicomm Online. It's been a wonderful six years.
