CIX conferencing system is bought out – again CIX, probably the oldest surviving online service in the UK, has a new owner, ICUK, which hopes to grow the system and attract new users. CIX - or the Compulink Information Exchange - started off in the pre-web days of the mid-1980s as a shareware distribution house's Fidonet bulletin board service, but the online community …
In the days of dial-up, I was a "CiXen" as t was styled, relying on an offline reader (on my Amiga) to track the discussions.
unfortunately I let my email inbox build up to such a level I couldn't login. And then I moved to PCs and a yahoo online account and finally shut down my cix account.
It was a different way of doing things then, "kids today" etc.
I was using an Atari ST - with a 9600 modem (now I am on a 6-core AMD 3gig machine on a 50Meg service!).
After many years it was getting just too much spam in my email so I ended up going to Gmail.
I wonder if my account still works?
ttfn
How old was PH when I was CIXing I wonder? hmm around 4 years old - deity! I feel old :-(
I'd kept my old account. I gave up CIX reluctantly when we had a financial crisis and each household member had to make personal cuts. I had hoped that the OU cosy system would be a substitute, but while it was free it was like being alone in a multi-story car park, instead of pushing shoulder-tight through an oriental souk.
I wonder If I could persuade the last 4 posters to nntp:uk.rec.sheds to move onto cix?
... I wish Leslie all the luck with this, CIX had a problem in that the bigger it grew, the more unwieldy it became to use. Membership peaked at 15,000 or so, which isn't a lot by most standards, although they were *paying* customers which is worth noting.
I think the reason that people think of it in the past is that for many of us it is in the past.
(Icon in remembrance of the "sexuality" conference)
Probably my fist computer-based contact with the outside world, back in the day when computers themselves were a novelty to me. Whilst at that time I had no choice but to use a character-based dumb terminal login, quite a few continued to do so even after PCs were put on our desks and Ameol became available. My employers never objected to the modem phone bill, as it was my prime source of technical help: a fantastic resource to one new to Unix and computers. I even recruited my successor through CIX!
I left CIX when I left the UK. Somehow, controversy over London's bus lanes and cyclists looses its appeal when one is 5,000 miles away, and the newly retired have to look to saving money. I still have Ameol, and its data from that time, archived on my hard disk. Wizards (.co.uk), another CIX community vendor, still host my domain and email.
CIX ran into problems when the succession of big-company buyouts began. None of them had a clue about the CIX community. That it has survived is a wonder, that the current buy-out is by a company headed by a long standing member is very good news indeed. I wish them all the best.
cix:cats, anyone? Only yesterday, I was remembering Valerie (of Harrow) and her family of a dozen or so. News of her death reached me back in those days soon after I had left CIX.
CIX is in the past for me --- but I'm happy to know that it still has a present, and, hopefuly, a healthy furure
The NNTP protocol, and therefore Usenet, pre-dates CIX by a couple of years, but the concept is similar, and as you say, CIX has no spam. It also has a much more sophisticated threading system, and a history of subsets of the users meeting face to face regularly, leading to a much more civil environment. Flame wars still happen, of course, but at least they're threaded properly.
GJC
... for me, the golden days of cix were in the mid 90's.
A great mix of people too; at a time when "on-line" was wholly equated with "geeks", I met authors, techies, business people.... a genuinely diverse and interesting community.
And it's not just the like of Demon who started out with an idea and a discussion. As Mr Campbell of this parish may testify, at one time it seemed like all the active and emergent ISPs had a presence there.
Might have to go back and see what's changed... or just to look to see what's still in the archive!
Ah, yes, there was a time when CIX was the place all the top techies from the UK ISPs went after work, to rant drunkenly about the money men, the sales teams, and the customers, whilst maintaining our best professional poker faces in our own official support conferences.
Damn, I miss those days :-)
You still out Cardiff way (and apologies if I've mis-remembered that, it was a while back)? We still have a big sort-of-but-not-quite CIX pissup at my place in August, if you're free?
GJC
Being on Cix for 20 years, the last few have felt rather sad as people left, died or just faded out. It's been an enormously useful and enjoyable meeting place on the whole, and now the place feels like it's party time.
Lots of old faces returning, and new blood starting to appear. ICUK have some very interesting plans and a fine reputation, and I for one am vastly relieved and quite excited by the prospects.
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