In 1980, MicroNET service changed its name to the CompuServe Information Service.
There were two reasons for the change. First, CompuServe discovered that the name MicroNet was being used by a modem company and thus there might be confusion in the market place. Second, and more significantly, while the original MicroNET service provided raw access to the CompuServe mainframes, it became obvious that users wanted better, more friendly navigation to the myriad products MicroNet was beginning to offer. Hence, the name CompuServe Information Service (CIS) was born to convey a service that was more user-friendly. Some also referred to CIS as the "Consumer Information Service."
In the beginning, the CompuServe Information Service was a small business unit of the larger, corporate, CompuServe, Inc. So, in essence, CIS became known as the consumer division and the name CompuServe still referred to the corporate commercial time-sharing service.
In 1980, CompuServe was also acquired by H&R Block. A good history of CompuServe can be found at Wikipedia. But what the history doesn't tell, is why HR Block or why be acquired at all.
As a small company in the telecommunications space, CompuServe lived in near-daily fear of the AT&T monopoly. AT&T, and most foreign telephone companies, considered the online industry to be part of the services the telephone company should not only provide but control. This was in the era before telecommunications deregulation and, outside of the US, most telephone companies were owned, or at least controlled, by their respective governments.
In the 1970's and early 1980s, the concept accessing information online was called "teletext" if one-way information access or "videotex" if two-way interactive. Most phone companies worldwide were promoting "telephone terminals" - in essence, video-telephones, as the next-generation telephone. Understandably, they saw CompuServe as an intruder on their turf. In fact, CompuServe was refused entry as an exhibitor to the 1979 Videotext trade show. Just as the large mainframe computer manufacturers looked down on those upstart PC-makers, the telephone companies looked down upon that upstart online service company, CompuServe.
In the US, if you wanted to build your own computer network, as CompuServe had done, you had no choice, but to lease telephone lines from AT&T. Once in 1978, CompuServe discovered that its computer network was abruptly "turned off" because an AT&T employee did not process CompuServe's monthly payment correctly. Corporate CompuServe, at the time, had significant commercial, government, and insurance business in Washington, DC and found its network "off the air" based on this perceived late payment. From that point on CompuServe executives were paranoid that they would always be beholden to AT&T unless they found a large strategic partner. But why H&R Block?
Friday, April 4, 2008
Wednesday, March 19, 2008
MicroNET – 1979
MicroNET – the first online PC service
By Bill Louden (c) 2008
By early 1979, CompuServe had come to COTUG and requested that we beta test a potential personal computing service - essentially raw access to their mainframes at night - called MicroNET. We had access to many of the DEC-10's features, storage, and better processing power, but of most significance we had started using two programs: One was a store-and-forward messaging system, called Infoplex, which allowed us to share text message files with one another even if we were not online at the same time. The other was a modified version of a program that allowed a user to send a live one-line text message to the CompuServe system operator. Our version, modified by Russ Ranshaw of CompuServe, allowed us to send one-line live messages to each other if we saw one another online. We called it the SEND program.
By June 1979, I was running my sixth Radio Shack store. I had gained a reputation as a troubleshooter fixing problem stores. This store was the Columbus warehouse store, which became one of Tandy’s first computer stores, as well as Tandy’s first Telephone store, fighting AT&T’s monopoly on selling phones. It was a TOP 40 store in the country.
However, as store troubleshooter I was soon transferred to Cleveland to turnaround a troubled Mall store. Cutoff from my user group and friends through that summer and fall, I began using CompuServe’s Infoplex program and our modified “SEND” program with great frequency trying to keep in touch with my friends back in Columbus.
I began to see the potential magic of being “on-line” and connected with them. In July of 1979, CompuServe officially launched its first online service called MicroNET. The target market was the emerging computer enthusiast. MicroNET was raw access to the CompuServe DEC SYSTEM-10 and SYSTEM 20 mainframes but, even so, it quickly found a customer base willing to tolerate 110 baud dial-up access (300 baud then was a premium). In September 1979, I called Jeff Wilkins, CEO of CompuServe, and began discussions of a consumer vision of MicroNET - well beyond the hacker community, which was its current niche. Shortly thereafter, I left Tandy and joined CompuServe, returning to Columbus to begin working on the next generation "MicroNET." It was Jeff’s initial vision that made the concept of a consumer online service a reality, along with seventeen of us who were 'disciples.
The Original Start-Up Team
Our first order of business was to establish a user number and password sequence for our future users. The DEC-10s at the time used a “PROJECT,PROGRAMMER” number sequence to identify workspaces, but they were limited to 1,000 programmer numbers per project. DEC considered one thousand programmers/users assigned to one project at the time as unreachable, hence its limit. We intended MicroNET to be a national service so we had to account for different cities, mainly for the purpose of identifying what time zone they were in to adjust pricing, etc.
From what CompuServe learned from our user group "hacking into their systems" the year before, we used a DEC project category "70000" that provided limited access and highly controlled security as our "consumer" domain. We knew that we would likely have more than 1,000 users (or we would all be out of jobs rather quickly). We developed a system based on the location of cities where CompuServe had dial-up access.
The first city was Columbus, Ohio, which received the designation 70010; Cleveland was assigned 70020; Chicago 70240; etc. Dave Morr of Bell Labs was given the first consumer ID number: 70010,101. I had the second: 70010,102. It would be my ID for the next 10 years – until CompuServe finally switched to an alphanumeric email system.
By Bill Louden (c) 2008
By early 1979, CompuServe had come to COTUG and requested that we beta test a potential personal computing service - essentially raw access to their mainframes at night - called MicroNET. We had access to many of the DEC-10's features, storage, and better processing power, but of most significance we had started using two programs: One was a store-and-forward messaging system, called Infoplex, which allowed us to share text message files with one another even if we were not online at the same time. The other was a modified version of a program that allowed a user to send a live one-line text message to the CompuServe system operator. Our version, modified by Russ Ranshaw of CompuServe, allowed us to send one-line live messages to each other if we saw one another online. We called it the SEND program.
By June 1979, I was running my sixth Radio Shack store. I had gained a reputation as a troubleshooter fixing problem stores. This store was the Columbus warehouse store, which became one of Tandy’s first computer stores, as well as Tandy’s first Telephone store, fighting AT&T’s monopoly on selling phones. It was a TOP 40 store in the country.
However, as store troubleshooter I was soon transferred to Cleveland to turnaround a troubled Mall store. Cutoff from my user group and friends through that summer and fall, I began using CompuServe’s Infoplex program and our modified “SEND” program with great frequency trying to keep in touch with my friends back in Columbus.
I began to see the potential magic of being “on-line” and connected with them. In July of 1979, CompuServe officially launched its first online service called MicroNET. The target market was the emerging computer enthusiast. MicroNET was raw access to the CompuServe DEC SYSTEM-10 and SYSTEM 20 mainframes but, even so, it quickly found a customer base willing to tolerate 110 baud dial-up access (300 baud then was a premium). In September 1979, I called Jeff Wilkins, CEO of CompuServe, and began discussions of a consumer vision of MicroNET - well beyond the hacker community, which was its current niche. Shortly thereafter, I left Tandy and joined CompuServe, returning to Columbus to begin working on the next generation "MicroNET." It was Jeff’s initial vision that made the concept of a consumer online service a reality, along with seventeen of us who were 'disciples.
The Original Start-Up Team
- Jeff Wilkins, CEO
- Sandy Trevor, CTO
- George Minot, SVP, Corporate Relations (George was our champion for the AT&T breakup - CompuServe's biggest fear at the time)
- John Meier, Vice President, Marketing,VP/GM MicroNET
- Al Keener, Director, Marketing
- Rich Baker, Press Relations
- Mike Ward, “The Rainmaker,” Business Development
- Bill Louden, “The Wizard of Games,” Director, Retail Distribution & Director, Product Marketing for Computing, Community, Games, Email, Communications, Shopping, Software Exchange, and PC terminal software product lines.
- Randy Vaughn, “Mr. BusPro,” Product Marketing Manager for Business, Professional Services, Finance, & Travel products
- Frank Scudder, “The Silver Fox,” OEM Distribution Manager
- Jeff Williams, Database Administrator
- Russ Ranshaw, “The Wizard of 10”, DEC-10 System Analyst (key architect of CIS)
- Larry Sturtz, Personal computing engineer, VIDTEX software products
- Peter Winer, Software Engineer
- Bill DuVall, Network Engineer
- Dan Piskur, “Hey, where’s your badge?,” Network Security & Facilities
- Lynne Gard, “aka Aunt Nettie” of our weekly online Q&A column, Customer Service Manager
- HK Gard, Jr.“Nerves of Steel,” “Hey, what do you expect for $5 an hour?,” Customer Service Manager
Our first order of business was to establish a user number and password sequence for our future users. The DEC-10s at the time used a “PROJECT,PROGRAMMER” number sequence to identify workspaces, but they were limited to 1,000 programmer numbers per project. DEC considered one thousand programmers/users assigned to one project at the time as unreachable, hence its limit. We intended MicroNET to be a national service so we had to account for different cities, mainly for the purpose of identifying what time zone they were in to adjust pricing, etc.
From what CompuServe learned from our user group "hacking into their systems" the year before, we used a DEC project category "70000" that provided limited access and highly controlled security as our "consumer" domain. We knew that we would likely have more than 1,000 users (or we would all be out of jobs rather quickly). We developed a system based on the location of cities where CompuServe had dial-up access.
The first city was Columbus, Ohio, which received the designation 70010; Cleveland was assigned 70020; Chicago 70240; etc. Dave Morr of Bell Labs was given the first consumer ID number: 70010,101. I had the second: 70010,102. It would be my ID for the next 10 years – until CompuServe finally switched to an alphanumeric email system.
Online: The Wonder Years: 1977 - 1979
The Wonder Years: 1977-1979
By Bill Louden (c) 2008
After over a decade into the Age of the Internet, it's hard for many to imagine online before the web. And having spent more than a few years online - some might say even from before the dawn of this new age - I thought I would start my first "blog" with recollections and commentary of those early years.
From a TRS-80 User Group
In 1977, Tandy Corporation introduced the TRS-80 personal computer. Three thousand were initially produced for Radio Shack; but with then 3,500 stores, no store was allowed a "demo" unit; they were to be sold by catalog only.
I have been selling retail consumer electronics for nearly five years by then, and as a Radio Shack store manager, I thought I could sell these pre-fab "computers," as well. I had previously experimented with some of the DIY computers at the time, building an IMSAI computer as a hobby one might build a short-wave raido.
But the TRS-80 was different; it was already assembled and 'ready-to-go.' At the time, Apple had recently announced a pre-assumbled personal computer and Heathkit had a computer in kit form. So, I personally bought a TRS-80 at $599 to put on display. My wife, Sher, and I had some serious discussions at what I was squandering our money on -- and I was not even going to bring it HOME!
My TRS-80 arrived in a week; it was a TRS-80 Model 1 with 4K of memory, a cassette tape recorder as its storage device, and a black and white monitor. My unit was serial number #10. I put it on display in my store and began learning BASIC.
I became the de facto"expert" in Ohio and the Midwest almost overnight simply by the fact that I had the only unit on display in the Midwest. I sold nearly two hundred units by the beginning of 1978, mostly to Bell Labs engineers in Columbus, Ohio, and one to an engineer at a then small company called CompuServe, and one to a lawyer from Chicago who flew in just to see it.
By March 1978, Tandy knew it had a hit new product and announced some additional add-ons: a 16K memory plug-in and a 110/300-baud modem. In June of 1978, I formed COTUG, the Central Ohio TRS-80 Users Group. It was mainly a vehicle to help sell more computers as well as learn from my customers at Bell Labs what it all meant.
I called it selling by "regurgitation." When a Bell Labs engineer would exclaim that the TRS-80 had a clock frequency of 900 nanoseconds, I would tell that to my next customer and how good that was. Eventually I learned what those technical terms actually meant and later built my second computer - an Altair - as a hobbyist myself. By mid-1978, I became proficient on the computer and had written a few programs, including a golf country club member’s tracking program, and a Ride-Share Zip-Code Matching program used by the City of Columbus during the 1978 bus strike.
The COTUG membership grew to over 500 by the end of 1978. We held monthly meetings at my home, where 50 to 80 of these ultimate computer "geeks" would show off their latest programs or "home brew" add-ons. One Bell Labs engineer brought in a large two by 3-foot plywood board filled with diodes. The first TRS-80 could only display capital letters, so he build his own lowercase generator - a sort of hand-built ROM (read-only memory) device. Another brought in a TRS-80 that was modified to display eight colors -- some three years before Tandy actually produced its first "Color Computer."
In the interim, I had built my Altair and had acquired my first "professional" computer, an old DEC PDP-8 that a Bell Labs engineer was discarding. The PDP-8 had to be booted manually by entering in the "bootstrap" codes one sequential step at a time. Its output was a Paper Tape reader: no video.
By the Fall 1978, most members of the COTUG user group had modems and we had built some early programs that could transfer files from one TRS-80 to another; including one program that could even remotely control another TRS-80. At the time, one of my customer's - CompuServe engineer Russ Ranshaw -- came to me and suggested that COTUG use our modems to share files on their DEC System 10 mainframes in the evening to test out an idea he had to let PC users tap into mainframes at night.
We eagerly accepted the opportunity to connect, and what we found was a hacker's dream. Most of CompuServe’s programs were written either in Fortran-10 or a language called 'XBA' for extended basic. It was very similar to the TRS-80's BASIC. I remember how amused and excited we were to find that many of CompuServe's programs were on-line in their source code form. Dave Morr of Bell Labs built a screen-capture program that allowed us to capture any text that would come across our screens. We used his program to "download" many programs from the CompuServe mainframes by simply "LISTing" them while online.
Programs like Startrek.xba, Empire.F4, spacewar.xba, Adventure550.F4 and many others were "downloaded" in text form and we converted many of them run on the TRS-80. In essence, we helped CompuServe refine their security levels as we "broke their system" many times. We gave away these converted programs via BBSs and via a pc-pc (now called peer-to-peer) file sharing systems.
CompuServe – Early Beginnings
CompuServe was founded in 1969 as a computer time-sharing service, by Harry Gard, Sr. and Jeff Wilkins. Note that in 1969 the government project APRAnet began. Arpanet is widely credited as the beginning of online, yet it was not until 1983 that the first .COM domains were allowed. In my opinion, it is arguable which came first in 1969: CompuServe or Arpanet.
In the early- to mid-1970s, CompuServe began to concentrate in several vertical time-sharing markets. One such market was the Insurance industry, where CompuServe developed an extensive database of product goods detailing manufacturer retail prices, replacement cost calculations and other data used by insurance companies.
An outgrowth of this database came from a company known as Comp-U-Card, which offered a membership-based consumer shopping service, called Comp-U-Store in the 1970s. Initially, it was used internally by Comp-U-Store telephone personnel. However, by 1981, CompuServe developed this database into the first on-line shopping product. Columbus, Ohio-based CompuServe was an early networking technology pioneer drove the initial emergence of the online services industry.
By Bill Louden (c) 2008
After over a decade into the Age of the Internet, it's hard for many to imagine online before the web. And having spent more than a few years online - some might say even from before the dawn of this new age - I thought I would start my first "blog" with recollections and commentary of those early years.
From a TRS-80 User Group
In 1977, Tandy Corporation introduced the TRS-80 personal computer. Three thousand were initially produced for Radio Shack; but with then 3,500 stores, no store was allowed a "demo" unit; they were to be sold by catalog only.
I have been selling retail consumer electronics for nearly five years by then, and as a Radio Shack store manager, I thought I could sell these pre-fab "computers," as well. I had previously experimented with some of the DIY computers at the time, building an IMSAI computer as a hobby one might build a short-wave raido.
But the TRS-80 was different; it was already assembled and 'ready-to-go.' At the time, Apple had recently announced a pre-assumbled personal computer and Heathkit had a computer in kit form. So, I personally bought a TRS-80 at $599 to put on display. My wife, Sher, and I had some serious discussions at what I was squandering our money on -- and I was not even going to bring it HOME!
My TRS-80 arrived in a week; it was a TRS-80 Model 1 with 4K of memory, a cassette tape recorder as its storage device, and a black and white monitor. My unit was serial number #10. I put it on display in my store and began learning BASIC.
I became the de facto"expert" in Ohio and the Midwest almost overnight simply by the fact that I had the only unit on display in the Midwest. I sold nearly two hundred units by the beginning of 1978, mostly to Bell Labs engineers in Columbus, Ohio, and one to an engineer at a then small company called CompuServe, and one to a lawyer from Chicago who flew in just to see it.
By March 1978, Tandy knew it had a hit new product and announced some additional add-ons: a 16K memory plug-in and a 110/300-baud modem. In June of 1978, I formed COTUG, the Central Ohio TRS-80 Users Group. It was mainly a vehicle to help sell more computers as well as learn from my customers at Bell Labs what it all meant.
I called it selling by "regurgitation." When a Bell Labs engineer would exclaim that the TRS-80 had a clock frequency of 900 nanoseconds, I would tell that to my next customer and how good that was. Eventually I learned what those technical terms actually meant and later built my second computer - an Altair - as a hobbyist myself. By mid-1978, I became proficient on the computer and had written a few programs, including a golf country club member’s tracking program, and a Ride-Share Zip-Code Matching program used by the City of Columbus during the 1978 bus strike.
The COTUG membership grew to over 500 by the end of 1978. We held monthly meetings at my home, where 50 to 80 of these ultimate computer "geeks" would show off their latest programs or "home brew" add-ons. One Bell Labs engineer brought in a large two by 3-foot plywood board filled with diodes. The first TRS-80 could only display capital letters, so he build his own lowercase generator - a sort of hand-built ROM (read-only memory) device. Another brought in a TRS-80 that was modified to display eight colors -- some three years before Tandy actually produced its first "Color Computer."
In the interim, I had built my Altair and had acquired my first "professional" computer, an old DEC PDP-8 that a Bell Labs engineer was discarding. The PDP-8 had to be booted manually by entering in the "bootstrap" codes one sequential step at a time. Its output was a Paper Tape reader: no video.
By the Fall 1978, most members of the COTUG user group had modems and we had built some early programs that could transfer files from one TRS-80 to another; including one program that could even remotely control another TRS-80. At the time, one of my customer's - CompuServe engineer Russ Ranshaw -- came to me and suggested that COTUG use our modems to share files on their DEC System 10 mainframes in the evening to test out an idea he had to let PC users tap into mainframes at night.
We eagerly accepted the opportunity to connect, and what we found was a hacker's dream. Most of CompuServe’s programs were written either in Fortran-10 or a language called 'XBA' for extended basic. It was very similar to the TRS-80's BASIC. I remember how amused and excited we were to find that many of CompuServe's programs were on-line in their source code form. Dave Morr of Bell Labs built a screen-capture program that allowed us to capture any text that would come across our screens. We used his program to "download" many programs from the CompuServe mainframes by simply "LISTing" them while online.
Programs like Startrek.xba, Empire.F4, spacewar.xba, Adventure550.F4 and many others were "downloaded" in text form and we converted many of them run on the TRS-80. In essence, we helped CompuServe refine their security levels as we "broke their system" many times. We gave away these converted programs via BBSs and via a pc-pc (now called peer-to-peer) file sharing systems.
CompuServe – Early Beginnings
CompuServe was founded in 1969 as a computer time-sharing service, by Harry Gard, Sr. and Jeff Wilkins. Note that in 1969 the government project APRAnet began. Arpanet is widely credited as the beginning of online, yet it was not until 1983 that the first .COM domains were allowed. In my opinion, it is arguable which came first in 1969: CompuServe or Arpanet.
In the early- to mid-1970s, CompuServe began to concentrate in several vertical time-sharing markets. One such market was the Insurance industry, where CompuServe developed an extensive database of product goods detailing manufacturer retail prices, replacement cost calculations and other data used by insurance companies.
An outgrowth of this database came from a company known as Comp-U-Card, which offered a membership-based consumer shopping service, called Comp-U-Store in the 1970s. Initially, it was used internally by Comp-U-Store telephone personnel. However, by 1981, CompuServe developed this database into the first on-line shopping product. Columbus, Ohio-based CompuServe was an early networking technology pioneer drove the initial emergence of the online services industry.
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