Re: oldtimers (was: Re: Dungeons & Magtapes)

[George Robbins <grr@shandakor.tharsis.com>]

> Date: Wed, 27 May 1998 13:21:49 -0400 (EDT)
> From: "Ron G. Minnich" <rminnich@Sarnoff.COM>
> X-Sender: rminnich@terra
> To: deltoids@mcws.net
> Subject: Re: oldtimers (was: Re: Dungeons & Magtapes)
> 
> On Wed, 27 May 1998, Clark Baker wrote:
> 
> > One thing I am struck by is how different the "after Teresa" crew
> > seems to be.  Without going back through the archives, some things
> > which stick in my mind from the later group are spiders and flys,
> > elevator hacking, lots of drinking, and lots of controling who can
> > have access to the computer, who gets a privileged account, and being
> > assigned work to do and not doing it because you weren't paid.
> 
> ditto. Once delta physically moved to education there was a definite
> change in attitude. The (ed. faculty) folks running it at that point
> struck me as wanting to show they could run a data center, which I thought
> missed the point of DELTA. I peeled off at that point anyway and stuck
> with EE ... 

Well, I wouldn't say that the "old crew" were without fault.  I think
it was a combination of things.  Some of the hi-jinks were a little
worn off because we'd already had some UofD time with Dave Robinson's
group and also because the first Delta days *were* in a non-student
data center - I got yelled at for walking around barefoot one day.
I'd guess Teresa was little bit forbidding too, you didn't really want
to have to explain things to her...

It's my after the fact recollection that we were quite exclusivist -
not out of malice, but more ego-centrism..  I don't think there were
too many helping hands out for new people and contact students, let
alone users, were well beneath the pale.  I know I was pretty horrible
about being "the one with the car".  We weren't handing out priveliged
accounts...

As far as drinking and that sort of thing, well maybe things were so
well codifed back then, but I think some of us were well of the end of
the geek scale and didn't have much of a clue as to how to be seriously
bad.  Going over to McDonalds for burgers & shakes was pretty innocent,
it required moving to Newark for more options to open up.  I remember
being kind of shocked by Ed Baker actually chasing girls aroud and
Linda Ruff actually entering the Stone Balloon (twas 18-yo drinking
age back then).

Also, there wasn't wage slavery back then - Teresa managed to get some
of us part time work with DICE (doing report cards) and I think there
was some money for working for Delta over the Summer, but it wasn't in
exchange for doing projects.  Clark may have started the trend in a
way by doing the port of Dartmouth's Impress system, and showing that
(some) students could actually do real programming projects...

						George
						George