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- hobby. While modern BBSes often have hundreds or even
- thousands of files available for download, on-line games,
- international message `echos' and more, the original ideas
- behind BBSing have never changed.
-
- As BBSes first started to pop up in the early 80's,
- they seldom offered little more than "message" bases.
- People could chat with one another, carrying on conversations
- that often last weeks or months. BBSes were places where
- computer users from all over could meet and talk about both
- computer and non-computer related topics. Since then, they
- have evolved to also allow these people to play games
- together, share public-domain and shareware files, and much
- much more. There are now some boards appearing that are
- trying to make money by offering large collections of files.
- However, BBSing still remains largely a hobbyist's venture.
- Even those few boards that do charge a membership seldom make
- any profit.
-
-