''BBS: The Documentary'' (commonly referred to as ''BBS Documentary'') is a 3-disc, 8-episode

documentary A documentary film (often described simply as a documentary) is a nonfiction Film, motion picture intended to "document reality, primarily for instruction, education or maintaining a Recorded history, historical record". The American author and ...

about the

subculture A subculture is a group of people within a culture, cultural society that differentiates itself from the values of the conservative, standard or dominant culture to which it belongs, often maintaining some of its founding principles. Subcultures ...

born from the creation of the

bulletin board system A bulletin board system (BBS), also called a computer bulletin board service (CBBS), is a computer server running list of BBS software, software that allows users to connect to the system using a terminal program. Once logged in, the user perfor ...

(BBS) filmed by computer historian

Jason Scott Jason Scott Sadofsky (born September 13, 1970) is an American archivist, historian of technology, filmmaker, performer, and actor. Scott has been known by the online pseudonyms Sketch, SketchCow, Sketch The Cow, The Slipped Disk, and textfiles. ...

of textfiles.com. Production work began in July 2001, and completed in December 2004. The finished product began shipping in May 2005. Although the documentary was released under the

Creative Commons Creative Commons (CC) is an American non-profit organization and international network devoted to educational access and expanding the range of creative works available for others to build upon legally and to share. The organization has release ...

Attribute-ShareAlike 2.0 License and later under 3.0, meaning that anyone can legally download it for free, the author has made it known that the downloadable version is only a fraction of the available material and recommends that individuals purchase the documentary DVDs.

Episodes

Disc 1: #

Baud In telecommunications and electronics, baud (; symbol: Bd) is a common unit of measurement of symbol rate, which is one of the components that determine the speed of communication over a data channel. It is the unit for symbol rate or modulat ...

: the beginnings of the first BBSes, featuring

Ward Christensen Ward Leon Christensen (October 23, 1945 – October 11, 2024) was an American computer scientist who was the inventor of the XMODEM file transfer protocol and a co-founder of the CBBS bulletin board, the first bulletin board system (BBS) ever br ...

and

Randy Suess Randy John Suess (January 27, 1945 – December 10, 2019) was the co-founder of the CBBS bulletin board, the first bulletin board system (BBS) ever brought online. Suess, along with collaborator Ward Christensen, whom he met when they were both me ...

SysOp A sysop (, an abbreviation of system operator) is an administrator of a multi-user computer system, such as a bulletin board system (BBS) or an online service virtual community.Jansen, E. & James, V. (2002). NetLingo: the Internet dictionary. Ne ...

s and

Users Ancient Egyptian roles * User (ancient Egyptian official), an ancient Egyptian nomarch (governor) of the Eighth Dynasty * Useramen, an ancient Egyptian vizier also called "User" Other uses * User (computing), a person (or software) using an ...

: experiences from those who used and operated BBSes, including B.W. Behling from ''

Ahoy! ''Ahoy!'' was a computer magazine published between January 1984 and January 1989 in the US, covering on all Commodore color computers, primarily Commodore 64 and Amiga. History The first issue of ''Ahoy!'' was published in January 1984. The ...

'' magazine Disc 2: # Make it Pay: the BBS industry of the 1980s and 90s featuring Philip L. Becker, founder of eSoft #

FidoNet __ / \ /, oo \ (_, /_) _`@/_ \ _ , , \ \\ , (*) , \ )) ______ , __U__, / \// / FI ...

: details the largest volunteer-run computer network in history #

Artscene The computer art scene, or simply artscene, is the community interested and active in the creation of computer art, computer-based artwork. Early computer art The history of computer art predates the computer art scene for several decades, with ...

: the history of the ANSI Art Scene which thrived in the BBS world Disc 3: # HPAC ( Hacking

Phreaking Phreaking is a slang term coined to describe the activity of a culture of people who study, experiment with, or explore telecommunication systems, such as equipment and systems connected to public telephone networks. The term ''phreak'' is a se ...

Anarchy Anarchy is a form of society without rulers. As a type of stateless society, it is commonly contrasted with states, which are centralized polities that claim a monopoly on violence over a permanent territory. Beyond a lack of government, it can ...

Cracking Cracking may refer to: * Cracking, the formation of a fracture or partial fracture in a solid material studied as fracture mechanics ** Performing a sternotomy * Fluid catalytic cracking, a catalytic process widely used in oil refineries for crac ...

): hear from the users of "underground" BBSes # No Carrier: the end of the dial-up BBS and its integration into the

Internet The Internet (or internet) is the Global network, global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a internetworking, network of networks ...

Compression Compression may refer to: Physical science *Compression (physics), size reduction due to forces *Compression member, a structural element such as a column *Compressibility, susceptibility to compression * Gas compression *Compression ratio, of a ...

: the story of the PKWARE/

SEA A sea is a large body of salt water. There are particular seas and the sea. The sea commonly refers to the ocean, the interconnected body of seawaters that spans most of Earth. Particular seas are either marginal seas, second-order section ...

legal battle of the late 1980s Disc 3 also serves as a DVD-ROM which contains thousands of photographs from the 200 interviews recorded during the 4-year production of the film. All of the episodes are subtitled in English and include

director's commentary An audio commentary is an additional audio track, usually digital, consisting of a lecture or comments by one or more speakers, that plays in real time with a video. Commentaries can be serious or entertaining in nature, and can add informatio ...

tracks. The Artscene episode is the only one to include subtitles translated into

Russian Russian(s) may refer to: *Russians (), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries *A citizen of Russia *Russian language, the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages *''The Russians'', a b ...

. All discs include hidden

easter eggs Easter eggs, also called Paschal eggs, are eggs that are Egg decorating, decorated for the Christian holiday of Easter, which celebrates the resurrection of Jesus. As such, Easter eggs are commonly used during the season of Eastertide (Easter ...

Reception

''BBS: The Documentary'' was well reviewed, mainly by publications within the technology space. ''

Wired Wired may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Music * ''Wired'' (Jeff Beck album), 1976 * ''Wired'' (Hugh Cornwell album), 1993 * ''Wired'' (Mallory Knox album), 2017 * "Wired", a song by Prism from their album '' Beat Street'' * "Wired ...

'' called it "a five-and-a-half-hour paean to the era when computers were named Stacy and

Lisa Lisa or LISA may refer to: People People with the mononym * Lisa (Japanese musician, born 1974), stylized "LISA" * Lisa, stagename of Japanese singer Lisa Komine (born 1978) * Lisa (South Korean singer) (born 1980) * Lisa (Japanese musician, b ...

, and tech loyalists fought bitter battles over the superiority of Ataris to Amigas". ''

Film Threat ''Film Threat'' is an American online film review publication, and earlier, a national magazine that focused primarily on independent film, although it also reviewed videos and DVDs of mainstream films, as well as Hollywood movies in theaters. ...

'' called it a "truly fascinating documentary about an increasingly obscure and obsolete technology". ''

Popular Mechanics ''Popular Mechanics'' (often abbreviated as ''PM'' or ''PopMech'') is a magazine of popular science and technology, featuring automotive, home, outdoor, electronics, science, do it yourself, and technology topics. Military topics, aviation an ...

'' called it a "labor of love" and said it was "the sort of thing that not everyone can digest, but is utterly fascinating to those that can". Since its release, the film has been cited by multiple academic works on the topic of computing history and internet culture.

References

External links

* * *
BBS: The Documentary
at the

Internet Archive The Internet Archive is an American 501(c)(3) organization, non-profit organization founded in 1996 by Brewster Kahle that runs a digital library website, archive.org. It provides free access to collections of digitized media including web ...

{{Jason Scott 2005 films Bulletin board systems Hacking (computer security) American documentary films Creative Commons-licensed documentary films Phreaking Warez Documentary films about the Internet Films directed by Jason Scott Documentary films about fandom Films about technological impact Works about computer hacking 2005 documentary films