Electronic hugs do nothing for me, unless they’re from someone I don’t know.
— Tumbleweed
Elisse and I fell easily into the pattern we had practiced for months, at least on the surface. The bike parked in her kitchen and mountains of touring gear, lists of things to do and constant rhapsodizing about travel, the well-thumbed atlas — all contributed to a careful layer of protection. But our habits were well-established, and the time together was comfortable and relaxing.
One night, after a pizza excursion, we sat on her couch. I studied Ohio county maps and my growing list of contacts; she read Newsweek. Restless, I reached for the computer in my briefcase.
With a soft click I attached her phone line; with a few quick commands I told the machine to dial CompuServe’s local number, then tell the system my User ID and Password. As the automatic log-on took place, Elisse looked up from the magazine. “Checking mail again?”
“I thought I’d drop by a couple of the SIGs to see what’s happening.” I had running conversations going with friends in two Special Interest Groups — one for writers of Online Today Magazine and the other for users of Model 100 computers.
She shook her head and returned to her reading. Meanwhile, on the screen, I saw:
CompuServe Information Service
20:51 EST Tuesday 18-Oct-83 P
OKHad there been any mail, the system would have told me, so I typed GO CB.
Request Recorded,
One Moment, Please
CB Simulator Ver 3(62)
What's your handle?The system was asking me for the name by which I would be identified to others in this electronic pub. The handle becomes one’s persona, and can convey a surprising amount of information. People who live in the fantasy gaming world might show up as “Dragonslayer” or “Level 9 Harpy,” while crude males sometimes use handles like “Hot Tongue” or “21 and Horny (M).” They can be whimsical (Conan the Librarian), professional (Psydoc), sexy (Sweet Thighs), gay (tight surfer boy), technical (UNIX_HACKER), inexplicable (Cow Exploder), geographic (Tacoma Tigress), graphic (…[A]…), automotive (’68 COUGAR), or just plain (Bob). Some people change their handles all the time and drive everyone crazy; others, like LooLoo and Cupcake, become known so well by noms de plume that their true names fade into obscurity. And some people even pretend to be other people.
I typed Wordy and hit the return key.
(Channel) users tuned in
(1)12, (3)2, (19)5, (30)2, (33)3
Which channel:Since the main action was on channel 1, with twelve people, I chose that. It was like picking the crowded kitchen when arriving at a party in a house of thirty-six rooms, most empty. Those figures didn’t include people who were in private conversations known simply as “/talk.”
For a while I sat and watched, then told the system to let me know who was currently signed on. A list scrolled by, revealing handles, User IDs, job numbers, and “nodes” (cities) of the people there, as well as the channel where each happened to be at the moment and whether or not they were /talking with anyone. There were many familiar names: Farquor in Syracuse, Logger in Seattle, Beach Bum in Florida, and others. Then I saw Stephanie and there was an instantaneous tightening in my chest.
I hopped over to channel 19. Stephanie and I had met on the system months before and our network charges were skyrocketing, though we had never met face-to-face. I hadn’t seen her since well before launch, 3 weeks earlier. Arriving on 19, I cried out my greeting:
(Wordy) Stephanie!!!!!!
(TI KID) STEPHANIE JUST WENT /TALK WITH ALLEGRO
(Texas Tornado) Hi Wordy
(PaRtY) Hey Word! You just missed her
(Wordy) Damn it. Hi all.Allegro, eh? I had seen him in /talk with her before. He was in Detroit and she was in Philly — and she had said something recently about going to Detroit to visit her sister. She may have only appeared as words on a screen, but she was real in this alternate reality and I ended my “Hi all” with a sharp slap to the return key.
Elisse looked over with an eyebrow raised. “Something wrong?”
“I just missed seeing a friend.”
“Oh.” She took a sip of 7-Up and went back to the magazine as I returned to channel 1. As usual, people came and went in a confusion of hellos and goodbyes. It all makes sense while it’s going on, with the conversations shuffled but strangely coherent.
(Wordy) Hello out there.
(NEON) HIYA WORDY
(Doctor X) Star > U M OR F ???
(Wordy) Hi Neon. Anybody seen Farquor around?
(-zing-) I hate Tymnet.
(Stargazer) Male, Doctor.
(NEON) WORDY DID YOU START YOUR TRIP YET?
(Doctor X) Wordy, Farq left. Star, U astronomer?
(Wordy) Neon -- yep, just back from shakedown.
(-zing-) what trip Wordy?
(Stargazer) Hey Word, you that guy with the bike?
(SEATTLE SLEUTHING) ARRIVING
(NEON) HI SEATTLE. CALIF HERE.
(Wordy) zing - I'm traveling on a computerized bicycle
(Wordy) Star - yep, that's me.
(Stargazer) Doc, just amateur
(-zing-) I hate Tymnet. Very Poor Quality.
(Wordy) Star -- VPQNET?
(SEATTLE SLEUTHING) SLEUTH-STAT
(Stargazer) WORDY- HAHAHAHAHAHA
(Doctor X) Wordy, saw U in TODAY mag. Congrats!
(-zing-) Wordy: what?
(NEON) HI SLEUTH
(Superstud) Any hot women here?
(NEON) HI SUPER
(-zing-) Wordy, what's VPQNET?
(Superstud) Hi neon, m or f?
(SEATTLE SLEUTHING) SO WHERE IS EVERYONE?
(Virginia Venus) Hi all!
(Wordy) Doctor - thanks.
(Wordy) Zing ~ Very Poor Quality Net.
(Neon) SS I'M MALE!
(SEATTLE SLEUTHING) HEY VENUS WANNA TALK?
(Stargazer) Bye all, gotta go.
(Superstud) Virginia » I give good talk, job 47
(Virginia Venus) no thanks, guys.
(Doctor X) bye star
(Wordy) Seattle - Columbus, but not much longerAnd so on. The electronic faces gradually changed, Superstud found a female to drag off into /talk, and it was a routine evening on CB. None of my close friends were there, and I participated only halfheartedly.
But suddenly the computer beeped and a message appeared on the screen:
Please /TALK with Job 32 [79404,211] Virginia VenusOh? Women are a minority on the system and are usually pursued so actively that they have no need to issue invitations to strangers. Maybe she had read about my trip… I smiled and typed the /talk command.
/talk 32
Virginia Venus is now in contact
(Use ^p to break contact)(Note: the conversation has been reformatted for easier reading. I am W; she is T.)
W: Hello there.
T: Hi. I hope you don't mind my interrupting you out of the blue. I was just curious.
W: I don't mind at all!
T: I saw ur pix in the magazine. What an experience!
W: thanks! I finished the test run and leave in 3—4 days for the biggie.
T: Where you headed?
W: East to DC, down to Florida, then west. I'll work it out as I go.
T: Hey, maybe you can visit! I'm in Richmond. My real name is Tina. You're Steven, right?
W: Yes... Call me Steve.
T: OK Steve.
W: What do you do, mysterious Tina of Richmond?
T: Consulting small businesses on picking a system, setting up spreadsheets, etc.
W: No kidding! I just wrote a book on that! Ever heard of *The Complete Guide to Microsystem Management*????
T: Yes!!! God, I don't believe this! That's YOU?
W: Indeed - I'm impressed too. Are you single? <smile>
T: Sure am. (wicked grin) Are you really coming to Richmond???We went on flirting for a while, getting to know each other. Tina was witty, literate, intelligent — she sounded wonderful. “Pert nose, blonde, blue eyes, five foot nine, and slender” was how she described herself, and I gave my own description with a bit of extra attention to cycling-tuned legs.
T: You sound so nice, Steve.
W: As do you. Isn't this a surprising medium? We're both grinning.
T: True!!!!!!
W: Huggg
T: Mmmmm, you *are* tall, aren't you?
W: A soft shudder just passed through me. That breath under my ear
T: Yes, that's one of my best qualities... and I like your tallness. I have a weakness for that.
W: Ooohhhhh.
T: Ahhhhh.
W: The feeling is er, tangible.
T: I noticed. I am "agitated" as well. My hands are clammy!
W: Mine too, but I bet it would change to warmth if we were together
T: The warmth we feel deep inside
W: Delicate touching, little whimpers...
T: I would explore your body with kisses...
W: Ohhhh, and I yours!
T: Rolling on the floor... ready for you, but teasing denial...My hands were shaking as I typed; my breath came fast and shallow. I glanced at Elisse and found her staring at me.
“Why Steve, I had no idea computers could be so exciting. What have I been missing all these years?”
“Oh — hehe.” I blushed. “Sometimes these conversations can be a little stimulating.”
“So I see. Mind if I watch?” Her voice was a little teasing, a little cool, a little curious.
“I was sort of seduced,” I explained weakly. “She interrupted me with a /talk request.”
“Mmm.” Elisse bent over to ponder the screen. She frowned slightly as Tina wrote:
T: The feel of your bearded face exploring my body. Oh Steve!“I hope you two have a nice time on my couch.” She stood, not smiling, and went upstairs to bed.
A flicker on the screen. I felt like I was living in two worlds at the same time, with reality puttering upstairs and an invitation in my lap:
T: I am quivering in my seat, wishing I were ALONE WITH YOU!W: Oh, compu-lover, I really should go. I have some writing to do
T: Do you think the hackers out there missed us?
W: Maybe they saw us in /talk and have been snickering
T: Steve, it's been beautiful.
W: Let's meet! I should be in Richmond in about a month.
T: Well, we can stay in touch about it.
W: What's your phone number? I'll call you.
T: Why not just EMAIL me?
W: I'd love to hear your voice. Is something wrong?
T: Ohhh. You're going to hate me.
W: Awww, nothing could do that!
T: Steve, I don't think you'll want to meet me.
W: But... why?
T: Well, I'm doing a sort of sociological experiment.
W: What do you mean?
T: My real name is Dave.I said a rather hasty goodbye, considering all we had been through together, and numbly logged off. I stared for a long time into the blank screen that was becoming my home.
With a sigh I trudged up the stairs, but stopped halfway and returned to sleep alone on the couch. It just would have been too hard to explain. “Hey, honey! I had an intimate experience with a beautiful woman waiting for me 500 miles down the road, but now I’m feeling the guilty realization that I need to recalibrate my entire understanding of human interaction in this emerging online age... I didn’t know that she’s actually a he. How are you?”
NOTE: 40 years later this is a cringy “well, you deserved it” moment, but these primitive text-only tools were in the process of rewiring our culture, Not only did they erase geographical boundaries, but online relationships engaged a different mental model… with no clear rules or filters (and a rapidly increasing problem with impostors). Words on a screen didn’t yet feel real.
I was excited about my technomadic business idea, but I was starting to realize that moving my life into Dataspace would change everything. Most of the world had not even heard of “online,” yet it was becoming my home… a vaporous new world, evolving by the day.
Life epochs are bounded by events: when a big thing changes, like a job or partner, it creates a time stamp in your memory (“ah, that was when I was with Susan”). But I was changing everything… home, vehicle, profession, relationship, pet, city, and even modes of personal communication… using tools that were still being invented. My new neighborhood was being rewritten in real time as people arrived by the tens of thousands.
Control-Alt-Delete indeed. I was feeling a bit dizzy.
My final week of normalcy.
I had a flurry of meetings with Kacy, moving boxes and furniture in the white Rabbit GTI, defining file-management protocols, figuring out accounts, and brainstorming. What we were actually doing was still not clear, but we agreed on a percentage and set up the Computing Across America office in their basement.
Bike and packs had undergone minor debugging during the Shakedown, and I powered through the to-do list while awaiting sunshine… but it was October in Columbus.
I reached around to the back of my head and pushed the RESET button.