[Kenji]

The internet got popular. What that means: Government snooping, DMCA, lots of non-nerds and idiots on the internet, websites that lock content down regionally, bloated garbage websites.

There was lots of untapped potential back then which made things exciting. Also, the communities were smaller, like families.

[lucaspiller]

I wasn't part of the scene (too young), but from comments here it sounds like there was a certain romanticism about writing/building and running your own BBS. It's not quite the same as spending 5 minutes to spin up a new Digital Ocean instance and running a Docker image.

[eveith]

I think that the achievement of some home-made appliance that was actually hard to get money-wise (and probably build) is one aspect of what makes those memories fond.

But I have another explanation, which, I think, explains much of it. Being a part of the BBS network meant one had overcome a bit of a hurdle and reached a small community that actually cared about the system and the sense of the community itself. Those BBS islands had their own rules, implicitly or explicitly spelled out, they were full with lots of creativity (cf. the ASCII/RIP art), and while the occasional troll or rude idiot can be found anywhere, posting something to a BBS usually meant you got some response back. It was a smaller circle (at least, it felt that way). You could actually make friends through the BBS network. Today, when I try to post something on HN, I cannot even find it immediately after posting, let alone hope that other people find my submission. :)

The SDF.org bboard feels much in the same way.

[selllikesybok]

In my local calling area, the motives and reasoning were simpler. Some of us just wanted more TW2002 and LoRD instances. Some of us needed to cut the phone bill. And some of us did it to, well... 'do it' (cause there is nothing quite so attractive as power -_^).