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Message: <blockquote data-quote="aramis erak" data-source="post: 9190537" data-attributes="member: 6779310">Let us not forget the vast array of fanzines, one of which is apparently still going since the 70's... (Alarums and Excursions)... Dragon, A&E, TSG/TFG, JTAS, White Dwarf, and several other widespread distribution got news out. The second tier game companies usually had their own house organ, which also usually had a catalog page or two of their own, plus paid-for adverts for dozens of other games.As for the InternetTechnically, Usenet's been going since 1979.... Fidonet since 1984... DARPANet since the 60'sD&D was discussed on fidonet since at least as far back as 1987, when I discovered fidonet via local BBS. I suspect earlier.And almost all the local BBSs (except the city library's) in Anchorage in 1985 to 1996 (when I was active in the Anchorage BBS community) had some gaming discussion. I found a lot of information available. Lots of bad advice, a few gems, and a whole lot of jerks threadcrapping. Funny, that sure sounds like the early internet... Truth be told, once WWIVnet was going, and .QWK packets common, it was very common to have actual discussions with significant volume... FidoNet was able to (slowly) propagate discussions and shareware across the country. And did so about the same speed as the US Postal Service.And at least one BBS in 1988 had a full-text retype of the rules book for Moldvay D&D Basic Set.  Dude couldn't get it in Nome, and his village didn't have a post office, which made mail order problematic (few were willing to ship to a "General Delivery" address), so a bunch of people posted chunks in a thread, and then someone else collated it all into a text file... Eventually, someone mailed him a boxed set. Dude had been introduced to D&D during AIT...Oh, and I had full internet dialup from Jan 1988... via University of Alaska. I also had access via FidoNet bridge through Fredbox.cojones.com - a UUCPNet, UseNet, and Fidonet connected local BBS, which was also internet accessible, from about 1990-1995... More than once I telnetted into Fredbox via the Uni...Between Mags and BBS Networks there was a lot of available information. But there was also a huge lot of gatekeeping.</blockquote>

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