From Newsgroup: news.admin.peering
On Fri, 18 Sep 2026 12:44:27 -0500, Nigel Reed wrote:
Are you only gating fidonet groups that specifically allow gating? Many expressly forbid it, or only allow with mod approval. Some are already
gated.
Fido's rules are and always have been archaic, I ran a BBS back in late 80s/90's (Ezycom under DOS/Desqview/Qemm) and i think it was 91 or 92
added this new thing called "the internet" with tcp trumpet sock or
something similarly named to allow logins - back then it more of a play
thing since Peter said Ezycom update facilitates it, boy those were the
days we had compuserve on a super blazingly fast best-thing-to-ever-
happen 2400bps modem line :)
the zone "kommandant" regulary objected to us allowing logins - on the internet line, whilst the other dialup line was always in its hourly
reserved netmail hour (4-5AM here), I argued with the kommandant for
several weeks on why I should lock everyone out when the dedicated dialup
was complying, I fulfilled my netmail obligations keeping the dialup
free, he knows that because our "discussion" was all via netmail :) he
cut me off 3 times over period of a year for that until he moved to
terminate my node altogether.
I then got a direct (IIRC called a point node) arrangement from John (everybody knows John in Zone 1, also went on to run a fair size ISP in
the US from what I heard in later years) I had all my feeds and netmail
from him via the internet (until I closed the BBS in late 90's - it ran
for about 12 years all up).
Over the following 2 or 3 years, my story was repeated several times over
by other BBS's here, but they just ended Fidonet rather than seeking
other access.
Some people insist in living in the stone ages, and Fido doesnt seem to
have realised its own policies are whats seen its demise, like this,
forbidden to gate areas, thats right forbid them, heaven forbid people discover Fidonet by finding their discussions on usenet, not advertise
and prevent others discovering them - not that I can imagine there being
many in 2026 anyway but I confess to not giving a damn enough to go
looking :)
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