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Topic: RIP: The Temple of the Screaming Electron (Read 5435 times) |
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Blunderov
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"We think in generalities, we live in details"
  
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RIP: The Temple of the Screaming Electron
« on: 2009-03-18 12:33:43 » |
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[Blunderov] Thanks for all the fish Jeff. 
http://www.totse.com/
When I first started this site, almost 20 years ago now, the idea was to have a place where all types of ideas could be spoken, traded, and exchanged, where no topic was off-limits or forbidden. At the time the site was started there was nothing like it. There wasn't a world wide web, Internet access was hard to come by, publishing new ideas was limited to paper, and publishing on paper and mailing out what you published was ridiculously expensive. After all of the effort, your potential audience was limited to a few hundred people.
Now we have the web, and anyone can start a web site or create a Facebook or MySpace page and publish their thoughts for all to see. If you want to be heard you can be, and if people are interested in listening they'll find you. Access is cheap and plentiful. This is the golden age of information.
I don't think it will come as a shock to most of you that after 20 years I am burned out. For the last several years I've reduced the time I spend on the site to the bare minimum -- paying bills, finding advertisers, maintaining the servers, fixing database problems, debugging e-mail server problems, handling SPAM, and answering the occasional question or mediating a random dispute, but even that takes too many hours each month. It's time to do something different. It's time for something new.
I don't know exactly what that something new will be yet, but I know I won't figure it out unless I make a clean break with the past, so it's time to say goodbye and move on. I am closing down the site as of January 17th. The irc.slashnet.org IRC channel #totse will remain on-line (I don't host it and I have nothing to do with running it) and Zok's BBS is up and running and Zok says he thinks his equipment can keep up with the load, but this web site will cease operations.
So make your plans, set up a new rendezvous, and move on to the next thing. Thanks for the memories, it's been an interesting 20 years to say the least.
-- Jeff Hunter
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Totse
<snip>Community
The community of TOTSE was an Internet forum and IRC channel. Some users of the community referred to themselves as "Totseans". Members engaged in discussion about a wide variety of topics including but not limited to religion, sex, politics, humanities, weapons, explosives, drugs, illegal activities, technology, music, the environment, mechanics, food, and do it yourself projects. TOTSE is affectionately referred to by the users as &T, &TOTSE, and "The Temple". Although Hunter had an account[7] he rarely posted on the TOTSE forums as himself. In his announcement of TOTSE's closure, Hunter stated that when he started TOTSE his "idea was to have a place where all types of ideas could be spoken, traded, and exchanged, where no topic was off-limits or forbidden."[8] ; the TOTSE text file archive illustrates this.[9]
The forum software was running a highly modified version of UBB 5.47a, which has been heavily criticized by several readers due to its age. Hunter purchased a copy of vBulletin, with the eventual upgrade occurring on April 4, 2007.</snip>
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Blunderov
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"We think in generalities, we live in details"
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Re:RIP: The Temple of the Screaming Electron
« Reply #1 on: 2010-10-27 19:45:54 » |
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[Blunderov] The recent raidz and A+lulz emanating from the ranks of of 4chan /b/ to the graet butthurt and pwning of such luminaries as the Co$ and Gene Simmons (amongst many other richly deserving cases) puts me in mind of their predecessors in the days of Web 1.0. And ED, righteously as always, acknowleges the debt with a satisfactory eulogy to the late lamented TOTSE.com.
http://encyclopediadramatica.com/Totse
<snip>Totse
From Encyclopedia Dramatica
This acolyte does not know the awesome power of Raid!Totse (AKA TOTSE or &T), or Temple Of The Screaming Electron, was a throwback to old-school BBS days when being a hacker was about information, instead of being some sort of generic fashion statement. The main focus of Totse was the Community Bulletin Board, followed by the Text Files section which had articles that appealed mostly to rebellious 13 year old boys who wanted to get revenge on their Nazi parents or wanted to plan the next Columbine. On the site you'd find information related to computer security, discussion of politics, even some stuff about religion. Of course, 90% of the articles consisted of:
1.Poorly written "instructions" on how to make bombs that will in all likelihood get you killed or arrested without doing any actual damage
2.Pornography and other spam
3.HAI TO YOU!
4.Endless outdated phone "hacking" techniques
5.How to get high off Raid and many other household items
6.The 100th revision of the The Anarchist Cookbook text file.......
.......Forum Warfare
Totse army invades times square.
Totse knows nothing about Ebaums, but they hate it either way.In the days before the existence of YTMND & 4chan, Totse was on their own. Their shitty software was prone to attacks such as the SPF raid. The Totse basement-dwelling elite found a solution to their problems: TOTSE ARMY. The Totse army was a group of hackers and skript kiddies who would stand up against Totse's enemies, executing massive spam attacks against their forums. They were basically an early form of internet military. The first targets in their career were the long time rivals at bombshock after some idiot from there came to Totse with the sole intent of trolling the shit out of the place. Totse once tried to make a gigantic "TOTSE" banner on drawball, however, they were all too goddamn stupid to organize their efforts resulting in two crappy banners that got thoroughly pwned by the Koreans.
However, the long gone army may be coming back (Probably not, since the site is gone.)
When they got bored they decided to do forum raids against random communities (much like 4chan's /b/). Things went well until they decided to attack the "The Lord of the Rings Fanatics Plaza". After the army finished raping and goatseing the shit out of the place, the forum dwellers called Jeff Hunter and threatened legal action. For the first time in at least 100 years Jeff Hunter actually posted on the forums and basically told everyone to knock it the fuck off. He then pulled out his massive cock shaped banhammer and sodomized the Totse army, who moved on to drawball.
</snip>
[Bl.] Absent friends. A toast. Keith Henson you are not forgotten.
http://encyclopediadramatica.com/Cult_of_the_Dead_Cow
Cult of the Dead Cow
From Encyclopedia Dramatica
<snip>One of the most ingenious logos EVAR!The Cult of the Dead Cow (cDc) is a group of h4X0rs who founded a BBS e-zine in the 80s. They also founded teh h4X0r con. But their biggest claim to fame is their creation of Back Orifice (though some claim they stole it from another Hacking group during joint operations), which has given Bill Gates nightmares for years. But, while all this stuff is cool and all, what really makes them worthy of your attention is their lulz-inducing history...
... cDc vs. Scientology
In God We Thrust
(Cult of the Dead Cow
is part of a series on
Security Faggotry.)
Once upon a time the Scientologists attempted to remove alt.religion.scientology from Usenet. Their lawyer, Helena Kobrin, served a copyright infringement claim in the form of a "remove group" message.
This infuriated the cDc, who have been constant enemies of those seeking to impose censorship on the internet. The majority of cDc releases concern either encryption allowing anonymity or fighting against censorship. While nothing became of the injunction the cDc – functioning much as Anonymous would later – declared war on the Scifags. Below is the "declaration of war":
Date: 6/4/95 7:19 PM
From: Swamp Ratte
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
FOR MORE INFORMATION, CONTACT: sratte@cascade.net
A statement from CULT OF THE DEAD COW/cDc communications:
It is our belief that L. Ron "Old Mother" Hubbard is to be held
accountable
for the deaths of thousands of innocent men, women, and children in the
"Killing Fields" of Phnum Penh, as we suspect that Pol Pot was a
Scientologist!
We believe that El Ron Hubbard is actually none other than Heinrich Himmler
of the SS, who fled to Argentina and is now responsible for the stealing
of babies from hospitals and raising them as "super-soldiers" for the purpose
of overthrowing the U.S. Fed. Govt. in a bloody revolution. We fear plans
for a "Fourth Reich" to be established on our home soil under the vise-like
grip of oppression known as Scientology!
In order to preserve our way of life and keep the torch of freedom lit
for future generations, we feel it is our duty as responsible world citizens
to declare WAR on the so-called "CHURCH" OF SCIENTOLOGY.
As future developments occur, we will broadcast them to the free world
as soon as possible. Thank you for your time.
S. Ratte'
CULT OF THE DEAD COW/cDc communications
Fearless Leader
Following the declaration, the alt.religion.scientology board experienced a huge jump in traffic as curious individuals flocked to the source of the mayhem. The request to close the group was roundly ignored, and the dissemination of information from the alt.religion.scientology boards was viewed as a major defeat for Scientologists.
Almost thirteen years later the Scientologists found themselves in a similar situation after a copyright claim was filed against YouTube and later Gawker Media regarding the distribution of a Tom Cruise propaganda video. Around the same time, the cDc announced a powerful new tool named "Goolag" that uses the copious amounts of information collected by Google to find exploitable parts of websites. Coincidence? Conspiracy? Epic lulz? Only time will tell.
[Bl.] The heirs to TOTSE?
http://www.linkbase.org/
[Bl.] And this for The Hermit
I miss the Hermit very much and I wish that he would rise above this silly dispute with us all. Otherwise probably the CoV will follow TOTSE into oblivion - all too soon IMV.
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