Why The Cellar?
 

I first found the Cellar in February (I think) of this year. Grabbed it from Tony's sig on Slashdot, which pointed to Image of the Day. Only recently did I start reading out of that. Image of the Day was more something for me to see every day at work. I'd come in, drink some water (I don't do coffee), browse CNN, MSNBC, Slashdot. Some time during the day I'd remember Image of the Day, which I'd bookmarked. I'd look at it, marvel at the image, read the comments, and then get back to work. In June, I finally registered, but I never really posted until July or so I think. I might have registered to respond to something, but I really don't remember.

Anyway, what keeps me coming back is the discussion, the differing viewpoints, the images (IotD is what I check first and most frequently; it's probably my favorite site on the web right now).

Why do you come here? What keeps you coming back? How did you find it?

Just trying to get to know the fellow cellarites a little better...

--dave

Honestly, I got started here from slashdot too. It was long enough ago that I don't remember how long ago it was, but I got sucked into the genuine intelligent conversation (which has become the net equivalent of the coelecanth. It was common, then people thought it had gone extinct, but if you go really deep and hold your breath for a long time, you can still find some. It never really survives being brought to the surface, though.). Also, man, love you as we may do, that poll was a waste, and, as my friends over at planetgamecube.com say, Polls make Louie eat your face.

it wasn't designed as a poll. just a question. i threw in the poll for bad measure :)

I visit Slashdot as well, but don't think I linked to here from there. It might have been a link of the day at Userfriendly.org for the Image of the Day. I like the nice small feel of the Cellar, intelligent conversation, and, of course, the Image of the Day.

*thinks* What a long strange year it has been...

Lessee, I saw the Cellar in Tony's sig line on phl.media. I remember someone making a crack about something he said (or something like that...don't remember now). I happened to saunter over and have been here since...that was January. I remember when there were only like 30 people registered. I like the discussion. This is one of the few places I've been on the internet where I have found intelligent people talking about intelligent things...and a few whimsical things as well. The IotD's are great. And it was a good way for me to get to know some Philadelphians, given that I'm relatively new to the city and only have a handful of friends here.

Think I started not too soon after syc though Slashdot as well.
Keep coming back coz it’s the only place you can a coherent intelligent conversation on the net. The mix of people makes it interesting, if a bit firey at times (me having anything to do with that? never...)

I first heard about the Cellar on Fark a week or so ago. I was intrigued by the fact that most of the posters are seemingly intelligent. I am from rural Louisiana so it was like a breath of fresh air. If you ever need to feel good about where you live go to http://www.sabinenews.com/cgi-bin/Ul...UltraBoard.cgi and read what my husband and I have grown up listening to our entire lives. It's a wonder we don't drool.

Anyway, for what little time I have been visiting the Cellar, I have really enjoyed it.

That's 'cause we rule. :)

Seriously, if you ever need to feel good about where YOU live, look at Carroll County, Maryland. Where I grew up. God.

No competition, dhamsaic. My family has been in this parish for about 30 years and no one can remember having a sheriff who wasn't a convicted felon. The two sheriffs I have had the pleasure of knowing where both convicted of buying votes, at the SAME TIME. One of them was actually elected in the next election. The same one I might add that walks with a limp because his wife shot him when she caught him with another woman. Which wasn't very fair because he could defend himself since, of course, as a ex-con he isn't allowed to carry a firearm. It is also nice to have an elected official WHO CAN'T VOTE.

And that is only the beginning.

So what you're saying is... everything we've ever heard about Louisiana politics is TRUE!!??? I thought it was all myths made up to make it sound like our representatives were colorful and full of weird quotes.

You're not represented by that guy Billy Tauzin ... are you?

you know, Galadriel, every time you post, I think of Cate Blanchett, quite possibly the most incredible looking female ever.

I have no idea why I find her so appealing either. But MAN. Had to pick that name, didn't you? :)

Undertoad- Yes it is all true. Actually there is a lot you never hear about, mostly because there is a certain headstone in the cemetary here in my hometown to remind everyone what happens when you least expect it. You think the Sopranos is bad, at least they have a code of honor.

dhamsaic- sorry to disappoint you, but I look NOTHING like Cate Blanchett. She is way taller, paler, skinnier, red-header, and Britisher. The only celebrity I have been told I resemble is Demi Moore and I think that was just a veiled attempt to get into my pants.

austrailian :)

Ah..."Klanland" as my gf calls it (she's originally from Woodlawn). Another Maryland connection though...very cool.

Hell, not like I can talk...the KKK tried to buy time on my university's public radio station when I lived in St. Louis. Since they were banned from doing that, they "adopted" a stretch of I-55 in South St. Louis County. Their sign was torn down on several occasions to the point where the cops had to start keeping an eye on it.

I am proud to be from Missouri and from St. Louis; however, some things that involve Missouri make me want to hang my head in shame, like John Ashcroft.
Or the alderwoman that decided to take a pee, wrapped in a sheet using a trash can, during a Board of Aldermen session in St. Louis. Or $5 a gallon gas prices on September 11th. Or Rush Limbaugh. Not to mention, when I used to post to stl.general, some punk decided to use my name and contact info while trolling, carrying on some tirade about religion or something of that nature.
Galadriel: I take quite a few calls from customers in Louisiana on a daily basis. Strange thing is, most of them seem to be calling from Marrero, LOO-siana. I was speaking to a gentleman from there again today. Polite as could be...could only understand about 15% of what he was saying. ;) Generally, they are extremely friendly...until I deny their claim. Then they're rather vicious.

Louisiana seems to be one of the more colorful states in the US. Wasn't the gubernatorial election the one year between Edwards (the crook) and Duke (Mr. KKK himself)? Would love to visit there sometime...not during Mardi Gras though.

Jag, you're about 3 months behind me. I think I'm member no. 18 on this version of the Cellar. *looks at his member info* Yep...18. God, I can't believe I've been here for the better part of a year now.

And you people talk about a year and Slashdot
 

I've been calling here for at least 9 years, somewhere around 10 I think.

I started out calling when Undertoad had this on a 386 running waffle on some UNIX variant.

I called here when he had one of the FIRST Linux distros for download, which was sometime in 1992. It rocked. Many people downloaded it to put on their l33t 386 machines. CmdrTaco was still playing Tradewars 2002 on a BBS then :). Thanks to the Cellar, I learned a lot about UNIX and can actually admin a *UX box without causing havoc.

I called the Cellar on a Commodore 64. At 2400 baud mind you with an emulated 80-column screen. Later I used the isn.upenn.edu outdial (if you all remember those) to dial the Cellar from college on the university UNIX boxen :).

I miss having the ultimate troll, Barak, around, to annoy all white people especially any sense.

I miss the old-school users like Blu (who I remember giving a 1 Farad capacitor I ripped out of a 1970's era hard drive to), editor (the man who knows more about your PC than the engineers who designed it), keymaster (aka BrianR), bartz, kml, adamzion (an incredibly cool fellow), richlevy, and just a ton of other names.

At least we still have tw on a regular basis, who actually is quite intelligent and well-researched, unlike Limbaugh, who Howard Stern could rip apart just on facts alone.

Waitasec, didn't Eric Raymond have a cellar account too? I remember a LOT of people did who you'd not expect.

This may sound a little strange, but when you've been part of an online community for this long, it feels a bit weird to see it all change. There's still a few people from the old days, and people who predate it and who were using Apple II's with 300 baud AppleCat modems to call it.

Will people feel the same about Slashdot 10 years from now? I think not. Although they'll tell wonderful Natalie Portman jokes.

I'd have to say hell yeah. If only because Undertoad's kept it going so long, with a great mix of people. I like it here because the rabid zealotry that permeates places like Slashdot doesn't come here. And the trollage is much lower :).

Now if Undertoad asked for donations, I'd gladly give. I owe the guy. Bigtime. At least dinner for him and his wife at Morton's.

It's so incredibly rare to see an online community last in so many forms for so long.

Take care,

Mitch
Cellar. hell yeah.

dhamsaic- sorry, australian

sycamore- yes, when I was about 11 or 12 (something like that) Edwards and Duke ran against one another. At the time my family was going to a local Baptist church (because my parents were going through a faze were they thought God = church, poor misguided children) and you think that wasn't fun. Here we are the lone liberals in a southern baptist church, I actually remember hearing the remark, "well, I would rather elect someone who was in the Klan, than someone who doesn't believe in God." What imbeciles, but that is a whole other thread.

And my husband reminded me of this little tidbit last night, our current sheriff is "allegedly" married to his half-sister. His mom was catting around with her dad, whom he just happens to look just like. So anyway, they found out eventually (like when they decided to get married) broke up, married other people, divorced and then married each other.

I miss some of those old-school users too. Blu is alive and well and living in Jersey; he showed up here early on but didn't stick around, and that really bugs me, I think he is one cool dude. Back in the day he was the very worst speller ever, much worse than Jag's hurried typos. Somehow he spelled "exhaust" with a Z.

I miss Jerry "Chronos" Winner who swore he'd always be a Cellar user. I tried to find him online anywhere, but old email addresses I found didn't seem to get anywhere... or he decided to move on, you never know.

I miss editor. I thnk he's still posting to phl.* groups and so I'm not sure what his beef is with us.

I miss kml. That dude could really write, had enormous style, smart, witty...

I miss darling. We had a falling out a year ago that I still can't figure out completely. I would be happy to take the blame for what was probably stupidity on my part, but he seems to have written me off for the duration.

I miss richh. He was a Cellarite before he was the talk of talk.bizarre, and his body of work was incredible. He too had immense style. He sweated cool.

I miss turtle. He actually works at a skate shop near me, and I bought skates from him about a year ago. The perfect father who could be counted on to stick in an interesting two cents. He was a fine mix of enthusiasm, grit, subtle wit.

I miss mason and omi/cerebus and there must be about 20 others who were just as awesome whom I'm forgetting. (If you happen to be reading this and you're one of them, please excuse my omission...)

I think esr had a cellar account, but he wasn't a contributor so to hell with him. No, I don't mean that. He helped to set up a Cellar-esque public internet access system in the county next to me. He also indulged in some of the same sort of political activity that I did, back in the day. I feel an enormous affinity to esr for these reasons, but it is ... unrequited.

The nice thing is that we can think back on all these cool people, but we have an equally cool group now.

As far as donations go, I think posting and sticking around and stuff is how everyone "gives back". Right now it doesn't lack for equipment or connectivity or anything, which is the only reason why donations of any kind would be needed.

adamzion
 

I had no idea he was an old-school dwellar. Strange. I remember he posted here a while ago, but I haven't seen him in a while.

pinging adamzion
pinging adamzion
do you echo, adamzion?

Steve

Barak? I did enjoy watching him outrightly get under the skin if it was a different color.

I don't miss miss barak at all. He was a smart guy, but he wasn't interested in conversation so much as baiting everyone. And he felt that, if he told everyone that he was baiting them, that made it okay. He wasn't talking to people, he was playing a little game of his own.

The subtext, if you take that approach, is that you don't respect the people you're talking to. That is, I think, the very worst thing one can do here.

Word. Like how I respect jaguar (and even think he's a smart guy!), but his misinformation about America is sometimes frustrating. :)

That's one thing I love about this place. Most people make an attempt to see the other's point of view, and you don't have shit like "No, you fucking moron", etc. Intelligent conversation, not namecalling. Except I've seen a pretty interesting conversation between tw and adamzion... that was rather colorful :)

Yes, but the Jaguar Conversion Project is proceeding nicely. Phase I (Basic Spelling) is nearly complete... regression testing will begin shortly. Phase II (Political and Social Re-education) is scheduled to begin 1st quarter of 2002.

Artist's conception of the finished product:

http://www.charm.net/~mbyrd/jag.jpg

April, 2006- Shortly after graduating from the Royal
Military College at Duntroon, young Lieutenant Jaguar
leads his platoon on a routine training exercise.

Actually, I was going to ask you something similar to that last night Tony. How do you feel about how the Cellar has progressed in the time that it has existed. Truth be told, it's even changed some since I've been here...and that's only shy of 9 months. When I first came here, there was more of a local feel, but it has grown to be more global in recent months. (Very cool, of course.)

It's been awesome. Truth be told, the weakest time for the whole system was just before the software switchover, which happened just before you arrived. After the switch, I realized that vBulletin was gonna get the job done, and I started to promote it more. "Promote" is the wrong word, but whatever.

The state it got to before the summer slowdown was great. And what's happened in the last three weeks has been just awesome. I'm pretty sure that WTC doesn't have as much to do with the boom in posts, as much as the end of summer. This summer slowdown phenomenon preceded the internet, we've always had it.

The wildest thing that happened was when I posted the "skinning" image of the day, and along comes the girl's MOM who discusses the whole thing with us. Now, I posted in their guestbook, so it wasn't unthinkable that they'd come around and check it out. But still. Then I have a Brazilian image and along comes Count Zero who announces he's from there, and offers another perspective. Excellent!

This sort of thing couldn't happen in the old days. I'm not shocked, this is the net, the IotD is in my Slashdot sig, people post the address and it gets out, and search engines are finding us more and more because we have, obviously, a ton of text available to them. But in the olden days, we had these discussions and they were pretty much guaranteed to be local, since they were always a local call.

The collision of society and technology is my favorite topic, needless to say. A recent news story noted that email is 30 years old. 30. Amongst the educated, at least, email is almost as common as the telephone. But it took a long way to get there, didn't it? Took damn near the whole 30 years.

That's partly because in the olden days, computers simply weren't networked. When I think back to the fact that my college ran off of four PDP-11 systems, 2 for office use and two academic, and the fact that they weren't EVER networked... it boggles the mind. This was 1981-1985. Today we see that an un-networked computer is very dumb indeed; it can hardly do anything. Back in the day, that wasn't understood.

Erm... what was the question again, sonny boy?

well, I do a *lot* of browsing... and I keep hitting the Cellar... it's won my "best new site of 2001" award, "new" meaning "new to me"... :)

Thanks =)
Misinformation, probably. What I see/hear apart from cellar is entirely media, I haven't been there since I was 6 or something so apart from a few American friends (one who holidayed with the Bushes) it probably gets a bit warped. Tough in recent times the combined stupidity of the DMCA, SSSCA, Antiterrorism act etc has kind put me off the place as a living destination. Also recent events have put me off living in New York somewhat..

Cellar is generally the second site I visit now, after Slashdot and apart of the elite *visit every day* groups of sites along with salon and the not too intellectually taxing Ask a Dick.

Phase 2 sounds interesting Q12002? Ill have read Das Kapital by then :p

It does seem to move so fast, even *I* remember when SneakerNet(a highly advanced intelligent packet switching network consisting of people putting stuff on disk, moving to another computer and putting the disk) in was a regularly used term!

Re: And you people talk about a year and Slashdot
 

T'was SCO, as I recall

Funny you should mention that--the Cellar is where I downloaded my first copy of the original Netscape beta. I got used to navigating with UNIX commands here too. And learns *piles* of Internet and especially Usenet lore; the Cellar was one of th efew lplaces with a genuine Usenet feed in those days, although the volume ultimately overwhelmed it.

Perhaps we can program a Barak emulation. I seem to recall suggesting at thet time that he *was* an AI.

And where's Major Matt Mason and the Arms Locker?

Now *there* was a character. I think I know who he was IRL, although said person denies it steadfastly. Don't forget bronwyn and rouge. Knew them IRL for sure.

Especially bronwyn.

I think I'm sneaking up on the ten year mark, although my appearances have been *very* sporadic.

As for the story about how I first found the place...Starry Sky...don't ask. You'd never belive it. I still don't believe it, and it happend to *me*...

I aint gonna work....on maggies farm no more.....
(any RATM fans will know what i'm on about) Apologies to the rest =)

Well, as knee-jerk musical refernces based on my name go, that's marginally better than that dreary Rod Stuart tune people keep dredging up. :-)

But you'll have to save it for another thread, becuae "back in the day", I was known as "janicel" here. Or "there", with this here being where "there" ended up.

Never thought I'd see people embedding images in Cellar postings, though. And "Maggie's Farm" makes me grateful some of the other MIME types aren't supported. :-)

Appropos such nostalgia:
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
CBBS VER 3.0
07/22/79 11:57:15
#7 TERMINAL NEED NULLS? TYPE CONTROL-N WHILE THIS TYPES:

*** WELCOME TO WARD AND RANDY'S ***
*** COMPUTERIZED BULLETIN BOARD SYSTEM***
(IN OPERATION SICE 2/16/78)

CONTROL CHARACHTERS ACCEPTED BY THIS SYSTEM:

DEL/BS/_ BACKSPACE AND ECHO DELETED CHARS
CTL-C CANCEL CURRENT PRINTING
CTL-K FUNCTION ABORT
CTL-M START SENDING 5 NULLS
CTL-R RETYPES CURRENT INPUT LINE
CTL-S SUSPENDS OUTPUT UNTIL NEXT CHAR RECEIVED
CTL-U CANCELS CURRENT INPUT LINE

IF YOU GET STUCK, TRY: CTL-K THEN C/R UNTIL YOU
BAIL OUT BACK TO THE MAIN MENU

WHENEVER WE REFER TO "C/R", WE MEAN YOUR "RETURN" KEY!!

----> BULLETINS: 44 LINES, LAST ENTRY 7/14, NEWEST ENTRIES FIRST...

Me old-timer too ...
 

I wandered onto the cellar shortly after the GTG attended by Dinty Moore (yes, his real name) ... and got to attend the booksigning GTG at Gene's Books (oh how I miss it!) in King of Prussia Mall ...

How did I find the Cellar? By accident, which is of course the best way. I had just gotten my first computer, had a copy of PC-ANYWHERE, and a list of BBS numbers that I grabbed from the back of Delaware Valley Computer User ... I called up a bunch of boards and just started playing around. The Cellar is where I stayed, cause the people were so cool!

I too miss many of the "old" Cellar Dwellars mentioned, including editor (hey bruce, are you still out there??), adamzion, mmm, Keymaster and Gatekeeper (Keymaster showed up at my house out of the blue, recently), ruthie (TITS! sorry ruthie!), vsp (yes, I know you're still here, buddy), and a whole host of others whom I remember.

What I really miss are the Cellar GTGs ... getting to actually meet the people I was hanging out online with ... any excuse to go to Michael's Deli, right?

one more old-timer
 

I was referred by MMM from the KAOS days. Or was it (then) Maxwell Smart? I tend to forget these days.

Anyway, I miss the old team although many are still here thanks to the Internet.

I will be making a visit there soon. Maybe in November. As soon as my paperwork for disability goes through (should be soon) I'll be making a farewell tour through my old stomping grounds before I resettle in some other state. If I can get enough people together, we can call it a GTG like the old days.

Anyone interested?

Brian

Though I am a "rookie," I'm always game for a few pints.

Re: one more old-timer
 

I'd certainly be up for it, assuming that I'm not working. My schedule is usually a little tight (one of the drawbacks of working evening shift for a 24-hour business) ...

But ...

If the nuts cooperate, and I can schedule off (if it's a weeknight) an old-style GTG would be awesome!

Eva

Re: Me old-timer too ...
 

Or House of Hunan. On a related note, I was gifted by my kids last Yule with some of the aluminum signs for the subject matter sections at Gene's. Apparently they went to the closing sale...

Pull me out and slap me when I cry.
 

I got here yesterday. I was invited along by a friend here whom i corresponded with on another list.

I like the fact that almost every comment about the Cellar alludes to it being a place that is inhabited by reasonably intelligent discussion; some lists I have visited in the past have consisted of conversations that go as deep as

"Hello, I'm a little tired" "LOL! Me too"

" Personally, I'm not very tired" "SHUT UP, ASSHOLE" "LOL"

"yeah, LMAO" "ROTFLMAO"

I also like the fact that it might get a little firey at times. I'm always up for a good disagreement, its good for the soul.

I'm from the UK, London ( most of you people are from Philly, right? ). In terms of local politics ( as discussed breifly on this thread ), we have resisted the point at which personal wealth and politics collide. We dont have to have lots of money to win elections here, but we are still at the mercy of corrupting influences from shady associations.

All things American reach these shores before too long though, so its good to get an insight into the way of things Stateside.

Anyway, I realise this post is a rather hamfisted attempt at continuing the thread, but I'm just easing myself in to the conversations here in as un-obsructive a way as I can. I dont actually know quite whats going on yet, and will be making similarly pointless posts on many of the threads at Cellar in order to find my feet. You have been warned.

( Maybe I should just copy&paste this onto the end of each thread here!?)

"LOL" "LMAO" "I'm a little tired"

( Cue: "SHUT UP ASSHOLE" )

-------

MM

My first error
 

Okay, so the post I have bolted onto the end of this thread made no linear sense whatsoever. Suspend your berating for a second, I can explain:

I am not very compooter savvy. I am a Mac operator for a start ( I have never operated a PC, but have been with Macintosh since 85). I had failed to realise that continuing threads have different 'pages'. I had read page one of this thread, then I hit the reply button and started typing.

Then I get taken to my post, and I see that it bears ABSOLUTELY NO RELATION to the convo that is now going on here. Doh!

Sorry folks. I know there's nothing quite as frustrating as running an orchestra when the bassoon player cant seem to pluck the right strings.

hehe. it's all good. you'll figure it out. also know that you can edit posts up to 24 hours later. so if you post something and it makes no sense, click the ol' "edit" button...

glad you found the cellar... it's cool to watch it grow...

It's all good is right. Any time an old thread gets resurrected, it just means we're all communicating more, which is the whole point.

Re: Pull me out and slap me when I cry.
 

I would estimate that number between 20 and 30. (UT, does that sound about right, based upon the folks here from the older versions of the Cellar?)

Yes, I think that's a good estimate.

plus 2 melbournians and some dude that lives in fairfax or something. i dunno where the other ones are from :)

Off the top of my head, we have folks from:

Philadelphia
Baltimore
Fairfax, VA
St. Louis
NE Pennsylvania
Louisiana
North Carolina
Houston
Arkansas
New York State
London
Sao Paulo
Melbourne

And probably lots o' other places

ha! sycamore is at 666 posts.

sycamore is the devil!

okay, okay. waterboy references suck. :)

man...

"where you live?"

"ballmer"

"huh?"

"ballmer. BALL MER."

"baltimore?"

"yeah, ballmer."

hehe.

There's also:

Pittsburgh

And from people that I know who haven't mentioned their locations yet:

Harrisburg
Minneapolis
San Francisco

Also, Parabolate says it's "Melburnians".

Tony -

go buy Quake III Arena tonight. You can find the "gold" version, with Team Arena, for like $30. So you should be able to get vanilla Q3 for like $20 or so.

Then, go to http://www.quake3arena.com and download the latest point release, 1.30 final.

Then, go to http://www.orangesmoothie.org/beta.html and download the latest osp version.

Then, email me at [my first name]@gaveup.org (my first name is dave!)

Then, we will find some other way to communicate and get some Quake played.

Sound good? I'm glad. :)

God...I'm an ass! How could I have forgotten about Pittsburgh? Apologies to our western neighbors.

Dham, that was funny. I didn't even think about the number of posts...heh.

You forgot something though...

"Where you from?"

"Bawlmer, hon."

"BAL-ti-MORE?"

"Yeah, Bawlmer, hon."

Rho properly pronounces her hometown's name, and I must admit, the first time I heard a native pronounce it, it was damn funny. Granted, it's not like they all pronounce it that way, but it is amusing. Sort of like some St. Louisians calling a sink a "zink" and "warshing" clothes, not "washing" them. :) Shit, I'm guilty of "warshing."

god. "warshing." man, that drives me nuts. megan says that. i make fun of her. tee hee. i'm such a nice guy. "gotta warsh the dishes." ugh.

from...
 

Jacksonville, Fla. Or am I still from Philly?

I tend to think of myself as being "from" wherever I'm located at that time.
I even pick up the local accents to some extent. I'm developing a touch of Southern Accent as long as I'm down here.

See y'all later

Brian

Not to be confused with the big city further north, "Fluffiya". You know, where the Iggles play.

Brian, don't feel bad about "y'all"...southern accents are *highly* contagious. One month in Memphis was long enough to make me completely unintelligible up here. Actually a couple hours worth of Shakespeare will have me speaking in Elizabethan cadences, too...

Just work on your prounoun formation. To spice it up, you can add a Texas accent:

Second person singular: "Y'all"

Second person plural: "*all* y'alls"

I spent 3 semesters in the pseudo-South (southeastern Missouri) going to school. They have some of the thickest drawls I've heard to date, other than folks from Louisiana. When I moved back to St. Louis, it took a while to get rid of the slight twang. One of my friends said that I sounded like a cross between a Southerner and a surfer. *shrugs*

Every once in a while, someone from here in Philadelphia says that I have an accent. Not a twang, but that it's just "different." The funny thing is now, when I listen to my mother talk, she sounds like SHE has an accent. I don't think the way I talk has changed at all since moving to the East Coast...at least I don't THINK so. St. Louisans generally do not have an accent, with the exception of some folks on the South Side (see my previous post here) and those out in the rural sections of the area (about 40 miles out of the city). The only other city I've been to that seems devoid of accents in general is Washington.

Well, Philadelphians DO have accents too. I didn't know this until I was about 20, but my brother (who was taking speaking classes) pointed out a few examples:

What philadelphians drink from the tap: wooder

What philadelphians dry themselves with after they shower: tal

What philadelphians put in a shortcake: strawbries

The full name of a philadelphian called Tony: Antny

The plural in philadelphia of you: youz

And, of course, we can't forget the proverbial "Yo!" which has since been kinda nationalized.

Why?

I happened upon this board when FARK linked to it, a couple weeks ago (?)

I like what I see, and since your membership requirements are so forgiving, I decided to quit lurking and join up.

Where (am I located/from)?

Minneapolis Minnesota/Ellsworth Wisconsin.

I first noticed it via a picture of the day through Fark.

I looked up the url and poked around and discovered I really like the Cellar; it is a throw-back to the polite days of the early eighties when I was BBSing around town. (Back then, we didn't know what a flame-war was if it burned our undershorts ... like I stated, I was from a polite group of technocrats)

The general character of its Regular Participants is rare and good and something that had been missing in my life for a while.

Cellar..Rock On...*snif* *snif*.... :-)

hi y'all. virgin post here.

just ran across an old bookmark i had laying around (most likely from an iotd link on /.)

been lurking a couple days and just having this cellar grow on me. it just utterly makes sense that this grew out of one of the old dial-up bbs systems. god, i spent a lot of time on those (chicago area, tho.)

i'd thought this sort of thing had been buried by the yahoos and /.'s long ago. who's running it? tony? if so, thanks, tony.

np, alley, welcome. To say that the place reflects on the old BBSing days is... well, something I'll probably steal for the tagline at some point, because it's damn hard to describe the place.

it's a cool thing you have here. not unlike what i have (had?) in mind for one i'm starting to crank up.

but i doubt it can be reproduced (and that would be pointless anyway). i hope my site can get something of this flavor tho, if i ever get it off the ground.

you all have a gem here. be careful with it.

btw, forgot to mention (definitely not in order of importance)

1) if you can "steal" something out of that for the tagline... make hay while the sun shines. i won't rain on the parade.

2) "damn hard to describe the place" is a definition of success as i gauge it. of course, my gauges aren't attuned to the rest of the world (as i've found, usually to my chagrin), so ymmv.

3) i find it interesting that i want to advertise the cellar, but only to people i like. which is pretty funny, given that i probably got the link from a posting on /., which means it's been harvested by every search engine in the friggin' world. of course the flipside of that is that <b>normal</b> people don't read slashdot. frankly, i'm not sure why i still bother.

fwiw

btw, apropos of little or nothing, this is a pretty kickass piece of forum software. i'll have to check it out - i know i saw a link there somewhere

alley - this is the thread for you :)

the cellar definitely is something special. i find myself in the same boat as you - i want to advertise it, but only to people i like. i'm not sure if this is cheating tony out of people or not. for now, i'm pretty open whereever i go about how much i like the cellar - that's because the readership of my general postings is generally pretty low. i want people to be here, but i don't want it to be another slashdot. we had our first "spam" here a few weeks ago, and there was a post a week or so after that with the infamous goatse guy. but i don't think that those alone will ruin it. i hope nothing ever does.

The forum software, vBulletin, is getting popular. This place is mostly generic vBulletin. My theory is that you stick with close to the default so people only have to learn the software once. You should be able to use any other vBulletin software out there if you use one vBulletin-based system.

Unfortunately most site operators believe that they are more special if they customize the hell out of it. But the features are so well thought-out that any customization beyond style is likely to break a very good concept of how this stuff is supposed to operate.

It's the people who make a forum special but bad software can definitely get in the way!

Arriving through intellectual pursuit, I came to the cellar in search of "community" on the Internet.

I hung around, I think, in large part because of the real sense of community I found at cellar.org. Not that everybody is a buddy. Everyone is not cut from the same cloth or wears the same stripe. It's not a club: it's a community.

It's interesting to me that this thread, Why The Cellar?, even exists ... to pose the questions: how did you get here? why do you stay? It's telling that this thread was started by a member of the community, not the founder.

I'm interested in the Internet as a communications medium for relationship-based enterprises. Community building is critical.

For a long time, I've been a disciple of Powazek, who recently published Design for Community. Derek's one of those friggin' geniuses you meet from time to time, and might never have met, but for the net.

Recently, Powazek wrote an essay on his book's companion website, titled Seven sites doing it right. Among those sites recommended by the guru for doing interesting things with community features, was Kuro5hin.org. When Powazek said to visit K5 "with your brain on" I was intrigued, and had an irresistible urge to explore for myself.

Off to K5, I started looking for a community doing interesting things with community features. On my first visit, I found a post by someone who also appeared to have his brain on ... Wondertoad. (Wonder who that is? Little did I know.) This toad's post indicated to me a deep appreciation for the subject of my quest.

It is well worth reproducing here:

Immediately, I ran to the cellar and registered my nic name.

It's great to be part of a community, where everybody knows your name.

Cheers,

Nic

(even if it's not your real name) :)

PS: Now I'm off to recommend cellar.org to Powazek's list of sites doing interesting things with community.

PPS: Your community is a precious thing. It's yours. Don't let interlopers screw it up for you. CitizenXit

PPPS: More sounds from Cheers.

Sam ... "You are the nuttiest, the stupid, the phoniest fruitcake I ever met."
Diane ... "You, Sam Malone, are the most arrogant, self-centered --"
Sam ... "Shut Up! Shut your fat mouth."
Diane ... "Make me."
Sam ... "Make you? My God, I'm, I'm gonna, I"m gonna bounce you off every wall in this office."
Diane ... "Try it and you'll be walking funny tomorrow, or should I say funnier."
Sam ... "You know, you know I always wanted to pop you one, maybe this is my lucky day huh?"
Diane ... "You disgust me, I hate you."
Sam ... "Are you as turned on as I am?"
Diane ... "More."