PicoSpan was a popular computer conferencing tool written by Marcus D. Watts for the
Altos 68000. It was written in 1983 for M-Net, which was owned and operated by Mike Myers. Sometime in 1984, Marcus's employer, an
Ann Arbor
Ann Arbor is a city in Washtenaw County, Michigan, United States, and its county seat. The 2020 United States census, 2020 census recorded its population to be 123,851, making it the List of municipalities in Michigan, fifth-most populous cit ...
company called Network Technologies International (NETI), purchased the rights for PicoSpan planning to develop it into a commercial product called E-Forum.
History
Computer conferencing was first pioneered in
Michigan
Michigan ( ) is a peninsular U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest, Upper Midwestern United States. It shares water and land boundaries with Minnesota to the northwest, Wisconsin to the west, ...
on
CONFER
The abbreviation cf. (short for either Latin or , both meaning 'compare') is generally used in writing to refer the reader to other material to make a comparison with the topic being discussed. However some sources offer differing or even contr ...
, PicoSpan, E-Forum,
Caucus
A caucus is a group or meeting of supporters or members of a specific political party or movement. The exact definition varies between different countries and political cultures.
The term originated in the United States, where it can refer to ...
and Participate.
Functionality and impact
PicoSpan tried to provide CONFER's functionality while using the least amount of resources, though many users found it hard to use. It formed the basis for many conferencing systems run by hobbyists. and commercial ventures
Picospan came with a toolbox of software customization utilities that could be used to make changes at the system and user level. It was tightly integrated with Unix and could provide transparent access to many external programs that formed a part of the Unix environment. Typing "unix" at the Pico prompt put the user in a shell and users could rapidly switch back and forth and move text from one to the other.
PicoSpan also permitted the linking of discussion threads into multiple conferences, at the same time, so that multiple groups could participate. On a big BBS with many users, not all conferences are followed, so it's advantageous if the more interesting discussions are cross linked.
PicoSpan also displays responses as a single integrated thread rather than a collection of separately displayed responses. It relied on constrained choices: no one could start a new topic merely by responding to an old post, so discussions and topics didn't fragment. You couldn't respond to an individual's post and had to respond to the whole thread, forcing people to stay coherent and on-topic. However many people found it hard to use, because of its plain-text environment and steep learning curve.
Users normally dialed into the BBS over slow and flaky telephone lines. After providing the system with a name and password, they invoked Pico and brought up a long list of conference names like "Theology", "Arts", "Singles", "Twilight", "Health" and various other computer topics which were in turn grouped into themes like "Entertainment" or "Computers". The user could then type a command with the conference name as an argument and enter the conference. Once inside, they would find a series of numbered topics or threads each created by a user and each representing an asynchronous conversation. They could then post his comments.
The WELL
The Whole Earth 'Lectronic Link, normally shortened to The WELL or The Well, is a virtual community founded in 1985. It is one of the oldest continuously operating virtual communities. By 1993 it had 7,000 members, a staff of 12, and gross annu ...
still provides Picospan access, via ssh, and the Engaged graphical interface still uses the Picospan database of Unix files. Marcus Watts had a direct effect on The WELL's culture: PicoSpan prevented censorship by preventing conference hosts (who are empowered to hide or delete any response posted in their forum) from influencing a discussion, by labeling such posts as being "
".
References
{{Reflist
External links
Marcus D. Watts, Home Page
Bulletin board systems
History of the Internet
Defunct social networking services
Unix software