Columns

ECHO TALK

Food for thought from Fido's echomail.
Purloined without permission by D Myers

In this week's Echo Talk, Clay Tannacore returns to Fidonet and attempts to mediate between Alec Grynspan and Bob Morasvik. The secret cabal controlling Fidonet is explained to Jerry Schwartz.

Area: Zone 1 Echo Coordinator
From: Clay Tannacore
To: Alec Grynspan

*In a message to Bob Moravsik regarding "Your silly muscle-flexing", Alec Grynspan wrote:

BM> Its the medication....slows down time !!!!! Misses the parade.
BM> Wonders what happened....pure buffoonery ! <wink>

AG> We already know about your meds, Bozo. That's why you were
AG> elected buffoon-for-life!

Jeez! I leave for three months plus, and find you two still in constant conflict, when I return. How about we officially divide The Buffoon Title in half, and bestow it equally between you two gentlemen?

Fair enough????? . . . [g]

Toodles,
CT

Area: Z1_ELECT
From: Douglas Myers
To: Jerry Schwartz

JS> Let's see: you have been nodelisted since 1986 and you are an NC.
JS> How do you define "Old Guard"?
JS> This repeated assertion that there is a cabal holding FidoNet
JS> back (and the underlying assumption that if things aren't working
JS> out the way we like, SOMEBODY is at fault) should be backed up
JS> with specifics or given a rest.

Dear Jerry -

I meant to mention this to you before, but sometimes things get forgotten in the press of echomail. Also, the Fidonet Elders don't take kindly to exposing their secrets, so I may have feared for my life at the time.

Deep in the caverns of Fidonet lie the secret Chambers of the Fidonet Elders. It is within these Chambers where the Old Guard resides, protecting the Elders as they gather in Solemn Enclave and issue Grave Pronouncements. The Fidonet Elders go back much further than 1986 - they even predate Fido itself. They are dedicated to the preservation of Tradition, and secretly control Fidonet from their Commodore Computers and 110 Baud Modems.

It is a little known fact that FTS-1 connection protocol contains a back door which enables any Fidonet Elder to seize control of the mailer session and modify nodelist segments or issue netmail in the receiving system's name. This is the mechanism of control which allows absolute, and yet secret, control of the mechanism which is Fidonet. The traditions of FTS-1 compatibility and ZMH keep each and every node in Fidonet open to their nefarious manipulations.

Now that I've backed up this assertion with specifics, it's likely that the Fidonet Elders will frown upon me. Consequently, I will be abandoning my computer, my job, and my cat and seek to establish a new identity in some foreign port. The Fidonet Elders will likely send a member of the Old Guard to turn the computer back on again and replace me with a virtual sysop. Perhaps this virtual sysop will even conduct a successful campaign for the seat of Z1C and give the Fidonet Elders yet another avenue of Fidonet control.

Respectfully
Douglas Myers
Displaced Freedom Fighter