>So, why was this such a big deal? Well, it was our internet back then. Ignoring voice calls, its how we dialed BBS's. Back then unless the BBS was very nearby

>So, why was this such a big deal? Well, it was our internet back then. Ignoring voice calls, its how we dialed BBS's. Back then unless the BBS was very nearby there was a per minute charge. So there was motivation to find ways around this for people who wanted to do things like chat, play games, use email, etc for non-trivial amount of time. Getting around long distance rates was quite the motivator. For reference, minimum wage in 1980's was $3.35. Dialing outside your local band could be as high as 5 to 10 cents a minute before you even hit long-distance rates. This stuff added up quick! I was a kid back then but I had a computer with a modem and really got to know how phone billing worked after my parents got a couple high phone bills. There weren't many BBS's within band A for me, so it was pretty annoying I couldn't leave the modem on for a couple hours to download something (this was back then 1200 baud was common but still expensive - $350 [fixed for inflation]). Also, there wasn't much else to hack that didn't belong to you. There was a 'hack it because its there' aspect here.