3 ms·

The phreaking scene opened up access to any bbs bypassing long distance/toll charges. What some use to do is put a 1-800 on a 1-900 number. By calling a 1-800

by ipaddr 5y ago

The phreaking scene opened up access to any bbs bypassing long distance/toll charges. What some use to do is put a 1-800 on a 1-900 number. By calling a 1-800 number you could connect to a sexline for free. We had so much as kids calling and making fun of the operators. A few years back I got a tv for Christmas. Christmas night I setup it up and it scans the cable channels available. Next day I notice some channels with fractions like 88.2 were programmed but the screen was blank. I rescanned and discovered new channels at different freq and they were playing really new movies. I watched a movie and when it finished there wasn't any content. I rescanned often and new movies would popup during the night. Then sex movies started to show up. I realized whatever anyone ordered via ondemand in my building was being broadcast and my tv could pick it up. If someone paused the movie I would have to wait. Mornings were a mix of cartoons and fast-forwarded porns. Day was mostly cartoon. Evenings were when people would order the hit movies. Interesting things are constantly happening no matter what era you are in.

300bps 5y ago
I noticed the same thing probably 15 years ago when I bought a TV with a digital tuner. You mirrored my experience exactly with one thing to add - another thing that cracked me up was when they would order it in Spanish! That pausing thing was annoying - on Friday or Saturday nights though you could usually change to another channel and find someone else watching the same movie at almost the same spot that didn’t have it paused. Oh and around 1985 and 1986 I wrote my own software to guess calling card numbers between midnight and 6 am. I would either use Sprint or MCI access numbers and get about 20 working codes per night.
- ipaddr 5y ago
  That's awesome. Nothing better than finding a code (turning on the screen the next morning). I got into it a little later and by that time a lot of software existed at least for the c64. I use to wardial in my sparetime and I published fun findings for a local zine for my areacode. Finding endpoints connected to a modem was a treat. Nothing better than figuring out you have to connect at 7,2 baud/parity instead of standard 8,1 then you are promped with a menu.. Fun times..
zxcvbn4038 5y ago
Lost to time apparently, there was a service called “PC Pursuit” that allowed you to dial into a local access number and then dial out again through a remote modem to BBSs in other area codes. The traffic in between was carried over an X.25 network. I used this service for a number of years before trading it for a Unix shell account w/ Usenet access. It was a little choppy sometimes but opened the door to a larger world. I still use the phreaking files from that era today - the phone number I use has rung busy for at least forty years. You can still use those automated callback numbers as a convenient exit for long meetings “oops, I’ve got to take this…”

by ipaddr 5y ago

300bps 5y ago

I noticed the same thing probably 15 years ago when I bought a TV with a digital tuner. You mirrored my experience exactly with one thing to add - another thing that cracked me up was when they would order it in Spanish! That pausing thing was annoying - on Friday or Saturday nights though you could usually change to another channel and find someone else watching the same movie at almost the same spot that didn’t have it paused. Oh and around 1985 and 1986 I wrote my own software to guess calling card numbers between midnight and 6 am. I would either use Sprint or MCI access numbers and get about 20 working codes per night.

ipaddr 5y ago
That's awesome. Nothing better than finding a code (turning on the screen the next morning). I got into it a little later and by that time a lot of software existed at least for the c64. I use to wardial in my sparetime and I published fun findings for a local zine for my areacode. Finding endpoints connected to a modem was a treat. Nothing better than figuring out you have to connect at 7,2 baud/parity instead of standard 8,1 then you are promped with a menu.. Fun times..

zxcvbn4038 5y ago

Lost to time apparently, there was a service called “PC Pursuit” that allowed you to dial into a local access number and then dial out again through a remote modem to BBSs in other area codes. The traffic in between was carried over an X.25 network. I used this service for a number of years before trading it for a Unix shell account w/ Usenet access. It was a little choppy sometimes but opened the door to a larger world. I still use the phreaking files from that era today - the phone number I use has rung busy for at least forty years. You can still use those automated callback numbers as a convenient exit for long meetings “oops, I’ve got to take this…”