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Fall of the Berlin Wall on Usenet (1989)
- _ugfj 3y ago[flagged]
- hinkley 3y agoWhat’s so amazing about the fall of the wall is how bureaucratic the announcement was meant to be (we have agreed to dismantle the wall, but we don’t have a plan to enact yet). But everyone showed up with amateur or actual construction equipment and started tearing it to pieces. The wall more or less went up overnight, it’s no wonder people wanted it down just as fast.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- em-bee 3y agofriends of mine took a VW bus and drove some 300km to help. i wasn't in the country at the time, or else i probably would have joined them.
- nixass 3y agoCan you please expand on that help thing? Was it to move people closer to border area?
- em-bee 3y agowell, as the parent comment said: "everyone showed up with amateur or actual construction equipment and started tearing it to pieces", my friends took hammers, chisels and maybe pickaxes, drove to berlin and started chipping away at the wall. i don't know how many went, but a VW bus can seat a handful of people: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volkswagen_Type_2 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volkswagen_Type_2 pictures my friends made looked similar to this: https://external-content.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.vol.at%2F2014%2F11%2F01903707.jpg&f=1&nofb=1&ipo=images https://external-content.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=https%3A%2F%2F... https://www.telegraph.co.uk/content/dam/business/2019/11/08/TELEMMGLPICT000215558722_trans_NvBQzQNjv4BqhNkvlguSCLNAbLFJA3hmlwHneqVwUKuplIkcPv5znvw.jpeg?imwidth=1280 https://www.telegraph.co.uk/content/dam/business/2019/11/08/...
- hannob 3y agoIt should probably be said that tearing down the wall was mainly a souvenir thing. People did this so they could get their "piece of the Berlin wall", not to practically tear down the wall to cross it. At the point these images were taken you were already legally able to go to the other side at normal border crossings.
- em-bee 3y agoactually, i don't think so. there were not that many official border crossings. remember the wall went right through the city, and by right you should be able to cross on every street corner. so i believe that people were motivated to remove the wall to be able to cross more easily. but also to remove the wall as a symbol of the separation of the two parts of the city. at the time i certainly felt the sentiment was to get rid of the wall. i didn't see any boasting of souvenirs by my friends later.
- kmoser 3y agoYou're forgetting that the "Berlin Wall" was actually two walls separated by a strip of "no-man's land" which was mined and patrolled by armed guards and dogs. Anyone who managed to breach one of the walls would not get far. While the guards tolerated souvenir hunters, you would definitely not want to make a break for the other side. Although crossing may have been technically legal, it was still under the jurisdiction of the border authorities; just as it's legal to travel from Mexico to the US, but you can't just waltz across anywhere you want. Remember, East and West Germany were still two different countries, each with their own laws about customs and immigration. The majority of the "wallpeckers" just wanted a souvenir and had no intention (or means) to actually break through steel-reinforced concrete using a hand held pick-axe and hammer. In fact, it took a concentrated effort to breach the wall sufficiently to create an opening you could actually pass through. The initial attempts at grabbing souvenirs (followed by actually removing large sections of the wall with construction equipment) happened at heavily populated areas like Checkpoint Charlie, where the large numbers of people made it harder for the authorities to object to. Full disclosure: I was there and used a friend's hammer and pick-axe to break off a few pieces of the wall.
- netsharc 3y agoIt was a bureaucratic mistake in the messaging, although it's not clear what the East Germans' actual plan was, it seems they did want to open the border: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fall_of_the_Berlin_Wall https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fall_of_the_Berlin_Wall
- hannob 3y agoThe story is a bit more complex than that. Günter Schabowski, who announced the "new travel law" as they called it, only got a note right before a press conference and wasn't properly briefed. He was then asked when that'll happen, and he said something along the lines of "according to my knowledge immediately", which was interpreted as "we can go there right now, tonight", but which wasn't what was planned. This eventually led to a situation where thousands of people were standing at the border, wanting to cross, and eventually the border guards saw no other option than to let them pass.
- layer8 3y agoYep, history might have turned out quite differently if Schabowski had refrained from answering with what was just his supposition.
- varjag 3y agoNot too differently. East Germany was a goner at that point in history.
- lisasays 3y agoIts days were numbered -- but the system could have easily come crashing down very violently, or remained intact but with a massive crackdown (in fact the party leadership was making explicit plans or the latter of these -- "Day X", as they referred that eventuality -- while a "Chinese Solution" was a tacitly acknowledged outcome as well). And then plodded along for another 10 years or so. That's why the events as they unfolded were surprising.
- varjag 3y agoEast Germany was not sustainable without Soviet Union. That strip of land in the middle of Europe with barely 16 million people isn't quite China. But yes it certainly was surprising, without the benefit of hindsight now.
- lisasays 3y agoThe famous announcement was in regard to permitting unrestricted travel (for a supposedly limited time window). Nothing was said about dismantling the wall (at the time or at any point in the future). The "dismantling" itself (which at the outset was more like vandalism and souvenir-grabbing) started happening spontaneously after crowds began to overwhelm the border crossing, and the ensuing carnival atmosphere took over.
- hutzlibu 3y ago"vandalism" I am not sure "vandalism" is the right term, when it comes to damaging a prison wall for a whole nation. It was a symbol of fear and oppression. People were shot at the wall every year, so sure, not everyone (or maybe only a few) who joined, were freedom fighters or deeply philosophical about the meaning of what they were doing. But it still was a liberating act, doing something that likely would have got you shot, just the day before. No matter if you would have tried it from the western or eastern side. (even though of course, it was more likely from the eastern side, the western side was already full of graffiti, but actually damaging the wall, also from the western side, would have not been very dangerous. People did do this to help people flee the east on purpose. And some of those helpers did get shot.)
- lisasays 3y agoI just meant the first "Wallpecker" blows were decidedly small-scale -- and not part a plan to demolish the wall per se.
- hutzlibu 3y agoI know what you meant, so no problem. I just wanted to let you know, that some people might react a bit offended .. (my first reaction was)
- Convolutional 3y ago> It was a symbol of fear and oppression The Russians, invaded twice by Germany in the 20th century, sought to withdraw completely from Germany, if it became a neutral country like Switzerland or Austria. The West Germans continually refused this. By 1961 they through in the towel and the west Berlin enclave was sealed off. After the USSR broke up, Russian and German (and western) documents on this were released, which verified what happened at the time. When Germany sought to reunite, the Prime Minister of the UK, Thatcher, sought behind closed doors to stop German reunification. So it was Gorbachev removing impediments to reunification and Thatcher seeking to create them.
- tomjen3 3y agoYou can actually watch that part of the press meeting on youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b3qVjwzgC2A https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b3qVjwzgC2A It's in German, doesn't appear to have any translations.
- doe88 3y agoThe twitter of its time (minus Elon)!
- mathgeek 3y agoNot particularly. The masses were neither on nor aware of Usenet and thus it never had the cultural real-time impact on society that modern popular services do. It was mostly “early” tech folks and academics chatting with each other.
- macintux 3y agoThere were glimmers. The Babylon 5 group had an impact on both the audience and the show itself, for example, with JMS actively participating.
- mjmsmith 3y agoPlus federation. Like Algol, an improvement on its successors.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- caf 3y agoTINC
- layer8 3y agoMore like the Reddit of its time.
- antod 3y agoI often think of it the other way round, ie Reddit is the usenet of its time.
- anthk 3y agoMore like Slashdot.
- 3y ago
- dhosek 3y agoMy favorite Berlin Wall story was a friend of mine wrote an opinion piece for the college newspaper in the fall of 1989 talking about the moves towards democracy in the Warsaw Pact nations which concluded with the line, “but don’t expect the Berlin Wall to come down any time soon.” He submitted the piece at the beginning of November. The paper came out on November 13th.
- huijzer 3y agoSimilar funny story. There was a Dutch historian who announced that Putin would never attack Ukraine full scale and he did this the night before the invasion. (Apart from that, I still respect the historian. He might not be the best, but he is a good storyteller.)
- S_Pineapple 3y agoDo you happen to know the name of said historian? I am curious to read what his specific reasoning was!
- pantalaimon 3y agoWasn’t that an opinion that was shared by many back then - that a full invasion would be way too costly with little to gain and Russia is just sabre-rattling? Most people in Europe could not imagine a full out war and considered the warnings from the US as merge fear mongering.
- nemima 3y agoMaarten van Rossem I think
- CPLX 3y agoPredicting things is hard. I was standing on West Street in lower Manhattan looking up at the World Trade Center on fire, on a cell phone with my mother, and said “well it doesn’t look like it’s going to fall down or anything.”
- macintux 3y ago
- jonhohle 3y agoWhat’s nice about Usenet (and maybe a reason to being something similar back, is that Mastadon?) is the replicated public archives of this snapshot of history. The thread earlier this week highlighted that DJB and Werner Vogels were on early sockets conversations debating the merits over STREAMS or Sun RPC. There’s a durability that doesn’t exist with so many independent BBS that are constantly shutting down, taking decades of conversations and information with them.
- jgilias 3y agoAnd now there’s Discord. I really wish less stuff happened on it.
- HeckFeck 3y agoI've seen too many game mod and open source projects choose to centre their community upon Discord. Whilst convenient, it does not bode well for posterity.
- antiterra 3y agoThere’s a lot of idiotic stuff I posted as a grade school kid too that I am super happy isn’t readily available.
- onionisafruit 3y agoSame here. 30 years later I am still very shy about using my name online.
- ghaff 3y agoThis highlights some wisdom from this Salon article: https://www.salon.com/2002/01/08/saving_usenet/ https://www.salon.com/2002/01/08/saving_usenet/ To a first approximation no one cares about bugs in some ancient SunOS version lost to history on Usenet. They care about the societal discussions that took place at the time. But a lot of people thought the former was documentation and the latter ephemera.
- __d 3y agoI think the basic point is valid: rec., soc., even alt., are kinda more interesting historically than the more "proper" comp., sci., etc, hierarchies. That said, I most often find myself searching (often in vain) for old posts in the comp hierarchy.
- highwaylights 3y agoI really wish I’d been around at this time of the net finding its feet. The 90’s kind of feel like the glory days in retrospect to me, but I get how I was one of the Eternal September arrivals for a whole bunch of people that felt that was the end of the heyday. Reading through the thread it’s a real shame to see the decline in our ability (willingness?) to have civil and thoughtful discourse. I honestly might just spend the evening crawling through 30+ year old usenet threads just to see what conversations people were having casually back then.
- super256 3y ago> Reading through the thread it’s a real shame to see the decline in our ability (willingness?) to have civil and thoughtful discourse. If you can read German, I recommend reading the usenet threads of Kim Dotcom (Megaupload founder). They will show you the opposite of thoughtful discourse. :D https://www.babsi.de/KIMBLE.txt https://www.babsi.de/KIMBLE.txt
- netsharc 3y agoHis email was @aol.com, ha, typical... I remember seeing his website in the olden times, where he put up pics of cars and parties from Monaco/Cote d'Azur. And when the NZ police raided him on behest of the FBI, it seems he got actual hero status. It makes me wonder if crime does pay after all...
- bboygravity 3y agoCrime?
- _rsp7 3y agoSchmitz got arrested first in 1994, but he wasn’t the only one. I can share some info from back then. In the early 90’s an employee at AT&T downloaded millions of calling card numbers at work and started distributing them through a worldwide network of invite only bulletin boards (lots of warez trading and other black hat related stuff). The fraud cost AT&T around $18 million and stretched across around 300 conspirators. As backstory, the US had started cracking down on hackers based in the US in the early 90’s and they were getting long prison sentences. As a result, there was still contract hacking work available, but fewer and fewer people in the US that weren’t serving long sentences who were up for it. As a result much of that work started being offered abroad outside the US. Naively (it was assumed) out of reach of the US authorities. Around the same time, many telephone networks in Europe started switching their PSTN networks from analogue to digital, rendering system 4 blue boxing dead, and international dialing went back to being prohibitively expensive. Hacking PABX’s with toll free numbers was the only (laborious) option (which Schmitz also sold). Therefore these calling cards quickly became immensely valuable in the scene, for making free calls wherever you wanted to and replacing that lost access. When the fraud was discovered the US Secret Service got involved. The conspirators were tracked down and rounded up within a coordinated series of worldwide arrests. The US tried to extradite as many as possible. Many however were barely out of their teens, and many countries didn’t want the negative publicity of sending 20 year olds to serve life sentences in the US. The raids included the local serious crimes division, US Secret Service and field office based FBI liaisons. They were pretty annoyed about it and there were a fair few bulletin board owners and card traders that were also hacking US domestic networks, including government agencies, on contract, so they were really enjoying themselves rounding everyone up. I believe that Schmitz came under BND’s radar at that point and they applied the pressure to turn him. I don’t think it would have been particularly hard to do so. The guy would have sold his grandmother for a couple of Deutschmarks and he fancied himself as some kind of James Bond. I think part of his 2 year suspended sentence deal was the condition that he had to turn agent provocateur within the CCC. That’s why his subsequent actions and self publicity always had an air of being untouchable. So he just grifted whilst setting people in the scene up to keep BND happy and working for the CCC hated lawyer Gravenreuth. Until people in the CCC figured it out and they cut him loose. The pertinent part of that page translated is as follows: https://pastebin.com/24vACUzp https://pastebin.com/24vACUzp
- subarctic 3y agoOne of the comments, by someone named Stewart Tansley: > Personally, I miss the objectivism debates - Come back Magnus, all is forgiven! Is this a reference to Magnus Pym, the main character in A Perfect Spy by John le Carré?
- davidgay 3y ago> Is this a reference to Magnus Pym, the main character in A Perfect Spy by John le Carré? No, probably a reference to https://groups.google.com/g/eunet.politics/search?q=magnus%20kempe https://groups.google.com/g/eunet.politics/search?q=magnus%2... I wasted too much time (not that much, but any time on this topic with a "true believer" like Magnus was completely wasted) arguing objectivism with him as an undergrad...
- olalonde 3y ago> Yes, I know that does not include the US. But shall we go on being intimidated by that hamburger-munching bunch of arrogant s*ckers? I see flaming was already a thing back then.
- ylee 3y agoI've been on Usenet since the 1990s. All those terminally online who claim that Trump (and Dubya before him) "ruined America's reputation abroad" are, of course, idiots. The online left back then hated the just as much as today.
- Georgelemental 3y ago> I think you are lacking some imagination here. There can be no doubt that after the events of the last couple of months (starting with the Hungarians opening their borders) there is no way back the the previous post-war state. With East and West loosing more and more reasons to be scared of each other, the military blocks will loose importance - they may be gone soon. > Sure, all the politicians in east and west keep telling the opposite, but that's just because they would rather keep things the way they were. For those in power, the status quo was much more comfortable as it is now, where no one really knows what's going to happen. How do they want to motivate further spending on arms when all those bad guys aren't bad any more? Sooner or later (and I believe sooner) the peoples of Europe will be fed up with this (if they aren't already), and what good are those military blocks then????? > The East bloc obviously start disintegrating, politically and militarily. The West bloc won't survive that; if there is no East bloc, NATO will fall apart quickly. So, what's the problem? I certainly will feel more at ease with _less_ weapons. So will most people, I think. And besides, I think it's time Europe is being run by Europeans, not by Americans and Russians. Oh, you sweet summer child…
- lizardking 3y agoThe west was drunk on the on The End of History kool-Aid before the phrase was even coined.
- mastax 3y agoWell it worked for twenty years or so.
- Georgelemental 3y agoNATO disarmament/disbanding never "worked" at all
- chickenimprint 3y agoThe western european armies all massively downsized. The West-German Bundeswehr had around 500K soldiers and almost 3000 tanks until the end of the cold war. Currently, the - notably united - German Bundeswehr employs around 180k soldiers and owns a measly 225 tanks.
- rewgs 3y agoIt's strange to see so much of what I think of as decidedly late 90s/early 2000s internet slang ("BTW," "flame," etc) being used here.
- glenneroo 3y agoEver heard of chunking? The old keyboards used to make a "chunk" sound when you'd type a key, hence going on a BBS and typing something = chunking. I'm curious where and when people used this word - googling these days brings up totally unrelated results.
- ck2 3y agoI wonder if Korea could ever be unified like that by even 2089 or if the absolute horror, suffering and abuse in North Korea will be perpetuated for all time, fortified by China and now their nuclear arms doomsday. East Germany never had nuclear right? Now that might be insurmountable.
- pyuser583 3y agoThe United States tried uniting two of its territories: Guam and North Marianas Islands. Guam had been occupied by the Japanese during WWII, while N Marianas had not. That difference was too much.
- s1mon 3y agoI was on Usenet at this time. It's hard, even though I lived through it, to really explain how different it was since the total "population" of Usenet was a very tiny fraction of the world (some sources say <1m people around this time). Now 5+ billion people have smartphones. Many individual newsgroups would only have hundreds of active users. The reach was very wide geographically, but the demographics were very narrow and numbers of people were very small. Typically they were in big tech companies, and at academic institutions. One related but vivid memory: in 1991 I was playing some text based MUD (multi-user dungeon) which I barely remember, but at certain moment, someone broke out of character and mentioned that the US had just invaded Iraq (during the Persian Gulf War). It seemed so bizarre yet foreshadowing of the changes to come, of the ways that our news would be shared on social media.
- lannisterstark 3y ago>But why non-Germans. Don't they have their own problems? Who on earth does REALLY STILL fear Germany? People who are used to your shenanigans since the foundation of Prussia, Hans. And I don't know about fear, more like fed up. Germany should have never been allowed to remain a state after helping start two world wars. Dismantle into HRE-like micronations or give it to their neighboring nations.
- mcv 3y agoGermany was completely dismantled and then rebuilt as a completely new nation. Modern Germany is nothing like its predecessors.
- mcv 3y ago"Content unavailable" Everybody else seems to be able to access this. Has it disappeared since this link was posted, or is it somehow region blocked?
- pyuser583 3y agoThe bits debating territories East of the Oder are interesting, especially in light of current events. At one point someone even asks if “Russia” [sic] get to keep the “bits” it stole while collaborating with Hitler. Of course, those bits now belong to Ukraine. At one point someone says “Look, Matt, that is the kind of debate we don't need at all in this situation”. I strongly disagree. Vigorous debates are important. Unified Germany eventually agreed to “cede” the land east of the Oder in 1991. That’s fine, but if Poland or Germany exit the EU there could be some hard feelings if German residents were deported from Poland. For its part, Poland is still filled with hard feelings regarding Germany’s WWII conduct. If agreeing to give Poland the land east of the Oder was meant to smooth things over, it failed. Germany is much better at remembering what needs to be remembered, and forgetting what needs to be forgotten. Maybe a bit too good.
- pyuser583 3y agoWilliam Scheier, the guy who wrote “Rise and Fall of the Third Reich” wrote and article warning against the rise of a united Germany. It seems quaint in retrospect. Germany is currently making noises about maybe, possibly, rearming. Other countries (France!) seemed ticked they aren’t doing it faster.
- pyuser583 3y ago“ This isn't a flame, but isn't the above statement simply an unsupported opinion? What kind of data do you have on …” I’ve written that about a million times myself.