I was around in the early 90s on BBSs. One of the things that amuses me about people asking AI how to do bad stuff and all the handwringing about AI safety is that one of the popular things that was available for download on some of the less reputable forums in the early 90s were various "text files" that would give instructions for doing various illegal or morally dubious things.
There were hundreds of these and it was a practical thing to share back when 1 megabyte took an hour to download. One that cracked up to no end that I still remember vaguely was "How to be a gigolo.". Apparently, you have to move to South Florida and wear a sport coat. I don't remember anything else from it except it was hilariously written. Good times.
Also, since BBSes required a lot of technical knowhow to get into, it was this back channel for all the extreme teenage geeks in the local calling area. It was this phenomenally fun secret club that I met some exceptionally weird people through, but also lifelong friends. There were some great magazines of the time like Mondo 2000, and the ethos was real techno-libertarianism, information wants to be free, and all that fun stuff. Everyone was coming off the high of the Soviet Union falling apart and believed that now human liberty would flourish everywhere.
There were hundreds of these and it was a practical thing to share back when 1 megabyte took an hour to download. One that cracked up to no end that I still remember vaguely was "How to be a gigolo.". Apparently, you have to move to South Florida and wear a sport coat. I don't remember anything else from it except it was hilariously written. Good times.
Also, since BBSes required a lot of technical knowhow to get into, it was this back channel for all the extreme teenage geeks in the local calling area. It was this phenomenally fun secret club that I met some exceptionally weird people through, but also lifelong friends. There were some great magazines of the time like Mondo 2000, and the ethos was real techno-libertarianism, information wants to be free, and all that fun stuff. Everyone was coming off the high of the Soviet Union falling apart and believed that now human liberty would flourish everywhere.