by Tom Lassiter, Membership Secretary
Avid internet fans, those who spend twenty hours or more a week on the web, thought they had died and gone to heaven when HAL-PC began its internet service - HALNet.
That was in August 1994 and the internet, while already beyond its infancy, didn't even approach the mass hysteria it is today. To see the growth graph of the internet take a gander at www.nw.com/zone/hosts.gif
Wow, that's impressive growth. Even more impressive has been the growth of our own HALNet. And even more impressive has been the continual growth in quality to match the quantitative growth. It has been a terrific success story.
From an initial gleam in the mind of Eb Gunther, HALNet got off the ground. Fueled by a committee under the chairmanship of Gerald Zimmerer the baby service was nurtured into adolescence by innumerable volunteers until today it stands a mature responsible provider of internet service to HAL-PC members and their families.
The "big four" (in abilities, not in girth) of Larry Dillard, Jeff Hupp, Robert Gunn, and Jay Thomas continue to lead us onto ever-higher plateaus of service. To be sure, they have help from many others. But they devote innumerable hours of near thankless, and sometimes actually cursed, volunteer service so that we can enjoy the surfing pleasures at our fingertips. So cut them some slack at times. Electronics, and particularly the internet, are not perfect. Most of your problems really have more to do with your phone line quality than anything HALNet can do.
I am far from being a technological wizard (most would place me at the opposite end of the scale) but I do know enough to appreciate the wizardry these gentlemen pull off on our behalf. From the early days when we had several hundred individual modems lined up on shelves in a closet of the old HAL-PC office, they have brought us to the pinnacle of technology as it is known today. I'm glad they have the desire and ability to maintain proficiency in this world of fast paced platform development as it loses most of us real quick.
If you think we don't have the technology, look at the HALNet info on the HAL-PC homepage or at hal-pc.org/~jeff. As I write it shows in real time there are 567 of 667 lines in use, the temp in the internet equipment room is 75 degrees, and 48 users are reading newsgroups. Since we had to restrict access to PING and TRACERT usage due to malicious attacks on the system, Jeff has also provided an alternate way to do them on the webpage listed above. Maintain the service and protect the system. Works every time.
We have many HAL-PC members who joined solely to obtain the dependable, cheap, internet services available via HALNet. And that is great. We hope they will also take advantage of the other benefits of HAL-PC membership; but if not we welcome them into our midst anyway. But it would be our loss as well as theirs if we did not get to know them as individuals and share our knowledge and theirs with each other.
So thank your lucky stars you live in the Houston area - home of HAL-PC, the world's largest PC user group, and HALNet, the premier ISP (internet service provider). While you are at it - thank fellow member Eb Gunther who once said something like:
"Hey fellows, there is this thing out there called the internet that we may want to take a look at".
The rest is now history.
Thanks to all the members who participated in the process.
Tom Lassiter may be reached at jamesl@hal-pc.org
E-mail me at webmaster@hal-pc.org with any comments you have and tell me what you want to see here.
