Re: On 'tros vs. pure cracks, my opinion

[Egan Ford <datajerk@gmail.com>]

On 7/27/12 8:24 AM, bloomer_au wrote:
> that I finally read any at-length stories about Apple II cracking history.

Now that is a book I would love to read.  Any takers?

I was never much of a gamer, and therefore not much of a pirate either 
(all I wanted for my II was Aztec C).  I was principally interested in 
programming and communications (BBS, serial, model, networks, etc...). 
However, the exchange of wares via modems fascinated me--I documented 
one such experience here: http://jerkwerks.com/bbs-get-your-retro-on/.

After watching Jason's crack screen video and his BBS documentaries, and 
after reading the various posts here on pirate lore over the years, it 
got me thinking that someone should document this as a book.  I would 
really like to know more about this pirate culture and the (low level) 
techniques used by crackers.

I wasn't completely blind to this culture myself.  Some of my best 
friends were avid collectors of wares and cracked them as well.  We 
started a club of sorts and met monthly at an artificial organs lab 
(they had large conference rooms with electrical outlets, but I was more 
interested in the status of various cows with artificial hearts) to 
setup our Apple IIs and later Macs to swap wares.  Back then *nothing* 
beat the bandwidth of a truck full of floppies.  And floppies were not 
cheap, not if you need 100s of them.

My buddy got a tip on a source of dirt cheap floppies.  He setup a meet 
and we drove to a shady part of town (half homes/half industrial) to 
meet a guy late that night in an abandon parking lot lit only by the 
passing cars on the interstate.  He sold us unmarked floppies in ziplock 
bags from the trunk of his car (he claimed that he got them from a 
dumpster).  Cash only.

I am sure there are 1000s of stories that would make up a great pirate 
lore book.  Most of them can be had from Usenet and textfiles.com, but 
given that many are still alive today face-to-face interviews would make 
for a fantastic read.

Just a thought.