Pondering on the future of the House of Lunduke BBS
I've been running my BBS (the adorably named "House of Lunduke BBS" ) for years and years -- with a few interruptions for server upgrades and the like.
It has been incredibly fun for me to keep a small part of BBS gaming alive. LORD, TradeWars, The Pit... these are some of my favorite multiplayer computer games of all time. Unique and truly enjoyable. And almost more importantly: keeping these games running provides historical value. Us old-timers can revisit them, and the young-ins can experience gaming of the 80s and early 90s for the first time.
Well, as many of you know, I moved. Rather... I hit the road. Right now, my family is traveling in an RV across the country. Visiting family. seeing national parks, and searching for the perfect town to re-settle.
Which means, the BBS is off-line. Because it's hard to run a server -- with dedicated Internet connection -- in an RV. ;)
So I'm left pondering what the near-term future of the BBS should be.
Obviously I can't run a physical server out of the RV. Connection issues aside, there just isn't the space.
Which means I'll need to get a remote server. No big deal, a pretty inexpensive VPS will be plenty beefy enough to run a BBS server. Even a popular one. ;)
But, perhaps, this is also a good time to shake things up a little. Get more people involved (Co-SysOps). Change BBS software to something "modern" (read: currently updated, like Synchronet or Mystic). Build in some Internet-y functionality. Let folks build newer games and doors for it.
Not sure, honestly! Torn!
At this point I'm really just thinking out loud. But I'd love to hear what all of you think.
Do you want to be involved in the running or building of a BBS? Do you want to see more historical accuracy (recreating the features and style of late 80s BBS's)... or would you enjoy taking a BBS to the limits of what can be done via ANSI, Telnet and (maybe) SSH? Should there be optional web interfaces for part of it? New games? Old games?
Curious your thoughts as I'm still forming my own.
Regardless of approach, I'd like to start getting a BBS back up and running soon. Just need to settle on the details. ;)