Possibilities - Report on ONE BBSCON '94 12/93

Contact:   eSoft, Inc. (Makers of TBBS)
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           Aurora, CO  80014
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REPORT ON ONE BBSCON '94 12/93
------------------------------

*** From December 1993 Possibilities Newsletter ***
*** Copyright 1993 by eSoft, Inc.  All Rights Reserved ***

The second ONE BBSCON occurred August 25-29, 1993 in Colorado Springs 
Colorado.  After the 1992 ONE BBSCON, expectations were high for this show.  
Two thousand BBS enthusiasts and experts had never been in one place before.  
What would happen?  Could it possibly top last year?  The answer turned out 
to be a very resounding yes!  Those who were at the first ONE BBSCON thought 
they knew what to expect.  Within a short time they were reduced to saying
"I never expected anything like this" all over again.  Last year the vendors 
and developers were not certain what kind of show they were coming to.  This
year they knew, and had clearly spent the time to be very ready to stand out 
in the crowd.  The attendees quickly realized that they had again found THE 
place to see what is happening in the BBS industry.

How Important Was It?
---------------------
More new advancements in both online software and hardware were displayed at 
ONE BBSCON than have ever existed at one time in this industry before.  
Clearly the entire online industry is now looking to ONE BBSCON as the place 
to announce and show new products, and the pace of development has increased 
as a direct result.  Hayes was busy announcing their 28.8k V.FC modems and 
before the show was over they had issued a press release indicating those 
BBS vendors who had signed on to provide full support for them (eSoft was 
the first to develop and released our support package as we promised in that 
release -- see the accompanying article in this newsletter).

The journalistic community also was strongly affected by this year's show, 
and you have already started to see mainstream articles on BBSing in the 
Wall Street Journal, Newsweek, and many other "mainstream" publications.  
Representatives from all of the major computer publications were present and 
all of them left with a new view of the place of BBS technology in the 
world.  As with last year there was a very large international contingent of 
both press and attendees, and they also were very impressed by the show (to 
the point of trying to talk Jack and I into doing a TWO BBSCON in Europe).

This year the attendees also came ready to participate in the vendor's show 
specials.  In the two days that the vendor exhibits were open over $1 
million of hardware and software was sold!

By presenting over 130 hours of seminars and expert panel discussions from 
the most informed people in the industry (including most of those who 
created each part of it) ONE BBSCON again lived up to its claim that it 
would have more information on BBS technology in one place than had ever 
occurred before.  Again there were so many stars, that you stopped thinking 
of them as stars, and they were able to relax and interact with the 
attendees as they are not usually able to do (more learning for all 
involved).  Everyone who attended said at least once "I thought it would be 
good, but I never expected anything like this!"

What Happened at ONE BBSCON?
----------------------------
There is no way to summarize everything that occurred in an article like 
this, and I'll primarily focus on eSoft's participation in ONE BBSCON.  Even 
though there were endless sessions and exhibits, the primary impact of 2,000 
sysops or BBS enthusiasts in one place is that for a few days a world is 
created where everyone you see cares a lot about the technology.  The 
intensity of the networking has to be seen to be believed.  At 3am there are 
still groups of a couple of hundred people in the lobby talking excitedly 
about their BBS.  Whatever an attendee was planning to do next (from make a 
purchasing decision, to learn how to do a new function with their BBS) they 
were sure to find someone who had already done it.  That type of first hand 
experience accelerates the learning curve to the point where you can learn 
in a few days what you would otherwise not be able to learn in a year.  
Everyone present learned something that started new ideas flowing.

For the second year in a row, the vendor floor was a sight to behold.  If 
you saw ONE BBSCON '93, the comparison was startling.  Instead of hastily 
constructed booths, every vendor had large, professionally constructed 
booths.  And the people in those booths had clearly spent time to learn how 
to professionally display their wares at a show.  Again, companies came as 
small players and left with their immediate future secured.  And attendees 
got to see hundreds of things they never knew existed.  The large amount of 
media coverage of ONE BBSCON has also helped many new companies solve the 
problem of "how to get the word out" about what they are doing in the online 
world.  This year's show proved that ONE BBSCON is now THE place to go to 
learn about BBSing.

How Did TBBS Stack Up?
----------------------
Once again, I was personally pleased that there were more TBBS sysops 
present than any other brand of BBS software.  WildCat!, PC Board, and 
Galacticom all had large contingents of sysops present as well as 
Searchlight, Remote Access, Roboboard and others.  eSoft conducted several 
presentations of our products, and the feedback I have gotten from TBBS 
sysops who were there is that once again eSoft made the best overall 
impression of any company at the show.

The "story of TBBS" was heard loud and clear.  Many who came to compare 
products and choose their BBS software left as proud new TBBS sysops as a 
direct result.  The number of people who bought TBBS in the booth and then 
carried their new TBBS software around at the show (proud they had made the 
right choice) was again very gratifying to me.  In an arena where they could 
see each BBS package in person, talk to sysops who ran each type of BBS 
software and compare them head-to-head, more people who came undecided chose 
to buy TBBS before they left than any other BBS software.  I can't ask for a 
better testimonial than that, and I'll freely admit that it feels pretty 
good.  This year several TBBS system installers and third party developers 
had displays and/or sessions as well, and I heard of several large deals 
which were made at the show by them.

What New Products Did eSoft Demo?
---------------------------------
In the eSoft booth we demonstrated several new pre-release products.  The 
RIP KIT (which provides RIP graphics sample language and menu files) was 
demonstrated, and many commented that it was the best looking RIP 
implementation at the show.  The RIP kit shipped a few weeks after the show 
and is now available.  Several third party developers were showing RIP 
related products as well.  The one that I heard the most comment about was a 
game by Jim Maxey (of Event Horizons).  Titled "Escape from Langhorn" it 
strangely resembles Castle Wolfenstein -- including the part where you get 
vertigo playing it!  Many other third party RIP interface programs were also 
shown.

The glow was off RIP a bit this year, as people were beginning to realize 
that while it can make things much nicer than ANSI, it is far from a 
panacea.  In my TBBS Graphics seminar session I demonstrated some dedicated 
TBBS/Graphics applications that use custom client software.  These showed 
what CAN be done with TBBS and graphics and the response was strong.  But 
the secret is that online graphics is a true client/server application.  
TBBS is the server, and the terminal software is the client.  Most of the 
work takes place in the client, and if a caller doesn't have the proper 
client software, then the entire application cannot be used.  The area of 
online graphics has a lot of evolution left before it becomes what people 
want it to be.  However, again this year I was able to show that TBBS was as 
good at being a server in these applications as anything that is available 
if you are ready to do the work it takes.

Connecting to the Internet was a hot topic at this year's ONE BBSCON too.  
And as I indicated in the last newsletter we showed off a lab experiment I 
developed to demonstrate what I thought a full interface between TBBS and 
the TCP/IP Internet would look like.  My mission was to see if my vision of 
the interface was right or wrong in the eyes of those who want this 
technology.  The response was that I had it right (and would I please get it 
to be a product fast so they could have it).  eSoft WILL produce a version 
of this product in 1994, but the demo I showed was not a product.  The real 
product has to be written from the ground up and it will be late in the year 
before it is available.  I'll keep you posted as more is known on when we 
can sell it to you.

We also demonstrated UltraChat, the entertainment chat option module which 
is under development.  We announced that UltraChat would ship before the end 
of '93, but it now looks like it will slip into the first quarter of '94.  
The price of UltraChat will be $195, but for current registered TBBS 
licensees there will be a special "introductory price" of $90 for 90 days 
after it is released.  Again, we'll keep you informed when we can take 
orders.

A special "surprise announcement" was made of a new version of SYSOM.  Again 
we had hoped it might ship before the end of '93, but it now looks to be 
late first quarter.  A demo version showed an online text editor (modeled 
after the full screen message editor) that allows you to edit text files 
while TBBS is up.  It also showed a full remote operator's console -- 
including performance monitor meters.  This is a total replica of the local 
console and shows you all of the same information.  TBBS 2.2 does not allow 
monitoring of other lines from this remote console, but the new SYSOM will 
be ready to do this when TBBS is updated to support that capability.

The other "hot topic" about new products was the new net mail utilities.  
This program (named FLAME -- FidoNet Link, Areafix, Mail, and Echomail) is 
going into full beta testing as this newsletter is going to print.  At the 
show we indicated it would ship by the end of the year, and it should not 
miss that by much (if any) unless beta reveals some problems.  Pricing and 
upgrade procedures will be announced on the support board as soon as a final 
date can be set.

Future TBBS developments...
---------------------------
One of the most interesting sessions at ONE BBSCON for TBBS sysops is my 
"Future Directions" session.  During this session the audience tries to pry 
out of me whatever I cannot keep quiet about that is coming down the pike.  
This year the big news was that I revealed that the next version of TBBS 
will handle unlimited lines (at least 10,000 lines) and unlimited message 
areas and messages.  The goal is to be able to do 500 high speed lines on 
fewer than 10 computers.  It will also support full logon through the LAN.  
That's the good news.  The bad news is that it is at least 12 months away, 
so we will be working to keep TBBS 2.2 up to date in the meantime.  But when 
a BBS that large, with the flexibility of TBBS becomes available, our motto 
of "Think about the Possibilities" takes on new meaning.

What About Next Year?
---------------------
With the success of this year's ONE BBSCON, there will definitely be a 
bigger and better show next year.  ONE BBSCON has become an event that no 
one who is seriously interested in the BBS and online world can afford to 
miss.  We have now done two shows in the mountains of Colorado, and have 
decided it's time to go east with next year's event.  ONE BBSCON '94 will be 
August 17-21, 1994 at the Inforum Convention Center in Atlanta, GA.  The 
headquarters hotel will be the downtown Mariott where the opening sessions 
and many of the hospitality suites will be.  It will be much bigger than 
this year's show in both exhibits and attendees.  So mark your calendar now!

We will lose some of the intimate setting that the mountains have given us 
so far, but the plans are to replace it with a serious high tech display.  
If it's part of the online world, the plan is for you to be able to learn 
about it in a session and then have plenty of "hands on" time to see each 
technology in action.

Each year now, the big question at the end of ONE BBSCON is "how can they 
top this?"  I feel very safe in saying that with the response we've had 
since the show, and the plans that are starting to shape up, ONE BBSCON '94 
will leave attendees feeling just as overwhelmed next year.

Both Jack and I set out to make the ONE BBSCON grow into a true showcase for 
the BBS industry.  All of our work and plans for ONE BBSCON are focused on 
making sure that those who come continue to have access to the largest 
gathering of information, experts and products possible.  Since the personal 
networking is also key to making the information transfer turn into ideas, 
we will make sure that both the show structure and the show setting continue 
to emphasize that as well.

Hope to see you in Atlanta in '94!  For info on ONE BBSCON '94 you may call 
ONE, Inc. 303-693-5253.

PS1293-4
Rev. 12/93

Copyright (C) 1994 eSoft, Inc., All Rights Reserved.  Permission granted
to distribute this file in its entirety, without modification, to any
interested party.  Any other use requires the written permission of
eSoft, Inc.

IMPORTANT:  The information herein is subject to change without notice.
Please call or write to confirm factual information of importance to you
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