Early Online Experience: JForum on CompuServe

In the mid-1980s, I joined one of the first online services, CompuServe.  [Previously, I had been a member of The Source, but that’s a different post.] One of the reasons I liked CompuServe was its journalism area, called JForum.  Jim Cameron was truly an online pioneer and created a place for journalists to virtually meet and share experiences and questions.

Jim and I started chatting online and eventually I helped bring the Society of Newspaper Design into the JForum fold as special interest group.  Jim also made me a “sysop” which meant I had special online privileges, most of which I have forgotten.  One of the things I did to help JForum was to make slides of various screens.  I used a newly purchased MacPlus to capture the screens.

It is interesting to note that Sam Donaldson, an ABC TV correspondent, was an early adopter of online services.