Prompted by another thread... The group went live 10th September 1997 so this is the 10th year this year.
How long have you been AFLing?
a little search showed I've been loitering since March 1999.
A very quick look-see found one of my posts from mid-99. Badger.
Found one from me dated Aug 2000, but I'm sure that wasn't my first post [1]. The trouble is, I have posted under various names, and I can't remember them all. Full name, initials, abbreviations, even odd nicknames when posting from a spoof address.
[1] For one thing, it didn't start "Hi, er, great group, er, can anyone help me with ..."
Yeah... mine was reatively similar changes but sufficient to shaft the stats.. but necessary to dodge the s**te spam.
Lee D
earliest I can find was sept 2001 but there should be earlier out in Cyberspace I did find one of my better efforts replying to a post designed to annoy................................
'And the little billy goat said dont eat me theres a much bigger and tastier billy goat coming along in a moment and the Troll said "OK and anyway I need to post some rubbish on the newsgroups to annoy the legitmate users because I am a troll and illigitimate as well" '
Derek
10th jan 2001 - shortly after i got my first landrover!
the first record they have for me on this group is August 2000, probably correct as I hung out on 4x4 before this.
My first usenet post appears to be in June 96
AJH
That'll be about 30 years after I got my first one, 644 FAR, which I think was built in 1958!
AJH
We've got some real creaky old beasts in here haven't we, and that landy too! Next question I suppose is "who is the oldest grease monkey in here", certainly not me in my mid 30s..
On or around Sun, 20 May 2007 21:08:17 +0100, "Lee_D" enlightened us thusly:
eeek. I'm at the top of the all-time posters list.
can't get google to find my earlier addresses though I'm sure Deja was better as an archive, I reckon Google are throwing stuff away.
7 May 2002 First post to AFL ... Had just bought a Landy SIII after not having had one for years .. ;)
LD> a little search showed I've been loitering since March 1999.
Hmmmm ...looks like 16th November 1999.........
It quite possibly was about before then but that is as far back as googles current archives go.
i dont think i show cos ive had too many email addresses :)
Google is deja.. im sure dejanews was one of the first things google swallowed up..
If you look at some of the earliest posts there are comments congratulating someone on starting the group and amazement at how quickly the spammers found it and started posting sex ads, so it looks like it was pretty close to that date. There is one post almost a year earlier but that looks like a borked date on a posting rather than an actual one.
It was, deja used to be one of the best resources for looking just about anything up, before all those pesky web forums came along and split the knowledge up into advert-laden private databases.
On or around Mon, 21 May 2007 10:13:32 +0100, Tom Woods enlightened us thusly:
quite. it's not as good as it was.
"Austin Shackles" wrote in message news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com...
Oh I don't know. Apart from as Ian mentioned (I think?) about the dilution of information due to web forums I think we now have more from Google than we ever got from Deja. Though finding Deja was jaw dropping in it's self as a newbie to the tinternet I saw a similar reaction three days ago when I showed Google to my Dad and searched groups on Throttle position sensor. After reading 3 or 4 posts he was convinced enough of a fault to commit to spending £5 on a second hand TPS and risking it ;-) Paid off too :-)
Lee D
The earliest I can find is May 7th 1998 -
AndyC.
Hours of amusement to be had searching I found a string where the earliest post was 8am Sept 11th 1997 by Pat Conners subject : Over-priced Yuppiemobile Derek
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