Years before RIP, there was IGS (Instant Graphics and Sound)

[Darklord]

Josh Renaud has launched a 6-part series on IGS (Instant Graphics and Sound) on the Atari ST.

Many Atari ST people have never even heard of IGS. When it was released, it had the potential to really shake things up in the online world.

Excellent article, well written and detailed, IMHO.

https://breakintochat.com/blog/2024/08/ ... roduction/

[Darklord]

Josh Renaud continues his 6 part series on IGS (Instant Graphics and Sound) on the Atari ST:

"... and Part 2 published this morning! This one takes an in-depth look at Mears, introduces his early GTerm/IG efforts, and shows his early discouragements."

https://tinyurl.com/yz48nr3j

[cloverskull]

Interesting stuff. I had never heard of this back in the day so this is super cool to learn about. My "online" experience went from ansi/ascii BBSes, to some RIP BBSes, to aol/prodigy/compuserve and finally an ISP. So I skipped over this one lol.

[Darklord]

Honestly, I think that was the problem - people just not knowing about it.

It had sooo much potential...! :)

[stephen_usher]

The BBSs talked about here were in a parallel universe to my experience, which was the pre-Internet in the UK academic networks and then ARPAnet before it became the Internet. For me my ST (and other software experience etc. was just downloading from uk.ac.ic.doc.src via hhcp over X25 and then Kermit and later ftp from the University of Kent archive, which became SunSite and is now the UK mirror service. For information it was just Usenet news comp.says.atari.st

[Darklord]

Josh has the IGS series up to part 5 now, BTW. :)

Instant Graphics and Sound, Part 5: Point and click

https://breakintochat.com/blog/2024/09/ ... and-click/

[Kirkman]

Thanks for sharing my IGS series, DL!

I'm hard at work, writing Part 6 now ... still working out if there will be one unplanned addition (Part 7). I think there probably will.

My "online" experience went from ansi/ascii BBSes, to some RIP BBSes, to aol/prodigy/compuserve and finally an ISP. So I skipped over this one lol.

IGS would have been available on Atari ST BBSes around the time you were calling ASCII, ANSI, and RIP BBSes. In fact, it debuted years before RIP, and was able to do some things (notably animation and music) that RIP never really did.

The BBSs talked about here were in a parallel universe to my experience, which was the pre-Internet in the UK academic networks and then ARPAnet before it became the Internet.

You were very lucky to have access to those academic systems! Definitely my own world changed once I started attending university in the late 1990s and could take advantage of the internet services offered. I continued calling BBSes, but the internet took up more and more of my attention.

--Josh

[Darklord]

"I'm hard at work, writing Part 6 now..."

And I'm eagerly awaiting! :)