I assume they may be referring to freenets that was an early method of accessing the internet for free, not requiring AOL or some other service for access.
True, they might be referring to that, although if so this is the first time I’ve heard such a complaint in 25 years.
The usage of the term "free-net" to describe early methods of free internet access was quite obscure even in 1999, I only learned of it years after starting Freenet.
Wow, I just remembered that I had an account on one of these "free-net" systems at some point in high school (late 1990s).
It was a much more trusting time in which people routinely gave all kinds of computer access to strangers just to help them out, or in some sense to help the net grow. When my computer club set up a Linux server at our high school, we sort of joined in by happily giving shell accounts to random strangers who had no connection with the school at all. Nobody seemed to think this was a bad idea!
"Freenet" already had a very specific meaning in the early ninities which could only be obscure if one was not paying attention.
I still maintain my freenet email address from 1991.
I recommend you find your own name for your very comendable project,
swiping an existing one is confusing and somewhat dodgy.
sanity|1 year ago
The usage of the term "free-net" to describe early methods of free internet access was quite obscure even in 1999, I only learned of it years after starting Freenet.
schoen|1 year ago
It was a much more trusting time in which people routinely gave all kinds of computer access to strangers just to help them out, or in some sense to help the net grow. When my computer club set up a Linux server at our high school, we sort of joined in by happily giving shell accounts to random strangers who had no connection with the school at all. Nobody seemed to think this was a bad idea!
tejtm|1 year ago