Back in the summer of '94 the L0phT was an exciting place bubbling with new ideas and scraps of reclaimed technology. The internet was exploding and the web was just starting to get big. We felt that to further our goals we needed to get some sort of connection to the net.

We really didn't have the money necessary to afford a dedicated link but then we found a company offering relatively cheap access. All we needed was couple of inexpensive modems. So we sold off some of our less used items hoping that someone would be able to reclaim more of the technology than we were.

With this cash we set ourselves up with a dedicated 28.8 modem link to the world. It was a happy time. Everyone was filled with excitement of what to do with our new found freedom. The L0phT internet presence was created. A web site went up, archives that had been tied to the POTS network where suddenly available to the world, information was freely exchanged.

We knew we could not keep this new found freedom to ourselves so we offered to share our connection with others to expand our reach into the world. We allowed others to use our site as their own.

I was drunk with information. I knew I had to offer something to world in exchange, but what? I had no vast archives of hacking material nor phreaking files. A web page full of just links to other sites or useless pictures would be exceedingly LAME. All I ever did was push my machine to its limits and my machine of choice was currently a Macintosh.

Finally, after mailing 'Holy War Dialer' to the umpteenth zillionth person pleading for it on a lame news group, it occurred to me that instead of mailing out the odd file or two why not just make them all available via FTP? That was it, a Macintosh FTP site. Not the usual SUMEX, or WUarchives sites but one devoted to those little known programs and utilities that would help others to utilize their machines to there fullest potential.

So I pieced together what parts I had and built a functional Mac SE with a whopping 4 megs of ram and an insanely huge 80Meg hard drive. I assembled the files and organized them and late in December of '94 The Whacked Mac Archives was born.

I had no idea how popular it would be. Within a month our once speedy 28.8 connection had slowed to a crawl. The other board members of LHI where complaining our entire net was basically useless. At this point I couldn't take the site down as too many people where dependent on it, so instead I reluctantly limited it to two users at a time.

Things where proceeding along smoothly, there where uploads and downloads and the FTP site was rocking. Everyone was happy. The only problem was physical space. We liked our old technology to much. It covered the floor. Not one, but three VAXen cowered in the corner under their Holy Lady Of the VAX. CRT's where hung from ceiling to preserve desk space. Piles of circuit boards where everywhere. Live terminals where used on the floor. We needed more space.

So we moved. Sold two of the VAXen, hollowed out another, cleaned up the floor, and packed it all up and moved the whole operation to a larger nicer place. By this time we new we needed a faster connection, the 28.8 just wasn't cutting it. Even with the limits on the WMA, our net was slow. The Web site was just crippling our bandwidth.

A plan for ISDN was initiated. (It is rumored at this point that Mary Alice Williams rubbed her hands in glee with an evil grin on her face.) L0phT the machine was severed from its LAN and placed in a safe place where it could maintain its connection to the world. This meant that the WMA would have to be taken off the net until this connection could be reestablished.

It was decided that to preserve hard drive space and connection speed that the WMA would remain off-line until a High Speed line could be connected to our new location and L0phT the machine could be reattached to its network. This was in June of 1995. NYNEX has given us a firm date of "sometime before the beginning of the year" for the installation of our ISDN line. Once this occurs the WMA WILL be placed back on the net and made available free to all.

When the site went off-line my mailbox overflowed. The demand was still there. People still needed the files. There was nothing I could do. I figured it would only be a few weeks until we got the High Speed line and then the thirst would be quenched. Weeks have turned into months and I still get tons of mail.

An idea came, Why not put everything on CD and offer it to the public? The idea was deemed good. So we sold some more of our less used technology, The Amiga Bridge board (we didn't have an Amiga), the Novell 1.1 (we where already running 2.5.1?) etc...... the cash was raised and a CDR was actually purchased. (One of the very few pieces of equipment here that was actually paid for with cash. You don't find CDR's in the trash everyday.)

I scoured the net, and visited those BBS's that where still tied to the POTS network, I searched high and low, I got as many files as I could find that I thought would be good on the CD, organized them, wrote up the file list, and burned the master. The master was sent to the Duplicator and in exchange for large gobs of money sent us back the Limited Edition Whacked Mac Archives CD-ROM.

And now it can be yours. Own a piece of the L0phT, a piece of my sleepless nights spent downloading and organizing, a piece of our dream.

Order your very own copy of the Whacked MAC CD- ROM