The Berkeley Macintosh Users Group, or more commonly "BMUG", was the largest Macintosh User Group. It was founded in September 1984 by a group of UC Berkeley students including Reese Jones [1] and Raines Cohen [2] as a focal-point for the nascent Apple Macintosh user community. With more than 13,000 members, or "BMUGgers" at its peak in 1993, the group was the largest, [3] and generally understood to be the most important, [4] Macintosh users group. A few of the notable members include John "Captain Crunch" Draper, the Sultan of Brunei Hassanal Bolkiah, notorious murderer Enrique Zambrano, [5] [6] early hacker-chaser Cliff Stoll, Inktomi founder Eric Brewer, and may prominent computing journalists like John Dvorak, [7] Ilene Hoffman, Leo Laporte and Adam Engst. An example of the group's omnipresent blue-floppy-disk lapel pin is held in the Smithsonian Institution's American History collection. [8] BMUG's history and activities were closely linked with the MacWorld Expo meetings, traditionally held in San Francisco each January and Boston each August.
Day-to-day management of the organization was balanced between the senior full-time staff: business manager Harry Critchfield, technical manager Steve Costa, and support manager Randy Simon.
BMUG's finances and business operations were managed by Harry Critchfield and Alisa Schulman, better known for her role as a DJ at KALX. [9] In 1995 Anne Wrixon replaced Harry Critchfield, [10] and in 1997, Wrixon was replaced by Hal Gibson, who remained until the end. [11]
One of BMUG's principal operations was collaborative Macintosh repair and maintenance. A benefit of BMUG membership was hardware repair (and often recovery of lost documents from floppy and hard disks). The technical operations were managed by Steve Costa. Electrical engineer Chuck Meyer conducted many of the trickier repairs. Herb Dang was a fixture in BMUG's technical services, and his son Frank continued that tradition into a second generation. [12]
BMUG maintained a Macintosh support call-center, which helped users around the world by answering questions and helping them resolve technical problems with their computers. The support operation was managed by Randy Simon, and staffed by volunteers. [13] While much of the support operation dealt with assisting users whose computers had crashed, a significant portion of it dealt with the specific "vertical market" of desktop publishing and prepress issues, which was then in its infancy and was one of the Macintosh's primary markets. Randy Simon also coordinated the production and publications of BMUG's massive biannual newsletters, sometimes totaling more than a thousand pages per year, initially with the assistance of BMUG volunteers Carolyn Sagami, Zig Zichterman, [14] Robert Lettieri and Bill Woodcock, and later Hans Hansen. A collaboration between BMUG members, Programming SIG chair Greg Dow (now at Adobe) and networking and prepress expert Bill Woodcock (now at Packet Clearing House) resulted in the first example of "database publishing," a 1989 encyclopedia of Macintosh software, for which plates were produced directly from a FileMaker database without intervening processing. [15] [16]
BMUG was initially located in suite 3B, 2150 Kittredge Street, in downtown Berkeley, directly adjoining the southwest corner of the UC Berkeley campus. This building also housed Farallon Computing until Farallon outgrew the space and moved five blocks south-east to Dwight Way. After six years, BMUG moved to a larger space with street frontage at 2055 Center Street, a block and a half west of campus and directly across from the downtown Berkeley BART station.
BMUG's primary revenue-generating activity was the sneakernet distribution of Macintosh shareware software from its comprehensive library on 400k and 800k 3.5" floppy disks. [17] [18] BMUG's shareware disk duplication and distribution program was run by Art Lau and Gerald Raddatz, supplemented by the efforts of many of the other volunteers.
One of the early successes for the group was BMUGNet, a variant of Apple's LocalTalk system which used standard telephone wires to connect Macintosh computers together in a local area network. [19] Wiring plans were initially published in the Fall 1985 BMUG Newsletter, but members could purchase adapters assembled by the group. Co-founder Reese Jones branched the production off as the commercial business Farallon Computing in 1986, renaming the product PhoneNet. [20] The group invented other subsequent low-cost hardware kits as well... the 1991 introduction of the low-cost Mac LC prompted BMUG to begin offering a $12 VGA monitor adapter. [21] MacRecorder, the first audio input device for the Macintosh, was also first released in 1985 as a BMUG kit, before being productized by Farallon and then Macromedia. [22]
BMUG was famous for lively meetings, "We are in the business of giving away information" motto, "BMUG Awards", its great MacWorld Expo get-togethers, CD and book publishing, 400+ page biannual "newsletters" akin to the Whole Earth Catalog, and one of the largest shareware collections for Macintosh Public domain software sold to members and customers on floppy disks. These meetings are often cited by tech notables as their introduction to technology. [23]
BMUG hosted an enthusiastic weekly Thursday night meeting with questions and answers, and software demonstrations by vendors, followed at the end by a raffle. Notable speakers included: Steve Jobs, Guy Kawasaki, Ted Nelson, Heidi Roizen, Andy Hertzfeld, Bill Atkinson, Jean-Louis Gassée, Marc Benioff, Melinda Ann French (Gates) and Bill Gates.
It also held Special Interest Groups (SIGs) on Basic Mac, Troubleshooting, ClarisWorks (integrated word processing, drawing, painting, spreadsheet, database and telecommunications), FileMakerPro relational databases, graphics, video, music, the Internet, programming and mathematics. Branch groups held general meetings in outlying areas, including San Francisco, Cupertino and Tokyo.
Rather than publish a standard monthly newsletter, the group decided to publish a collection of articles in a bound book every six months. The resulting "newsletter" routinely exceeded 300 pages in length. The newsletter was originally edited by volunteers Carolyn Sagami and Zig Zichterman, until Randy Simon was hired as staff, and then turned over to Hans Hansen when Randy departed. [24]
BMUG's Bulletin board system or "BBS" was managed by Bernard Aboba (then in graduate school at Stanford and UC Berkeley, subsequently at Microsoft) with the assistance of Bill Woodcock. It was an early FidoNet node, and from 1986 through 1993, the home of the FidoNet MacNetAdmin "echo," which spawned the AppleTalk Network Managers Association (which in turn begat the AppleTalk Networking Forum), the inaptly-named A/UX Users Group, and numerous other real-world periodic meet-ups. The BMUG BBS also served as a nexus for the interoperability testing of email gateways between FidoNet, UUCP, SMTP, and a number of proprietary AppleTalk, NetWare, and Internet Protocol electronic mail systems, including CE Software's QuickMail, [25] SoftArc's FirstClass, [26] those from Information Electronics [27] and AppleLink Personal Edition, which went on to become America Online. When the BBS host system in Berkeley was damaged by the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake, Aboba set up a temporary stand-in using a solid-state industrial PLC and multi-line serial controller, which was able to keep up with the heavy call volume by answering, presenting an ASCII banner explaining the situation, and immediately disconnecting. The BBS eventually ran on hardware in Berkeley, Palo Alto, Boston, and Tokyo.
In addition to the newsletter, BMUG published the occasional reference book. These included:
BMUG was certainly the largest Macintosh users group, [32] but the Boston Computer Society was the largest computer users group. BCS-Mac, the Macintosh special interest group of the Boston Computer Society, was the second largest Macintosh users group. A good-humored rivalry obtained between the two groups throughout their mutual existence, but they were ultimately supportive of each other. [33] BMUG's first foray onto BCS-Mac's Boston home turf, at MacWorld Expo on August 11–13 of 1987 was commemorated with a new T-shirt, featuring an inscription "BMUG in Boston" which Bill Woodcock, who designed BMUG's T-shirts, intended to look like graffiti, using a rattle-can to write the original text in black paint on white paper, which was then photographed, scanned, and converted to PostScript in Adobe illustrator, before being silkscreened in red on black shirts. The red-on-black effect, however, was said by startled BCS-Mac members to more resemble dripping blood than spray-paint.
By 1995, BMUG had accumulated a debt of $250,000, which forced a two-year period of restructuring and the layoff of some of the staff, but which was weathered successfully. [34] [35]
With the increasing cost of printing the biannual newsletter, decreasing membership and the waning sales of software due to the rise of the Internet, revenues could not keep up and the not-for-profit corporation declared bankruptcy in 2000. However, its members continued to collaborate and meet as separate entities in the following years. [37] [38] [39] [40]
A bulletin board system (BBS), also called a computer bulletin board service (CBBS), is a computer server running software that allows users to connect to the system using a terminal program. Once logged in, the user performs functions such as uploading and downloading software and data, reading news and bulletins, and exchanging messages with other users through public message boards and sometimes via direct chatting. In the early 1980s, message networks such as FidoNet were developed to provide services such as NetMail, which is similar to internet-based email.
Shareware is a type of proprietary software that is initially shared by the owner for trial use at little or no cost. Often the software has limited functionality or incomplete documentation until the user sends payment to the software developer. Shareware is often offered as a download from a website. Shareware differs from freeware, which is fully-featured software distributed at no cost to the user but without source code being made available; and free and open-source software, in which the source code is freely available for anyone to inspect and alter.
The TeachText application is a simple text editor made by Apple Computer and included with System 7.1 and earlier. It was created by Apple programmer Bryan Stearns with later versions created by Stearns and Francis Stanbach. TeachText was one of the only applications included with System 7, leading to its frequent role as the application to open "ReadMe" files. It was named "TeachText" as a nod to this role in tutorials and other introductory materials.
The Macintosh Classic is a personal computer designed, manufactured and sold by Apple Computer from October 1990 to September 1992. It was the first Macintosh to sell for less than US$1,000.
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The Macintosh SE is a personal computer designed, manufactured, and sold by Apple Computer, from March 1987 to October 1990. It marked a significant improvement on the Macintosh Plus design and was introduced by Apple at the same time as the Macintosh II.
The Macintosh, later rebranded as the Macintosh 128K, is the original Macintosh personal computer from Apple. It is the first successful mass-market all-in-one desktop personal computer with a graphical user interface, built-in screen and mouse. It was pivotal in establishing desktop publishing as a general office function. The motherboard, a 9 in (23 cm) CRT monochrome monitor, and a floppy drive are in a beige case with integrated carrying handle; it has a keyboard and single-button mouse.
The Macintosh 512K is a personal computer that was designed, manufactured and sold by Apple Computer from September 1984 to April 1986. It is the first update to the original Macintosh 128K. It was virtually identical to the previous Macintosh, differing primarily in the amount of built-in random-access memory. The increased memory turned the Macintosh into a more business-capable computer and gained the ability to run more software. It is the earliest Macintosh model that can be used as an AppleShare server and, with a bridge Mac, communicate with modern devices.
The Macintosh Classic II is a personal computer designed and manufactured by Apple Computer, Inc. from October 1991 to September 1993. The system has a compact, appliance design with an integrated 9" monitor, typical of the earliest of the Macintosh range. A carrying handle moulded into the case added a degree of portability at a time when laptops were still relatively uncommon.
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Netopia, Inc., formerly Farallon Computing, Inc., was an American computer networking company that produced a wide variety of products including bridges, repeaters and switches, and in their later Netopia incarnation, modems, routers, gateways, and Wi-Fi devices. The company also produced the NBBS and, as Farallon, Timbuktu remote administration software, as well as the MacRecorder, the first audio capture and manipulation products for the Macintosh. Farallon originated several notable technologies, including:
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The Boston Computer Society (BCS) was an organization of personal computer users, based in Boston, Massachusetts, U.S., that ran from 1977 to 1996. At one point, it was the largest such group in the world, with regular user group meetings, many publications, permanent offices in Boston, and hosting major product announcements, including the East Coast release of the Apple Macintosh in 1984.
A Macintosh User Group (MUG) is a users' group of people who use Macintosh computers made by Apple Inc. or other manufacturers and who use the Macintosh operating system (OS). These groups are primarily locally situated and meet regularly to discuss Macintosh computers, the Mac OS, software and peripherals that work with these computers. Some groups focus on the older versions of Mac OS, up to Mac OS 9, but the majority now focus on the current version of Mac operating system, macOS.
Info-Mac is an online community, news aggregator and shareware file hosting service covering Apple Inc. products, including the iPhone, iPod and especially the Macintosh. Established in 1984 as an electronic mailing list, Info-Mac is notable as being the first online community for Apple's then-new Macintosh computer. Info-Mac was the dominant Internet resource for Mac OS software and community-based support throughout the 1980s and early 1990s.
Blue Board is a bulletin board system software created by Martin Sikes (1968–2007) for the Commodore 64 in the 1980s in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, and sold worldwide. Due to optimized code and memory allocation, Blue Board boasted very fast performance for a BBS on that hardware platform. In fact, Blue Board was faster than most if not all BBSs run on 8-bit computers. This speed combined with its use of the ASCII character set and XModem file transfer protocol rather than PETSCII and the Commodore-specific Punter protocol sometimes led users to believe that they were calling a BBS running on a much larger and faster computer.
The Macintosh Hard Disk 20 is the first hard drive developed by Apple Computer specifically for use with the Macintosh 512K. Introduced on September 17, 1985, it was part of Apple's solution toward completing the Macintosh Office announced in January 1985. It would be over a year more before Apple would release the file server software AppleShare that would link all of the hardware together. By that time the SCSI interface introduced on the Macintosh Plus in January 1986, would accommodate far faster and more efficient hard drives, rendering the Hard Disk 20 virtually obsolete.
Mac OS is the series of operating systems developed for the Macintosh family of personal computers by Apple Computer, Inc. from 1984 to 2001, starting with System 1 and ending with Mac OS 9. The Macintosh operating system is credited with having popularized the graphical user interface concept. It was included with every Macintosh that was sold during the era in which it was developed, and many updates to the system software were done in conjunction with the introduction of new Macintosh systems.
The most important Macintosh user group in the area, and arguably within the entire user group movement, was BMUG. Started in 1984 by Berkeley students Reese Jones, Raines Cohen, Tom Chavez, and others, BMUG's members went on to found numerous businesses, most notably the networking companies Farallon and Netopia; develop software and hardware for the Macintosh; write for Macintosh industry magazines; and serve as some of the machine's staunchest advocates.
This square button, designed to look like a 3½" floppy diskette, has a blue background. At the top, in a yellow rectangle, is a blue image of a clock tower and blue text that reads: 'BMUG Disk / BMUG / 1442A Walnut St. #62 / Berkeley, CA 94709 / (415) 849 9114.' On the reverse is a black card with a metal pin.
Before the Genius Bar and before Apple's own online forums, when the Mac was young and its users needed help, there were user groups: Part social clubs and part volunteer tech-support staffs, they disseminated tips, troubleshooting advice, news, and arguments about the Mac. They distributed loads of early Mac shareware and became important stops for vendors promoting new Mac products (including one Steve Jobs when he was trying to get NeXT Computer off the ground). And in that early Mac age, no user group was bigger or more important than the Berkeley Macintosh Users Group, known to all as BMUG. Founded in 1986 and lasting for 14 contentious years, it at one point reportedly boasted more than 13,000 users, with satellite groups in Boston and Japan.
Consumer groups are trying to fill the void. The Berkeley Macintosh Users Group, BMUG, has 10,000 members, about half in California. Weekly meetings in the Bay Area attract several hundred people. The BMUG booth had an unvarnished hackers' quality that seemed a throwback to Apple's early days. 'We provide technical support to end users that Apple doesn't provide any more,' said Bill Woodcock, a volunteer, who works at Farallon Computing and volunteers two to three hours a day. Dealing with Apple is hard, he says. 'We don't buy thousands of machines every year, and we don't make millions of dollars.'
For Mac LC owners to want to take advantage of the machine's capability to hook up to a VGA monitor, the Berkeley Macintosh Users Group (BMUG) is shipping an adapter that lets users do just that. Users can purchase the adapter as a parts kit from BMUG for $12 or fully assembled for $39.95.
SoundEdit was the first popular GUI-based audio editor for digitized audio. It was not only one of the first important audio applications for Macintosh, but one of the first significant audio applications for personal computers in general. SoundEdit was one of three audio applications created during a sabbatical by Steve Capps during 1986. The Macintosh had no built-in sound input, so the MacRecorder audio digitizer was invented for this purpose in 1985 by Michael Lamoureux, a mathematics student at the University of California, Berkeley. The MacRecorder hardware and software was publicly released through the Berkeley Macintosh Users Group as a kit in late 1985. SoundEdit first shipped in January 1988, as part of a hardware product called MacRecorder Sound System, by a company called Farallon Computing (which eventually became Netopia). One of the major drivers for SoundEdit was Apple's HyperCard. With MacRecorder Sound System, stack makers could finally create alternatives to HyperCard's two built-in sounds.
An excellent, more general guide to Internet, FidoNet, and much more is The BMUG Guide to Bulletin Boards and Beyond by Bernard Aboba, a BMUG sysop and knowledgeable denizen of the online world. (The second edition will be out in March. It should be available from Quantum Books [617/494-5042] in Cambridge, Massachusetts.)
BMUG, the Berkeley Macintosh Users Group, is the world's largest advocacy group for Macintosh computer users.
BMUG is offering BCS members access to its Internet help at both its Berkeley and Boston offices, as well as the biannual 300-page newsletter and help guide, among other services. BCS Interim Executive Director Frank Smith said potentially 7,000 BCS-Mac SIG members will be interested in the BMUG offer.