Talk:echomail

The difference between echomail and netmail

Helpfully explained to me by a BBS enthusiast:

NETMAIL is like email, it's a message you send from one BBS that is on a specific Fido style network (Fidonet, SciNet, fsxNet, etc..) to a specific user on another BBS that is also a member of that net. eg: You could send me a netmail from BBS 1, addressed to: myname@1:229/428 and when I log into BBS 2 (or 3, or 4 etc..) that are also members of that 229 net, I will receive that message and can read/reply to it. Then that reply is sentback to all the BBSes in that 229 net, etc.. etc...

It's semi-private, although privacy is purely in the hands/trust of the Sysop(s) on the BBS(s) that netmail passed through to get to whatever BBS I read it on.

Echo mail is like a forum. I can write an "echo" message in a message area, say.. "Raspberry Pi". Every BBS that subscribes to the Net the 'raspberry pi' echo is on will receive a copy of my message in their copy of the raspberry pi echo (it replicated to every BBS on the nodelist for that net.

The nodelist is a text file listing all the BBSes that belong to that particular net, and their contact/routing info.

It's all from back in the day when long distance calls at 300baud were costly, so one BBS in say Fidonet would pass mail to the next geographically closest BBS in the net, and then it would do the same to the next geographically closest BBS, etc. etc. until un the case of Netmail, the messages replicated to a BBS in the recipients area code, or for echo mail, every BBS carrying that echo area received the message posting for members to read and reply to.

Equinox ◑ 00:20, 23 May 2021 (UTC)