Having worked at MSN during this time, I can tell you, the jealousy of AOL and the client-based walled garden they built was almost physically palpable. AOL was the onramp to the internet for so many folks, but many felt they didn't need to leave the garden. MSN was kind of a halfway spot: a bit more open, but also more integrated into Windows (standard embrace and extend approach). Yahoo! was the other big worry: also had a dialup option, but basically was the internet for many, in that, as a portal, it safely met many of their needs for info and communication.<p>You saw some of this stuff live on as ActiveX objects in IE for a few years after the client wound down; MSN Money was the last big holdout with it's portfolio manager and charting engine, which also was released as part of a Quicken competitor for personal finance management called Microsoft Money.
I recall NetWits, a multiplayer 1950s-style quiz show game on MSN where you played as a contestant against other MSN subscribers in real-time (there was a scheduled "broadcast time" every weeknight -- couldn't play at any other time). There were real prizes, like trips from Expedia.<p>Here's a video of it:
<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uyje8xlGc9Q" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uyje8xlGc9Q</a><p>Truly a product of its time, but they really tried to experiment with multimedia (at least in MSN 2.0). I think there was an online version of Encarta and a bunch of other things that I've since forgotten.
Definitely a forgotten program. Another one from that era (that actually survived until Win 10 I just learned) is the "Briefcase". It was basically a primitive file syncing tool for multiple devices.
> And so The Microsoft Network wasn't a program you loaded like CompuServe. It was part of the OS, with folder icons that looked just like real folders. It was a kind of version of the Web where you could browse online data the same way you browsed your file system. This is what made it cool.<p>Microsoft <3 Plan 9?
One of the things that came from Microsoft Network that's still around is Expedia. Microsoft needed content to put on MSN and a few engineers got interested in the traveling business. Eventually the experiment turned into a website and then got spun off.
<a href="https://youtu.be/5DqJwmzG6Fk?t=1133" rel="nofollow">https://youtu.be/5DqJwmzG6Fk?t=1133</a><p>This video was linked in the article. What a trip down memory lane. This is the most 90's thing that ever existed.<p>Also, the explanation of what a "right click" is and how it is for "power users". Wow, how far we have come. (This is at 21:50 in the video).
Rich clients were all the rage back then: Apple eWorld, Compuserve, Pointcast etc.<p>And then everything swung to the web and then back to rich clients i.e. mobile apps.
It was called Project Blackbird.<p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackbird_(online_platform)" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackbird_(online_platform)</a><p>"It was later revealed that Blackbird had severe performance problems because of an over-complex architecture which made excessive use of multi-threading. When prototypes of the Trident HTML layout engine were completed, and it was shown that the goals of complex layout in Blackbird could be achieved in HTML at better performance, it led to executives to rethink the project."
The dithering and fonts and the overall look of the MSN-inside Explorer really brings you back.<p>MSN was one of those things that you played around with because it came with MSN and you used the free trial (like you did for every ISP you could find back then). But I didn't know anyone who really used it past that.<p>There was a 'second' MSN, that was just a dial-up ISP. Very popular for including the $400 rebate when you bought a new computer at a retail store, you also got 2 years of a MSN dial-up contract to pay the $400 back.
MSN had an amazing Quake 2 and just general multiplayer games service for a while, I want to say it was called Games.com or something like that. The one day, poof it was gone.
CIX is still going in the UK. <a href="https://www.cix.uk/forums/accessing-forums" rel="nofollow">https://www.cix.uk/forums/accessing-forums</a><p>Just had a quick poke about and my last post was 22 year ago. Which was a bit of a gut-punch
Knoware (pun intended, probably), my first Internet provider, back in 1993, had a 9600 baud connection to the Internet, shared by all his customers. When I phoned the guy (late, as he worked at night and slept during the day) to get a login, his first question was: do you have a Mac? There was no TCP/IP stack for Windows back then (Trumpet Winsock only came out in 1994, and was not a Microsoft product). He had heard of linux, said that it <i>probably</i> would work, but I would be on my own.<p>Fast forward to 1995: Windows 95 <i>still</i> didn't have TCP/IP (that only came with service pack 1). MSN was clearly intended as a Windows Internet, to eclipse and make irrelevant the existing one, leaving Mac and linux outside in the cold.<p>Of course, the local pizza guy would have to pay to be on it. Win-win for Microsoft.
"The raw, unfiltered mess of the Internet was quickly becoming the New Cool Thing, and no-one wanted to sign up for yet another Stupid Proprietary Thing"<p>Which is exactly what Microsoft is pushing today with their idiotic "Microsoft account," making it increasingly impossible to use Windows or their other products without signing on to this bullshit.<p>They clearly didn't learn the first time around. Nobody wants another goddamned account, Microsoft.
I found it a bit jarring the way that the mass of regular BBSes go unmentioned in this piece. Fascinating though, I'm from the time (in the UK) and have no recollection of the Microsoft Network.
> they gave you a number like you were Patrick McGoohan. It'd be like 71477,134<p>So nice. I bloody wish we still had numeric IDs instead of email addresses and nicknames.
> At least now I can happily use fopen to read data from a website, right? And backup my email just by dragging folders from Gmail to a local disk. Right guys?<p>It would be nice to rsync to send/retrieve emails and manage my inbox. Maybe the original MSN concept needs to be revisited?
It was... <i>proprietary</i>. The common "walled garden".<p>Everybody thought they could make a walled garden people would like better than the open internet. IBM had SNA, DEC had DECnet, Compuserve, WELL, ... None lamented.
An associated question is, "why the hell would I want 12 months of msn with a new pc at Best Buy?!?", as I seem to remember most computers being bundled with walled garden isp deals in the late 90s.
I could never get my head around Briefcase, with floppies, ZIP drives, USB drives, FTP sites, .zip files through email.<p>And today I can't live without OneDrive. It's on all my computers, phones, tablets.
The writing here is great. Extra points for The Prisoner reference.<p>"They didn't even give you the decency of a username on CompuServe, they gave you a number like you were Patrick McGoohan"
My god, that code is horrid. I remember seeing code like that as a kid. Not being able to recognize any of the tokens was a huge turn-off for getting into Windows development.
The article is unfair.
"After all, these new directions brought the PC almost up to the same spec that other computers had been enjoying ten years ago." - this is simply not true. Apple, main competitor of PC's, still had years and years ahead to gain preemptive multitasking. Windows NT and even 95 were significantly ahead of competition.