% From the desk of Sir Jackson Phlashalot:

Man, I haven't written one of these  since around this time of year
back  in  1998.  That's  almost  24 years ago. I  mean,  it's  been
something  like  16 years since  Demonic had any sort  of  official
release, for that  matter. That's... kind of  fucking mind blowing,
to be honest.  The truth  is that, despite  Demonic slowly  burning
out  and  fading  away, I've personally never  stayed too far  away
from  the scene.  Zer0net and  my BBS, Distortion  are still  up, I
draw the  occasional  ANSI and ASCII (shoutouts to Blocktronics and
Impure, respectively) and I even  put out a new, completely recoded
and redesigned  version of my door  game Darkness back in 2020. The
same  was  true for a  lot of  old Demonic members  and  especially
our  extended circle  of scene friends.  Many embraced  the rise of
telnet and  broadband back in  the early 2000s and  put their BBSes
back online, though  most of those have disappeared by now. Who can
blame them, though?  What kind of a loser is still fucking with BBS
shit in 2022?  Most of us  have careers  and  families or, hell, at
least some goddamn  contemporary hobbies.  Well, I'll let you in on
a couple of juicy-ass secrets:

1. Retrocomputing has seriously blown up  in the last 5 to 10 years
and has  contributed to keeping  some  new blood trickling into the
scene. That, and a lot of  the same old dudes who were pumping life
into  the  scene  around  the time  Demonic died  are still around.
Digital Man is still cranking out Synchronet releases and g00r00 is
still working hard on Mystic BBS, for instance.
2. This shit is still fun!

Back  to  the  subject  of writing NFO files  though.  You  know, I
strongly suspect that between my love of  old school ASCII  and the
extremely  tenuous  grasp  of  the  English  language I  had  as  a
teenager,  most of you  guys probably  assumed I was from some tiny
European nation,  modding,  drawing, and  coding from the first IBM
compatible PC ever to make its  way to my impoverished village, you
know, after finally upgrading from some  obscure microcomputer that
no  American  had  ever heard  of, of course.  Man, the grammar and
spelling mistakes that  used to be  in my old updates and articles.
*cringe*  I mean,  I'm not  promising  perfection  here (obviously,
heh) but, at least I  got better at something in the last 24 years.

Oh  yeah.  I  was  supposed  to  be  talking  about  Demonic. Yeah,
Demonic!  So,  Demonic  died? Why? Well, simply put, I was too damn
busy.  I  started  Demonic  when I was a  senior in high school and
most  of our glory days were between then and the few years I spent
in college. I still  can't fathom  how I was going  to school  full
time,  working  part time, and  had  a pretty  active social  life,
dating,  going to  shows  multiple nights a  week, and that sort of
thing, and  still deeply involved with the  BBS scene. As soon as I
graduated and  got into the workforce though?  Oof!  Reality sucks.
It wasn't just me either,  as most of us  were around  the same age
and  going  through  similar  transitions  in  our  lives.  When  I
announced  a shift from  mod packs to  individual  releases in  our
seventh  and  last  pack, it was  definitely  in  earnest,  and  we
continued  to  put  out  some  pretty  cool stuff.  That said,  the
releases got less and less frequent,  as  did  participation in our
IRC channel and any  sense of  group cohesion  with that,  and next
thing you know, it was really  only the rare oddball member who was
still hacking  away in isolation that wanted to release and,  even
then,  with the  group on life  support,  their releases barely got
any promotion or distribution support. An undignified end...

Modding groups  came  and went,  though very few have made anything
resembling a  notable dent  since then,  and these days only Phenom
Productions  and  a  handful  of  unaffiliated  modders  and coders
remain  to  carry the  torch. I'd  been asked many  times in  those
intervening  years to release something for someone  under Demonic,
or  to  revive  the  group  wholesale,  but  knowing  my  own  time
constraints  and limited  attention  span to which I could focus on
any one of  many hobbies,  I  resisted.  Why is now the right time?
The truth really isn't all  that dramatic.  I've been releasing the
occasional  thing  here  and  there,  with plans  to release plenty
more,  and I've got other  friends who are ready  to do the same as
part of a group, so, Demonic is back, baby!

Now,  allow  me just one  more paragraph  to talk a bit  about what
Demonic of 2022 is,  and  what  it  isn't.  It is still  focused on
putting out  cool and  interesting  mods, code, and  tutorials with
good  art,  source  code,  and maybe  a little  bit of  that  edgy,
sinister  flavor  that was  so  compelling to us  when we  were 14.
We're also  focused on stuff  that's actually...  you  know, fairly
useful.  There's  a  lot  of  weird,  progressive  vanity  projects
floating  around  these  days, and  this ain't that!  I  mean,  who
knows,  but we'll  try to  keep our  superior  technical skills and
planet sized egos in check.  With that in mind, we're  dedicated to
BBSing  first and  foremost,  so don't  expect us to spend our days
interacting  with  social media.  I mean, we'll  hopefully put up a
new web page  sooner or  later,  but  beyond  that,  GET OFF OF OUR
COLLECTIVE LAWNS, YOU LITTLE SHITS!

% Memberberries

One of those aforementioned  unaffiliated modders is xqtr,  hailing
from  Greece.  I  mean,   what   would  Demonic  be   without  some
non-Americans  around to  class  us up?  In  addition  to the utter
nostalgia  trip that is  Null emag, xqtr has  been putting out some
absolutely diabolical  stuff (mostly for Mystic) for years now, and
plans  to continue  releasing the same sort  of  stuff (and perhaps
updates to some of the exact same stuff) with  Demonic. Oh, and you
need to check out his insane BBS, Another Droid.

esc is a name you might remember  from back in the day. He's one of
the few Demonic  members who is  still involved  in the scene, with
his (awesome)  BBS Monterey going  up and down more than a... Okay,
I'm not a fucking teenager anymore, am I?  Anyway, esc shifted away
from  Iniquity  into the  tantalizing  world of Daydream BBS  years
back,  taking  on  updates  and  stewardship  of the  project,  but
continues to dabble in all sorts of stuff.  One thing he doesn't do
anymore is draw ASCII, but I'm  mentioning that here so you all can
join me in peer pressuring him get back in the saddle.

% 0-Day Releases

It would be utterly  lame of me to announce something and then have
nothing  to show for it,  so we're pulling an  Apple on  your asses
and actually  have a small  handful  of  new releases  available to
preorder... err, download TODAY!

DEM-LM10.ZIP - xqtr  brings us a  lightbar  matrix  for  Mystic.  I
know, I know, you're thinking  "great, a  lightbar matrix...  where
have I heard  that one before?"  but remember when I said xqtr puts
out diabolical shit?  This  is  completely coded in MPL and has all
kinds  of extra functionality.  Even if  you don't want to spice up
your matrix,  you can bask in the  glory of xqtr's  MPL mastery and
maybe learn a thing or two.

ESC-BB10.ZIP - esc  brings  us a  door  for  Daydream  that  adds a
simple prompt to proceed  through  before  loading the rest of BBS,
handy  for dropping those bots and script kiddies. Includes source,
but of course.

ESC-MSBK.ZIP - Another  esc  release, a  collection  of scripts for
Mystic/Linux to  make daily, weekly,  and monthly  backups  of your
BBS. Not  recommended  for those  who have yet to lose their entire
setup  to  a  disk  failure  or a  virus  or  whatever,  as  you're
practically required  to have  your  own  version  of that  classic
anecdote to call yourself a real SysOp.

ESC-RLGN.ZIP -  rlogin-launcher v0.666.   An  rlogin   client   for
GameSrv.  Includes Linux,  Windows,  and  MacOS binaries,  by  esc!
Crushing the  previous  record  for  Demonic's largest  release, at
least when it comes to file size.  Hey esc, it's not the size  that
counts, man.

JP!TCEG2.ZIP - TCEGraff/2  by jack phlash.  Oh  look  everyone,  JP
thinks  he's  too special  to use  a  dash  in  his  filename  like
everyone else. Oh,  and did I mention  this is a  fucking oneliners
door.  A oneliners door, in 2022?  Some men are born leaders rather
than doers,  I guess.  Anyway,  this  is a  script  for  my earlier
REFDoor v1.2  release intended  to be more of a REF script  example
than  anything, but hey, it's  colorful and I like the art, so fuck
off.

% Contact us! We're lonely. :(

We are  accepting new members!  so  if you  think  you're  ruggedly
handsome  enough to  join our ranks,  get in touch  and tell us why
and we'll let you know if we think you'd be a good fit.  Be warned,
we're  only interested  in members who actually intend on releasing
or  otherwise  contributing.  No  one  cares  about  scene cred  by
affiliation in 2022, okay?

I'd love to hear from any old Demonic members too,  so even if  you
have  no  interest in  ever touching a  telnet terminal  or an ANSI
editor again, feel free to drop me a line and say hello.

Email  is  still  a  thing  in 2022,  right?  You  can  email me at
jp@demonic.net  and I  promise  I'll at least  glance at it  before
procrastinating  on  typing  up a  reply  then  forgetting about it
entirely. Of course, that's only if your  message  makes it through
my  ridiculous array  of  anti-spam  scanners.  I mean, it probably
won't, but I'll check my spam folder from time to time too.

And of course, we run bulletin boards!

Another Droid (andr01d.zapto.org:9999)  run by xqtr  will  make you
question if  man can simply go too far in pushing the limits of BBS
modding.  I won't answer that for you,  you need to call and decide
for yourself.

Distortion (d1st.org) run by jack phlash  is a far more traditional
art scene style board, and that's only  partially because I've been
too lazy to make any significant updates to it since the 1990s.

Monterey (1-900-213-374U)  run by esc  isn't actually too elite for
you, rather  it's undergoing  re-construction  right now.  Take  my
word for it that it's  pretty fucking cool, and I'm not just saying
that because half of the art on it is by me.

Technologists as we are,  you don't actually need to connect to our
boards  to  talk to  us  via a board.  Instead,  you  can  post  in
0N-DPUB  (or  whatever  the board you're calling  named it) on  the
Zer0net echomail network.  You heard me right, echomail! The future
is now! Or was then. Or something.

Oh, and  we  still  have  http://www.demonic.net up  too,  but it's
pretty damn barren  pending a redesign.  You can also visit my only
slightly less barren blog at https://jackphla.sh  where I intend to
post a bunch of stuff about Demonic... *cough* one day.

Regardless,  I intend to  put out  one of  these little newsletters
every now and then to update anyone who cares on member changes and
new releases,  all  without actually  having  to talk to  any of us
weirdos. See you then?

% Greets and treats.

This is the part where I'd  normally shout out  some groups,  maybe
talk shit about  some others,  that kind of thing.  There's  really
only one group left though,  so big ups  to our  friends at  Phenom
Productions.  You can check them out at  https://www.phenomprod.com
or wherever fine mods are distributed.

Obviously  I  need  to  personally  shout  out  esc  and  xqtr  for
collaborating with me on this  effort.  We've been plotting this in
secret for  quite some time and have a lot of interesting ideas for
the group going forward. Exciting.

Next, those  still plugging away at BBS software in the year of our
lord 2022. I already  mentioned  Rob and James,  but I also want to
shout out  things like  Ispyhumanfly's  new  Iniquity 3.0  project,
Nuskooler's Enigma 1/2, and Mercyful Fate's  Oblivion2 XRM, and the
absolute shitload of  older  softs still being updated  or at least
hacked  to pieces.  Things  like  Daydream, Renegade, and WWIV,  to
name just a few examples. <3

Finally,  as always,  I'm  pouring  one out  for  my dear  departed
friend  and  Demonic hall  of famer  Micah McCrary,  AKA  m1cah  of
kracked.com.  RIP, brother.

% EOF!?