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Historical Notes on the UFOP
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The real name is Steve, more known for playing David Cody for almost a decade (and other characters in the UFOP formation years). | The real name is Steve, more known for playing David Cody for almost a decade (and other characters in the UFOP formation years). | ||
'''Original Joined''': | '''Original Joined''': September 1994 - April 1995, formerly of the AOL Chat Sims. | ||
'''Rejoined group''': 15 February 2006 ([http://groups.yahoo.com/group/SB118-Independence/message/8982 First Post]) | '''Rejoined group''': 15 February 2006 ([http://groups.yahoo.com/group/SB118-Independence/message/8982 First Post]) | ||
==The History of Michael Blade & the Foundations of the UFOP: 20-21 Years of Fun!== | |||
Michael Blade was originally designed as a table top character in an original sci-fi/fantasy table top sim in 1991, from original game designers Steven Myers and myself, Steven Hood. I acquired the nickname of “the Silver Blade” during the tenure of “Project Whiterook” between 1991 through 1996, which was my original AOL user name. | |||
In 1994, Michael Blade was the registered user of AOL when it first went online as the Silver Blade, and originally came about from high school friends who used the AOL chat rooms to collaborate on a Star Trek fanfic consisting of the relationship between William Riker and Deanna Troi. Myself and my cohort, Rhonda, wrote a fanfic together utilizing the chat room format (of which later I ran a one-shot limited publication for Rhonda in a hardbound copy). The result of this collaboration brought the UFOP knocking on my door, a user who introduced himself as the owner of a new online Star Trek RPG and was out recruiting people who might be interested in joining his venture. | |||
I’m writing this now before I forget, while my memories remain sharp. I joined the UFOP (or back then, the chat room where we wrote together on so many of a night- in the beginning there was no separation and it was a common occurance for missions to intersect) between September 1994 - April of 1995. I started out as an Ensign, and made my way up to LtCmdr at the Yolanda Run that started in AOL, and finished in Egroups. I remember this because my very first Egroups submissions chronicled teleporting alongside several members of the original crew of the Ranger onto the planetoid being used for the Mass Driver, and had the pleasure of being the guy who shot the control board that short-circuited the firing control (PS. Don’t beam your crew out in the last second while the planet is self-destructing… ahem! That’s a note for you, Brian… grrrrr). I’ve had the rare pleasure of getting to know the original founding members, although I was never a part of the command staff. | |||
And Wolf, if you think I’m ever going to let you forget you popping over to the Centris to “borrow” one of Elinor’s shuttlecrafts while Pelletier blamed me for that incident because you were so set on rescuing Maegara… think again. I got ripped a new one IC because I abandoned ship to make sure you didn’t fly solo. Of course, that’s how I first met Maegara, and the very first time I ever simmed with Wolf side by side. :p Nor am I ever able to forget that “asteroid mining” incident leaving us all stranded on the damn asteroid while the Phoenix was dodging asteroids. :D Oh yeah, I remember. Both Jeff and I were cursing that night ‘cause YOU refused to evacuate us until you were sure it was safe. AHEM…. | |||
Heheh. | |||
Here’s the real deal about the initial first year or two of the group. We didn’t have a separation between ships. It wasn’t uncommon for us chat simmers to shift from one ship to another, depending on who was logged in on a given night, and our normal closing time usually happened between 2-4am in the morning. Chat simming is an entirely different animal, because we’re all on and online at the same time, having to read through every single line for tags and/or responses while some of us were chatting between each other simultaneously. You see, back then, in the infancy, AOL was the original platform (unless you were using bulletin board services). On any given night, a mission chat sim consisted of +10 printed out pages if we were to preserve it, or onto corruptible large 5 1/4in floppy discs. I have very few saved chat sims, all of which have corrupted to the point where they’re beyond saving (and I really wish otherwise- I’d love to be able to get some of those up here on the wiki for historical reference). The rosters didn’t develop until there was a solid core base of simmers, which took about two years (I checked… what little I was able to recover consisted of Phoenix sims as well as a few infancy Centris sims, and mostly consisting of Ranger sims). | |||
I brought my table top character over into the UFOP, which is how I got immersed into this fun writing RPG right before it hit its second year. And now, twenty (20) years later, I feel the need to write this all down before it’s forgotten. The chat sim missions I remember stand out clearly, while others, not as sharp anymore. I can remember some ship launchings that came about from ’95 through ’97, when we migrated over to Egroups and that allowed us to create individual email groups for a given ship- I blame Yahoo for that F-up. Some of those early email sims are lost, beyond recover, while others transferred over when Yahoo acquired Egroups. We lost a good number of ship email groups during that transition. | |||
So now you know why I’ve kept coming back over the course of my tenure, given this is my 20th/21st Year with this ever changing, always rewarding, writing RPG group. And I am very proud to see where we started from, to what the group is today. This is why I occasionally leave, and return- because I believe in this vision of Wolf’s from its inception, and have always supported it, even when I didn’t agree necessarily 100% of the time. I keep coming back because the UFOP has been, and always will be, my home. | |||
To Wolfe and the Fleet members: thank you for 20-21 years of unforgettable, wonderful memories. I look forward to the decades to come, and all the new, wonderful writers who come and discover this truly remarkable gem. | |||
It took the better part of these last ten years to remember. But I do remember the very first person I ever had the pleasure of simming with was Jeff Pelletier, who greeted me when I landed in the docking bay, and identified himself as Lt. Pelletier. I, of course, was a simple Ensign. I remember this, not from something I preserved, but from a clear, unwaivering memory of my very first time simming online. | |||
Beautiful, wonderful memories, and a good solid group of friends and writers that remains to this day, the pleasure of being able to write with other ST writers. ;) | |||
==Characters== | ==Characters== | ||
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* Winemaking and distilling (only I can only read up on the latter as I would need a license to practice). | * Winemaking and distilling (only I can only read up on the latter as I would need a license to practice). | ||
* Audio/Video post-production (as I do that in real life). | * Audio/Video post-production (as I do that in real life). | ||
==Testing Pages== | ==Testing Pages== | ||
Or rather, 118Wiki projects (and/or testing codes) | Or rather, 118Wiki projects (and/or testing codes) | ||
* [[DCodySubs]] | * [[DCodySubs]] | ||