Early Store-and-Forward Dial-Up Networks

Early store-and-forward dial-up networks were pre-broadband computer networking systems that moved messages between machines over ordinary telephone lines by queuing traffic and forwarding it in batches rather than through a continuously connected link. FidoNet, developed in the early 1980s and platform independent so it would work with any bulletin board system written to use it, became the largest such store-and-forward message network, bundling private mail, public message boards and file attachments into archive files and relaying them between nodes over dialup sessions on a set schedule. Usenet, created in 1979, distributed newsgroup articles between participating sites over similar dial-up links, and the two networks were directly bridged: many FidoNet discussion groups were shared onward through gateways to Usenet, letting users of either system read and post to the other's discussions. Both systems let personal computer users exchange messages and discussion posts long before always-on Internet access was common, using intermittent dial-up connections and store-and-forward relaying rather than a live end-to-end circuit.