I came in early enough to know about BBS's, but never used them, not even to the limited extent I used newsgroups. It's so true, though, about the linking people around to other places. And some of it was codified; I got my hands on the 1993 edition of the Big Dummy Guide to the Internet and read it faithfully from beginning to end, and was all prepared for things like Telnet and Gopher and Archie and FTP and Finger (god, remember Finger?) (and can you imagine telling someone now "oh, we used to finger people on the internet" *dies*) and MUDs, with specific lists of places to start out -- and then there was Netscape and I shifted to the web, and never really used any of the others except FTP to any real degree.

Tumblr, man. I have one, and I poke at it to try to figure it all out, but the lack of ability to actually have a conversation is a huge barrier to entry for me. Ah well; in 5-10 years I'll have adjusted, in time for fandom to have already moved on to whatever even more fragmented, higher-noise/lower-signal platform arrives!