Hiya! My name is Gregory and I'd like to welcome you to the Annex Cafe.

The most simple way to describe this site is to say that we are a "Clean, Well Lit Online Community".

Here, you will find a wide variety of interactive features such as:

• Interactive Chat rooms supporting a variety of ways to connect to them.
• Public Message areas covering a wide range of topics.
• Useful Internet related files and utilities.
• Special Interest Groups (forums) with specialized content developed by experts in their fields.

And all of these features are publically available to you at no charge! Why do we do this for free? The answer is simple, if not long-winded (grin):

I will start with a statement of WHY Annexcafe exists.

Back in 1985 (seems like a century ago), I discovered a magical world called "bbs'ing". My brother had given me a commodore 64 that was sitting in his closet. He had found no use for it. One of my friends from Rocky Horror (oh gawsh, remember THOSE days maybe?) said, "You should get ONLINE with it!". Up until that point, I had been using it to do accounting for one of those silly MLM type businesses I was trying.

A 300 Baud modem later, I was enrapt with the online world with some local bbs'es (Bulletin board systems) and some national ones that had online games. To try to understand how fast 300 baud is, consider the fact that a MODEM DIALUP to the internet is 56,000 baud. A DSL LINE (the cheapest at 128k) is 128,000 baud. Those were the days..

So I really got into BBS'ing and by 1987 I had my own 4 line bbs. That meant that 4 people at a time could dial up into my bulletin board and chat with each other, or post messages for others to read and reply to (or they could play TradeWars).

In 1992, after I had moved to Los Angeles, Annex really began. We migrated to an 8 line system, which grew to 16 lines, 32 lines, 48 lines, 52 lines and ultimately 240 lines. People from all over the world were meeting up, chatting and learning new things about people through my set of computers.

It was my last, best destiny. I loved making a living by actually making a difference in the world. People met, changed their mind about preconceived notions, divorced, married, had babies. A "VIRTUAL TOWN".

THEN CAME THE INTERNET.

It changed everything. We adapted by first offering dialup access to the internet through our bbs. Then we were one of the first people in California to offer web site development and hosting. This is back BEFORE earthlink existed.. Before AOL was on the internet.. Before compuserve/prodigy went away..

The business had changed and we had to get with it.. So we developed websites and hosted websites.

Then came MSN.

For those who remember, the original MSN was specialty software that ONLY worked with Windows95. That had a grand vision about what the internet could offer. I agreed with their vision. They never gave that platform enough of a chance, imo.. I worked for Microsoft (as a contractor) from late 1995 to early 1998. MSN evolved from proprietary software to WEB-BASED technology and I managed several MSN Community sites (The Internet Community, The Forum Manager's Community, and the Law and Courtroom Community). In addition, we set up servers on OUR side that acted as a resource for other FM's (Forum Managers).

Then they (MSN) gave up on the managed communities idea, and a LOT of communities were left in the cold. My business was hopping, and I felt (and still do) that I owed something back to the internet community in general.

So we put up a chat server. We put up the newsgroups. And we gave a home to all the abandoned online communities that MSN purged. That was the birth of the Annexcafe, and we've been adding new groups and chats since! We have an awesome crowd of people and you'll find that we're a really big family here.

JOIN US!

We hope you enjoy our community as it grows and develops, and want this to be YOUR home on the net. Send us feedback if there is anything that we can do to make that happen.