When the Internet first started gaining mainstream popularity in the late 90s, many optimists claimed that it would bring people together by reducing barriers to communication. That ideal hasn’t exactly come to pass yet, as anyone who has been on the Nextdoor neighborhood social network can likely attest to. Before social media, neighbors weren’t completely in the dark about their local communities, though. Besides word-of-mouth communication, there were also local access channels on cable TV, which had none of the downsides of modern social media. And [Hans] is bringing this style channel back.
[Hans]’s project is called CABLE 82, a bulletin board channel that matches the style of these channels from the 1980s. There’s better technology available for these types of systems now, though, so instead of relying on something like a character generator he’s using a Raspberry Pi running custom software to produce the video feed. The Pi hosts a web server so the 4:3 video feed can be reserved for the bulletin board display, but users who have older Pis with the yellow composite video output can skip using something like an HDMI to RF converter on their period-appropriate CRT displays. The software also adds sound functionality, as these channels always had some sort of elevator music playing while they were scrolling through local community news.
For those looking to recreate some of the nostalgia of 1980s community and technology, [Hans] has made this project open source, with all of the files on a GitHub page. Part of the reason [Hans] got interested in building something like this is that he had been trying to source a CRT television for retro gaming, and wanted to reproduce more of that era than just a few video games. A channel like this would be a great addition to a complete cable TV recreation build like this one, which even includes a preview channel of everything playing.
