acappella 的部落格

CompuServe CB was the first public, commercial multi-user chat program. It first went live on February 21, 1980, built to over a million subscribers by 1988, and was CompuServe's most popular service through their acquisition by AOL in 1997. 

AIM (AOL Instant Messenger)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AOL_Instant_Messenger

In the middle of the start of the beginning of a series of technological revolutions -- from 1985 through 1995 -- CompuServe provided the common virtual space for technical support for high-tech companies from Adobe to IBM to Lotus to Microsoft. Each company had one or more CompuServe "Forums" which included a number of virtual "conference rooms" for visitors to chat, all supported by the CB technology.

Because of its ubiquitous use in the technical community, CompuServe CB was widely influential on chatting culture, and many of the common abbreviations used on the Internet, such as IMHO, MORF, and textual emoticons like ;) first came into common online use on CB. 

http://www.livinginternet.com/r/ri_compuserve.htm