Barely a month ago, while cleaning up Frank Maloney's Facebook account, I became aware of Portland Motsscon XXII.

I discovered the soc.motss newsgroup back in 1989, when I arrived in America as a grad student at Brown and had steady access to Usenet. MOTSS = members of the same sex, an opaque euphemism for gay attraction, which helped the group be created with a minimum of fuss in 1983.

I lurked on soc.motss for two years. I knew that I was bisexual, but I wasn't ready to admit it to anyone. Then my friend Éamonn came out as gay and I promptly came out to him. After a few …continue.