DarkCloud: Well, I think that Internet forums provide a good outlet for the world community to stop, discuss and debate.  However, all too frequently thickheaded people like Civnation and some of the Newsmaxians misuse and twist facts and data and try to mislead people. 
The main problem with this sort of people is that they don't even listen to someone who has a good point, or has defeated their argument, they just keep on proclaiming the same drivel time and time again.
The only excuse for their ignoring of the facts is that many internet sources are suspect, however, there is a point at which the data becomes overwhelming and must be believed. Someone can only argue for so long that white is black until proven wrong.

On another note, I see internet forums as microcosms of the world. In real life you are going to meet people like those on internet forums and see all the same arguments about the same things.  Forums prepare you to meet real life.
In addition, Internet forums are much like the coffeshops of the mid 20th century, universities of the industrial age, and the ancient forums of Rome.  They are places where learning and new ideas mya be fully traded and developed.
Forums train people and help them develop ideas which may later be sold in books or submitted to government representatives.
Finally, forums help unite people around the world and destroy racial misconceptions and other preconceptions. They help create a truly global community.
 

Ron Jeremy: Would you agree that what the internet most needs is a 5-year moratorium on all names starting with "Dark"? There's millions of you buggers!

DarkCloud: Yes, certainly. The internet most definitely needs a moratorium, us 'Dark ____'s' are overflowing. We are bursting the internet at the seams.
There can only be so many Dark's before the name loses its intimidating properties and merely becomes plain vanilla like Merlin, Merlyn, and Darth____, which, despite how good they may look, are all boring and done to death (ex: Hi- I'm Darth Steve!), with the exception of a few (DarthVeda being one of the inventive ones ;))

I have to apologize for promulgating this phenomenon of 'Dark'ness- my first Internet username was DarkCloud on various Bulletin Boards, followed by Dark Ta'ang on Total Annihilation, and
Dark To'uk in some strange RPG Game. I, and many others seem to have a strange primordial instinctive 'need' to use Dark in their names.
I suppose I am addicted to "Dark", but I have been trying to break the mold for a while, as my numerous DL's on FreeFireZone will show ;)... I could list them here: (I <i><b>LOVE</i></b> lists- don't you? ;)-
Lessee, this is only 3/4ths (the other 1/4th is specially witheld since no one knows I own them ;))
¥, £, Emperor ZARDOZ, Saint of the Day, ProvostQ, Top 20 Poster, The Walrus, Anarcho-Provost, Killer Universe, The Evil Not-Z, (Santor, the Destroyer), (Unix, the Programmer), Insidious Wasp, Glow Worm, 2002, Wandering Bararian, Lord_Provost, Provost C, KnightoftheOrderofthePinkTacos, Ser Moon Moth [A name I took from a Sci-Fi short story), Stefu II, Dark Cluod, Civ Lancer, Alexanders Horse, Symbol, Guru
and quite a few others...
However, I'm still attached to my original name, and, to preserve it's integrity, I support a moratorium on Dark ___'s... [This is presupposing that I'd get to keep my name if I was for a moratorium, would I not? ;)]

Solver: Need to have some of this... How did you get started with civ?

DarkCloud: I first observed Civilization I in the summer of 1995 while staying at a friends home. I watched them play the game and was intrigued by the whole idea of civilizations fighting. Then, when I returned home some days later, I immediately purchased the game.
Civ I was my most played game back in the early days, even more so than the shareware games, Morraff's Word (A D&D clone), Empire (Risk on the Computer), and Commander Keen (by Apogee! ;)), and other freeware/shareware games.
In my first few games I immediately learned to never trust the Mongols and the Zulu.  The Zulu defeated me more than once in the first few years of my civilization. Although, I did enjoy the Zulu when I played as them with cities such as Ulundi, etc. when I frequently conquered the game as them. But, strangely enough I've never played as them in Civ II.
Note: I still play Civ I in MSDOS ;) occasionally and can get through the copyprotection now without the civlopedia book.

Solver: Civ2... tell us about your thoughts about the game, and give a short outline of your experiences.

DarkCloud: Well, I received Civ II as a gift, well two gifts actually, in 1996. I traded one of my copies for Command and Conquer or something of that nature, I can't remember exactly.
Civ II, I felt was far superior to Civ I, but I was a bit annoyed that it didn't have an endgame replay button to show your conquests over time.

However, I enjoyed Civ II, the graphics were much better than Civ I, and the cheat menu was interesting. However, I never played at any level above Chieftan. I did quite good in those days, reaching alpha centauri or annihilating everyone, although I had some trouble in the WWII scenarios... Every time I played as Germany, the allies immediately made peace with me and Russia backstabbed me... And when I played as Russia, Germany and the Allies declared war on me.
Then, when I was the allies, Russia declared war on me once. Oh well ;) I must have played hundreds of games. Then, when I discovered Fundamentalism's allure, I made a beeline for the tech. I think I had a perfect system worked out, I could always reach the armor tech when my enemies still had cavalry... I think some of this was owing to the fact that due to bugs, I was sometimes able to research Writing without Alphabet, and other such strange things.
Also with Civ II, I began my deep hatred and mistrust for the Russian civ and the Sioux civ (in the game) and added them to my blacklist of nations I never make peace with. For some reason those nations (and the Indians [who also inhabit my blacklist]) always backstab me regardless of what I do in the game. That may have something to do with the fact that I never give tribute, but oh well, I refuse to give tribute. I also refuse to give up any land in a war and will always fight to the death.
Thus, when I play, I never negotiate with them. I play all my games to the death. And strangely enough, my game also possesses a bug that, if I refuse to meet with enough leaders at the beginning of the game, even if I only declare war on 2, and even if my reputation is Spotless, no one will speak with me, and I am forced to do total war.

In the summer of 1997/8 I found a neat little CD called the Toolkit for Civilization II, published in Oct 1996, with scenarios by the master, Mike McCart and advice on civilization II, I played the games, and realized that I could mess around with the scenarios, etc, but was afraid to do so.
It was also around 1998 when I found Dan's Ultimate Civ II Site and downloaded the Star Wars Civ game (which I have since been unable to find... and which I accidentally deleted :() by Mike McCart... The StarWars game was over 20MB (with sound) and completely redesigned civ... IT was one of the earliest Mods, I believe.

Let's see, around 1999 I started desigining scenarios after I purchased Civ II: Fantastic Worlds which came with a scenario editor. Then I took hundreds of units off of civ-sites. I have nearly 1000 on my hard drive, possibly more. I'm still cataloguing them.
I created several scenarios including a historical reenactment of the American's Civil War and a Lord of the Flies Scenario, whose units I edited from others... I think the LoF scenario is quite good as is the Civil War one... I also designed a few more.
I was hard at work on an Atlantis scenario when I realized that Civ II:FW was acting up on me, for some reason it randomly corrupted files... This doubled my work time and caused me to trash the whole concept of scenarios... Although I will, time to time, create a scenario with grasslands +20 food to see how many and how large cities I can build.

Around 1999 I made my first attempt at Deity level and, with a foolproof strategy was on the road to winning. I still have the game, but got bored after a few hundred turns, however, I had already conquered 2 civilizations, despite the fact that I was on an island 20x20, surrounded by 7 civs.
Nowadays, I usually play at Prince level because I am disgusted with computer cheating and dislike the fact that at the higher difficulty levels the computer forces extra malcontent citizens to appear.
Thus, while I can play Deity, I hardly ever do.

All in all, Civ II has followed me to about four computers, and Civ I has been on two others.