I wasn’t on Usenet back then, as I was still in elementary school rather than university. But I heard the story later in the 90s. On the radio. I guess that last part makes me old after all.

Was on Usenet (rec.aviation mostly) through most of the second half of the 80s. Left the job that gave me that access in 1990 and had only limited (and pay-per-minute phone call) access for a few years (CIX and Compuserve, don't remember the order) so just used email a bit until a few years later and came back to a very different Internet.