I learned the concept of social engineering in middle school through those AOL CDs. There was a culture of making proggies and learning about the inner workings of how AOL the program and the company worked if you were interested and knew where to look.

If you called into a certain department at AOL, you could tell them you were a business and would like to put out their CDs for display. So long as the order was for under 1000 or so they would send them to you, for free, directly to the address of the "business".

I also learned in middle school that CDs sting but don't really hurt and the various ways to launch attacks in a CD war with friends and classmates. You throw CDs vertical to be precise and sideways for a crazy flight path to confuse your opponents.

Sadly I also discovered that all the racist didn't die in the 70s, as the owner of one of the largest AOL hacking discussion forums I frequented loved to talk about how he would move if a black family ever moved into his neighborhood.