Feb 6 2013 I received it as an email forward back in the days before email had a GUI.
mutt (http://www.mutt.org/ or http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutt_%28email_client%29) is my current primary email client so the idea of pine being referred to as a client "before email had a gui" gave me a bit of a smile.
Put it this way: If we wanted to get online, we waited 30 minutes to an hour for one of the University's 20 2400 baud modems to come free. Then we logged in via VT100. We were then limited to email via PINE, "browsing" the "web" via LYNX or cruising a couple MUDs. Oh, and TALK command. Which you did by haranguing the other dozen or so usernames listed by student number (mine was 9446600). Based on your link, Mutt wouldn't be invented for another year. Edited to add: I've used acoustic couplers to dial into a university server to play Adventure on a terminal that lacked a monitor but had a daisy-wheel printer. Fuckin' VT100 was a revelation.