Before the Internet

[Steve Reichert]

As I've squandered many hours perusing this site today, I realize I haven't tended to the house, the kids, the wife.

So here's a question for everyone: was life better before the Internet, or is the Internet really making things better?

[aam1234]

Can't imagine life without the internet. Think of how difficult it will be to get simple info, like the weather or the score of games.

[tharper]

I remember when my dad set us up with Prodigy way back in the day. 286 8mhz PC with 640k ram and a 20mb hard drive, monochrome CRT. You were allotted 30 'messages' aka emails or you'd be charged more. 2400 baud dialup, smoking fast! I can't imagine life without it now. I honestly think the world would have a terrible time readjusting.

[Mr. Pickles]

Life before the Internet was better. As it is now, everyone is a spoiled little brat.

[Rick Waldroup]

I love the internet. Life is much better with it.

I mean, just think- you can fight with people from all over the world without ever leaving your chair or raising a fist. You can view hot porn at the press of a button. You can be whoever you want to be and no one is the wiser. I can read and see things that would have been impossible before. I can get kicked off places and just go find another place to play. Etc, etc, etc......

Are you kidding? This is the greatest invention since the hula hoop. Round and round we go, chasing our own tails. Round and round we go......

[ohenry]

I find the internet a significant advantage to my life. It is filled with useless and often incorrect information frequently, however. Just read some of the replies in this forum

[Rick Waldroup]

Originally Posted by ohenry

I find the internet a significant advantage to my life. It is filled with useless and often incorrect information frequently, however. Just read some of the replies in this forum

See, I just knew there was something we could agree on.

[ohenry]

Originally Posted by Rick Waldroup

See, I just knew there was something we could agree on.

You're talking about the 24/7 porn, right?

[Rick Waldroup]

Originally Posted by ohenry

You're talking about the 24/7 porn, right?

Exactly!!!!!

[Steve Reichert]

Originally Posted by ohenry

You're talking about the 24/7 porn, right?

This is a very funny discussion. But I hope my wife will not read this.

[KmH]

I don't think life is better now than before the Internet, but it is certainly different.

[Joves]

I find it can be a curse on one hand but, a blessing on the other. A curse in that you can get on and all time seems to accelerate and, a blessing at times in that there is no many things you can do on it. It is better than the old days and, being stuck watching TV during bad weather or, not having money to do things.

[Mike_PEAT]

Before the internet there was local BBSes (Bulletin Board Systems) which people ran out of their homes...one person could only sign on at a time, and there were time limits to try to allow other people to sign on...the days of busy signals!

I first went online in the early 80's, you talk about 2400baud above, when I started the max was 300baud and I even connected to BBSes as low as 110baud!

I remember to connect to a BBS (on the old style rotary phones) picking up the handset, manually dialling the number, listening for the modem tones, and putting the handset into a cradle which had a speaker and a microphone called an "acoustic coupler modem" to transmit the data from the computer:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acoustic_coupler
Then direct connect modems came out which could achieve 300baud and autodial numbers; the first ones had no speakers so you could be dialling the wrong number and not know it until the police show up after receiving a complaint from an old woman; had that happen at the computer store I worked at since we gave out BBS numbers with the modems EXCEPT that the numbers came from the manufacturer and the kid doing the dialling didn't bother to enter the area code since it was a long distance call.

Later came online services that were accessible in multiple cities like Compuserve, Canada Remote Systems with multiple lines to reduce busy signals.

Wow, that means I've gone online for almost 30 years now! How far we've come in such a short time!

[kewk]

Originally Posted by Steve Reichert

As I've squandered many hours perusing this site today, I realize I haven't tended to the house, the kids, the wife.

So here's a question for everyone: was life better before the Internet, or is the Internet really making things better?

I absolutely, without a doubt, cannot live with out some type of net access. Period. In an indirect way the internet is a huge factor in how I came to love photography.

[verdesardog]

I would be totaly lost without my internet connection. There are two stores here, Home Depot and Wallmart. I do most of my shopping via the net.

[glockman99]

My wife hates that I found the 'net back in 1999, but at-least she knows where to find me most of the time...(At-home, in-front of my computer.)..

[degatti]

Before the internet I had a small BBS I ran from my Atari and Commodore computers. The good ol days I love the internet I just don't think it's found it's place yet. As a parent I can see the way it has impacted my kids lives. I have to kick them in the butt so they will go out and look at the world. I also think it's funny that my teenagers would rather send a text message then talk on the phone.

[Bunny N]

just got this from a friend yesterday. kinda fits this conversation.

Dear spoiled-ass under 30 Noobs,

When I was a kid, adults used
to bore me to tears with their tedious diatribes
about how hard things were. When they were
growing up; what with walking Twenty-five miles
to school every morning....

Uphill...

Barefoot...

BOTH ways

Yadda, yadda, yadda



And I remember promising
myself that when I grew up, there was no way in
hell I was going to lay a
bunch of crap like that on my kids about how
hard I had it and how easy
they've got it!


But now that... I'm over the ripe
old age of thirty, I can't help but look around
and notice the youth of today.

You've got
it so easy! I mean, compared to my childhood,
you live in a damn Utopia!

And I hate to say it, but you kids
today, you don't know how good you've got
it!

I mean,
when I was a kid we didn't have The Internet. If
we wanted to know something, we had to go to the
damn library and look it up ourselves, in the
card catalogue!!


There was no email!! We had to
actually write somebody a letter - with a
pen! Then you had to walk all the way
across the street and put it in the mailbox
and it would take, like, a week to get there!
Stamps were 10 cents!


Child Protective
Services didn't care if our parents beat us.
As a matter of fact, the parents of all my
friends also had permission to kick our ass!
Nowhere was safe!

There
were no MP3' s or Napsters! If you wanted
to steal music, you had to hitchhike to the damn
record store and shoplift it
yourself! Or you had to wait
around all day to tape it off the radio and the
DJ would usually talk over the beginning and
@#*% it all up! There were no CD players!
We had tape decks in our car We'd
play our favorite tape and "eject" it when
finished and the tape would come undone.
Cause - that's how we rolled,
dig?


We didn't have fancy crap like
Call Waiting! If you were on the phone and
somebody else called they got a busy signal,
that's it!

And we didn't have fancy
Caller ID either!
When the phone rang, you
had no idea who it was! It could be your school,
your mom, your boss, your bookie, your drug
dealer, a collections agent, you just didn't
know!!! You had to pick it up and take your
chances, mister!

We didn't have any
fancy Sony Playstation video games with
high-resolution 3-D graphics! We had
the Atari 2600! With games like 'Space Invaders'
and 'Asteroids'. Your guy was a little square!
You actually had to use your imagination!! And
there were no multiple levels or screens, it was
just one screen... Forever!
And you could
never win.. The game just kept getting harder
and harder and faster and faster until you died!
Just like LIFE!


You had to use a little book
called a TV Guide to find out what was on! You
were screwed when it came to channel surfing!
You had to get off your ass and walk over
to the TV to change the channel! NO
REMOTES!!!


There was no Cartoon
Network either! You could only get cartoons on
Saturday Morning. Do you hear what I'm saying!?!
We had to wait ALL
WEEK for cartoons, you
spoiled little rat-bastards!

And we didn't have microwaves, if we wanted to heat
something up we had to use the stove!
Imagine that!


That's exactly what I'm
talking about! You kids today have got it
too easy. You're spoiled. You guys
wouldn't have lasted five minutes back in
1980 or before!

[Mike_PEAT]

Originally Posted by Bunny N

But now that... I'm over the ripe
old age of thirty, I can't help but look around
and notice the youth of today.

You've got
it so easy! I mean, compared to my childhood,
you live in a damn Utopia!

And I hate to say it, but you kids
today, you don't know how good you've got
it!

They forgot about digital cameras...how in the old days we had to wait for our pictures to be developed at a lab, or use Polaroid which cost a lot of money per picture (and still had to wait 30-120 seconds for the print to develop). Of course I'm preaching to the choir on this one.

[M. Worthington]

There was more quality of life before the Internet.