A window to the past

[Elok]

Does anybody remember what search engines were like before Google? No matter what you searched for, you always got a random assortment of completely unrelated results, shot through with scads of pornography. You could search for "kittens" and get twelve pages of Jenny McCarthy showing her goods. I didn't mind too much, partly because I wasn't spoiled by search engines that actually worked and partly because hey, I was fourteen.

[Elok]

No, not really.

Given that Facebook didn't go public until about four years ago (IIRC), I'm not sure why he thinks you'd be unable to grasp that. I don't know how long Youtube's been around, but it's not exactly ancient either. You were born when, 1992 or so? I could probably check your profile, but eh.

[Nikolai]

So? I am amazed that you didn't grow up with Apple IIe's. In my day, the average American home didn't have computers and there was no internet in the public consciousness because it basically didn't exist (I know, technically it did but nowhere near a recognizable form). In my elementary school days (the early 90's), kids were only exposed to computers at school and they displayed a weird greenish hue all the time and like no colors.

In my high school days (1999-2003), youtube, myspace, and facebook didn't exist. You probably would have difficulty fathoming that.

I feel your pain. I'm somewhere in between, but closer to you than Haudron, being 24. My siblings haven't lived in a world with almost no computers, internet being unknown, only one TV channel available(being American, you probably can't fathom that ) and kids actually having to use their IMAGINATION when playing.

[Nikolai]

The freshman class this year is just young enough to never have used floppy disks.

A bit shorter term, but somehow alarming to me nevertheless.

I was shocked a few weeks ago to learn that some doctors still use floppies to send over journals to the hospitals.

[MikeH]

I started out with one of these.



The game there is 3D Monster Maze. Great, it was. First 3D game I ever played. :cloud9:

We had one too (though I was too young to use it really). We had a bag of frozen peas in the freezer dedicated to being the ZX-81 cooling system. We expanded it to 16K of RAM!

Then we had a BBC B, with a MASSIVE 32K, and colours!

[MOBIUS]

Well! When I were a young lad, my step dad bought a kit computer which he had to assemble himself onto a wooden base! Then he used to beat me within an inch of my life by writing a program that would teach me the capitals of all the countries in the world (not including island nations, for some reason), whether I liked it or not...!

Then we upgrade to the Spectrum 16K, then the 48K, then the +...

Kids of today...

[Jon Miller]

So you didn't know the capital of Ireland or Great Britain?

JM

[MOBIUS]

Yes, obviously I did, I mean the little diddy ones in the Pacific and the Caribbean...

(Though I may not have actually known about Dublin, I think I was 9 at the time.)

[Dauphin]

You didn't know Dublin was the capital or Ireland? You do yourself a discredit no doubt. I knew all the capitals of South America at age nine - I don't anymore, not after I learnt it was unimportant to know them.

[Al B. Sure!]

I was doing geography bees at age 9

[Nikolai]

A guy I know, knows all the countries in the world ranged after size, all the largest 10-20 mountains, rivers, lakes etc in all of them, including the lenght, height, area etc. He also knows a lot of similar stuff. He's incredible. He wrote a book a few years ago with these facts, it sold well too. He's also the only real commie I genuinely like.

[Cort Haus]

Then we had a BBC B, with a MASSIVE 32K, and colours!

Flashy ****. My rich friend had a BBC B. He didn't deserve it. Oh No. But he got to play defender. :Mad:

[Jon Miller]

I played on the AT&T (8086) into the 90s (we had it from the 80s).

There were other machines, some old unix one which was even older, I didn't really play on it though...

I think they were ones from work, at some point.

JM

[ricketyclik]

When I started reading this thread it made me feel young, but by the end I was feeling old