As you might imagine, Ryan and I don't spend a lot of time watching CNN, but we did get sucked into their documentary series on the 90's. I guess this really does officially make us old people: we are watching the throwback to our teen years remembered as ancient history. ACK!
If you haven't heard of this series, it has several parts that cover different facets of the 90's: TV, terrorism, politics, etc. And the one we watched this past weekend was about the age of technology. We laughed right out loud several times, watching clips of news anchors (with hello, 90's hair) explain these groundbreaking advances that are just flat out archaic now.
Some highlights and memories conjured up included:
* The news anchor who talked about computer guru "Steve Jobes."
* The original Macintosh computers that almost sent the company into oblivion. I told Ryan, while we watched that part, that my first ever computer was a Mac. My parents bought it for me my senior year of high school, so I could stop typing all my papers on the electric typewriter. Back then, the trusty Mac came in about eight boxes: the massive monitor, the huge external hard drive, the printer, the keyboard, the mouse that always fell off the back of my keyboard slide and hung by its cord. I used that computer throughout college and a bit beyond, before I had to get something "more with the times." My how that has changed!! (Although I confess, I've still never gone back to a Mac.)
* The familiar static blare of dial-up internet. That took me back to my first years on the job when I had to dial up every morning to connect to lender sites to get updates on outstanding loans. 8:00, turn on computer. 8:05, ssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssstatic.
* Do you remember your first email address and when you learned how to email for the first time? Boy, I do! I was in college, and my trusty Mac wasn't hooked up to the internet. No, no, no. Unless you were super important, which I most certainly was not, you did not have your own internet connection. You wrote papers on your computer. If you needed email, you went to a computer lab and hoped for an open machine. The school provided all students with an email address and the majority of my messages were exchanged with friends I would see 100 times during the day anyway, and they were always forwards of inspirational stories or jokes.
* I do remember getting my first non-school email account. My boyfriend-at-the-time set it up for me, and I thought I was pretty big time to have a yahoo account, thankyouverymuch. I went to the computer lab much more frequently after that!
* I also remember when I learned to search on the internet for the first time. This fellow (but younger) college student took pity on me and spent an evening in a computer lab teaching me to open new tabs, type in the URL for a site I knew and search for keywords to bring up sites I didn't. I had to learn this for a class I'd signed up for. That lesson overwhelmed me so profoundly that I marched straight to the registrar's office the next day and dropped the class. Search? On the internet? So not for me.
* Ryan said the first time he searched on the internet, he was a senior in high school, using the library computers (What??? He went in the library??? Say it isn't so!) The librarians said he could look up anything he wanted on the internet. He stared at the computer and had no idea what to look up, but he liked watching Seinfeld, so he looked up Jerry Seinfeld. He read a little bit, wasn't impressed, shut off the computer, and left. Probably never went back in the library again. JUST KIDDING, BABY!!!
* I digress. Back to the show. My FAVORITE part of the whole show was the very end, when they showed a clip of Bryant Gumbel, Katie Couric, and some other anchor live on the air, arguing about the meaning of @. Bryant thought it meant at. Katie thought it meant around or about. And neither they nor the other anchor had any idea what this phrase meant that they had to read from the teleprompter that included the mysterious @. Katie hollered to producers offset, "Can someone explain to us what internet means?"
Best. Line. Ever.
I wonder if Steve Jobes heard that newscast.
11 comments:
Oh dial up....dunnunuuuuuuuuuuu that connection ugh. Also...we had a second phone line for a fax (does anyone fax anymore?) and I used to pick up the line when I thought my sister had used enough internet so she'd lose the connection (:
CRACKING ME UP!!!! And yes...faxing! I remember at my last two jobs when we were able to ditch the fax machine because we could fax through the copier instead. OH! And the other thing I forgot to mention in the blog was the printer paper that fed through on the little roller. The perforated sides you would tear off? Remember that?
My first email address was my college- given email address. I didn't use it at all until I took a class in college wherein the professor said that we HAD to use it. I almost dropped the class but didn't. It amaaaaazes me how we got things done before the internet. I'm glad I'm of the generation that remembers not having cell phones and the internet. What contrasts the era of not having those things to now.
So true.
Internet...ah, yes, I even remember jobs that I had that involved NO internet. Finally, by my third job, the internet was an option for us to email colleagues on and off campus. The headers, when emails came in, had all of the locations through which the email was sent...ie emailing from SIUEdwardsville to ISUBloomington/Normal went from SIU to UM (Missouri) then up to Bloomington/Normal. And interestingly, I still use the very same 'personal' email (not associated with a college or university) that I set up in 1985...talk about not wanting to change...bet you'll give me a hard time about that one! Lois
it is really NUTS how fast everything has changed from a technology standpoint (well, it feels fast to me). So funny what Katie Couric said!!!!!!
Maria - There's another post! Cell phones! My first one was the size of a cordless phone! I remember getting it right after I graduated from college, so that was just over 17 years ago now. INSANE how far those have come in 20 years!
Odie - Crazy, right?
Lois - You made my jaw drop! You??? Not change?? I just wrote about our famous "change" conversation in FA when you first started. My ability to do so started with you!
Sarah - I fear your clicker would be working overtime counting all the fast changes in technology!!! :)
My first address was an AOL account at the end of senior year, but if I recall you couldn't use it unless you were on your home internet connection. Or maybe I just didn't know how. So freshman year of college I emailed from my trusty "Barnabas" account. Aww, memories.
Yes!!! Barnabas! That was my first one. 😊
I must be a lot like Ryan. When we first got internet at my parent's house I was just stumped . I mean, I wanted to use it, but what could I possibly use it FOR? I couldn't think of anything! I collected rabbits for my room, so I decided to search for "bunnies". Then my mom freaked out because she was afraid my search on the world wide web might result in images of the x-rated type of "bunny." Didn't do much searching after that. :)
Other than school email, I think Jonathan created our first email address that we both used when we first got married.
I LOVED the paper with the perforated edges. I would always weave them back and forth to make little accordion-like things. Know what I mean?
I received a cheque a few months ago that had been printed on a DOT MATRIX PRINTER and still had the perforation holes on the side. Instead of depositing it, I almost wanted to frame it as an antique!!!
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