Where Were You When The Internet Was New?
Back in the day, everyone used Netscape Navigator as their web browser. In fact, they used to say "I'll see you on Netscape tonight" as "newbies" (that's how it was spelled at the time) thought Netscape was the internet. It took hours to download, and you had to cross your fingers that the connection would hold until it did.
Navigator 9 can still be downloaded here.
CompuServe, Prodigy, EarthLink - 30 million people on America Online "You've Got Mail!"
Modems also made an annoyingly loud screeching noise when starting up, giving you a sensation like nails on a blackboard.
Phil Zimmerman and PGP (Pretty Good Privacy) Real Networks, QuickTime Video Player, Red Hat, Mandrake Linux which required a degree in Quantum Mechanics in order to install it. Man-pages, RPM "Linux is gonna take over the desktop" right! Keep dreaming fanboys! :)
Four ex-Beatles were still alive. Now we're down to 3, (check, before you challenge that number) Ringo Starr, Paul McCartney and who else? That's not Ringo on the drums! :)
Did you use ICQ? ("I Seek You") which was a popular early instant messaging service. I wonder what happened to it?
serious research (porn).I remember signing up for an ISP and the lady said "we have 11,000 newsgroups, do you want us to protect you from adult subject matter?" I'm like: "Don't censor nothin honey, I want it all!"
Skype didn't exist, there was no such thing as "social media." No Instagram, Facebook or Twitter, can you imagine? No Google either. Search was done on Yahoo!, AltaVista or even Dogpile.
Some douchebags were running Apple into the ground because Steve (do I even have to use the last name?) was exiled in NEXTwhere at the time. Bill Gates and his giant pumpkin-head looming over our "iCEO" onscreen during a Stevenote. The iMac, which changed everything and made computers cool again.
There was no iPod or smartphones, and a company called Diamond Multimedia sold these crappy little Rio mp3 players that only held a few songs.
My first computer came with Windoze 98 SE and I paid an extra hundred bucks for a "fast" 56k modem, a massive 4 Gigabyte hard drive, (You're never gonna fill that up!) and a little port called USB which I was roundly ridiculed for as being a complete waste of money...
What are your memories from the early days of the internet?
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Tried download Quake 1 demo as a kid. 14.4k connection. I gave up after the third day. Mom wanted her phone line back.
Downloaded a rom of Donkey Kong 3 for an emulator. It was the biggest ROM ever. It took me over 3 hours to transfer all of it's 5mb, but I spent even longer playing it, so it's okay.
Napster arose and died very quickly. It was simple. I liked it.
Playing Warcrat II online was a no go. It just kept crashing. Nowadays I assume I was supposed to type my IP, not my friend's home number.
Up to this day, I don't know what is an IPX connection over the local network. But I know I couldn't use it to play Genewars.
Diablo 1 on battle.net rules supreme forever, ever and ever.
Quake was hella fun! I forgot all about not being able to use the net and phone at the same time. I couldn't take the slow speeds anymore and was the first in my neighborhood to order broadband. We had a line out the door of people waiting to use it! No one believed webpages could load instantly. Cost me $120 a month and I had the entire node to myself. Good times!
Using CompuServe.com on my Psion Organiser! Also people giving me patronising looks when I talked about email, and smugly saying "I like to have face-to-face conversations with real people" (in other words, "Shut up, weirdo!")
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I didn't know you could get the net on one of those things! I think CompuServe was my first ISP and I remember being confused by the numbers they used instead of names. They were considered a more "serious" provider than the others.
I was the first person to order anything online in my neighborhood, a book from Amazon. People thought I was nuts to put my personal info online, but I knew it was the future of commerce.
Yes, my Psion had a small modem which did actually work! It was a while before I ordered anything online - though I did book a trip to the Pacific Islands online in 1997. That seemed like a crazy thing to do at the time, though it worked out well in the end.
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