The day the internet was turned on
Discussion
I was pretty much there from the top. I've been number one on all the search engines since the beginning. Currently hold the top three places on Google. Not 'cos I was clever, but 'cos I was early! (One of the few benefits of being old).
ETA: When I bought a ZX80 in 1980 people asked 'Why?' - when I bought the first Apple with music software people said 'Why?' - and when I bought a domain name (s) people said 'Why?'. Took most of them two decades to catch up. Nurd was in fact, not such a bad thing.
...oh, and I was called a luddite on PH earlier this week (!)
ETA: When I bought a ZX80 in 1980 people asked 'Why?' - when I bought the first Apple with music software people said 'Why?' - and when I bought a domain name (s) people said 'Why?'. Took most of them two decades to catch up. Nurd was in fact, not such a bad thing.
...oh, and I was called a luddite on PH earlier this week (!)
Edited by GetCarter on Friday 28th August 11:20
My early computing years were spent as a young child in the 80's on an Amstrad CPC464 and then CPC6128, both with colour monitors, which produced much better quality graphics than the ZX spectrums of the same era that my friends had.
School had those BBC Micros which we never really used.
I spent many years playing Dizzy and suchlike whilst tinkering with the software using a Multiface
Then came the Amiga 500+ in around 1991 which me and my brother virtually played to death over the next few years, it was an amazing machine capable of music, sound effects, speed and graphics that just blew our minds. The 3.5" floppy that loaded games in seconds was like something from the future! Lol!
Our first home PC was an Olivetti 386 in around 1990.
I remember first going online around 1993 at the computer club at school, where we used the school connection to look at basic websites and bulletin boards. I thought it was really exciting and pestered my parents to get a modem.
In around 1995 the Internet finally arrived at our home. I think we had a Gateway PC and a US Robotics Sportster modem... And AOL naturally!
As other have said, I will never forget that dialup noise.
My parents would go mad because we would be chatting on AOL and browsing for hours and thus rendering the house phone line permanantly engaged.
In about 2000 a mate at Uni was amazed that I didn't use Google for searching the web and promptly showed me it, and of course I've never used anything else since.
I think it's totally and utterly amazing that within my lifetime I have been lucky enough to see computers move from being a huge and virtually useless object sat at the back of a classroom, to millions of people being almost permanently connected to a World Wide Web whilst having microscopic supercomputers and communication devices in their pockets.
Incredible.
School had those BBC Micros which we never really used.
I spent many years playing Dizzy and suchlike whilst tinkering with the software using a Multiface
Then came the Amiga 500+ in around 1991 which me and my brother virtually played to death over the next few years, it was an amazing machine capable of music, sound effects, speed and graphics that just blew our minds. The 3.5" floppy that loaded games in seconds was like something from the future! Lol!
Our first home PC was an Olivetti 386 in around 1990.
I remember first going online around 1993 at the computer club at school, where we used the school connection to look at basic websites and bulletin boards. I thought it was really exciting and pestered my parents to get a modem.
In around 1995 the Internet finally arrived at our home. I think we had a Gateway PC and a US Robotics Sportster modem... And AOL naturally!
As other have said, I will never forget that dialup noise.
My parents would go mad because we would be chatting on AOL and browsing for hours and thus rendering the house phone line permanantly engaged.
In about 2000 a mate at Uni was amazed that I didn't use Google for searching the web and promptly showed me it, and of course I've never used anything else since.
I think it's totally and utterly amazing that within my lifetime I have been lucky enough to see computers move from being a huge and virtually useless object sat at the back of a classroom, to millions of people being almost permanently connected to a World Wide Web whilst having microscopic supercomputers and communication devices in their pockets.
Incredible.
AB said:
My earliest memories of being online are dial up modem followed by 'Welcome to AOL'.
This, and GET OFF THE INTERNET I NEED TO USE THE PHONE!!I remember setting up wireless Internet for my household, when I got fed up of me and my siblings arguing over using the USB modem.
My first experience with a computer was an Amstrad that ran on cassettes. Can't remember what games were on it apart from the in-built game which was called Burnin' Rubber.
The Amiga we had was where it was at. Finally figured out how to use an emulator and been searching the Net for games that I remember. Even though I've got Lemmings for Windows, I still had to try playing it on the emulator for nostalgia. Now to find someone who will play the 2 player mode with me! Something I never got to do
Edited by Ste1987 on Friday 28th August 11:43
First computer encountered - Atari consoles, late 70s I think.
First computer with keyboard (high school) - Commodore PETs - 1981.
First computer at home about 1982/3, vic 20.
Became C64 whilst mates had Amstrads and ZXinclairs. SID chip music era, ZZZap64!
Spent time 'resoldering' the 555 timers in quickshot joysticks to comprehensively beat others in "Daley thompsons decathlon".
Saturdays were walking into Dixons and doing weird things to their demo machines and running away.
Atari ST by 1985, 16 bit had arrived, competing with the Amiga and Archimedes.
6th form (1986), college had a room full of beebs on a network called Arcnet (fileserving). First signs of networking wind ups.
College (Leicester Poly, 1988) had a room full of HP Vipers connected over 10/T co-ax - think this was my first email address (Janet), and first exposure to Unix & TCPIP.
Picked up first PC in about 1989, 20Mhz 80286, 2x5+1/4 floppies, no hard disks. Soldering ram onto video cards for 1024x768/256 colour glory.
First IT job 1991 (College placement), wrote 3d graphics application on DEC Ultrix workstations in C. Badly. Also burned a load of CPU cycles playing galtrader on their VAX (multi-player, non-temporal, text version of Elite).
First real job for IBM in 1993 - working with Testing and ANSI Standards bodies around Hard disks, SCSI, SSA and Fibre Channel. A 2Gb 5&1/4 drive was bleeding edge.
First personal internet account (Demon internet) about 1995/6 I think. Metacrawler searching, Netscape, Cooltalk, dial-up. Free Pr0n. Still use this email address, still own the static IP they gave me.
I still have my Beeb with Revs, Thrust and Elite Disks and C64.
First computer with keyboard (high school) - Commodore PETs - 1981.
First computer at home about 1982/3, vic 20.
Became C64 whilst mates had Amstrads and ZXinclairs. SID chip music era, ZZZap64!
Spent time 'resoldering' the 555 timers in quickshot joysticks to comprehensively beat others in "Daley thompsons decathlon".
Saturdays were walking into Dixons and doing weird things to their demo machines and running away.
Atari ST by 1985, 16 bit had arrived, competing with the Amiga and Archimedes.
6th form (1986), college had a room full of beebs on a network called Arcnet (fileserving). First signs of networking wind ups.
College (Leicester Poly, 1988) had a room full of HP Vipers connected over 10/T co-ax - think this was my first email address (Janet), and first exposure to Unix & TCPIP.
Picked up first PC in about 1989, 20Mhz 80286, 2x5+1/4 floppies, no hard disks. Soldering ram onto video cards for 1024x768/256 colour glory.
First IT job 1991 (College placement), wrote 3d graphics application on DEC Ultrix workstations in C. Badly. Also burned a load of CPU cycles playing galtrader on their VAX (multi-player, non-temporal, text version of Elite).
First real job for IBM in 1993 - working with Testing and ANSI Standards bodies around Hard disks, SCSI, SSA and Fibre Channel. A 2Gb 5&1/4 drive was bleeding edge.
First personal internet account (Demon internet) about 1995/6 I think. Metacrawler searching, Netscape, Cooltalk, dial-up. Free Pr0n. Still use this email address, still own the static IP they gave me.
I still have my Beeb with Revs, Thrust and Elite Disks and C64.
1st computer was a ZX81 my Dad bought from some bloke down the pub for 25 quid I think. I was about 5 then. Recall typing in a few BASIC programs from the manual but it was a bit s
t. Eventually ended up with a BBC B as Mum was a teacher and Dad was a programmer. They liked the combination gf 6502 and educational software.... I liked the fact that it had Elite! FFWd through an Atari 520 STFM and a million PCs from an IBM PS/1 through to 3/486SX/SXs but which point I was playing around on BBSs with an acoustic coupler 9600 baud modem Dad brought home from work. Followed by a USRobotics 14K modem which I really knocked up the hours on. I think we installed a second line eventually. CompuServe at first, then various dialup internet accounts and pissing about with Trumpet Winsock on Win 3.1. Learned the ways of HTML in 95 and started playing about with content. eventually lead to me doing a Software Engineering degree and I've never looked back.
t. Eventually ended up with a BBC B as Mum was a teacher and Dad was a programmer. They liked the combination gf 6502 and educational software.... I liked the fact that it had Elite! FFWd through an Atari 520 STFM and a million PCs from an IBM PS/1 through to 3/486SX/SXs but which point I was playing around on BBSs with an acoustic coupler 9600 baud modem Dad brought home from work. Followed by a USRobotics 14K modem which I really knocked up the hours on. I think we installed a second line eventually. CompuServe at first, then various dialup internet accounts and pissing about with Trumpet Winsock on Win 3.1. Learned the ways of HTML in 95 and started playing about with content. eventually lead to me doing a Software Engineering degree and I've never looked back. My first internet experience was at my dads in 1995, on his brand spankers new Windows 95 pc, I remember wondering why it didnt work until he pointed out I'd used a comma rather than a 'dot' in the url...
Then we got freeserve dialup at home in 97, then AOHELL in 99. Then my mum met and moved in with my stepdad in 2003 and he had 4mb ADSL BT, and things started to be normal again!
Then we got freeserve dialup at home in 97, then AOHELL in 99. Then my mum met and moved in with my stepdad in 2003 and he had 4mb ADSL BT, and things started to be normal again!
andrewrob said:
I remember my dad signing up with compuserve for internet access. I also remember Freeserve, they did a crazy deal which was unlimited minutes online for £5 a month or something silly.
I also remember leaving my laptop on downloading overnight for a week to get a dodgy copy of midtown madness, think it was about 200mb
Yes I had the freeserve and dial up.I also remember leaving my laptop on downloading overnight for a week to get a dodgy copy of midtown madness, think it was about 200mb
Used to get my music from the IRC network of chatrooms using software call mIRC.
Oh and porn sites with pictures and howthe screen loaded from top to bottom and jumped a little every time a picture was complete
Dial-up around 1985, accesss JANet at university in 1988, and FIDONet at home in the holidays, on the UUNET newsgroups around 1992 (I met Terry Pratchett as a direct result of being a regular on alt.fan.pratchett), first Compuserve account around 1995, bought my first domain in something like 1997 (it was quite expensive, and hosting even more so).
Edit: And since people seem to be mentioning their first exposure to computers, that would have been in 1976 for me. My dad bought a TRS-80 Model 1.
Edit: And since people seem to be mentioning their first exposure to computers, that would have been in 1976 for me. My dad bought a TRS-80 Model 1.
Edited by JonRB on Friday 28th August 13:03
First time I ever saw the internet was in School, about 95. That was on JANET (academic mega fast internet) with Pentium 75Mhz beasts. I remember asking a teacher what to go, and I still have a vivid memory of him telling to use a search engine.
The other prominent memory was the knuckle dragging lads in school bringing up ogrish and rotten.com and showing everyone pics of dead prostitutes on coroners tables and chopped up people. Lovely. Back in the 90s, the net really REALLY was a wild wild west of anything goes and it was insanely easy to get to it.
The other prominent memory was the knuckle dragging lads in school bringing up ogrish and rotten.com and showing everyone pics of dead prostitutes on coroners tables and chopped up people. Lovely. Back in the 90s, the net really REALLY was a wild wild west of anything goes and it was insanely easy to get to it.
ZX81 - 1981/82
Followed by a Spectrum a year later
Followed by an Amstrad PCW 8515 in 1985 writing programs for my dad for pocket money.
Left School at 16 (1986) and started at Olivetti (remember them?) working in their central repair lab - Place was stacked out with electronics and computers - happy times.
Didn't get onto the internet until the early 90's using the work's telephone line via AOL!
Registered my own domain name in 1998 (mez) and secretly hosted my website on spare IP space on the works 64k leased line!
Early Adopter of ADSL when it first came out and FTTC when that came out.
Followed by a Spectrum a year later
Followed by an Amstrad PCW 8515 in 1985 writing programs for my dad for pocket money.
Left School at 16 (1986) and started at Olivetti (remember them?) working in their central repair lab - Place was stacked out with electronics and computers - happy times.
Didn't get onto the internet until the early 90's using the work's telephone line via AOL!
Registered my own domain name in 1998 (mez) and secretly hosted my website on spare IP space on the works 64k leased line!
Early Adopter of ADSL when it first came out and FTTC when that came out.
GetCarter said:
I was pretty much there from the top. I've been number one on all the search engines since the beginning. Currently hold the top three places on Google. Not 'cos I was clever, but 'cos I was early! (One of the few benefits of being old).
I'm so old I don't know what any of that means.I was working at LB Newham when new fangled commputers were being introduced. We got an extra 3 days leave a year as a result. Lord knows why.
Sega Dreamcast - I used to play ChuChuRocket online for 1p/minute! I can't remember the ISP at the time, although it may have been CompuServe ... ? Anyway, this was late 1998. My parents (They've never been IT literate - The home PC was mine! Still, it helped towards my career!) soon upgraded my Internet access to a 56K modem, which allowed me to play Team Fortress Classic and Counter Strike online.
However not long after this, my parents agreed to upgrade to 512K ADSL! I think I was one of three people in my year group with ADSL ... £50/month, just for the Internet. Thanks parents!
Even though I work in IT, I'm quite glad I witnessed a time with no/little Internet. It was quite nice spending time outside during Summer hoidays, playing football or riding around on bikes. As soon as the Internet was introduced, it was difficult to resist the interest in online games and forums. Back then, I even remember reading Teletext pages on the television! Slowly waiting for the page to move to the next one ...
However not long after this, my parents agreed to upgrade to 512K ADSL! I think I was one of three people in my year group with ADSL ... £50/month, just for the Internet. Thanks parents!
Even though I work in IT, I'm quite glad I witnessed a time with no/little Internet. It was quite nice spending time outside during Summer hoidays, playing football or riding around on bikes. As soon as the Internet was introduced, it was difficult to resist the interest in online games and forums. Back then, I even remember reading Teletext pages on the television! Slowly waiting for the page to move to the next one ...
Surfr said:
Eventually ended up with a BBC B as Mum was a teacher and Dad was a programmer. They liked the combination gf 6502 and educational software.... I liked the fact that it had Elite! .
You could tell a lot about someone parents from which 80s home computer you had. BBC in particular said Mum and Dad were a bit studious, took the kids education really serioiusly and be dammed that the only decent games it had were Elite, Aviator and Revs (all simulators really as home computers shouldn't be about games. Oh no!)First computer I remember at home was a borrowed Digital VT100 from Dads work. Around 1979. He used to sell hard drives to corporates for $60k a pop. They were the size of a fridge / freezer and stored 60MB.
First www experience for me was 1994. Remember the Netscape browser with the low res 3D capital N logo thingy
Used Apple Acorn's and BBC's at school but my first computer was a Vic20. Followed it with a sharp MZ700 with a built in printer - in colour!
Was first introduced to the internet at college where someone was trying to get smut from bulletin boards and Gopher but I didn't understand anything I was being shown and more importantly, didn't find any smut!
Bought my first home PC - a 386 with a 16mhz clock which could be turbo'd to 33mhz! I can still remember the salesman pushing a 286 model with a 20Mb hard drive saying we would NEVER fill 20Mb.
Upgraded to a 486 and a modem. I think it was AOL that I tried first and pulled the phone line out when it went berserk making strange noises. Overcome my fear and left it plugged in and tried again and my world was filled with netscape, images loading a line at a time, so you never knew if the smut was lingerie, topless or full nude for about 30secs.
I'm sure we used it for other things, but smut was my primary reason.
Was first introduced to the internet at college where someone was trying to get smut from bulletin boards and Gopher but I didn't understand anything I was being shown and more importantly, didn't find any smut!
Bought my first home PC - a 386 with a 16mhz clock which could be turbo'd to 33mhz! I can still remember the salesman pushing a 286 model with a 20Mb hard drive saying we would NEVER fill 20Mb.
Upgraded to a 486 and a modem. I think it was AOL that I tried first and pulled the phone line out when it went berserk making strange noises. Overcome my fear and left it plugged in and tried again and my world was filled with netscape, images loading a line at a time, so you never knew if the smut was lingerie, topless or full nude for about 30secs.
I'm sure we used it for other things, but smut was my primary reason.
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