• Aceticon@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    2 hours ago

    I was following it just fine until the “experience the information superhighway” part.

    My mate’s ZX Spectrums had no “information superhighway” connection.

  • ChickenLadyLovesLife@lemmy.world
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    3 hours ago

    In the early '80s we used to hang out at my one friend’s house and play games on his TRS-80 which we affectionately called the “Trash 80”. We were all in high school except Monty who was 23 and enormously obese. Monty had a real job as a programmer somewhere and one afternoon he sat down at the Trash 80 and wrote a very plausible hi-res version of Space Invaders from scratch in about half an hour. At the time it meant nothing to me, but now after a 30 year career as a programmer myself I understand just how impressive that actually was.

    Monty wired up his car’s alternator to the ignition switch and he would leave his keys in the switch, hoping that somebody would attempt to steal his car and die. Not knowing about this, one of our friends ran out to his car after a D&D session, started it up and drove around the parking lot. Monty was so disappointed that nothing happened. I kinda miss the '80s.

  • RedFrank24@piefed.social
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    4 hours ago

    I remember when my mum used to say “Don’t bother your dad, he’s on the internet” like it was this big important thing. Not “He’s checking his email”, or anything more specific, the simple act of being on the internet was actually of note.

    • davetortoise@reddthat.com
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      4 hours ago

      “Surfing the web” is one of my favourite phrases in that it’s completely meaningless now despite there being far more of it happening than when the phrase was created

  • Aljernon@lemmy.today
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    4 hours ago

    I remember looking for porn for the first time at a buddies house and we couldn’t even figure it out. It never dawned on us to type “porn” into the search engine. Just two 13 year olds going “type in girls, damn, ok, try babes. Nothing? What about chicks?”

  • Sanguine@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    5 hours ago

    Old internet was the shit. Netscape navigator on a crappy 56k or DSL line, AIM, Runescape Classic. What a time to be alive.

  • njm1314@lemmy.world
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    5 hours ago

    I remember a bunch of us going over to our neighbor’s house to watch him play Sim ant.

  • justOnePersistentKbinPlease@fedia.io
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    8 hours ago

    Used to be a plugin called StumbleUpon.

    People who used it could submit websites to it, tag them. Then htting the button on the plugin would take you to a random website from your selected interests. Like/dislike/report as needed.

    The internet used to be magnificent.

  • MudMan@fedia.io
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    6 hours ago

    We used to go to arcades even when we had no money just to watch other people play over their shoulders.

    It was like Twitch, but sweaty and with more mullets.

  • daannii@lemmy.world
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    5 hours ago

    I can remember when texting came out. Y’all remember how the phone companies charged per minute and per text back in the day ?

    • Typotyper@sh.itjust.works
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      5 hours ago

      The nice had a HUGE phone bill. Memory is falling me here on the cash amount but I want to say it was over a grand. The statement was half an inch thick.

    • TexasDrunk@lemmy.world
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      3 hours ago

      Yeah, the ubiquity of it made it even more attractive to advertisers. Even more attractive when everything went from being individual forums to Facebook groups or subreddits.

  • ArbitraryValue@sh.itjust.works
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    9 hours ago

    Back when my friend got AOL for the first time, I came over and we sent an e-mail to the While House urging Bill Clinton to protect the environment.

    I’m not insecure about my age, though. On the contrary, people younger than me should be insecure about theirs. No one born in the 21st century can ever really reach adulthood, IMO.

  • Aneb@lemmy.world
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    8 hours ago

    Ughhhh my friends would come over to watch me play club penguin. Then we would walk to their house and watch them play club penguin. When we older we called each other while playing together. Also Halo CE was awesome in 4v4 multiplayer spit on a 1080 TV, 4 IRL people playing against 4 randos. One time I was hasty and picked “Hang em High” when it was my friends choice, I then asked “wanna play Hang em High?” It felt the natural pick lol