Internet: A Look Back into the Future

I found this archive from October 1993. There is a video about this new thing that is gaining popularity called, the Internet. I thought it was interesting and decided to pass it along. I thought it was funny to see them explain emoticons. The optimism of the demeanor of the average Internet user is also interesting. So now, 12 years later, how we doing?

1993 Internet Story

wow that was a great news thingy. seems like nothing has changed with the reasons why regular people are online (except commerce and graphics and how we connect to it and now it's THE internet hehe!!).
*claps*

Wow funny clip. 1993 was the first time I heard of "Internet," my Senior year in high school and it wasn't until 1995 that I finally logged on. Ohh it is my 10 year Net anniversary! YAY.

I found interesting the part about everyone being nice to each other and no one saying "Go to hell" especially topical given the current state of these forums. <--I am serious.

haha yeah, that seemed a little naieve, and they made a point of showing the alt fan rush limbaugh bbs hehe!!

I still don't have a problem with venting online though, you don't do someone any favors by allowing them to think they are universally correct and with anything semantic there is so much room for interpretation, and no amount of can really explain how funny you are trying to be and who the hell uses to mean 'i'm serious' anyways? hehe I remember in 95 wondering why a friend was so thrilled with downloading porn "for free" and being disgusted when my girlfriend got a 300$ phone bill because prodigy was using a long distance number instead of a local one haha!!

"There is not alot of put downs, screens full of go to hell its suprising" ...


Reminds me of most online games i played
new in game : friendly happy shiney people everyone helping eachother
people who play to much aka very high levels : grumpy grinding things for drops or $$$$ NEED GREED MINE (enter random curse words)

Ok not aaalways but its easy to spot

Growing at the rate of an embryonic brain... one that is now old enough to be full of cuts, put-downs, cursing, and screens full of "Go to Hell."

Does this mean that in twenty years the internet will be too old for all of that and looking to have babies?

Yes. This is the quote, which I thought worth preserving:-

"There's an interesting kind of restraint that you find. There's not a lot of cursing or swearing; there's not a lot of personal cuts; there's not a lot of put-downs that one would expect to find. There's not screenfuls of "Go to hell!", which is surprising.

... It's interesting, because one would think if you were anonymous you would do anything you want, but people in a group have their own sense of community."

:-|

I just realized I have become old. Most of my friends and myself had been using that "new thing" for over 10 years by the time that story hit the airwaves.

How are we doing? To be honest you all could go home and give me back my old internet.
No lag, spam or crap or the world wide wait.


Rox

Anyone remember FidoNet and EchoNet?

remember NSFNet?
you oldbie you

LOLEX... nice find, Loki! I always knew the Internet would come this way and end up like it is, but most of my peers at the time gave me flustered looks of disbelief. I'm just happy history like this is archived so we all get a good look. Although, now people tend to say "I can't believe we used to do that!" in regards to past climes.

Some revolution!

I do.

I started 'surfing around' back in the days where BBS's ran the show (bulletin board systems) with 2400 Baud rates. When I first got my first 14.4kbs modem I was extactic, even though I didn't know exactly at the time, the transfer rate depeneded entirely on the quality of the phone line. BBS's at the time were the only way really to relay information to one person to another. They say the First Gulf War, was the first 'mass media war' that could be transmitted within hours to everyone in the world. But, that's debateable since internet technology was still in its infantcy.

I really do understand the importance of technology of this and how it'll affect how we do our daily lives. I expect vehicles will be fully integrated with this technology within the next 5-10 years, if not sooner.

We've gone an extremely long way in JUST a little over a decade. From small local BBS's to full blown metaverse systems (SL). This is just the start folks hang on to your seatbelts, we're in for a good ride.

~einsman~

Make the most of the net while you still can. We are living in the net's "Golden Age" at this moment.

I am soooooooooo dropping the "the" and calling it "Internet" from now on. Thanks for the link!

The golden age of the internet was when everything was free. The golden age is over and this is the just umm age. When the internet was golden, I was one of the first people to get a freepc from FreePC.com. LOL


In 1993, IRC was always a haven for asshat college kids to flame each other to hell, and nothing has changed on IRC, except a lot of those college kids are old now. Like me

Interesting indeed.

I remember being online during this period though and I dont think this "sweetness and light" thing is really that real.

I take it as them referring to the fact that the discussion hardly ever degenerated to the point of just writing "go to hell" over and over (which it usually didn't), and was more debate or "argument-style" as opposed to being in the form of a RL conversation where such "go to hell" screens might be the result. In other words I think they are referring to the fact that as a "typed" media it is that much more literate or formal than a regular conversation.

Our discussions here are similarly argument based and most often also dont get to the point of the "go to hell" screens, the closest analogy here would be that some of the "picture" posts can approach that level of comment.

Just because we are "debating" instead of swearing and pulling each others hair out though, does not mean we are being civil or mature, and the whatever imposed "formality" typed responses enables over and above more conversational style remarks has certainly degenerated strongly over the intervening years.

~

Hmmm, thought you were a capitalist.

The "golden age" for me was just before the web, when it was all text based. Seriously. I had way more fun back then, more mystery, and absolutely no advertisements at all! Heaven.

And when you "met" someone, it was just two sets of yellow characters glowing on a black screen, no avatars, no bodies, just minds in a void.

Heck i think my mind STILL just floats in a void -

when someone finds it let me know?