We could also open "Encyclopedia's", and go look things up in books in "libraries". However, your steps generally agree with my recollections.
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How did people spend their time pre-internet?
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I don't know when it started, but originally, they sent floppies. Starting in about '93, the ISP I worked for sent either 3 Windows floppies or 4 Mac floppies when you signed up. Most folks I knew reformatted AOL floppies to keep their non-essential data on.
I had a co-worker who could essentially sing our dial-up number and the rest of the dialog. In tune. We could all recognize it.
Oh, dear lord! How do you think an electronic device works? I'm really trying hard not to twit you, but some of your assumptions are just.... epic.
Ugh! Really?
HAHA! Nope. But, not surprised. At all.
I actually did not know you can get the time from a cellphone tower. In fact, I am not sure who is the authority to say what time it is now. IIRC back in the dumb phone days you had to set the clock yourself does not auto adjust to the tower.
You are correct. Having to sit on a desk limited our internet access, then the mobile laptops took it around with us, and finally the smartphone made us connected 24/7.
I didn't know that. Now that you mention it, I think both use copper to transfer electricity and phone signal (is the phone signal electric too?)
I try to do this but in all honesty there are emergencies where you need to be contacted or you need to contact others. I can imagine the horror of being stranded in some road with a flat tire with no phone in your pocket.
Exactly and this has a lot to do with this thread. Even social norms have changed. Its happening without us noticing it. I noticed this in pre-80s movies. The pace of those movies was so slow I would imagine people were very relaxed back then over our instant gratification behaviour today.
I am aware of this yet even I find it difficult to stop as I find myself reaching for the phone with no reason what so ever. Which reminds of an experiment that I just can't find info on now where mice were rewarded with dopamine every time they hit a button and they became so addicted that , IIRC, kept hitting the button until they died. What I found is another experiment where isolated-caged (alone) mice consumed 19 times more morphine than free roaming rats which should makes us aware of the dangers of being more isolated and connected via the internet. After some time in life, I realised that the human is a social animal and he can not live alone. It really does damage him mentally. No need for torture, lock some one in an empty room and he will get brain damage over time I am sure of it.
I am wise enough to say I do not know when I do not k now. I rather not be the idiot who acts he knows it all and blabbers misinformation. How phone works? I do not know. Just like I do not know how solar panel works, or how air conditioner works, or how a CPU works.
When I was younger, when we had block wide electricity blackout but the phone kept working, and unlike all other electric device that connected to the electric socket (this one did not), I assumed it worked in some other method.
Yes really, I never heard of p2p gameplay over the internet until at least like 1996
You must be really old because I do not remember of a time or someone who talked to me about how they drew cash out before cards. I had to look it up and found out that the magnetic stripe (swipe) was around since the 60s so if you remember a time before that you must be really old. [link] [link] [swipe available since the 80s]
If you are from the USA maybe that is the problem. US stick to the old technology much longer. We had the cards with chips for years meanwhile USA being still reliant on the swipe and sign method.
I think the problem is social norms. I think back then when people had no computers, 4 channel tv, and no internet they were much likely to welcome people dropping by.
Now everyone is engaged in a screen and their lives are much busier so such thing is not as welcome as it used to be.
I guess it depends on how far you go back. My Nokia 6275i wasn't considered a smartphone but it picked up the time automatically.
In modern times, doing what’s called a “one shot” is considered a challenge. That’s where you stretch a single shot as long as you can and try to get as much action into it within one take and without any cuts. Back then, it was the norm.
I won’t go into how much I hate 21st century movies; all of them without exception. They’re all indicative of a narcissistic, infant-minded society on the brink of collapse.
To give you an idea: watch a real 70’s movie. Everybody was mature, had a clue, knew who they were, had a life. They were autonomous adults.
Now watch one of the many hundreds of wannabe 70’s movies today. There’s that new Disco movie, for instance. Notice that every actor in it is a feeble adult child vying to make their libarts-construct of their self align with reality but reality isn’t budging. Watching these actors pathetically try to emulate people with real personalities such as those in the 70’s is like watching elementary kids putting on a play. Taping a fake beard to your face and wearing a craft-paper stovepipe hat doesn’t make you Abe Lincoln. You still look like a kid trying to fill dad’s patent leather shoes and coat.
Jodie Foster was about twelve when she acted in Taxi Driver. I have never met anybody in their twenties as mature as that in this century. At this point, I can start pushing that statement to include most people in their thirties. Even young Macaulay Culkin was a better more convincing actor than anybody in their thirties or forties today.
Another post here reminded me of a sad fact of today’s tech. Satellites are polluting our night sky. I can go out around 9:30 on almost any night and see a highway interchange of orbital traffic. There’s so many going in every direction. Most of my time lapse photos catch at least one if not three. When I was a kid, maybe I saw “a” satellite if I was looking hard enough for long enough. Now it’s impossible to focus on the empty vastness out there without interlopers. There is really no more sanctuary.
I have a home theatre set up for watching movies, and I learned some time ago that I should never take my phone in there with me otherwise I'll start browsing during the "boring" bits!
Our internet adoption was a bit slower than the States, in the late 90's early 00's in my first computerized years we had to purchase time cards from the local ISP and use that to gain access. They had three variants: Day, Night and Both. The night one was cheaper and it allowed access from 10 PM till 10 AM, if I recall correctly. That's the one I used to purchase. Anyway, since these stored up to 8hrs only, and I had to spend my pocket money on them, my online presence was, naturally, very limited.
So what I distinctly remember, is playing single player on my computer, but being on the phone with my friend who was playing what could be a different single player game on his end. That was our way to connect lol. The physical downside was a sore neck since you used both hands on keyboard + mouse, thus you held the landline phone between your shoulder and the side of your head.
So what I distinctly remember, is playing single player on my computer, but being on the phone with my friend who was playing what could be a different single player game on his end. That was our way to connect lol. The physical downside was a sore neck since you used both hands on keyboard + mouse, thus you held the landline phone between your shoulder and the side of your head.
Haha, funny thing happened one of the inmates requested that song and we did it, true.
Okay.
I got married in 1997 and my wife and I lived without cabletv, without internet and we didn't get cell phones until late 1997.
As a young, married couple in our late 20s with no kids and only part-time night jobs, I can sure as heck tell you we didn't appreciate people dropping in.
By 2003 we had our first kid. We appreciated that less, even with internet, cabletv and cell phones.
Perhaps in my teens and mid-20s, when I had a part-time job, lived with my parents and no one was home, I might have appreciated it.
My friend and I once made a trip from Southern California to Oregon and back. We were both in our mid-20s and had miscalculated money. We needed a place to stay for the night before returning and could not afford a hotel. So we 'dropped by' my cousin's home in the Bay area.
She was nice and accommodated us for the night, but with three small kids and no food in the house I can tell you that she was LESS THAN HAPPY to see us.
While you make a certain point, having been a kid in the 70s, I often look to 70s film and TV shows and find that this was an era of old people.
Most actors of that day looked old, even though they were in their 30s or 40s. Not particularly anything that drove this 80s kid to see that era of movies or shows. There were certain exceptions of course.
Another thing I didn't care for in that time period was the really big holes in plot. Especially in what was primetime TV shows of the era. In order to enjoy these shows you had to suspend your disbelief, a lot. You couldn't get by now with those plot holes. Actors were selected because they could perform the role - but I find it hard to believe a lot of those actors could actually be the character(s) they were portraying.
I agree, there were some good movies back then. I'm just not seeing the totality of it as you describe.
Ah I remember watching TV on the phone with friends.
It’s worse, today. With the stuff like Kingsmen or whatever it’s called, you have kids that look like they would freeze up or run at the first sign of aggression running around Chuck Norris’ing. Remember the journalist that cried after trying out an AR-15? He said it caused PTSD and was too intense for him? That sounds more fitting for those soft doughy actors than any sort of badass. I’ve seen people that look like that in too many real-life robbery or shooting videos and the reality is they are greater cowards than a scripted portrayal could possibly convey. It’s my personal experience with their type as well, and I’m talking about people easily twice my mass 🙄
I really can’t stand the shovel-loads of westerns from the 50’s into the 70’s. I can say, however, that I’ve never seen a bad portrayal of a cowboy from that era. Hell, the only Jack Palance role that I find fitting was his cowboy in Shane. I was just watching a show like Bonanza or Gunsmoke or the Rifleman while waiting at the DMV and I was reminded just how convincing these cheesy shows were. I know they’re not historically accurate and they do ham it up when it comes to the theatrics like being shot and flying through a window. At the same time, the gritty actors and extremely strong lines they deliver have so well painted a picture of the west that when I think back to history of that era it is with such actors and film grain. I do believe that if there were motion picture cameras in that era, it would look exactly like what we see in The Big Trail. (Obviously excusing the use of backdrops). Granted, there were plenty of people that actually experienced the Oregon Trail-era that were living when that movie was made, they weren’t the young actors. Those young actors did a fine job making one wonder if they grew up slinging six-shooters and jerking meats, though.
How about the Scorpio killer in Dirty Harry? His performance is one that I use to illustrate somebody who is so great in a particular role that I can’t possibly see the actor under the character. He’s not a one-note actor, either, since he has performed equally fine in other roles.
Hill Street Blues was full of hit-and-miss roles. Yes it is one of the cheesy shows you mentioned but TV was almost never cheese-free. Almost everybody had a shot in that series. Jonathan Frakes, Meg Tilly, David Caruso, James Avery, Linda Hamilton AND Michael Bean, Alley Sheedy, Cuba Gooding Jr. all appeared and those are just the few I can remember. It was like every episode had somebody and now every time I’m watching a movie and I see a familiar face, I’ve recognized them from guess where.
Sometimes these actors are just actors: extras. Sometimes, though, their performance is so compelling that it really becomes hard to see the actor beneath. Give it a watch and tell me that you aren’t convinced that Meg Tilly is a well-tread prostitute.
Today…well they have girls with fewer beans rolling around the old tin can than Mila Kunis or Megan Fox delivering hyper-technical lines as if they didn’t study all night just to say a three-syllable word. I’m not convinced that the people you see in real life saying things like “it’s chicken. Chicken of the sea” would be delivering verbose monologues about the poetic justices of one’s duplicity being their comeuppance.
Basically every 21st century movie is this.
True there was little difference between 1000AD and 1400AD. but we’ve seen more technological progress in the last hundred years than we’ve had over the entirety of human existence, with little sign that’s going to slow down.
History of technology - Automation, Digitalization, Robotics | Britannica
History of technology - Automation, Digitalization, Robotics: Recent history is notoriously difficult to write, because of the mass of material and the problem of distinguishing the significant from the insignificant among events that have virtually the power of contemporary experience. In...
www.britannica.com
Just search for ‘atomic clock’ and you’ll find sites like this:
The Official U.S. Time | NIST
The National Institute of Standards and Technology - Time and Frequency Division maintains the standard for frequency and time interval for the United States, provides official time to the United States, and carries out a broad program of research and service activities in time and frequency...
One major thing I have noticed in decline since the introduction of the internet is the hobby club or meeting club, basically a club/group that was run in the evenings run by people who shared a common interest, sports, reading, knitting, movies, toys, fashion, music, art, gardening, nature, flowers, machinery, engineering, medical, fishing, swimming, walking, running, keep fit, athletics, darts, pool, snooker, bowling..and the list goes on. There was always a multitude of clubs being run in your area that you could attend after work for those who were adults and similar clubs for those that were children/teenagers. There was always something to do in the evening and they were always run from a Monday to Saturday. Sunday was always considered a day of rest. If religious you did church activities and then family time or if non religious it was family time. The one day of the week where you did everything as a family.
Along came the internet and now people wanted to stay home and chat with people online. They stayed home to play games online with their friends or stayed home using the computer to look at stuff on this new internet thing. You no longer had to go out and do things, you could stay in the comfort of your home. This meant less and less people were going to their local clubs which meant more and more clubs closing meaning there was less and less things for people to do in the evenings.
Along came the internet and now people wanted to stay home and chat with people online. They stayed home to play games online with their friends or stayed home using the computer to look at stuff on this new internet thing. You no longer had to go out and do things, you could stay in the comfort of your home. This meant less and less people were going to their local clubs which meant more and more clubs closing meaning there was less and less things for people to do in the evenings.
Check out this site - you might like it.
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You've got the wrong idea in your head. My post was not an invitation that I missed evening activities. It was to explain about evening activities declining.Check out this site - you might like it.
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Find Meetup events, join groups, or start your own. Make new friends and connect with like-minded people. Meet people near you who share your interests.www.meetup.com
I didn't include shows like the Rifleman or Gunsmoke (both shows I like) because both those shows started in the 60s. In the case of Gunsmoke it was even earlier, 1955. We'd been discussing 70's era. I know a portion of Gunsmoke aired during the 70s, but I wasn't counting it because of when it started. Hill Street Blues was the 80s, along with St. Elsewhere. Both those shows I only started to catch as an older teen.
I think possibly too, we have a difference in what shows we like to watch.
Regarding TV pre internet days, it was in tune with how people went about their day to keep them active and busy. As a child I especially remember Saturday morning children's TV, there was always something entertaining to watch right up until you had your midday meal. Then once the meal had settled you went out and met up with your friends/ other children you knew down the local park. Played a lot of activities until 4pm-5pm when it was time to come home for evening food, then it was either meet up with a specific friend either at your house or their house and played games or you went out to an evening club, stayed until what ever time your parents allowed you to stay out till, came home, an 1hr of evening TV and then bed. Saturday's was always hectic and there was always lots to do. No time for the internet back then if it had been around then lol.
One of the key differences that the under-40s are going to have difficulty in grasping is that fact that if they turn off their computer and phone, they can't mimic the experience of 'pre internet' because too much has changed.
For a start, the high street. I've tried to explain to my own 20-something children about shopping centres and department stores, but it's difficult for them to understand. Even small UK towns like where I lived as a child, they had at least one huge department store selling everything from clothes to furniture to records and tapes, hifis, organs, cameras, all that kind of tech you have to go online for now mostly (well, accepting that some of that is obsolete now anyway). In the States, you had massive shopping malls with cornerstone retailers like Sears.
Mostly all of that's gone, so young people cannot mimic our experience just by turning off their tech.
For a start, the high street. I've tried to explain to my own 20-something children about shopping centres and department stores, but it's difficult for them to understand. Even small UK towns like where I lived as a child, they had at least one huge department store selling everything from clothes to furniture to records and tapes, hifis, organs, cameras, all that kind of tech you have to go online for now mostly (well, accepting that some of that is obsolete now anyway). In the States, you had massive shopping malls with cornerstone retailers like Sears.
Mostly all of that's gone, so young people cannot mimic our experience just by turning off their tech.
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