My younger coworkers have no idea what it was like to grow up with dial-up internet.
By @sashamm · Nostalgia
I was telling a story about having to get off the phone so someone could use the internet, and they looked at me like I had three heads. It made me realize how much of the early internet experience is just gone.
The full story
I work in a pretty young office, I'm 34 and most of my team is in their early-to-mid 20s. We were just chatting the other day and I made a joke about the dial-up sound, and how you had to warn everyone in the house before you logged on. Blank stares. All of them. I tried to explain the agony of waiting ten minutes for a single song to download from Napster or Kazaa, and the constant risk of it being a weirdly edited version or just a completely different song. Or the strategic thinking that went into your AIM away message, because you only got one. You couldn't just be 'away,' you had to have a perfectly crafted, emotionally resonant emo lyric to signal your mood to the world. Then I got into the social dynamics. Having to share one family computer that was in the living room, meaning your parents could walk by at any moment and see your Neopets page or your extremely personal LiveJournal entry. Having to use a phone line meant you couldn't be on the phone and the internet at the same time. If your mom was waiting for a call, your internet time was over. That was the law. It was a physical resource that had to be shared and negotiated. They sort of laughed, but in a polite 'wow that's weird' way, not in a way that they actually got it. To them, the internet is just always on, everywhere, on a device in their pocket. They can't comprehend a time when it was this slow, clunky thing you had to access deliberately, in one specific place, while a modem screeched at you. I feel ancient, but also a little sad for them. They missed the Wild West era of the internet.
How people voted
- Facts — 25% (33 votes)
- Depends — 43% (56 votes)
- No Way — 32% (41 votes)
Readers say “Depends” (43%) — 130 votes and 5 comments so far.
What people are saying
@danimm — ok grandpa
@sortaright — I'd start exclusively communicating with them through obscure emo lyrics in my slack status.
@remyee — My dad used to unplug the modem to make phone calls and it would cancel my Runescape session. I've never known true rage since.
@maraee — I'm 35 and my younger sister (26) absolutely knows what dial-up is, are you sure they weren't just being polite?
@gussorta — you gotta start unplugging the wifi router and tell them its your turn on the internet
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