When you firstfound the internet usefull ?

Jason harwood · Mar 27, 2009

As this is my first post on this forum I have decided to post a question which has always been something that has come up a lot in my life time.

I first found the internet in about 1995 with a friend who was a total computer geek. Since then I have found it to be the most useful tool in every aspect of my life.

I would really love to hear your experiences as to when you firstfound the internet to be usefull?

fisicx · Mar 27, 2009

It was about the same time (1995). I used it to search for a Myst walkthrough. This was in a time before Google when altavista rules the waves along with Netscape Navigato a 386 chip and 56K modem!

And 40Mb Hard Drive was the best you could get along with a 15" screen.

And if you wanted to social network you used newsgroups and guestbooks and webrings....

Ah, life was so much simpler then.

Jason harwood · Mar 27, 2009

Oh wow, you just gave a real proper flash back. Looking for a walk through for a game called Kings Quest ,,,,, a good old P75 with a diamond stealth graphics accelerator. Man alive life really was simpler then. To tell you the truth I can not remember the search engine but that was definitely when I first found out the internet was going to a resource monster.

deniser · Mar 27, 2009

Whilst I had an internet connection some time between 93 and 95 (when to my great excitement I got a new AST PC to replace the old Amstrad WP), I didn't use it for anything useful - it was more of a gimmick.

The internet really came into its own when I started working remotely in 2000 and got one of the satellite broadband connections via a receiver attached to my house (being out in the sticks at the time).

I think Ask Jeeves was all the rage then.

Actually this is an interesting thread because I am always thinking how we - my generation - are pioneers in the general use of computers/the internet - and how life changing they are. The first time I saw a computer I was about 10 years old and my uncle had some kind of early computer that had a ping pong game on it - I remember being truly amazed! The first computer was introduced to our school when I was 14.

Mattonella Tile Studio · Mar 27, 2009

When I got back from Canada in 1999, so I could easily keep touch with the people over there. Prior to that, had emails at Uni, but never really bothered with the browsing.

leemason · Mar 27, 2009

I can't remember exactly but I used to have a Compuserve account which probably goes back to about 1991-1992. I think I had either a 19.2Kb or 28.8Kb modem at the time which I later upgraded to 56Kb. I can't exactly remember which PC I had then but I think I got a new Apricot LANstation which had a 386SX processor and was one of the first PC systems to actually have a built in network card. Before that my first actual PC was a Zenith 8086 IBM PC clone (can't remember if it was an XT or an AT thought).

awebapart.com · Mar 27, 2009

Jason harwood said:
I would really love to hear your experiences as to when you firstfound the internet to be usefull?

Probably the early 90's when I was working as a developer for the NatWest group in London. Working in a large department, using a lot of new and beta MS software at the time, with a lot of skilled contractors, there was a lot of expertise and experience on tap, but sometimes that wasn't enough. Originally we didn't have our own internet connections, but some clever guy installed an offline usenet reader and made it available to the department LAN, which meant that the whole department could see what other people around the world (mainly US) on usenet were discussing about software tools, how they were using them, what problems they were encountering, etc.

Previous to that I did work at Shell in London in 1988 (industrial year for university course) and was tasked with evaluating PC shareware available on bulletin boards but I wouldn't really call that the internet, although there was some pretty useful PC DOS shareware about at that time.

doggybizniss · Mar 27, 2009

I think I am one of the "generation X"! I can't remember finding it useful, because i've always kind of taken it for granted. But, i think the first time I found it really useful would be for doing my homework!

Jason harwood · Mar 27, 2009

Ah yes the homework. Now both my kids are like your self, they have always had the internet, fast connections and mobile phones. I bought a HTC touch diamond and first found it to be rather complicated but within 5 minutes my 11 year old daughter had connected it to MSN, you tube and was surfing the internet from the wireless within the home. I was blown away at how easy she found the technology and quickly she has adapted to it.

Personally I dont use the mobile phone for internet use but I do know it is definitely becoming a business tool. Now the social networking world comes alive on the mobile phone. Dont know about you guys but I have not succumbed to the twitter bug yet but one of my colleagues is continuously on his I phone updating his twitter account

NCA · Mar 27, 2009

I was getting help on a programming issue on a Usenet newsgroup (via a fidonet gateway) in the late 1980's.

jarf · Mar 27, 2009

Jason harwood said:
I would really love to hear your experiences as to when you firstfound the internet to be usefull?

I remember having a 386 sx (33 Mhz) (back in the day!), with 1 meg of ram and a killer 20 megabyte harddisk (wohoo!) which meant I had to archive everything I wasn't using and doublespace my whole drive just to run Windows 3.11 and not have to delete Doom.

It's hard to imagine how both computers and the Internet have changed in these last two decades.

I remember using a state of the art US Robotics 14.4K Bps Sporter modem with the Compuserve chatroom at a ridiculous tariff and chatting to someone in California - and wondering if this might just be the coolest thing in the whole wide world - until the bill arrived!

From my early teens I found the first ever online multiplayer game British Legends, which Compuserve had purchased the rights to, originally called Essex MUD written in 1980 at Essex University by Richard Bartle and Roy Trubshaw.

In a strange way I yearn for those simpler times again. I guess what I firstfound great about the Internet was the sheer freedom. People can say and think whatever they choose, and built communities, even if their beliefs or lifestyles are considered odd to people in the real word.

Ah memories ... I reserve the right to blog about this later. lol

silvermusic · Mar 28, 2009

I've been working with computers of one sort or another since around 1990 and I bought myself one, a 286 with the rest of the spec equally laughable by today's standards. It really started off as an interest/hobby and over the years I've learnt so much, even now I still find them facinating from both a hardware and software point of view. I left school in the 70s, so unlike today's generation I came to them much later in life and remember "the Good old Days" before they existed in the home and were a part of everyday life.

I got on the net in 1997/8 I think it was, loved email and also found usenet totally absorbing, spent far too many wasted nights arguing the toss on all kinds of subjects. I don't think I could have imagined that in the following decade things would change so rapidily, as for spending the last five years earning most of my income on the net that would have been unthinkable 11 years ago. When I left school it would have been science fiction, I'd have probably got a clip around the ear for suggesting anything so stupid, assuming I could have predicted the net.

ken_uk · Mar 28, 2009

My memory sucks for remembering what year things happened, but it was in the old days when netscape navigator was released.

Before that I was used to bulletin boards (nearly got to set up a wildcat BBS, but it fell through) and used to sometimes support xenix/unix systems remotely by phone (logging in via a 'state of the art' *very* expensive hayes 9600 baud modem the boss had.

I remember when they bought a 4 gig hard drive for several thousand pounds to serve as a central repository for all the source code, it seemed so big to us, when we thought 40 MB was a luxury........

silvermusic · Mar 28, 2009

My first computer was an IBM PS1, 30mb hard drive 512k ram, cost the best part of a £1000 back then, didn't have windows either, they had their own menu system built in a rom chip. Had that for about a year then went through various PCs and upgrades, too many to remember. One thing I do remember was Microsoft Works for DOS (probably version 1), I remember being blown away when someone showed me the basics of how to use a spreadsheet and thinking to myself what a wonderfuly useful and interesting tool this was and I could see the potential uses of it. Don't think I used Windows until version 3.11 which would have been around 1992 time. You think XP and Vista are rubbish, you haven't used early versions, many a time I'd exit Windows back to DOS to do something.

DavidT · Mar 28, 2009

Started using the internet in 1994 at University, getting access to various files and talking to random students in New York and other places using Y-Talk.

Had an Amstrad 386DX 4Mb Ram, 40Mb HDD (Replaced the 65Mb one that crashed) and I think it was 16MHz - hard to remember... but I do remember the thing had a key to lock it. That cost about AU$5,500.

Near the end of '94 I bought a modem... 28.8Kbps from memory, or maybe 56.6Kbps but everyone at work thought I was nuts and didn't know what it was for. That was on special for around AU$500.

My parents used to hassle me about the internet as no one real seemed to know anything about it... not in Canberra anyway and they thought I'd get hit with a huge bill from the University. I don't remember using any browsers back then - just some Unix text interface.

J-Wholesale · Mar 28, 2009

1999 - landed my first decent job from a Usenet newsgroup. Never picked up a newspaper since.

Jason harwood · Mar 30, 2009

I do enjoy my news feed page.

Once or twice a day I am nose deep in my news feeds. At a click of a button I have a good catch up. The joy of it all is its all live and up to date. God bless the internet!

As first mentioned with this thread I wanted to know every ones thoughts on when they firstfound the internet useful, one thing that has struck me is that since that day I dont think I have found a single day where the internet has not been useful or befitted me in some way. Keep them coming people, I have thoroughly enjoyed reading your comments and have had a good laugh with some of them.

garyk · Mar 30, 2009

Well started off with the old bulletin boards around 91/92 and then moved onto compuserve and cix circa 93/4 and I remember how cool it was to be able to communicate with people all over the world using a lowly 14.4k modem. What was useful even then were for the techy work I was doing was being able get info/help off of newsgroups and compuserve special interest groups.

Rags · Mar 30, 2009

For me it was 1999. I was travelling/living in India and discovered that I could stay in touch with my life back here in Blighty with a Yahoo email account.

Before leaving, I remember being on the internet helping my mates who were in a pub quiz - they would phone the questions and I would frantically search.

cmcp · Mar 30, 2009

After BASIC on C64 I progressed onto an IBM PS2 (386), earliest memories was fishing in program files folders changing text files of high scores on minesweeper.

Other than networkign at school my first serious memory of the internet was of mp3.com, suddenly there was a world full of all these niche punkrock bands that only existed in my dreams. It was like the worlds biggest tape exchange.

Nathanto · Mar 30, 2009

NCA said:
I was getting help on a programming issue on a Usenet newsgroup (via a fidonet gateway) in the late 1980's.

Oh my god, I'd forgotten all about Fidonet!

A friend and I used to set up BBS's on Fido back in the day but my first memory of the Internet proper was 1995 when I created my first ever web site.

The site is still going strong and incredibly the original site from 1995 and 1996 is still live on an old host's server. Those were the days.

FireFleur · Mar 31, 2009

Still waiting

apexweb · Mar 31, 2009

First online in October 1992 on my brand new Amiga 1200 with a 1200 baud modem, the computer was using floppy disks so you had to load the tcpip stack and then the basic browser demo which was limited to 20 mins at a time. The browser, Voyager was very basic! Also used newsgroups and irc on the amiga. Made my first website a few months later about my home town which is still running.

jane p · Mar 31, 2009

It was about 2001/2002. I used the comp at the library got an email address etc and really got into it kept going down there. Eventually got online at home and now well I am on it most of the time.

2 hours per day at the library wasnt enough plus its so popular and no privacy.

Its great be lost without it.

Kevin Alt · Mar 31, 2009

jarf said:
I remember using a state of the art US Robotics 14.4K Bps Sporter modem with the Compuserve chatroom at a ridiculous tariff and chatting to someone in California - and wondering if this might just be the coolest thing in the whole wide world - until the bill arrived!

1989. Pretty much had no idea what I was getting into then, it was just a fad/idea that was floating around in some circles. Chat rooms and mashing some html together to create a page that in todays standards would be classified as horrific or simply pathetic but Im pretty sure I sat back after making my first ever web page and thinking, ha ha dam Im good
So I would say that I firstfound the internet useful towards the middle of the 90s when i got involved in networking and some web design.

BMM · Mar 31, 2009

OKAY...I think I will post something very different here...some will laugh and others will feel sorry for me!

I'm originally from Iraq, and we heard about interent and never seen it till 2002 when finally Saddam agreed on letting people using it. It was all controlled and monitored by the government and we had 2 different subscrptions, one for internet itself and one only for email!! I know this might sound crazy, but this is how they decided to go with LOL...most of the websites were blocked, of course all free email websites like Yahoo, MSN..etc were blocked, so you have to subscribe to the government solution to have an email address. and I used to have one email address but no internet connection!!..to make this a bit clearer, I used dial-up and then start Outlook to check my email, if I click on IE..no internet pages at all!!..so I remember when I used to send emails to friends living outside Iraq and they reply back with some website links or asking me to go to some chat services to chat...I reply..I cant because I dont have internet connection, and they reply back wondering how am I then emailing them!!..Haha....what crazy days those were.....but still fun to remember them!!!

But to reply the question, I found it very useful at that time even with the VERY limited access to almost everything, but I knew people around the world are finding it useful, so it must be useful to us too..only when we use it freely !!!

BMM

Rags · Mar 31, 2009

BMM said:
OKAY...I think I will post something very different here...some will laugh and others will feel sorry for me!

I'm originally from Iraq, and we heard about interent and never seen it till 2002 when finally Saddam agreed on letting people using it. It was all controlled and monitored by the government and we had 2 different subscrptions, one for internet itself and one only for email!! I know this might sound crazy, but this is how they decided to go with LOL...most of the websites were blocked, of course all free email websites like Yahoo, MSN..etc are blocked, so you have to subscribe to the government solution to have an email address. and I used to have one email address but no internet connection!!..to make this a bit clearer, I used dial-up and then start Outlook to check my email, if I click on IE..no internet pages at all!!..so I remember when I used to send emails to friends living outside Iraq and they reply back with some website links or asking me to go to some chat services to chat...I reply..I cant because I dont have internet connection, and they reply back wondering how am I then emailing them!!..Haha....what crazy days those were.....but still fun to remember them!!!

But to reply the question, I found it very useful at that time even with the VERY limited access to almost everything, but I knew people around the world are finding it useful, so it must be useful to us too..only when we use it freely !!!

BMM

Whoa - it's so easy to forget that we take things for granted...

leemason · Mar 31, 2009

And to think that in the early 90's Bill Gates said that it would never catch on!

tony84 · Mar 31, 2009

1996-97
I was 11 or 12.
We had Claranet and the phone bill was about £200 THEN!!!.

Ahh AltaVista how things have changed. I used it for cheats on games and also to cheat on coursework.

Jason harwood · Apr 3, 2009

BMM said:
OKAY...I think I will post something very different here...some will laugh and others will feel sorry for me!

I'm originally from Iraq, and we heard about interent and never seen it till 2002 when finally Saddam agreed on letting people using it. It was all controlled and monitored by the government and we had 2 different subscrptions, one for internet itself and one only for email!! I know this might sound crazy, but this is how they decided to go with LOL...most of the websites were blocked, of course all free email websites like Yahoo, MSN..etc were blocked, so you have to subscribe to the government solution to have an email address. and I used to have one email address but no internet connection!!..to make this a bit clearer, I used dial-up and then start Outlook to check my email, if I click on IE..no internet pages at all!!..so I remember when I used to send emails to friends living outside Iraq and they reply back with some website links or asking me to go to some chat services to chat...I reply..I cant because I dont have internet connection, and they reply back wondering how am I then emailing them!!..Haha....what crazy days those were.....but still fun to remember them!!!

But to reply the question, I found it very useful at that time even with the VERY limited access to almost everything, but I knew people around the world are finding it useful, so it must be useful to us too..only when we use it freely !!!

BMM

Ok that just puts everything into context doesnt it? There we all are waffling on about the early 90s and how we found it useful even back then and then you have someone like BMM who knew about it but just couldnt get to it. Wow. Cant wait to see what the future holds out there for us internet loonies.
I am really enjoying this thread!!

SteveJMerrick · Apr 8, 2009

Jason harwood said:
I would really love to hear your experiences as to when you firstfound the internet to be usefull?

I'm one of the generation that never really grew up without the internet - we got our first PC back when I was 12, and we were online before I hit 14 (I can still remember that dialup modem noise!) - so rather than networking and making money I guess I firstfound the internet to be a useful tool for researching homework. Before we got online, I remember trawling through Encarta disks (more nostalgia!) looking for obscure facts to use in my schoolwork and then all of a sudden...

BAM!

More information than you can shake a stick at! I'd like to say the 14 year old me would have loved to have access to wikipedia, etc, but to be honest he spent more time looking for less wholesome things!

Search

Search

When you firstfound the internet usefull ?

Jason harwood

fisicx

Jason harwood

deniser

Mattonella Tile Studio

leemason

awebapart.com

doggybizniss

Jason harwood

NCA

jarf

silvermusic

ken_uk

silvermusic

DavidT

J-Wholesale

Jason harwood

garyk

Rags

cmcp

Nathanto

FireFleur

apexweb

jane p

Kevin Alt

BMM

Rags

leemason

tony84

Jason harwood

SteveJMerrick

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