A nice place to discuss rumors, happenings, innovations, and challenges in the technology sphere. We also welcome discussions on the intersections of technology and society. If it’s technological news or discussion of technology, it probably belongs here.
Remember the overriding ethos on Beehaw: Be(e) Nice. Each user you encounter here is a person, and should be treated with kindness (even if they’re wrong, or use a Linux distro you don’t like). Personal attacks will not be tolerated.
Subcommunities on Beehaw:
This community’s icon was made by Aaron Schneider, under the CC-BY-NC-SA 4.0 license.
I’m almost 37. I remember as a kid being my parents’ "navigator’ on family road trips with the map. My parents still carry an atlas in their cars, but ofc, they’re using GPS on their phones/cars like anyone else.
As far as actual pre-Internet, I was on the Internet at a pretty young age (back then). I think was 8 or 9 when my dad signed us up for AOL. Roughly 1995/1996. And I was all over that (only briefly did he put a filter on my account). So I don’t have a whole lot of experience truly being pre-Internet. I was playing online PC games while my friends were playing on the N64 or whatever.
As a kid playing in the neighborhood, I either called my parents from my friends’ houses (which I rarely did to my mom’s anger) or periodically stopped back home. Or at the very least, be back before the streetlights came on.
I had a cell phone by 9th/10th grade, esp since I was involved in band and other activities. I think I used pay phone maybe once before that? And then never again.
I was driving before GPS was widely available on phones (which existed pre-smartphone), but you just printed out MapQuest directions before leaving. Which obviously relied on the Internet.
So yeah, I don’t have much experience pre-Internet, really.