~ When did you first discover the Internet?

Thread originally posted on the Aeclectic Tarot Forum on 03 Sep 2002, and now archived in the Forum Library.

kayne	03 Sep 2002
I was reading the "Why that nickname?" thread and VGimlet says she has used that nickname on the net since 1989 or 1990. I don't think I was even aware the net really existed back then... So, I am interested to know, when did you first discover the interenet and did it change your life?

Kazz	03 Sep 2002
This is interesting!!! I have only been aware of the Net in the last five years, and I have only had a PC at home in the last 2 years so I am fairly new to it. I must say that since joining in here I have had the chance to explore more and I love it. I think as far as changing my life.....well in this particular area (Aeclectic) yes definatley!!! Cheers Kazz :TQC

wavebreaker	03 Sep 2002
I think I first discovered it in 1994, which is when my company first got an internet connection. At first, it was mainly email that changed my life, because it's such an easy way to communicate. Writing a letter or making a phone call takes time, an email takes just a few minutes and there are quite a few people that I have reestablished contact with through email. Back in 1994, the internet wasn't very useful, because you could hardly find anything on it and most business didn't have a website yet. It was mainly the fact that it was a new means of communication that made it interesting. Today, I couldn't live without it... ;) There are so many things I do on the internet: finding information, electronic banking, buying stuff, booking trips, meeting people (through Aeclectic of course!)...

Jenny-Li	03 Sep 2002
I think I was pretty late in discovering the internet. I remember spending nights at the Uni trying to finish up some papers that had to me turned in the morning after, and taking breaks every now and then to discover this new thing called the internet. This was like... 1995, I think. But I didn't really understand what the big deal was, and the modems were such crap back then, I think you have to add another bunch of years before I was really hooked...! Jenny :)

floracove	03 Sep 2002
I knew there would be an internet, as a small child from watching the movies, they had computers in their homes with moniters where they could see each other while talking, didn't know what it would be called... I just got this 3 hand computer in January of this year. I think it's wonderful that so many people from so many different places can be together even though they are not, to share. And think it is awsome that no matter what language you may speak that everyone has the opportunity to understand the other with out a personal (in the flesh) interperter. There is so much to see and to learn and so little time. My only regret is that my Father did not have access to one, he was a very intellegent man and I know he would have enjoyed being able to access such intellegence and am sure that he could have added a few things for our learning and enjoyment himself. I do think that it would be wonderful if some people would take what they know and help build the internet into something that could help us even more instead of using their knowledge to send out virsus and such to tear each other down.

jema	03 Sep 2002
around 89-90 there was this thing called BBS that was the "net" i tried it a few times. then at uni i found the ftp servers sunet.se and a few others. it was not user-friendly at all. you basiclly just saw long lists of what files where at the server and downloaded files "blindly" and read them later. i remember when my library was offering internet for the public and i rasied my voice and concerns that was not that to ask a lot of the patrons to understand all those dos-commands and people looked funny at me and showed me this thing called netscape and i just went WOAH!! coolness!!! but if i start counting from my first browser experience on the net i would say i started out late - around 95 and in 96 i found this wonderful place called firefly and got addicted to it. firefly is gone now though. oh does anyone remember the first net-soap = the spot? it was a huge hit! kind of like MTV real life only totally fake with photos of models in a beach-house and strange soap-plots and fiction-journals. wonderful stuff:) *** edited cause i just remember WHY i was so slow to discover browsers and webpages - the people i spent time with were complete nerds - computer programmers (and party animals i might add) and they thought that browsers were for whimps. real hard-core compuret fans should use FTP and dos-command or nothing! so they basically never told me about it and i was just too daft to find it out on my own.

Bings	03 Sep 2002
I remember back around 1985 my husband got his first computer and bought this thing that he thought was SOOOO cool. If I remember right he had to put the whole phone onto it. Then it made a long distance call and he claimed you could get all sorts of information and even shop!!! All I could see on the computer was words. It just made no sense to me. But the phone bill made lots of sense!!!! It was so high that after just one month we had to have the phone turned off. I could have killed him!!!!! Then around.... 1993.... He found out that someone he worked with had a server set up. My husband could actually dial in and get files and such. I think they even managed to chat one night. But it was again just a screen with words to me and every time he used it I would remind him of our 1985 phone bill. The phone bill came in normal that time but I was still not impressed. Then while living in Spain, in 1995, he came home from work one day so excited. We could get internet service!!! YEAH..... I wasn't too thrilled, told him it was just a waste of money, but he wanted it so badly. We only had it hooked up for about 2 days when he convinced me to sit down with him and learn how to use the internet. It took me about 2 minutes to become completely addicted. The first thing I learned was IRC (internet relay chat), then email, and then after a few weeks decided to explore the rest of the net. And now, 7 years later, my excitement and addiction over the internet is still going strong. Dianne

catlin	03 Sep 2002
I suppose it was around 1999 when we were allowed at the secretary college to use the computers in our spare time, I am really no computer freak but soon my class mates called me "web witch" because I got really hooked with surfing but I am still not so fond of technical computer details.

Liliana	03 Sep 2002
I discovered the internet the first time in 1993 I think it was when my science teacher logged me on for a brief time to chat and I talked to someone named Aquarius. I never got on again til my husband reintroduced me in 1995, and I had my own connection hehe. My husband, tho I think hes been online since the beginning of it all, his father was a science teacher and taught him. Ill have to ask him when he started :THP

Umbrae	03 Sep 2002
1989

Strega	03 Sep 2002
It was 1994. I was in high school then. It started when one of my buddies couldn't stop talking about this new thing called the "NET". And I quote: Oh it was sooo cool! ;) After much begging, I finally convinced my father to get me "hooked". :cool:

Sullanciri2002	03 Sep 2002
... okay, to most people that might be late - but as we never had (and still don't) have a computer at home. I only started to surf the net when they started using the net at work, where I was told to experiment a bit to get the hang of it. Once I discovered there were heaps of sites related to all of my hobbies and interests ... well, suffise to say I was caught in the web. I've thought I was addicted until lately - when, during our summer vacation, I did surprise myself by not even wanting to search the net for a whole three weeks - ahum. It's just that, whenever there's a computer around, it's hard not to check what's been happening .... NOw that I'm quasi-addicted, we've decided that - if a computer gets into our house (probably for the kids) it won't have an internet-connection: wouldn't want to lose the wife because she thinks we've become distant whenever I'm on the net - LOL

napaea	03 Sep 2002
no, sullanciri, i was '97 or '98, so i relate! i'm sure i probably heard of it before then, my brother in law always had great computers cause of his job. but that was the first time I ever got on the net. for a while i had really easy access to it, through school and where i lived. then i spent 4 years without access. now we have a pc and i'm on here every bleedin' day!!

Laurel	03 Sep 2002
1995 although I'd played around a little on some BBSes a few years previously. It wasn't until the Fall of '96 that I developed Internet addiction and after I graduated from college in '97 it became significantly worse. Laurel

truthsayer	03 Sep 2002
it was '98 before i got one. up to that point i couldn't understand why typewriters had become obsolete. i kept using what i had as long as possible. boy! did i not know what i was missing! i was quickly hooked but didn't understand the difference b/t local service providers and those that created big long distance phone bills. BIG PHONE BILLS!! when i figured that out then i got a local service. then my first one died of unnatural causes in 2000. i went out and bought another w/o consulting mt husband. generally not a good idea but i was in the midst of computer withdrawal symptoms and he had to accept it.

Moongold	03 Sep 2002
It was about 1992 for me, although I was using computers for work related purposes in 1986. I had to study one unit of Information Science (they called it then) for another course and got hooked on IT. I was initially a librarian (left in 1983) but have always been fascinated with information and its uses. I had to set up an IT system in my place of work in 1991/92 and that led to Internet use, and I also love it. The global community fascinates me and I correspond with others in the US on a regular basis. The ready availability of so much information enthralls me. From Australia we can actually look through the library catalogues of Oxford and Cambridge and the British Museum! We can buy books and almost anything else over the Internet. However, there is still nothing like sitting down with a book in your lap, a cup of coffee alongside and the prospect of a few hours reading ahead. Whilst the information revolution is exciting it can also produce overload and there is something about the "quickening" of today's world that is innately disturbing. Peace to all Moongold

debins	03 Sep 2002
about 1991, at a university where they wanted graduate students to "surf" through DOS, would you believe! Of course, it was awful. And the graduate students' supervisors tried to suggest that we could each access materials at Oxford, Cambridge, MIT, Yale, etc. Connections took 10-15 minutes, when they worked at all. At the time, I thought the internet would never work, would never develop. But then graphic user interface came along and changed all that with little icons and mouse(s)--one doesn't say mice, in this case. So there you have it.

jade	03 Sep 2002
yes, i seem to be the latest arriver. this is the first place i found on the net. planted roots and stayed. heehee jade

Kismet	03 Sep 2002
I recall being in high school 16 years ago and our school just began offering computer courses. We had only 11 computers, so the brightest were of course allowed this class, I wasn't among them,lol. In Feb 96 I bought a used system from a girlfriend thinking "Wow!", but unknown to me, it was a 386 and only had 2 megs of ram, not enough to get online. So after upgrading, I was finally on, yeahhh! I was very politically active at the time then went off into chat areas. I later went to other chat programs, including mIRC, where I met my boyfriend. We were together a bit over 4 years before he passed. Did the internet change my life? You bet. Love and Light, Kismet

starr	03 Sep 2002
The late 80's i believe. My how it's changed. Starr

amyel	03 Sep 2002
My folks had computers back in the '80's. Then we got an Atari system - no, I lie, our first was a Texas Instruments model that you hooked up to the TV and could play tennis on - vvveeerrrrryyyy slowly. :) I don't know when my folks first got any sort of Internet, but I recall in the late '80's my mom had Prodigy hooked up on her MacIntosh, and I remember being so impressed that you could do things like order your groceries and stuff. That was waaaaayyyyyy back. (Funnily enough, my brother married a gal whose father was one of the VP's of Prodigy.) I also used an early version in university for basic research and email. It wasn't very user friendly. I remember using a version of an intranet through work in the early '90's. Now, I work in high tech, but I didn't even own my own computer until I got married in '98. And now we have high speed cable and hubs is lusting over broadband.....and all I want to do is come to Aeclectic! You see, I work on computers all day, I train people on computers - and the last thing I want to do when I get home is spend more time in front of a computer. Call me crazy.

osami2717	04 Sep 2002
I didn't have any access to computers growing up and our school didn't have many either. It wasn't until my sister went to college that I even heard of the Internet. [2000- i believe] She'd come home and tell me all about it and I'd smile politely and think *What IS she talkin' 'bout??* But it was my boyfriend that really got me into it. He was going to move away and I was desperate to keep in contact with him so I forked over money to get a computer and then internet access through a local server. [2001- june] My boyfriend turned out to be a lousy correspondent but I did found a few pen-pals, the longest lasted 5 months. Then I discovered chat lines and found that to be a blessing and a curse. *Lots of Perverts out there* It wasn't until about a year ago that I discovered you could actually find any useful information on the net, if you were patient. I found myself here and consider that the best thing to happen yet. Saves time going to the library... :D

WolfSpirit	04 Sep 2002
I don't know when exactly I became aware of the Internet, my former very slow computer also had a modem built in but at some point it was really impossible to get anything from the net, I spent hours waiting for a site to appear, so I just used it for e-mail then (which is very useful as I have a friend abroad) Then I had the chance to buy this second-hand computer from someone who always wants the latest fad, this one serves me nicely. After spending a little time just surfing I now use it for Aeclectic, ordering stuff from Amazon and such, and to get info.

The ~ When did you first discover the Internet? thread was originally posted on 03 Sep 2002 in the Chat board, and is now archived in the Forum Library. Read the active threads in Chat, or read more archived threads.