I was thinking just yesterday about the old days of the Internet. The once upon a time era that is nothing more than fabled past for many of today's youngsters. Back in the early 80's of the last century (boy does that make it sound old--and me too) the incredible technology was released that would add new dimensions to the still infant world of the home personal computer (pc). The *insert gasp* Internet. With the use of a program purchased on a monthly basis from the wonder companies such as AOL or MSN (back then they were the only two real options with the possible exceptions of business having their own programing especially for their employees, but not available to the public at large, along with a few fledgling upstarts that had a hard time competing in a global market with the AOL and MSN giants) you could plug your computer into the etherial world of mass communication.
Sounds cool huh?
Well, it was, but when you consider the limitations its rather laughable now.
The early days of the Internet were imprisioned by the walls of the individual server. You could talk to anybody you wished so long as they were also a part of that companies package. Sounds kind of like a lot of modern day cellphone plans, lol. At least with cell phones you CAN call outside the network, you just get charged more. With the infant Internet it was not possible to communicate with someone outside the walls of the server.
Even inside the walls it was severly limited. It consisted of email and chatrooms for the most part. There were small advances that would enable users to create a 'web-page' that unless you had higher computer skills were mostly just business cards online. But, it was a start toward a more prolific future.
Then came the whispers. Code words bandied about that were said to make it possible to break free the binds of the behemouths... a single prospect guarded by the gatekeepers called HTML.
It actually sounded simple. A language that would allow you to write your way out of the box. Simple until you tried to read and understand the language. Foreign language class never seemed so difficult. For the common person it appeared that being relegated to the confines of the server would be a forever sentence. The murmured prospects of a 'world wide web' were out of reach and incomprehensible.
My husband and I were part of that early age. We had laptops that were such new concepts back then, and came complete with what was then the leading modem technology. Those obsolete little machines now would sweat and shiver with the speed prospects needed for today's Internet connections, but they were cutting edge at the time.
However, when those machines broke down, which they did with alarming speed--the fragility of the hinges on the early laptops was legendary--we didn't morn the loss very long. After all, we weren't really missing out on much.
Enter the late 90's. Once again revisiting the prospect of purchasing a new computer to replace my old desktop relic that I used for bookkeeping and writing there weren't any to be found that didn't come with the promise of high-speed (at the time) Internet hook up.
Okay, well, that's fine so long as it still does what's needed, I thought. Plus I'd heard about the marvelous advances the Internet had made and how it was now a world wide web for everyone regardless of their ability to speak in foreign tongues like HTML.
Glory be it was too. What an amazing place this is, and it has come further still in just those short ten years. What normal everyday people can do on the web is mind-blowing. Yet so many I meet who were born later, lived longer in the tech age, or maybe all their lives in it don't remember, and realize what a marvel it really is.
I can only imagine what ten years from now holds... and what marvels we will posses right at our fingertips.
Full speed ahead, damn the torpedoes--yes, I do love technology.
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