The old internet

wassie · 09-11-2019 8:36pm

ohnonotgmail wrote: »

rocketmail and hotmail started in the same year.

Actually 'HoTMaiL' is older - it was launched in July 1996 & bought by MS in Dec 1997

Rocketmail launched in March 1997 and acquired by Yahoo in Oct the same year.

1o059k7ewrqj3n · 09-11-2019 8:40pm

I started getting online in the early 2000s but had used the Internet before in Internet cafes in the late 90s.

Even though the technology and capabilities are far superior now, I miss the variety of the internet back then. You used to have so many websites made by people for an interest in a hobby, band, game or movie.

It’s not that people don’t still put this kind of content up now, but it’s all migrated to a few platforms - namely Facebook and YouTube. It used to be across Angelfire or Geocities fan made websites and even though some could be sort of amateur, you could tell there was a lot of dedication involved, made with love.

Facebook and YouTube have sort of homogenised those experiences - you need to fit your content into their box, abide by their rules, and you will get banned or shadowbanned if you go against the grain.

It kind of diluted the possibility of the Internet.

80j2lc5y7u6qs9 · 09-11-2019 8:46pm

igCorcaigh wrote: »

Ah yes!

I loved usenet. I wish forums had a client server architecture again, sorry boards.ie

What is the difference between boards and client server architecture? What is boards?

wassie · 09-11-2019 8:49pm

Friend of mine in Oz sent me this.

His ISP's home page some 20 odd years ago:

His ISP's homepage today.

Obviously no budget for the branding dept!

wassie · 09-11-2019 8:50pm

1o059k7ewrqj3n · 09-11-2019 8:59pm

Issac Icy Phlegm wrote: »

What is the difference between boards and client server architecture? What is boards?

I imagine Boards style dictates how you experience it - the HTML and CSS for example are all set on the server that you must visit, whereas with client server it’s more customised? I dunno that’s just a guesstimate.

ohnonotgmail · 09-11-2019 9:07pm

wassie wrote: »

Friend of mine in Oz sent me this.
His ISP's home page some 20 odd years ago:

His ISP's homepage today.

Obviously no budget for the branding dept!

they somehow managed to make it worse

80j2lc5y7u6qs9 · 09-11-2019 9:50pm

I had internet at work form about 97. Someone showed me how to send email saying type joe bloggs at and i putjobloggsat.. Did not know about the@

I bought a laptop for home 56k modem in 2003. 20 GB hard disk and 128MB RAM. I still have it but it does not work too slow even with a1GB RAM

skallywag · 09-11-2019 9:52pm

IRC was great.

a/s/l

limnam · 09-11-2019 10:30pm

skallywag wrote: »

IRC was is great.

a/s/l

fyp

Capt'n Midnight · 10-11-2019 12:15am

skallywag wrote: »

IRC was great. l

IRC is just multiplayer notepad.

10-11-2019 7:24am

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

IRC is just multiplayer notepad.

It used to be so much more though.

ctrl-alt-delete · 10-11-2019 7:48am

Our parents trying to find out who Diego Garcia was and who was phoning him - the eircom bills were huge.

It was an Auto-dialler, dodgy viral software phoning an island in the Indian ocean at extortionate rates.

80j2lc5y7u6qs9 · 10-11-2019 6:21pm

ctrl-alt-delete wrote: »

Our parents trying to find out who Diego Garcia was and who was phoning him - the eircom bills were huge.

It was an Auto-dialler, dodgy viral software phoning an island in the Indian ocean at extortionate rates.

Dialers used to be big thing years ago and also keyloggers

80j2lc5y7u6qs9 · 10-11-2019 6:24pm

and remember +1, haven't seen that for ages

kenmm · 10-11-2019 6:27pm

wassie wrote: »

Friend of mine in Oz sent me this.
His ISP's home page some 20 odd years ago:

His ISP's homepage today.

Obviously no budget for the branding dept!

That for real?

not sure I'd be giving them many personal details (no secure forms etc):

http://www.omninet.net.au/webmail/

And whats going to happen in 17 years time?

Copyright 1998-2036 All rights reserved, Omninet - Albany Western Australia Terms and Conditions apply

LeBash · 10-11-2019 6:33pm

Ger Roe wrote: »

The Old Internet :

Back in the 90's I was involved with a pirate radio station in Dublin that was one of the first online broadcasters. We only had one phone line into the 'studio' (garden shed) and we had to announce that no requests were to be phoned in while we attempted to connect to the internet. It was a dial up connection and we only operated on the web at specific times as we could not afford the cost of having a full time web connection. It was fun to go on line and wait to see if any emails came in from far flung parts.

I was amazed to find out that the sellotape and string system we used actually worked when I went on holidays to Canada and could listen in to our garden shed station.

Simple and fun times.

Was that radio active?

NSAman · 10-11-2019 7:06pm

LeBash wrote: »

Was that radio active?

Well at least the government sent out iodine tables in those days, if it was! 😀

B.A._Baracus · 10-11-2019 10:34pm

B.A._Baracus wrote: »

The more I read on them... the more they seem .. how do I put this? out of all the cults that are whacky they seem not evil.

They simply thought, well we all know what they thought :pac: , but the end was coming (their belief of getting to a higher level) and they did themselves in.

- Didn't seem like the founder was some science fiction writing who was arrested for conning people *cough*
- The founder wasn't asking every woman to join him in "the house of david"
- etc.

Wonder if I am missing something...

Quoting myself.
As, if anyone is interested in knowing more, But while the members weren't evil it turns out the leader was. A right charismatic scumbag.

The members were lost or social outcasts and some even had some mental issues. He took advantage of that.

While no one can confirm its believed he wanted to die and he didn't want to do it alone from the looks of it.

FanadMan · 11-11-2019 3:52am

Steyr 556 wrote: »

I started getting online in the early 2000s but had used the Internet before in Internet cafes in the late 90s.

I still have tons of discs from the mid 90s. Used to go to an internet cafe in Derry. They had loads of games on their machines - Quake, Doom, Heretic etc. So I used to hire a couple of machines at a time and rip all the games. Compress/zip the folder and use a DOS file splitter program to span it onto floppies. God knows how many times there was a corruption in one disc and I'd have to go back and do the whole thing again.

Didn't have internet access at home till the very end of the 90s but for a couple of quid could view the world and all the weirdness out there.

s7ryf3925pivug · 11-11-2019 3:59am

Decent encryption was declared to be a weapon by the USA so they could control who could use it. People were shocked by Snowden but his revelations weren't too surprising when you put them in that context.

s7ryf3925pivug · 11-11-2019 4:02am

I found pic of Naomi Campbell in a bikini and printed it out on a dodgy inkjet printer.

pornhub is way better.

Quantum Erasure · 11-11-2019 5:56pm

http://www.homerswebpage.com

skallywag · 11-11-2019 7:01pm

Jaliyah Melted Narc wrote: »

I found pic of Naomi Campbell in a bikini and printed it out on a dodgy inkjet printer.

I can recall such pics coming in one line at a time over my 28K modem, so taking about 10 minutes from the top of Naomi's head to her bikini :pac:

11-11-2019 7:29pm

another observation is that Geocities promoted the concept of homesite "neighborhoods": site owners in a particular "neighborhood" could interact with one another in such forum mine was "Cape Canaveral". There were also "Rodeo" and "Heartland" neighborhoods.

Ever since, no other webspace provider business or free never again cared about facilitating such a concept, and nobody cares anyway.

Grandeeod · 11-11-2019 8:45pm

I'm on the old internet tonight! Broadband is not working so I'm on my laptop using a Hotspot via my crap mobile connection. Its great. All I can do is type stuff.:D Forget Youtube and anything video related.:D

Shady Grady · 11-11-2019 8:50pm

I remember connecting at 2400bps on dialup. And the longer the handshaking as they called it was the worse your connection was.

skallywag · 12-11-2019 9:40pm

Shady Grady wrote: »

I remember connecting at 2400bps on dialup. And the longer the handshaking as they called it was the worse your connection was.

Well you win the prize there. I never recall using anything slower than 14.4K.

The handshaking by the way is still used in all communication systems. It's just a way that the machine who sends the info can know that it was received correctly at the other end.

ACK : 'Acknowledge' : ' I received it properly'
NACK : 'Not Acknowledged' : 'I did not receive it properly, send it again'

Mugser · 12-11-2019 10:18pm

Remember getting our first Windows 95 pc, from Gateway! cant remember the specs but pretty sure the current fridge probably has more computing power, it cost somewhere in the region of 1,100 punts too.
Oceanfree.net was the way into the internet, remember the wife's comment.... "Sure that's the same as Aertel!"

12-11-2019 10:31pm

Web - Rings. How to link up various amateur websites.
They died the same time homesite owners would agree together to put each others link on their own website.
The Commodore 64 webring was one of the more famous.

branie2 · 12-11-2019 11:03pm

We got our internet at home in 1997

Graces7 · 13-11-2019 4:43pm

Deleted User wrote: »

There was almost an innocence to the Internet. The real weirdo's were on Mirc/IRC rather than mainstream internet sites.

Everquest was all the rage, along with Ascherons call. Games that were actually difficult to play.

My students were shocked when I told them I got my first phone when I was 20. There was simply little need to have a phone at that time. No smartphones. Just simple phone/text. They all started around 14 with their smartphones and apps... I could see their eyes glaze over trying (and failing) to understand what it was like.

The only way to make a phone call in my early life was to hike down to the nearest phone box.. They always stank of... almost no one had home phones

Assetbacked · 13-11-2019 4:51pm

The Internet wasn't on computers back in the good old days.

ytpe2r5bxkn0c1 · 13-11-2019 5:02pm

branie2 wrote: »

We got our internet at home in 1997

Same here. October 97. Dial up and wait an age for anything to load then somebody would pick up the phone to make a call and disconnect the internet. People would call wondering why the phone was engaged for so long.

The cost was ridiculous, as phone usage was charged by time.

artanevilla · 13-11-2019 5:04pm

Free internet CDs from AOL you got from petrol stations. Great frisbees.

Waiting a couple of days for songs to download on Winmx.

OU812 · 13-11-2019 8:02pm

artanevilla wrote: »

Free internet CDs from AOL you got from petrol stations. Great frisbees.

AOL was the world's largest CD producer in the 90s

Grandeeod · 13-11-2019 8:06pm

Assetbacked wrote: »

The Internet wasn't on computers back in the good old days.

Okay, I'll bite. What was it on?

My memories.

I connected up in 1999. The usual dial up crap on my PC. Yup, it cost a fortune in phone bills for exciting stuff if you had specific interests and were finding sites worth reading. Video back then had to be downloaded before watching and even then the quality was pretty crap. But you didn't care if you got the chance to see a live recording of a band, brief as it was. Chat rooms were cool and again if it was based on an interest you had. Some came with a specific day and time for said chat.

It all changed very quickly in terms of content and the video aspect improved. But in Youtubes early days, up loads were limited to 10 mins and the quality wasn't exactly great. I spent over 10 years accessing the internet from a PC or Laptop and watching it grow and develop. Then the smart phone/tablet era came along and it changed. In 2008 Facebook was a really nice place and was considered an "oldies" spot as opposed to Myspace etc.

The mobile device gave the internet to everyone and the rest is....ah well! I often wonder how the internet would be if it was restricted to those who are computer literate.

13-11-2019 8:14pm

1997: To watch many movies other than animated GIFs you used FLASH plugin. An Evil plugin for Netscape navigator.

To do your own cartoon processing for the web in 1997, you could use something like Macromedia Director.
:Make a Shockwave movie. Then convert it to Flash format for display in a web browser.

Internet Explorer 3.01 was the Microsoft offering in 1997 and was shunned, except for its compatibility with Microsoft Office 97, with which it was available on the Microsoft Office 97 CD!

paleoperson · 13-11-2019 8:14pm

skallywag wrote: »

Well you win the prize there. I never recall using anything slower than 14.4K.

The handshaking by the way is still used in all communication systems. It's just a way that the machine who sends the info can know that it was received correctly at the other end.

ACK : 'Acknowledge' : ' I received it properly'
NACK : 'Not Acknowledged' : 'I did not receive it properly, send it again'

The name stems of course from how in the old days you would have to travel to the local exchange and request the operator there to connect you and literally handshake the operator there agreeing to the terms and conditions. Tough times.

skallywag · 13-11-2019 8:20pm

paleoperson wrote: »

The name stems of course from how in the old days you would have to travel to the local exchange and request the operator there to connect you and literally handshake the operator there agreeing to the terms and conditions. Tough times.

:pac:

Capt'n Midnight · 13-11-2019 9:38pm

Shady Grady wrote: »

I remember connecting at 2400bps on dialup. And the longer the handshaking as they called it was the worse your connection was.

From
https://www.windytan.com/2012/11/the-sound-of-dialup-pictured.html

Let me sing you the song of my people ...
https://oona.windytan.com/blogfiles/dialup.mp3

This is what the sound looks like - large picture
https://oona.windytan.com/posters/dialup-final.png

kenmm · 13-11-2019 11:22pm

1/2 meg 'broadband' around summer of 2000 - compared to the dial up via my Nokia 7110 (9kbs!) it was brilliant!

Assetbacked · 13-11-2019 11:22pm

Grandeeod wrote: »

Okay, I'll bite. What was it on?

I was making a vague Simpsons reference, nothing to do with shorts!

kenmm · 13-11-2019 11:25pm

Deleted User wrote: »

Web - Rings

There is a term I haven't heard for years!

Samsgirl · 13-11-2019 11:34pm

Lotus notes

limnam · 13-11-2019 11:52pm

net meeting.

Not sure it was entirely built for the use case it ended up been used for.

:pac:

LaFuton · 13-11-2019 11:57pm

IOL in the 90s was my isp, 'surfing the net' all night. yip it was better in the early days, not just the newness and esoterism of it but the hidden infinity of it and it being a global library of knowledge as opposed to everyone having it now and it just being generally all samey. as somebody said, it definitely went downhill with the web 2.0 tech social media and all that jazz, it was kinda nice when it was mostly people who had interest in learning.
i remember making sites with frontpage and dreamweaver, had geocities, cant remember the others but there was shortcut kickme.to/whatever
very nostalgic now xfiles episodes coming back...

Montage of Feck · 13-11-2019 11:58pm

Lets say I still wanted to connect to the internet over dial-up is it still possible? I cant seem to find my eircom.net CD anywhere and i've completely forgotten how to set up a dial up connection.

LaFuton · 14-11-2019 12:22am

i worked for eir for a long sad month once and its my understanding some people still are connecting with this, i think it has to be your only available option, so you would need to have your original copper phoneline and i suppose an isp still offering the old secret handshake, go on the information super highway and perform a websearch

mikeecho · 14-11-2019 12:23am

Ask jeeves

The old internet

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