In the time before tablets and people giving their kids small personal phones with email and text options, This plain, clunky bastard was it.
Imagine the struggle of having one single house phone and having to remember phone numbers :(
And if you were a kid and actually did need to call someone, You better make it quick. Because if you were on that line more than a few minutes you would inevitably hear an adult screaming for you to "Get off the godd*mn phone!"
No Coddling Of Any Kind
Back in the day, there were no anti-bullying campaigns or any other kind. So you either got good with these.....Or you got your ass handed to you by anyone who felt like it, And for any reason they deemed necessary.
And there was no use crying about it because nobody really cared. Matter of fact, Some parents wouls kick their kid's asses again just for losing, or they would make them go back and fight again until they won.
That's why I never understood the 'terror' of these cyber bullies. The only way one of them could make a kid from my generation cry is from laughter. And after they got done laughing at these wimps, They would find out where they lived and go show them how a real bully made someone cry.
One good thing, though Is you never seen crap like this
Having to handwrite your book reports and essays
There were no other options, Except possibly using a typewriter.
And after you got done writing one of these 10,000+ word bastards you almost get a failing grade because the damn teacher can't read your handwriting.
Simple But Insanely Difficult Video Games
There were two difficulty settings back then, Impossible to beat and give up, Already.
And save features were a luxury not many games bothered having. It was not uncommon for kids to throw their systems against the wall on stomp the hell out of them in a psychotic display of utter frustration.
Having to 'blow' your video games before they would play.
And you have to find the right angle so you could see your Gameboy enough to play it....And you had to hope you never forgot to save a game before the batteries run out.
Dial-up and Windows 95 were your only options
This could take forever, Depending on your location. And it was heart-wrenching to get all the way to the end and get a connection fail :(
I remember when it took like 2-3 day to download an 11-second porn clip, And you had yo be that sucker on a loop to do any good. And, You have a hard time complaining about windows XP and anything after if you were unlucky enough to have ever used Windows 95
Having a cassette tape get 'eaten'
Then having to untangle that mess and keep it straight while you rolled it back up with a pencil.
Going to rent a new movie and find all the copies already rented out.
VCR tapes could get 'ate' too. And it was a pain in the ass if you ever had to take one apart and put it back together.Not to mention having to adjust the tracking till you could see the damn thing then rewinding it when done.
Some of these are still applicable in the poorer parts of the world. So the more things change, The more they stay the same.
11.2K opinions shared on Society & Politics topic.
Been there, knew all that and -8mm film camera and its projector -6x6cm and 6x9 cm photo cameras, manual film advance with a rotating button. (to be loaded and unloaded in the shadow!) -throw away magnesium flash bulbs -Nearly only B/W photography, color was way too expensive and I could develop the film myself in a darkroom) -diapositives and their projector -45rpm and 33 rpm disks (even 78 rpm disks) -Phones with a rotating dial disk -Punched cards and batch processing -Micro computers with 64kbRAM and DOS 1.0 in the BIOS -no internet -80286 computers without HD but two floppy drives, one with the OS and Word, one to save on - 2Mb floppy disks (big 5 inch or 2.5 inch) -monochrome 15" CRT monitors DOS 6.1 with Norton Commander shell Windows 3.1 Windows NT4 (an excellent one, that!) -Windows 95 SE -making wet photocopies (they had to dry, yes...) :-'( :*(
I like to think of that as the "Babysitter's Club" era. The Babysitter's Club series, by Ann M. Martin, was created during the late 1980s and early 1990s, a time period when people didn't use the computer as much. I was born in late 1990, but I lived in a developing country in the early 1990s. Only in the mid-to-late 1990s I became familiar with the American lifestyle. Americans really do have a palate for meaty and sweet things. The wealth of sweet things probably contributes to the American obesity epidemic. It's a paradox of being a wealthy nation and a sick nation.
I rather go back to the 90's/00's than deal with the poor quality of the technology you have today. Yes it was a struggle and much more simple, but it was worth it. Smartphones acting more like dumb phones. Everything is so digital, it goes out the moment you can no longer get a signal. Or it's permanently screwed up to the point you have to buy a new one. Repairs are even higher! I miss doing hand written work. Less typos unless you just can't spell! It teaches you to use your brain! To think! Not have a computer think for you. To tell you the truth, I never liked DVDs when they came out. At first I was amazed by them, but the more I used them, the more they got starched beyond repair, I grew to hate them. But with companies no longer manufacturing VHS anymore, it defeats the purpose. And the flip phones was also my favorite! They need to bring them back into style instead of just having them for older people, or the less fortunate. Just tweak it up more and upgrade the features and you have a better phone.
LOL the windows 95 thing. i still remember using AOL mail and all the insane amount of popups that could destroy your computer. best case scenario you have to restart, and worst case scenario the entire thing starts smoking and you have to buy a new computer. viruses could literally do that back in the day.
speaking of which i still remember the first video i ever saw on the internet (this was before youtube, it was either quicktime or real player) a short film about a guy who gets his clothes stolen during a pool party at this bully's house, and years later the bully has inherited the house from his parents and the kid whose clothes he stole is running around and he's now this weird feral dude who haunts the house where he was stripped naked. i really wish i could find it, i have no idea what it was called.
The 90s and 00s weren't that long ago! I 've experienced all those. My phone was older than that, the middle revolved. I was being bullied and bullying and teachers didn't care. I fought like a boy and in the end I realised that the best approach is to do whatever is best for you and not care about what people say about you or stoop to their level.
Hand written essays are still a thing... What do you do instead? Write it on a computer? You'll get taken own for cheating, because a teacher can't control what's on the computer.
Hand written essays are the only way I've been allowed to do it and 10,000 words really isn't that much in the grand scope of things.
I dont know, I kind of enjoyed all of that. Even though I struggled with ALL of these, Id rather live in that time now still. I mean its nice not to complain about batteries, or your DVDs getting eaten but I hate this era!
VHS and cassette tapes were a piece of cake to put back together again. The real bitch was trying to put an 8 track tape back together!
I actually miss Winbloze 95!
I actually had one of those clunky old bastards on my night table and was probably the only girl in school with her own phone number so I never heard "get of the god**mn phone".
Windows 95? ha ha I was working with an American major bank and our mails were DOS based, to enter windows we had to type 'WIN' - Windows 95 came much later :D
ha ha old school? Computers came in (leave alone internet) when I was in my 8th or 9th grade and they were HUGE with those magnetic tapes etc lol, my generation has seen some change there lol
VHS tapes getting eaten though. That only happened once and it was the most scary thing ever. Also lol at the Confederate Flag article, I also don't really see the bullying aspect of cyber bullying.
My original house phone had a dial , later had the push button version. Who remembers taping music from the radio & saving onto the old cassettes. Same with video , Betamax didn't last long !!
... is this a joke? I'm 21 and I've lived through all of those things. It really wasn't that big of a deal (except for the bullying part, which really sucked, cause i'm super scrawny).
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