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Why did it used to be so fun to be on the computer? (lemmy.world)

submitted 9 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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i know i know enshififiasdition yeah yeah

but .... it's been so long, it brings a tear to me eye.... what made the old internet so captivating?

check out this graph as well: https://twitter.com/hexprax/status/1758656167893688556

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[–] [email protected] 5 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

In response to the tweet: the years don’t align perfectly but I was a teen around then and I can think of a few explanations:

There weren’t forever wars and it was easy to be optimistic after the Cold War ended
Guns were unpopular (like the assault rifle ban passed Congress in 1994 and it’s hard to imagine that happening today since people fetishize guns now).
Certain drugs temporarily went out of fashion. Heroin and crack, especially, had killed some high profile celebrities and MDMA was the “cool” new drug. Big Pharma hadn’t really started marketing opiates.

Those are just guesses but most people probably didn’t have full blown computers, much less internet, in 1994 so I doubt it had to do with that. Word processors and video game systems were pretty ubiquitous by then but I knew plenty of middle class people who didn’t have home computers that went online.