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What the internet used to be...

Chuck(G)

Chuck(G)

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Pacific Northwest, USA
Nowadays, you mention "the Internet", and people immediately think of the World-Wide Web. But it wasn't always that way.

While going through a stack of old used floppies, I ran across this one:

"Internet Starter Kit for Windows"

"This disk contains all of the software you need to access the Internet! The disk contains NetManage Chameleon Sampler, WinVN News Reader, Eudora 1.4 and WS Gopher"

That's the internet, circa 1994.

Somewhere around then I started using NCSA Mosaic...

If anyone wants an image of the disk, let me know...
 
Anyone remember "NetGuide" and other books that were simply a directory listing of websites? I have a copy here, along with tons of "Internet Starter Kits" that came out through the years. I was on AOL back then using a 14.4k modem, Version 1.1 for Windows that is. I also remember the DOS based Prodigy... and how slow it was...and that maze game they had.

The other thing I miss is things like geocities actually having useful websites. College students had awesome pages, always cool emulation projects being developed. The non-commercial web was a very interesting place.
 
I still have my original Quarterdeck Mosaic 1.0 disks here. My first experience on the WWW was dialing up a BBS and then hopping on the net from there (Rusty n Edies BBS offered the service for $60 a year or something like that, local call).

The first online GUI I used was Prodigy, the setup disks came with my new Packard Bell 286 back in 1989 or 1990.
 
My net access was through an ISP that also hosted my website. Network Solutions was the only registrar and dealing with them was bizarre. I remember that my ISP decided to upgrade his system and he didn't bother to tell any of his customers about all of his changes. So nobody got email or had a functional web site for almost 2 weeks. When I became rather irate with his level of service, he informed me that my account was terminated.

So I signed up with another provider and the original ISP (who was listed as the administrative contact) refused to approve the domain transfer. It took a notarized affidavit and a copy of my driver's license mailed to NS, who then took only another 3 weeks to approve the transfer.

NS did nothing by internet then, though sometimes you could talk them into accepting a fax-ed document.

All email was done via UUCP with both ISPs.

I don't miss those days.
-----------------
I was surprised to find that there are still some gopher sites (using the floodgap server). Haven't tried Archie yet...
 
Ahhh Mosaic. I first had dialup access through the local College in Dec. of 1993. Connecting at a blazing 9600 bps. I might just have to hunt down a copy of Mosaic to see how (if!) it renders modern html.
 
Geez, you guys must still be kids! :) I remember DOS 3.3, Telix and SLMR for BBSing (around 1988 ). And then came the internet! I used the same 2400 modem to access that as well.
 
Chuck(G) said:
"This disk contains all of the software you need to access the Internet! The disk contains NetManage Chameleon Sampler, WinVN News Reader, Eudora 1.4 and WS Gopher"
Click to expand...

Chuck,
Were any of these programs called "blinkers"? I remember dial-up costs were expensive and one would sign up for perhaps 30 hours per month with an early ISP like BIX. Blinks would allow you to download the page you specified by its url, and then it would hang up. Later you would read the page off-line to save on-line charges. As I recall, it only downloaded the text.
 
Stone said:
Geez, you guys must still be kids! :) I remember DOS 3.3, Telix and SLMR for BBSing (around 1988 ). And then came the internet! I used the same 2400 modem to access that as well.
Click to expand...

My point was that the BBS wasn't the internet! My first "online" experience involved a TTY at 110 bps in the 1960s. Around 1980, I was on Usenet--but that wasn't "the Internet".

When did people routinely start using TCP/IP for remote access? (i.e. not as a networking protocol, but for "terminal" access)
 
Stone said:
Geez, you guys must still be kids! :) I remember DOS 3.3, Telix and SLMR for BBSing (around 1988 ). And then came the internet! I used the same 2400 modem to access that as well.
Click to expand...

I'm 20, soon to be 21.. My first brushes with the Internet were on a 56K modem under Windows 95. We had computers before then, but the Internet wasn't too important to us until the days where Netscape 4 and IE...4? were vying for dominance.

dpatten said:
Ahhh Mosaic. I first had dialup access through the local College in Dec. of 1993. Connecting at a blazing 9600 bps. I might just have to hunt down a copy of Mosaic to see how (if!) it renders modern html.
Click to expand...

It.. tries... lol
 
dave_m said:
Chuck,
Were any of these programs called "blinkers"? I remember dial-up costs were expensive and one would sign up for perhaps 30 hours per month with an early ISP like BIX. Blinks would allow you to download the page you specified by its url, and then it would hang up. Later you would read the page off-line to save on-line charges. As I recall, it only downloaded the text.
Click to expand...

I remember those, but I don't think those are included here.
 
Stone said:
Geez, you guys must still be kids! :) I remember DOS 3.3, Telix and SLMR for BBSing (around 1988 ). And then came the internet! I used the same 2400 modem to access that as well.
Click to expand...


Nahh, closing on 40 fast. Although, compared to SOME of the guys around here...

We had a couple of BBS's locally in the mid to late '80s. Including one run by the local el-shift-oh club. We used to dial in on a 300 baud 1650 modem.
 
BBS are a total different thing, I used them in the 1980's.

As far as I remember Microsoft didn't use TCP/IP untill the internet was alive and kicking. You needed a protocal upgrade for Windows 3.11 (WFW) to get TCP/IP since it defaulted to NETBEIU which is for local networking only. Ethernet to internet for home was done late in the game since everyone had a modem untill late in the 1990's.
 
I first saw the internet (WWW) in 1994 at university computer lab. The computers were running Windows for Workgroups 3.11 and the browser was Netscape. Pages had simple layout with very small pictures. Large images took forever to load. I remember watching as large images were displayed a line at a time. It was a painful experience, but we endured it because it was still a huge advance over any alternative.
 
And don't forget about Compuserve - now defunct finally !

Email was just simple text - small font on light blue background but a lifesaver in those days to communicate around the country with my contacts about various projects.

The pure luxury of 5 am sipping coffee in jamies communicating by email some tech stuff with your tech peers across the world even.

Then the Kaypro era of the 1980's with BBS's - helped a lot to swap info, but many today would just laugh about all this now, but back then it was all we had and we were so greatful.

Getting repair info and ideas on BBS's helped a great deal then since so few knew about computing and any “ so called “ computer repair shops just did not cut it.

I got into repairing my own when costs got so high by these "shops" and I found a common paper staple used a a jumper on a Tandon disk drive that was replaced - could have easily fell out and shorted God knows what.

As I always speculate - what will it all be like in just 5 - 10 years from now - recent Time article says by 2045 one computer will have more capacity than all the people in the world !

But what will that really mean - just better to access "factoids" or will it actually do some "thinking" ?

Everyone by now knows the outcome of the Jeopardy game with the IBM "Watson" super computer ! Could have predicted that for sure !

Enjoy - it is still quite the ride as we chug along from our timeframe when it all started.

Frank
 
I remember first seeing Mosaic and the WWW in our departmental IT service centre in 1993. Through my University, I'd discovered the Internet in 1988 and was very excited about what email, ftp, newspgroups and Gopher could offer. I was very active in local BBS circles and would often cross-post stuff to local BBS boards that I'd found on the Internet.

However, when I first saw Mosaic running under Windows 3.1 I knew things would never be the same. It was a WOW moment.

Tez
 
CompuServe was the internet (sort of) for many people.

Quite a number of the larger businesses had accounts with Compuserve. Somewhere, I still have a copy of the driver registration number for Windows 3.0 that I applied for on Compuserve (under 3.0, you didn't refer to a driver by name, but by a 16-bit number. This was before VxDs).

Developers could get questions answered on Compuserve forums; it was very useful and best, it was all text-based. (CIM hadn't been invented yet).

All for about $9 per month. I kept that account active up until about 1997 as a fallback in case I lost service from my ISP.
 
I remember the Internet before it was overlaid with the WWW.

Telnet, gopher, the whole 9 yards. I knew some people who were still in university, so, getting a dial-up account wasn't much of a problem. Using the shop's Model 100 to "dogpaddle the internet" was a real experience.

It was so less crowded and everyone and their grandmother didn't have a website (seeing as they didn't really exist) that no one but they really cared about clogging up the works. Sigh...

You had to a) know what a quad was and b) know what the quad of where you wanted to go was. Far beyond the capabilities of, oh, 95% of the WWW users today.

The only similarity between the internet and the WWW was that they both had porn LOL
 
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