
Who needs 'internet' when we have fax? An 'expert's' view from 1996 - deusclovis
http://www.golfclubmanagement.net/2012/05/the-internet-a-personal-perspective-from-1996/
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beloch
The article is written in English and includes a mention of teletext, which
means the author was probably in the UK. The UK wasn't quite on the bleeding
edge of internet tech in the late 90's. Computers were _much_ more expensive
in the UK than in North America or Asia and local telephone calls were metered
by the minute. If you paid for a month's subscription to an internet provider,
you'd still have pay your telco by the minute just to use your dial-up modem!
Needless to say, not only did this make everything more expensive, it also
added time-pressure to browsing. Get on, get your data, get off! Quick! It's a
minor thing, but really must have changed the experience for early users in
the UK.

~~~
daledavies
From my own experience of being an internet obsessed teenager in the UK at
that time I'd say the internet was definitely considered a luxury because of
the cost involved.

My parents had no idea I was spending hours on the internet until they
received their first £200+ monthly phone bill. To say they were unhappy would
be an understatement.

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timr
If you weren't alive and sentient during the time this was written, it's
pretty easy to dismiss it as absurd. I mean, _obviously_ this guy was a total
fool, right? He didn't see the overwhelming tidal wave of change coming at
him! What a moron! He should've looked _past_ the fact that nobody knew what
the internet was, and that only a few people even had modems. Or that it was
so difficult for the average person to connect to "the net" that the idea of a
coffeehouse full of dedicated "internet computers" that you rented by the hour
seemed like a great business plan.

What are you dismissing as absurd right now? Maybe it's a lame portable music
player that seems small and primitive. Maybe it's a me-too social network for
Harvard undergrads. Maybe it's a website where you rent out your air mattress
to strangers.

In other words: we're all living in a big glass house. Easy with the stones.

~~~
walshemj
I think you are being to kind if this was written in 86 it would be fair
comment in 86 when online was Telecom Gold (dialcom) PRESTEL and CIX.

But in 96 the internet was just starting to ramp up and beak out of the nerd
ghetto.

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stevebrowne
This was out of date in 1996. I agree with others that if it was 1986 there
would be an excuse, but in 96, then he was giving out bad info.

We had already seen the rise and fall of Cello and Mosaic. Trumpet Winsock was
envy where. Here in the UK we had services such as Demon offering an Internet
connection for £10 a month. Internet magazine had been running for a couple of
years. Hell even my book had been out for a few years
([http://www.amazon.com/The-Internet-Via-Mosaic-World-
Wide/dp/...](http://www.amazon.com/The-Internet-Via-Mosaic-World-
Wide/dp/1562762591)) and was already totally out of date due to the fast
moving nature of things.

I think it was around then that even CompuServe were moving from the
traditional CSi back end over to fully Internet based systems.

The UK was pretty Internet savvy in 96. Far more than this consultant was,
anyway.

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BerislavLopac
Actually, when you think of it, a lot of comparisons being made actually quite
hold if we take into account that there is no Google. It used to be much
easier to look for a local plumber in the Yellow Pages than on the Web.

I don't think many of us are really aware of the difference that was made by
Google's search engine.

~~~
greenyoda
There were search engines before Google came along. Lycos (1994) and Alta
Vista (1995) existed at the time this article was written.

~~~
BerislavLopac
I know, and I have used them, along with HotBot, Inktomi, Infoseek, Northern
Light and others. But it was Google which brought the level of confidence in
search results which we take for granted nowadays, and which make it
convenient not to remember or bookmark a URL since we're pretty sure we'll be
able to easily find it at any time.

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tomjen3
>This 'telephone' has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as a
means of communication. The device is inherently of no value to us." \--
Western Union internal memo, 1876.

>"The Americans have need of the telephone, but we do not. We have plenty of
messenger boys." \-- Sir William Preece, chief engineer of the British Post
Office, 1876.

>"The wireless music box has no imaginable commercial value. Who would pay for
a message sent to nobody in particular?" \-- David Sarnoff's associates in
response to his urgings for investment in the radio in the 1920s.

Point being that for every good invention somebody will think it has no value.
The opposite is also likely to be the case so the really interesting question
is how do you distinques between the two?

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zrgiu_
_They buried something. And now it 's reaching out, calling us in. And you
came. So when it comes right down to it, why did you come here? I'll tell you
why. Because it was there! Brilliant! Human beings. You are amazing!_

The author notices that people use the internet to discover things they didn't
know before, but fails to recognize how HUGE that is. People are suckers for
information. One characteristic at the base of our existence and development
is curiosity. Curiosity got us to 1996, when the internet was just starting
up, but curiosity also got us to the fax machine and the phone.

Yes, there will also be business people. There will always be people trying to
make money off it, because that's another thing that characterizes most of us.
But at the core, all we want to ever do is be better in any way possible, we
want to simply .. know more.

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netcan
I was 12 when this was written. We had a computer that could connect to the
internet via dial-up, pay by the minute.

My experience with the internet was that it was useless, but exciting. I'm not
sure why exactly it felt exciting, but I think it had something to do with the
chaos of it. There was porn (and rumours about the porn). Information about
drugs and weird religions. About a year after this article, I could use huge
internet directories to do what I now do procrastinating on wikipedia and ICQ
for what we now call social networking. ICQ had a button started a chat with a
random person somewhere in the world. 90% would chat back.

I think the wildness of it somehow signalled to me that it was a big deal.
Wild means open ended. Thats ultimately what made the internet different from
telephones, fax, teletext and all the other stuff the author compares it to.

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baha_man
"Answer a survey question to continue reading this content..."

Flagged.

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austinstorm
The kicker is at the end, when he calls the Internet a fad, "like
skateboarding or mountain bikes." I hope this is real.

~~~
bowlofpetunias
In 1996, this could very well be real. In fact it was quite a common opinion,
held by many intelligent people.

And many aspects of the Internet were just that, fads. With hyped up
"cyber"-everything, it was hard to see the forest for the trees. Hence the
bubble and collapse.

Also, it took a long time for the Internet to actually be better at many
things. Yellow Pages mentioned are a good example. It took a decade from hype
to reality before the Internet made the local Yellow Pages superfluous.

(Personally, I had been waiting for something like the internet to happen
since the 80's, but that makes me a hacker and a nerd, not a visionary...)

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greenyoda
A lot of things that people are writing about the future of technology today
will probably seem equally ridiculous in 17 years.

