I see your nostalgia and raise you this:
I see your nostalgia and raise you this: this
I actually had to learn to use a slide rule in high school, in the late 1970s.
thhhick
Don’t they still use computers in schools?
What? Computers are all in schools, and libraries are still a thing too. This is about the old times.
I don’t understand the picture not being a shared experience.
I learnt to type on a piece of paper that had a picture of a keyboard on it.
You must be young and never experienced floppy drives.
If I was I wouldn’t be asking if kids don’t go through this now.
Simpler times? Hell no they don’t.
Computer class in high school back then for me was treating them as glorified typewriters. I fooled around with some VBScript as that’s all we had available (I was very fortunate my grade school teacher taught us LOGO) and I managed to script kiddy my way into admin access for the internet filter for my friends so we could play stuff on Newgrounds. My career advisor told me to get a science degree because there was no future in computers, haha.
Computer lab day!
I remember essentially turning a BASIC prompt into a spinning, geometric rave decoration back in 5th grade, and thinking it was the coolest shit ever, but really… it was all about Math Blaster and The Oregon Trail in the years up to that point, and for several years later.
And yes, I’d go back in a heartbeat.
I used to love lifting my feet, putting one hand on the monitor screen, turning it off, and shocking the hell out of whoever was sitting beside me.
Computers were still exciting. And hadn’t been enshitified.
Yeah but not because of the computers.
Yes and no.
Computers and computer systems weren’t so much enshittified back in those days.
But the bulk CRT screens, I don’t miss those…
By the way, at those times almost every screen had one of those stupid placebo ‘glare filters’ . I don’t miss those either.
Oddly, I want the CRT’s, but those optiplexes are horrible.
I just want one crt per system for retro gaming.
Yes, computers were fun and exciting. Now they just suck.
Unless Linux. But even then it takes an effort to disable all the bloat and spyware bs in the bios.
what do you mean by bloat and spyware on linux? (asking because it’s the first time i hear this take)
In the bios: it’s the booting software that’s separate from the OS. Most newer computers have ridiculously long menu’s and you have to be careful what you disable because of bit locker nonsense and whatnot.
Despite havin a very nostalgic soft spot for my 16-bit and 8-bit home computers, these labs do nothing for me. I worked in so many as an technician at a uni and in various other tech support roles in my 20s that these generic cream boxes leave me kinda cold. Give me an Amiga, an ST or even a ZX Spectrum any day. Probably cos I’m old AF 🤣
Yes, yes, a million times yes!
You better believe I was degaussing as many CRTs as I could.
I miss youth and the sort of reckless abandon and constant sense of wonder. The easy friendships and stuff. The discovery of learning tech. The tech was cool and new and dramatic but our tech is def cooler now.
Things are pretty cool now too if you look for it. Sure there are problems but there have always been problems. I look for things to trigger my sense of wonder and it still feels amazing. Just harder to find cus I’m more experienced and well traveled or whatever.
I dunno I was a goofball kid working at tech then and I’m a goofball kid in a old body oggling tech now too :D
Rick Rosner had this to say about high school:
High school’s attractive to me, not necessarily because you have a good time, but because it’s clear why you are miserable.
I would go for a redo if I could. I would know better not to trust the guidance councilors or school therapists. No compromises on the classes I really should have been in.
