The very first time I logged onto the internet, I used...

I'm iterested to see how many people here got onto the internet for the first time at what time in history. I won't try and date anyone by putting times on the poll. We'll measure the time in terms of available technology.

For example, the very first time I logged onto the internet, I was using a 9600 bps modem connected to an XT and the Internet was text based back then, no browsers widely available. And to quote so many before me... If I knew then what I know now, I would have registered all the 2 and 3 and 4 letter .coms that I could get my hands on, as well as all the major trademarks I could think of. (That didn't become a big no-no until much later. - I would have had plenty of time to sell quite a few of them.)

 

Depends on what you mean by "logged onto the internet".

The first exposure I had to the Internet was when I was running a BBS back in the 80s, I had a few forums that were usenet newsgroups that I got via from a Fidonet gateway.

In the early 90s I connected a couple of VAXes to PSI to pass e-mail around using UUCP. There's still a few maps around on different sites that have my name and bang paths in them:

At home I connected to PSInet to get e-mail and usenet, with an XT type machine. I don't think there were any browsers available. I remember putting Slackware on that box, or it might've been a later box (286 or 386sx) and having Lynx to browse the Internet. Might have been a different program, but it was similar to Lynx.

 

56k for me. Ah those days... we've got it so much better now. I can only image what it felt for the slower folks.

 

What platform were you running the BBS on?

 

I actually started out with BBSs and the Commodore 64 and a 300 bps modem!!! Man, that was slow!

 

The first one was an 10 MHz 286 machine with 2 x 20 MB (megabyte) hard drives. It was a DOS-based, single line BBS. I started with a 1200 bps modem, then went to a Multitech 2400 bps modem. Later on USRobotics started their "Sysop" program and I landed a USR Dual Standard modem. That was HST (14.4k, I think) and V.32 (9.6k, before bis was finalized, which brought it up to 14.4k as well, if I remember correctly)

Man, that was fast. ;-)

 

Good ol' Compuserve in 1995.

Ha, it would take minutes for a 500 pixel picture to load.

 

Wow... does this bring up memories... using a 14400 modem... using Mosaic as a browser and weird commands like telnet to get into a BBS...

 

I started out on the BBSes too. Then I went to 14.4 dialup Internet access...don't remember which ISP it was then. As soon as 28.8 came out, I jumped on that. Then 56k for what seems like longer than the ones before combined...then finally DSL.

 

lol, I was Amish, so i did not get online till 99, and then I got my own computer in 2000, and have been hooked since. I wish would have been able to get a few domains back in 99 when I was living with my brother. But I was young, and had no idea what a domain name could do back then!

 

I first got online back in 1995 when I was in junior highschool. I remember it like it was yesterday. I really liked using Yahoo back then and I've stuck with it sense.

I sure wish I'd built and maintained a site back then.

 

April 1996, 14.4K.

Back in the 90s I couldn''t even fathon downloading a 10 Meg file!! I once thought my step dad was on crack to spend hours downloading a 13 meg file in about 1997!!! Heck, back in 1996, to download a 150K file you just leave the computer and come back later!!! Now 10 Megs is tiny. Now I would compair that to downloading a file thats well over a Gig!!

 

March 1999 - internet cafe - I surfed altavista.com as I remember...

 

yeah i thought the net cafe's were awesome! i had to beg my mom to get internet, it seemed like such a delicacy, like cell phones used to be, now everyone has it