What's new
Fantasy Football - Footballguys Forums

This is a sample guest message. Register a free account today to become a member! Once signed in, you'll be able to participate on this site by adding your own topics and posts, as well as connect with other members through your own private inbox!

People that grew up before the internet age, how was life different? (1 Viewer)

One of the biggest things I can remember is that you didn't have this giant resource to call back to in regards to television/music/movies etc.  If you didn't get it when it came out or recorded it.....you were SOL.  I remember being at a comic convention in the early 1990s...and this guy had a bunch of bootleg VHS. He was randomly playing them....and he put this  in.  It was like a dog whistle for a half dozen people (myself included) as we hadn't seen/heard that since it came out in the late 70s but still remembered it. 

 
Went outside more often. Could just go outside and make friends, find friends, etc,etc.

Got lost a lot when driving in unfamiliar areas.

Read the newspaper every day, usually had a little newspaper ink stain around the knob area on the bathrooom door.SportsCenter was best TV all day, only avenue for highlights and if the games ended late you did not get even get the box score in the paper the next day. So if a game was late Monday night, if you missed SportsCenter, you might know details until Wednesday.  I've not seen Sportscenter in over 10 years. 

Had to actually go the library to do research on papers/projects. Met my future wife this way.

Had to watch news or weather channel for weather updates.

Read longer stories and more books.

Want-ads in newspapers was sort of a cross between Craiglist and Indeed.

 
Reading these replies:  Kids today do not have it better than we did. Even with all the technology. We got to be kids. Run around all day, parents not having a clue where we were. Much more independence and responsibility than today’s kids. 

If a kid today makes a stupid mistake it can literally ruin their lives. We could do dumb #### and it would quickly be forgotten. Today one accusation or nude photo on the internet and an 11 year old is wrecked. Sad. 

 
During summers growing up we would take our boat out to the middle of the lake.  We would anchor and start drinking ,swimming, toking, maybe start a card game.  Friends would visually see you were out there and they would come by, drop anchor, tie up and join in.  Soon, as the process repeated, there would be a flotilla of boats tied one to the other, an island of skinny dipping drunken debauchery. It was glorious.  Sometimes the lake cops would come bye.  We, of course, could see them coming. we would drop our beers and booze over the sides in nets tied to an anchor so they would be out of sight.  The bongs and pot got taken under the decks of the pontoon boats until the cops left, the same with anyone who was naked, there was plenty of opportunity to stay out of sight.  Every night was a party. 

 
In high school, if we hadn't heard about a party at school, we would drive around looking for people to see what everyone was doing.  We had a loop: Putt-Putt, McDonald's, school parking lot, golf course.  Often we would just stay at one of those places and party there.

 
boots11234 said:
Reading these replies:  Kids today do not have it better than we did. Even with all the technology. We got to be kids. Run around all day, parents not having a clue where we were. Much more independence and responsibility than today’s kids. 

If a kid today makes a stupid mistake it can literally ruin their lives. We could do dumb #### and it would quickly be forgotten. Today one accusation or nude photo on the internet and an 11 year old is wrecked. Sad. 
Click to expand...
We also had to figure out things mostly on our own a lot.  We didn't have a cell phone to use to call someone or look something up in every new/scary/unknown situation we faced.  

 
LAUNCH said:
Every kid was outside a lot.  There were kids all over the neighborhood playing sports all the time.  Nobody wanted to be inside.  If it was cold and snowing, then people were sledding or having snow ball fights.
Click to expand...
This.  My childhood was spent outside playing every sport known to man and some that we just made up.  We had lots of kids in my neighborhood around my age.  It was a magical time.

 
LAUNCH said:
Every kid was outside a lot.  There were kids all over the neighborhood playing sports all the time.  Nobody wanted to be inside.  If it was cold and snowing, then people were sledding or having snow ball fights.
Click to expand...
We used to have 25- 30 kids everyday to play pickup baseball after school.  5-10 would always be waiting to get in as the others had to leave for dinner.  We would actually get our dads lawnmowers, brooms and rakes and pretend we were the grounds crew at Tiger Stadium.  All the kids kept that field in perfect condition.  We would steal Coke and Pepsi banners from party stores and hang them on the fence like advertisements.

Now I live by pristine ball fields that are totally empty unless an organized team is playing.

 
Last edited by a moderator:
boots11234 said:
Reading these replies:  Kids today do not have it better than we did. Even with all the technology. We got to be kids. Run around all day, parents not having a clue where we were. Much more independence and responsibility than today’s kids. 

If a kid today makes a stupid mistake it can literally ruin their lives. We could do dumb #### and it would quickly be forgotten would never be known by anyone beyond who was also there. Today one accusation or nude photo on the internet and an 11 year old is wrecked. Sad. 
Click to expand...

 
There were no treat bags at birthday parties. The birthday boy got gifts and that was it. You’d give out invites at school and your friends would bike to your house and eat cake and run around your block for the party. 

Man an I hate treat bags.

 
Da Guru said:
We used to have 25- 30 kids everyday to play pickup baseball after school.  5-10 would always be waiting to get in as the others had to leave for dinner.  We would actually get our dads lawnmowers, brooms and rakes and pretend we were the grounds crew at Tiger Stadium.  All the kids kept that field in perfect condition.  We would steal banners from party stores and hand them on the fence like advertisements.

Now I live by pristine ball fields that are totally empty unless an organized team is playing.
Click to expand...
Now kids and parents want to be around each other 24/7.  We did everything we could to get away from them.

 
Our FF commish added up weekly scores by hand out of the USA Today and mailed the results to each owner. 

WW was processed on Tue & Th nights only, between 6:00 and 8:00 pm. Call an add/drop in at 8:02? Tough poopies. 

ESPN Primetime for all highlights, or The George Michael Sports Machine if you got home late from the bars on Sunday night. 

Coors Light 12pks were $7.99 on sale

these were good days. 

 
We played whatever sport was in season. Baseball/Wiffle Ball in the spring and summer, “touch” football in the fall, hockey in the winter. Mix in basketball in the driveway whenever we needed a change.

Somehow many of us still ended up being good enough to play our chosen sports in college without “specialization.”

 
Last edited by a moderator:
Quint said:
Our FF commish added up weekly scores by hand out of the USA Today and mailed the results to each owner. 

WW was processed on Tue & Th nights only, between 6:00 and 8:00 pm. Call an add/drop in at 8:02? Tough poopies. 

ESPN Primetime for all highlights, or The George Michael Sports Machine if you got home late from the bars on Sunday night. 

Coors Light 12pks were $7.99 on sale

these were good days. 
Click to expand...
I still play in a league that uses these “archaic” waiver wire rules, just because that’s the way it’s always been done. A little weird, but kind of cool to keep the tradition at the same time.

 
You had to be sure to have friends that had older brothers.  That's where you got the porn and learned about cool music.

 
Let's not get carried away. Not everything was better back then. Going to the library for a school project and paying for photocopies isn't 'better' than pulling up Wikipedia on your couch.  And no way is fast-forwarding a cassette to try and find your favorite song better than simply telling Alexa to play "The Cars that go Boom". 

 
boots11234 said:
There were no treat bags at birthday parties. The birthday boy got gifts and that was it. You’d give out invites at school and your friends would bike to your house and eat cake and run around your block for the party. 

Man an I hate treat bags.
Click to expand...
Yeah so dumb

i don’t know when this started but my wife has always done it for our kids (oldest is 9).  I’m assuming it started sometime before that because little Billy didn’t get a present and threw a fit

 
I went to the library in order to write a 10 page report on Dr. J.  Technological advances made it easier than prior reports -- instead of a Bic pen and white out, I was able to use the amazing "EraserMate".  It was a pen, but you could erase it like a pencil.  Revolutionized junior high.

 
Great,  now I'm the old guy that can answer crap like this. 

I guess the title of my answer to come would be... I survived drinking from the garden hose and other stories of life before technology. 

 
Pong was amazing.  Hooked it up to the back of your TV, put the TV to channel 3, and played ping pong -- on your TV!

 
boots11234 said:
Finding an old playboy in a garbage was better than finding a 100 bill!!
Click to expand...
I have a box of playboys in my basement I've been saving since my late 20's. At the time I told myself: "Save these for when you have kids. You can stash them in the garage or the backyard when they are 15 or 16."

I'm now 48, and that box is still sitting hidden in my basement. If I crack them out now that my boys are pushing the teen years, I'd probably get arrested.  :lol:

 
Last edited by a moderator:
Brony said:
Let's not get carried away. Not everything was better back then. Going to the library for a school project and paying for photocopies isn't 'better' than pulling up Wikipedia on your couch.  And no way is fast-forwarding a cassette to try and find your favorite song better than simply telling Alexa to play "The Cars that go Boom". 
Click to expand...
We"re Tigra and Bunny and we like the boom. Chigga Chigga...

 
Just took a road trip with the family to Hilton Head and back (Twin Cities MN).  Road tripping is dramatically different.  I remember my dad teaching me how to use the Atlas as a kid, learning the differences between intertates, and state highways and all the different road indicators.  Learning how to read the milage differences between exits, what the different interstate numberings meant.  He would sit down before the trip and map out what he thought the best route was.  It would take some serious time.

Now, I just speak Hilton Head Island into my phone and it maps the route.  I'll approach a city and it will offer a different route based on traffic.  It's an amazing difference.  Coming in to Atlanta on a Friday night and traffic was horrific.  Google maps took me on some side country roads that I wasn't sure was really a shortcut but the interstate was bumper to bumper thirty miles out, so it probably saved some time.  I looked over at my 16 year old sitting in the front seat and said "well, you sure are seeing a part of Georgia you'll never see again."

 
If I wanted my mom to pick me up, I had to call collect. When they said to say your name, I would say, come pick me up. She would hang up and come get me  

ETA should have actually read the responses. Seems like we all did the same thing. 

 
Last edited by a moderator:
My family got internet when I was in middle school. There were no smartphones and we all shared a desktop computer so I was rarely online for extended periods. My brother generally monopolized it with online gaming. Beforehand we wasted time just in different ways (more TV, video games and time outside... nothing productive).

I wouldn't say it had any impact on my social life. After school was always sports practice, farm work or my part time job. I didn't have much time for anything else

 
Last edited by a moderator:
Bull Dozier said:
Just took a road trip with the family to Hilton Head and back (Twin Cities MN).  Road tripping is dramatically different.  I remember my dad teaching me how to use the Atlas as a kid, learning the differences between intertates, and state highways and all the different road indicators.  Learning how to read the milage differences between exits, what the different interstate numberings meant.  He would sit down before the trip and map out what he thought the best route was.  It would take some serious time.
Click to expand...
We just got back on a long road trip (to Minnesota actually) and me and the kids had about an hour long discussion of all the above. It was great. 

 
In general, the bad was the lack of communication.  I really didn't keep in touch with hardly anyone from college, grad school, or early jobs because we only had phone calls and snail mail.  But in general, the good for sports was the lack of free agents.  Your team generally stayed as your team ...none of this constant moving around to find the best contract.  

One specific bad: Drove 3 hours to Detroit to get tickets to an Elton John concert ...and the line was massive when I arrived, so I turned around and drove home.  One specific good: Went to the opening night of Rocky with no advance knowledge of what it would be like.  Oh, man, was that fun.  People on their feet, in the aisles, throwing air punches, cheering ...

 
ChiefD said:
I have a box of playboys in my basement I've been saving since my late 20's. At the time I told myself: "Save these for when you have kids. You can stash them in the garage or the backyard when they are 15 or 16."

I'm now 48, and that box is still sitting hidden in my basement. If I crack them out now that my boys are pushing the teen years, I'd probably get arrested.  :lol:
Click to expand...
When we moved into our house 30+ years ago, I happened to find some really old girly mags above the basement ducts.  Old enough that the true girly parts were covered with those black rectangles.  Still got 'em up there.

 
Thunderlips said:
One of the biggest things I can remember is that you didn't have this giant resource to call back to in regards to television/music/movies etc.  If you didn't get it when it came out or recorded it.....you were SOL.  I remember being at a comic convention in the early 1990s...and this guy had a bunch of bootleg VHS. He was randomly playing them....and he put this  in.  It was like a dog whistle for a half dozen people (myself included) as we hadn't seen/heard that since it came out in the late 70s but still remembered it. 
Click to expand...
Holy crap - Battle of the Planets - G-FORCE!!! So awesome! :)   We used to BOLT home from grade school to watch both this and the 60's Spiderman cartoon reruns (WUAB Channel 43.) 

The other thing was arcades.  We had an arcade in our little town, we used to get $5 or $10, change it out to quarters or hopefully 5 tokens for a $1 / 30 for $5 / 65 for $10 or something ride our bikes down to the arcade (if no-one else wanted to play football/basketball/wiffle ball) and play as long as the money would last.

 
Dickie Dunn said:
We played whatever sport was in season. Baseball/Wiffle Ball in the spring and summer, “touch” football in the gall, hockey in the winter. Mix in basketball in the driveway whenever we needed a change.

Somehow many of us still ended up being good enough to play our chosen sports in college without “specialization.”
Click to expand...
I pitched in HS..I ruined my arm for a whole season from playing strikeout everyday with a tennis ball.  Trying to hit 90 with a ball that was way too light is not good.

 
Brony said:
Let's not get carried away. Not everything was better back then. Going to the library for a school project and paying for photocopies isn't 'better' than pulling up Wikipedia on your couch.  And no way is fast-forwarding a cassette to try and find your favorite song better than simply telling Alexa to play "The Cars that go Boom". 
Click to expand...
Im not sure. Was a lot harder to procrastinate back then cause like you said you actually had to go and do the research, lot less fake news as well. And i actually listened to the entire cassette back then cause it was such a pain to find that certain song.

 
Dickie Dunn said:
We played whatever sport was in season. Baseball/Wiffle Ball in the spring and summer, “touch” football in the gall, hockey in the winter. Mix in basketball in the driveway whenever we needed a change.

Somehow many of us still ended up being good enough to play our chosen sports in college without “specialization.”
Click to expand...
We would ride our bikes from neighborhood to neighborhood challenging kids to wiffle ball.  We used a lawn chair as a strike zone, so it was always a fight to see who had to ride and carry the chair.  I can remember a kid getting his ### kicked after getting caught corking his bat (cut the top off, stuffed it with newspaper).  

 
What's sex like now? We most certainly did not live with the avalanche of porn available now.   I have to think it's pretty meh to finally feel a boob when you've been watching sex and what not constantly for the past few years before actually getting to experience it.  

 
I remember my best buddy's mom was constantly on the phone (Italian family) so calling him was typically out of the question.  I'd just get on the bike and make the 5-10 minute jaunt over to see if he was home.

Do kids actually TP houses these days or is all pranking type of activity done online too?

 
Before answering machines you'd call your buddy and if his family wasn't home the phone would just ring and ring and ring. You give up after about 6-7 rings. If I called his house and the was no answer I'd keep the phone off the hook and check it every 15 minutes or so. If the phone was still ringing I knew he wasn't home yet. If I heard a dial tone I knew someone had answered and he was home. So I hear the dial tone and call him right away. I'd say "Hey, what's up? You just get home?" He's like, "yeah, how'd you know?" Guy thought I was psychic. Hours and hours of ringing phones eventually drove his dogs insane.

 
Stranger Things is a pretty good approximation of my life.  

  • Bikes. 
  • Arcades.
  • Deathly fear of approaching girls. 
  • Older bullies.  
  • Everybody smokes in the house and car.
  • Awesome music.

 
Punxsutawney Phil said:
The world was full of bs'ers because you couldn't Google things instantly.  
Click to expand...
I do miss the days of urban legends.  We had a dead-end street in our area that was creepy to drive down, legend was there was a colony of albinos that lived at the end that would shoot you. 

 
use to go to the arcade with a sandwich bag full of actual quarters. And when you were out, you were out. None of this, "dad, reload my card" crap. 

 
and how much jackpot it was when you saw your friend's dad come out from between those saloon style doors that separated the "Adult" room from the rest of the video store with a stack of porn VHS's

 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

BobbyLayne
Yes, Gen Z is staring at you. The question is why.
2
Replies
77
Views
3K
QUEZILLA
Q
Paddington
  • Locked
  • Poll Poll
How To Get To Heaven When You Die. Read The First Post. Then Q&A Discussion. Ask Questions Here! (2
9 10 11
Replies
528
Views
14K
Paddington
Paddington
titusbramble
  • Locked
FBG FFA Countdown - The Greatest Video Games Ever - project on hold
2 3
Replies
115
Views
5K
FBG Moderator
F

Users who are viewing this thread

Total: 1 (members: 0, guests: 1)
Back
Top