When did you first get online? (laptops, e-mail, network, website)

[NJBest]

Most people probably got email addresses before they got the internet. The internet was available to homes after email was.

I got online first in the 80s playing games when I was learning to read.

I got my first email address in the late 80s most likely. I still have it but don't use it. It was all commandline and is not accessible via a web browser.

We got the internet later on. I don't remember when. We had AOL throughout the entire 90s (still do, but don't use it).

[Bluff_Dweller]

I got my first email address in 1994, My ISP was a four letter word like Zeno or something like that. My chioce of dial up addresses were Kansas City, Lawton, Oklahoma or Ft. Smith, Arkansas and I had to pay long distance charges all the time I was on line. I found real quick to do all my emails offline and go online to send them all at the same time and receive new messages and then logoff quickly. Good old days, I don't think so. LOL

[Asheville Native]

Originally Posted by thecoalman

Does using my C64 and a phone line to connect to my friends C64 with a BB set up count?

I went online with an Atari 800, at the mind blowing speed of 300 baud (paid over $100 for the modem) in 85. Young teen daughter hated me cause I tied up the phone line, and actually installed a second land-line for the computer. 300 baud was still faster than I could type, so it worked for BB's.

Then 1200 baud, a "real Hayes" modem that a local hospital surplussed. Co-sysop'ed an Atari pirate board, and actually got pretty good at cracking some protection schemes.

If you had told me then that I would have a 15+Meg connection at home I would have told you that you were flipping nuts. Remember going into a bookstore near Chicago when I was up there on a business trip that had a "full T1" connection to the internet. People were just standing around with their jaws gaping open at how fast pages loaded (Mosaic - and text only pages).

Probably got on the "internet" in 93, dialup @2400 at first. Remember it was Mosiac 1.0, and you had to buy a 'directory' of sites because there was no search engines.

[thecoalman]

Originally Posted by Asheville Native

Probably got on the "internet" in 93, dialup @2400 at first. Remember it was Mosiac 1.0, and you had to buy a 'directory' of sites because there was no search engines.

I missed that part, I started the early 80's with a commodore and ended the 80's with Michelob. LOL I really didn't get back into computers until about 97 when I purchased a 233mhz with 56K modem. My friend who had the BB set up was bit of computer genius, he went on to start a small dial-up company that was bought out by a larger company. He's got some kind of cushy job with that company making mountains of cash. I should of stuck with it!

[Skunk Workz]

Originally Posted by Asheville Native

..... you had to buy a 'directory' of sites because there was no search engines.

Ha, I remember those web site directories, and the BBS directories as well.

[Bo]

My university offered optional Internet email addresses for students in 1988. I signed up for one, even though I didn't know anyone else who had an Internet address! Consequently, I never did use that one or log in to it.

[dkf747]

Prodigy. Late 80s I think. Internet access came later, also through Prodigy. I had been using an account my mom gave me for a long, long time. I got my own when AOL came out.

[kevxu]

I got my first email address in the 1980s sometime...can't remember what year. I remember using bitnet and listserv before the present internet. Think my address must have been something@cuny.edu.

[DubbleT]

My dad was a programmer in the 70's and 80's, I still have the first Tandy he brought home. I don't remember the first time going online but do know that by about '90- '91 I regularly posted on a couple of bulletin boards. Didn't do a lot of email because we didn't know many other people that had computers.

[WyoNewk]

GEnie in 1991 for all practical purposes. I'd actually gotten "online" in the early 80s, but there was little to do online then, at least for me. I met my late wife on GEnie in '91, and it wasn't until a few years later that we joined a local board, then signed onto AOL in maybe '94.