Remember when...

Oh god you’re one of those

I remember when we all looked forward to advancing technology rather than complaining about people using it.

Gone are the days..

My uncle's Apple Watch (possibly Series 7) dings every hour

Not sure if already said but can always remember it was completely forbidden to use the internet between peak times cos the price for dial up at that time was atrocious and even worse during peak time.

Just mad to remember times (not even that long ago really) when you had to be seriously thoughtful about whether or not you dared to download something or make a phone call.

Remembering then when “high speed” broadband and Data connections became more common you paid more a month to have a higher download. And if you had unlimited download well just look at you.

Thats assuming you COULD get broadband since it took yonks for access to become semi common 😅

The good old days where you had €5 a week max for phone credit and you’d have to decide what was more important— sending a few dozen texts to your mates before you had none left or ring someone and get mere minutes of social interaction that week.

Being in a debt spiral when you’d use Vodafone’s IOU so you’re always owing €2 at the next top up but therefore always getting IOU’s. (As a teenager so I wasn’t loaded)

Ah then the top up deals came along. You’d be raging if your mates weren’t on the same network as you, cos the deals got you free calls and texts 087 to 087 etc only haha.

And going to the shop and asking for “€X 08X” cos your prefix was your network and you scarcely changed your network of course. #VodafoneForLyfe. 😂 or in my case being made stick with Vodafone cos me nanny would have to pay to ring me otherwise. 😂

I’m not that old not that young so I was growing up throughout this crazy shift in technology— I personally don’t get nostalgic for old records and VHS but then I’ll always remember using them fondly. I guess I was in the time when shifting to the “newer” tech was accelerating but at the same time it was prohibitively expensive for those on lower incomes/middle incomes.

I was about 8-9 before we ever got a DVD player. I remember a magazine came with like a scooby doo DVD or some shite with a single episode or whatever. Not sure the reasons why but irrelevant— anyway, we had no DVD player as I said. So I can remember trying to use the CD player, not exactly sure what I was expecting but anyway, of course it didn’t work.

Fast forward to the DVD player arriving, I believe it was supposedly a gift for the mother for her bday, my guess the aul fella just wanted an excuse to buy a home cinema. 😂 But I realised that DVD’s are like CD’s but with video. It was amazing honestly. Right there and then I really think it’s where my love of technology was born.

I used to take apart cameras and video players etc just to see what was inside and understand, to some degree I was a child, how things operate. How technology functions, I guess.

Always would prefer to go to shops that had silly gimmicks in them like touch screen coffee machines and the likes, now they’re everywhere of course but I can remember when it was a fairly emerging technology— the screens used to be behind like a rubbery plastic sheet and it was almost like pressing a button in the screen. Hard to explain how it felt but they were so shite compared to your smartphone screen say.

I do remember my first touchscreen phone as well. A white Samsung Tocco Lite. Mowed me uncles lawn for 6 months every week to make €120 for it. €5 a week every week for 6. Months. It was awful but I wanted that damn phone so bad. Worth every penny and every minute.

Also got me €20 a month for credit so it was handy. Feel like it kept me level as well like regularly wee bit of work. I say lawns, but me uncles loaded so he had big fcuk off lawns. Acres worth so it was a few hours work like on a ride on mower. Thing is the fecking thing had a mulcher so it didn’t use grass box. But that meant the grass it spat back out would stick to the wheels, meaning when you drive it back up the driveway the grass stuck to the tarmac..

So every evening I’d finish I had to sweep about a kilometre of grass. On two sides of course. And no I’m not joking it was that big of a driveway. Ludicrous, definitely didn’t get paid enough now that I think about it but anyway.

So yeah I love tech. All of it but not really some of its pure shite. But it’s always been nice to think back and look at where we are now. Really it’s not even that technology is advancing insofar as “new tech” we’ve really just super refined the same technology we’ve had for yonks.

Touch screens, computers, the internet, it’s all been around for decades, but we just made them so much better. Honestly I feel bad for people who can’t embrace this world. It has gone to make so many things so much better.

Jesus that’s a lot of words