I still remember my first encounter with the Internet – I was six, and my mom was starting her first ever email account with Pacific Net. We bought a spanking new computer system, which consisted of a monitor and CPU, both weighing twice as much as me at that time. It was the most exciting toy we've had in the house. To access the Internet, we got a modem that took an incredibly long time to dial up. It also kept me off the phone because making a call would terminate the Internet connection. It was frustrating, but the Internet was too intriguing to have me fuss over such technical glitches.
Less than a decade down the road, the Internet has evolved into our modern encyclopaedia, quenching our thirst for curiosity and helping us stay connected with people locally and globally. Computers are now a fraction of the size and weight it used to be. In fact, most people nowadays use laptops instead of PCs at home because of its convenience.
Aww look how they've grown :') My memory of my first computer wasn't the machine on the left though (I'm not thatttt old).
My first computer looked something like this. Big-assed monitor, noisy CPU and springy keyboard keys ^^
I am fortunate to have been born in the 90's. The 90's was awesome because besides experiencing the boyband craze first hand, I witnessed the Internet evolved. I watched the transition from words on paper to text online. In school, we visited the computer labs to familiarise ourselves with these intelligent robots so often that tree huggers would've been proud of us. Teachers stopped using overhead projectors (or more commonly known as OHPs) and moved on to Powerpoint slides. We were no longer handed worksheets in the form of brown recycled paper whose words faded overtime (does anyone else remember this?), instead, work was distributed to us online. I no longer had to write out the lyrics of my favourite boyband song while it was playing in the background – I could simply google it.
Google. What started out as a search engine company has now become a verb. We use the term so loosely in our everyday conversation that we forget to capitalise the "G" in Google. Google has evolved into so much more. It's a Cloud, a chatroom, an email host, a translator, a word processor and probably the world's best mapping service, just to name a few. With so much to boast about, it is safe to say that Google is the most amazing thing on the Internet today.
Haha. Found this on Google images but I think it's from PostSecret. I can definitely relate. My first browser was Netscape, then Internet Explorer after I upgraded to Windows 98, then Safari when I got my first Macbook in 2006 (I never looked back. Mac forever woohoo!). Betrayed Safari and hopped onto the Google Chrome bandwagon recently and I must say I'm really liking Chrome.
Don't forget the other wonders that come with the Internet – social media, online shopping, instant messaging, e-learning (this one's not so wonderful to me TBH haha). More on that in the weeks to come ;)
Leaving you with a video by one of my favourite vloggers, Caspar Lee (vlogs, another great discovery!). Here, Caspar tests his mom (who's probably not as IT savvy as a 90's kid like himself) on the latest terms in technology. If you're reading this, you're probably familiar with them ;)
