There seems to be a similar general demographic of late 30’s to early 40’s users here… (could easily be my confirmation bias saying that). I was around for Napster, GeoCities, MySpace, Yahoo, Mama, AoL, AiM, and if you are ~40yo, you likely were in this same wave of broad scale adoption of the internet by average Joe jr public in the latest 90’s and early naughties. We are the first group where digital life is the rule, not the exception(s) and early adopters; the first gen of internet grandparents… How does that legacy play out. /r

  • shalafi@lemmy.worldEnglish
    20·
    24 days ago

    I’m 54. We built this shit from the ground up. We went from zero internet to dial-up as we went from teens to young adults.

    We installed the first DSL and cable lines, mitigated Y2K in the field and on the keyboard.

    We straddled the digital divide. We’ve seen it all.

    tl:dr; Lawn. Off of it.

    • czardestructo@lemmy.world
      4·
      23 days ago

      I came into this thread all puffed up with pride, only to be humbled by your post. Humility is important, thank you. Please accept my upvote as an insufficient offering to those who came before us.

      • shalafi@lemmy.worldEnglish
        2·
        22 days ago

        Thank you! GenX is a unique generation. I often wonder what it was like at the dawn of the Industrial Age.

  • Rhynoplaz@lemmy.world
    18·
    24 days ago

    Uh oh! Don’t forget ICQ!

    Related note: Remember how all dads (ok not all, but a lot) knew how to fix a car? Now dads are in charge of fixing the computer/WiFi.

    • j4k3@lemmy.worldOPEnglish
      1·
      24 days ago

      Lol, I did pro automotive paint, airbrush, and graphics for most of my late teens and twenties, ported heads and built motors for nostalgia drag, was pit crew for a sprint car, and might know a thing or two about blowers, carbs, hilborn injection, and megasquirt. One time I even owned a normie car that depreciated in value by the time I got rid of it. But I can compile and run Gentoo…

    • XeroxCool@lemmy.world
      1·
      24 days ago

      Cars are way more complicated. Maintenance is somewhat the same for things like brakes and oil, but taking down a check engine i light trigger is worse than wifi. No scanning for a code doesn’t tell you what broke. It tells you what isn’t reporting right. Diagnoses is up to you.

      That being said, cars are way more reliable in general. We don’t need to fix them nearly as often. Unless you’re me and keep buying 90s shitboxes to save money.

  • radix@lemmy.worldEnglish
    5·
    24 days ago

    Shout out to my mom, who really drove us as a digital family when I was growing up.

    She just turned 80 this week.

  • TheFogan@programming.devEnglish
    1·
    24 days ago

    I’m just shy of 40… My ex had what’s now my son when I was 21. My son is 18 so… guess I’m kind of close to there… though my son has my level of anti-socialness so… I dont really see being a grandparent in the near future.

  • Lost_My_Mind@lemmy.world
    0·
    25 days ago

    I must have missed Mama. I know the rest. Kinda weird that you didn’t include tripod, angelfire, or talk city. Or message boards. I mean, Lemmy and reddit are essentially just message boards on steroids, but there used to be ACTUAL message boards.