# How long have you been using the internet?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-long-have-you-been-using-the-internet/668522>\
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion\
**Created:** [September 10, 2013, 8:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-long-have-you-been-using-the-internet/668522 "2013-09-10T20:19:55Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 5

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**Author:** ![Boyo\_Jim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)\
**Post date:** [September 13, 2013, 12:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-long-have-you-been-using-the-internet/668522/81 "2013-09-13T12:08:07Z")

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> [@Voyager](#):
>
> That would be PLATO - the game being called michelin first (from the lesson it got space from) and then I think empire. Overnight about half the cpu time on the Cybers running PLATO was devoted to it, as the fanatics (like me) tried to take advantage of people on other teams doing something silly like sleeping. I had this massive simulation run on our PDP 11/20 which I had to checkpoint every hour or so, so I stayed up all night playing it. I wrote the Start Trek Preview column on the Red Sweater News.

Yes, PLATO. And by the time I got to the game, I believe it had already been named empire. Thinking back, I probably wasn’t on the system in '76 in my first year – probably 77 or 78.

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**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\
**Post date:** [September 13, 2013, 1:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-long-have-you-been-using-the-internet/668522/82 "2013-09-13T13:28:44Z")

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I feel like a latecomer: Interviewing for a job in 1978, the guy obviously lost interest in me when he learned I’d never heard of Arpanet. When I clicked on this thread I was afraid I wouldn’t know the answer. My employer in 1982 had a long-distance connection between sites; did it use TCP/IP? I don’t even know. (And if it did, would that be “Internet”?)

Then I saw that there was only a single “before 1995” option. :smack: I may have a 2009 SDMB join date but … I’m “not buying any green bananas”! 🆒

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**Author:** ![Raza](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/raza/32/213_2.png) [@Raza](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Raza)\
**Post date:** [September 13, 2013, 3:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-long-have-you-been-using-the-internet/668522/83 "2013-09-13T15:27:00Z")

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I was on the faculty of a state university from the late 80s to late 90s, so got my exposure there.

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