Thanks. I haven’t seen the movies in years, which is my excuse. But I spent a lot of time with my Walkman and the soundtrack to the first movie on my lunch breaks in high school.
I must say I don’t miss tapes much at all, my iPod is much much much better.
Come on, corduroy? Most people under 30 probably don’t know the Pearl Jam song by that name, but they should know what the fabric is – and if they don’t it’s not due to their youth. Corduroy pants and jackets are still widely available from big name clothing companies.
I don’t think your description of the fabric is very good, though. It sounds like you’re talking about flannel, so that might have confused people.
Also, I know I asked about this in GQ years ago, but nobody had an answer. Maybe it’s something youngsters never caught. CRT-based televisions in the US usually had the CRT recessed somewhat in the cabinet, like this. However, when I watched a British show on PBS, and a television was depicted, the CRT bulged out from the cabinet, like this. I still don’t know why the was a difference in cabinet design, and the difference in analog television standards (NTSC vs PAL) doesn’t seem to explain it.
Am I the only doper who owns one?
I’m 42, BTW.
Back on topic. Here’s one the under-30 crowd can’t comprehend when I’ve talked about it - the pre-Web Internet. Email, IRC, FTP, Usenet news, MUDs, and Gopher, but not the Web. They see the Web as the Internet.
I’m 20 and I recognize almost everything in this thread - as another poster said I think it’s mainly down to paying attention. I’ve never had a rotary phone, for example, but I know what one is just from being aware, seeing it in films and TV shows, etc.
Back in the 60s, the CRT was indeed bulgy and was really heavy glass. Over time, they got lighter and “flatter” to the point where in the early 70s they no longer bulged.
Yeah, I’ve got one too, a portable model. When the cover is on it, it looks for all intensive purposes like a briefcase. I inherited it from my father (who inherited it from his father), along with two big boxes of various vacuum tubes.
Does anyone remember having to put yellow food coloring stuff in your margarine? It was sold white with packets of coloring. Perhaps I should say oleomargarine! 
Yeah but, yeah but, would YOU get a “Beechwood 4-5789” joke?
I spent a little time with the you-are-what-you-own set the other day and my ego took a sound drubbing when my ancient cell rang and was the subject of amazement. An antique cell phone! Imagine that.
'sall right. Had the same experience with my electric typewriter.
My husband has a riotous story of watching a kid try to figure out a rotary dial phone. Looked like a fairly bright kid, too.
64, here.
Before answering machines you could get a service that had operators who would take your calls and relay messages to you.
And do you remember party lines? You and several neighbors had the same phone number. So if you picked up the phone to make a call, it might already be in use by someone else. The polite thing to do was to hang up and try again later, though it seemed that everyone had a nosy neighbor who eavesdropped.
And how about TVs with round screens. Our first set, in the early 50s, was a Zenith with a round screen, black & white of course. Some sets came with a big magnifying glass that hooked onto the screen to make the picture larger.
When I was in my early twenties, I expected that people my age then would not know how to tell time (digital doesn’t count) by now. I was wrong - everyone in their twenties that I know can tell time (unless the clock face has no numbers, which is a stupid design and should be rejected).
However, it never crossed my mind people would not know how to write cursive, but none of them do. It’s the equivalent of logs and slide rules.
Or experiencing all kinds of new and exciting television because you’re too lazy to get up and change the channel.
If you put a slide rule in front of a kid nowadays would they would actually be able to figure out what it was for? How about drafting tools?
Other things.
[ul]
[li]5 1/4 floppy disks.[/li][li]Acoustically coupled modems.[/li][li]Monochrome computer monitors.[/li][li]Mimeographs.[/li][li]Film Projectors (were you a projector geek in school?)[/li][/ul]
A friend of mine made her son learn to sign his name, but I have to admit I don’t use cursive anymore and hardly ever write anything longer than a paragraph by hand.
One of the things I meant to say was that I can’t tell analog time very well (if I stare at it long enough I can figure it out, but not at a glance) but I’m not sure whether that’s a sign that I’m young or a sign that I’m lazy and would rather just look at a digital watch. Basically everyone I know around my age can easily use an analog clock so I’m going to go with lazy.
I’m 29 and other then a slide rule and the acoustically coupled modem I’ve seen and used all of those things. In fact most schools had all of those things for quite a while.
As for cursive, I remember learning it in third grade and looking back I have no idea why that is/ was taught in school (is it still?). I don’t know where along the way I switched back, but I have to think about what certain cursive letters even look like nowadays (not that I have any reason to except for times like this). As for clocks, I remember in kindergarten learning to read a clock and picked it up pretty damn easily. It’s not as if a clock with hands has been phased out or something. They’re everywhere, and anyone that can’t read one is gonna get in trouble someway somehow without knowing.
I’m 51 and I can’t even see what the license plate in the second link is supposed to say (and YES, I’m wearing my reading glasses :D). It’s just a blurry blue and white. And I didn’t get the Wayne’s world reference either.
snake-hips has explained it a couple of times but people here seem to still getting confused about what he’s talking about. The dial he’s talking about isn’t on the TV, it’s on the antenna control itself. Ours sat on top of the TV.
I don’t know anyone who doesn’t know what manual transmission is. Most may not know how to drive one, but they all know what it is.