# Was the internet better 30 years ago? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [May 11, 2025, 6:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-internet-better-30-years-ago/1018260 "2025-05-11T18:22:42Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![saje](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/saje/32/3631_2.png) [@saje](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/saje)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2025, 11:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-internet-better-30-years-ago/1018260/41 "2025-05-12T11:59:38Z")
The only thing I miss, computerwise, from 1995-ish is the game Hover. I was addicted to that, something so very zen about it. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2025, 11:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-internet-better-30-years-ago/1018260/42 "2025-05-12T11:59:43Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > People griping about the enshittification of social media have no eye on the bigger picture. The internet has changed lives and enriched economies that badly need help, Why not both? The internet changed lives and enabled people to do things they could never have done without it, but also, the enshittification of social media and the rise of cybercrime, scams, corporate motives, disinformation and other factors have changed the internet so that it is not so much that enabling, life-changing place it once was. ---
**Author:** ![Jophiel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jophiel/32/66_2.png) [@Jophiel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jophiel)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2025, 12:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-internet-better-30-years-ago/1018260/43 "2025-05-12T12:20:14Z")
> [@Mangetout](#): > > Why not both? Exactly. Modern farming and food industries have fed a lot more people than in older times while also reducing the flavor and quality of food for many people via corporate practices. Modern manufacturing has allowed more people to own quality of life enhancing gadgets while also reducing the build quality and repairability of products until they’re cheap landfill trash within a few years. It’s possible to acknowledge one and still lament the other. ---
**Author:** ![DPRK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4491bb/32.png) [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2025, 12:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-internet-better-30-years-ago/1018260/44 "2025-05-12T12:59:57Z")
Even the pampered elites, and not just they, have access to tools facilitating research, markets, and other “productive” activities much more advanced than was possible 30 years ago. Elites have always had access to those services at some level, but now it is available to everyone. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2025, 2:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-internet-better-30-years-ago/1018260/45 "2025-05-12T14:07:19Z")
> [@Mangetout](#): > > Why not both? It _can_ be both, but one of these sides way outweighs the other in overall scale, in terms of what’s “better”. > [@Mangetout](#): > > iit is not so much that enabling, life-changing place it once was. For you and people like you. For poor African farmers, it simply _didn’t exist at all for them then_, and now it’s a _complete_ game shifter. or tl;dr: “First World Problems.” > [@DPRK](#): > > Even the pampered elites, and not just they, have access to tools facilitating research, markets, and other “productive” activities much more advanced than was possible 30 years ago. Sure. Hell, just on my phone or laptop I have access to the kind of real-time field information I would have killed for when doing field work in the 90s, and that even my professors would not have had access to. People who focus on just the degradation of the social media side of the internet are missing so, so much of what’s great about it (and even there,I think they have rose-tinted glasses. Much of Usenet was combative crap even in '95, for instance.) And even ‘social media’ is a broad category that encompasses a lot of great content even for all the commercial shit out there. ---
**Author:** ![Quimby](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/22d042/32.png) [@Quimby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quimby)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2025, 2:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-internet-better-30-years-ago/1018260/46 "2025-05-12T14:15:17Z")
Reading and posting on USENET for hours on a Linux shell account in 1993 was peak Internet. ---
**Author:** ![salinqmind1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/958977/32.png) [@salinqmind1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/salinqmind1)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2025, 2:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-internet-better-30-years-ago/1018260/47 "2025-05-12T14:24:23Z")
…I only know _I_ was better, 30 years ago. The first thing I always looked at was The Straight Dope - I think it was on AOL? We already had a book or two. ---
**Author:** ![Eonwe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eonwe/32/240_2.png) [@Eonwe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eonwe)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2025, 2:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-internet-better-30-years-ago/1018260/48 "2025-05-12T14:41:54Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > People who focus on just the degradation of the social media side of the internet are missing so, so much of what’s great about it (and even there,I think they have rose-tinted glasses. On the other hand, so many people and outcomes are so intertwined and complicated, any attempt at justifying a “better” or “worse” position is going to be looking at a cherry-picked set of variables or metrics. If the modern internet is enabling X amount of increased food security in struggling nations, while also driving deforestation and climate change, and serving as a primary tool for the destruction of social cohesion and global stability, is it better now or not? ---
**Author:** ![echoreply](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/echoreply/32/3641_2.png) [@echoreply](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/echoreply)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2025, 2:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-internet-better-30-years-ago/1018260/49 "2025-05-12T14:44:08Z")
> [@Mangetout](#): > > Perhaps it was _too_ innocent for its own good The innocence was designed in. Look at protocols like SMTP. Sure, anyone can leave me emails, and claim they’re anyone they want to be! The original thought was that any computer that was on the internet must be trustworthy. By 1995 we knew that was a mistake, but other than some spam, the repercussions hadn’t really hit yet. It was innocent and fun. It probably was around 95, maybe earlier, that I made my first online purchase, and it was incredibly exciting. I remember having to telnet to a system, and then I could enter a bunch of information and make my purchase. It was probably directly accessing some companies AS400 based purchasing system. I probably bought some SIMMs. The changes between 95 and 2000 were immense, though. The pace of change in a few years from hand crafted websites, and the novelty of finding a Usenet group that was about something _other_ than Star Trek or porn to the full peaks of the dotcom boom was certainly exciting. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2025, 2:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-internet-better-30-years-ago/1018260/50 "2025-05-12T14:51:56Z")
> [@Eonwe](#): > > is it better now or not? You’d have to quantify all of the positives and negatives while stating your metrics and axioms. Is the internet driving deforestation and climate change _itself_ (notwithstanding the literal energy/resource usage of the physical infrastructure), or is that globalization and Western levels of consumption, and the internet is only one tool used to do that and it was heading that way in the days of faxes and landlines? _Is_ the internet driving social unrest, or again, is it a tool and would other tools (cable TV news, for instance, or NewsCorp tabloids) serve as well? Whereas for the things the Internet does for those poor farmers now, there were no alternative tools before, they just went completely without if not within reach of some donor programme. Also, I’m not just talking about food security - that’s the bare minimum. I’m talking about actual economic development and education to move away from that baseline subsistence level. That’s way more massive with huge knock-on effects. ---
**Author:** ![Eonwe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eonwe/32/240_2.png) [@Eonwe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eonwe)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2025, 3:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-internet-better-30-years-ago/1018260/51 "2025-05-12T15:10:19Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > (notwithstanding the literal energy/resource usage of the physical infrastructure) This is what I meant specifically… the literal cost of resources to run and access the internet- electricity, mining, etc. > [@MrDibble](#): > > _Is_ the internet driving social unrest, or again, is it a tool and would other tools (cable TV news, for instance, or NewsCorp tabloids) serve as well? I think it’s a convenient argument to put forth (even hypothetically) that all the bad stuff might still be happening because people are gonna people, but not apply that to any of the good stuff. You claim that there was a literal dead-end to progress that could only have been addressed by the internet. Maybe that’s true, but it’s pretty hard to assess. > [@MrDibble](#): > > Also, I’m not just talking about food security - that’s the bare minimum. I’m talking about actual economic development and education to move away from that baseline subsistence level. That’s way more massive with huge knock-on effects. I don’t know your work/area of expertise, so I was just referencing the specific you mentioned- no intention of minimizing the scope of the work or the unquestionably long list of positive projects that use the internet as a tool. I’m just not convinced that that list, however long, tips the current iteration of the internet to a net positive when weighed against the global costs and risks. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2025, 3:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-internet-better-30-years-ago/1018260/52 "2025-05-12T15:29:59Z")
> [@Eonwe](#): > > This is what I meant specifically… the literal cost of resources to run and access the internet- electricity, mining, etc. In that case, no. The deforestation just for the portion of internet used by the developing world pales in proportion to that consumed by the developed world, and it’s only that portion that we need to consider in weighing up the positive vs negative. > [@Eonwe](#): > > You claim that there was a literal dead-end to progress Not a dead end - a barrier. Progress was always theoretically _possible_. The effort was not being spent (or going to be spent) in the amounts required by the only people capable of doing so. Whereas the technological revolution in the last decades enabled those less-developed communities to do things for themselves in addition to outside aid. > [@Eonwe](#): > > I don’t know your work/area of expertise, I currently work in software implementation, but my second BSc degree (only some 12 years ago now) included an environmental and developmental.geography major, and I’ve done work in that sector, mostly at the NGO and local government consultancy level. > [@Eonwe](#): > > . I’m just not convinced that that list, however long, tips the current iteration of the internet to a net positive when weighed against the global costs and risks. We had rising fascism, environmental catastrophe and actual world wars _long_ before the internet. It can’t all be laid at its doorstep. What the developing world _didn’t_ have, before, though, was access to the same resource as the developed one. That kind of equal footing, and the developmental leverage it affords, is IMO invaluable. One of the things it’s used for is in fact [community organization to combat](https://www.globalforestwatch.org/about/) the kind of environmental degradation you’re bringing up as a counter. ---
**Author:** ![Dark\_Sponge](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dark_sponge/32/121_2.png) [@Dark\_Sponge](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dark_Sponge)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2025, 3:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-internet-better-30-years-ago/1018260/53 "2025-05-12T15:31:22Z")
Definitely not 30 years ago. I might agree with 20 years ago. ---
**Author:** ![Pleonast](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pleonast/32/1183_2.png) [@Pleonast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pleonast)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2025, 3:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-internet-better-30-years-ago/1018260/54 "2025-05-12T15:34:26Z")
Writing, theater, printing, novels, newsprint, telegraph, telephone, radio, television, email, social media, etc. Every new communication technology goes through phases. 1. A “honeymoon” phase when early adopters figure out how to use it effectively. 2. A “youthful” phase when it becomes widespread in particular communities. 3. A “backlash” phase when non-adopters complain about the ills of the technology. 4. A “ubiquitous” phase when everyone uses the technology. 5. A “nostalgia” phase reminiscing about the honeymoon and youthful phases. 6. An “unremarkable” phase when the technology is just there, used by some and not others, but not considered noteworthy either way. Very overgeneralized, of course. We are a social species. I believe better communication among individuals is always to the net benefit of the species. There are of course bad uses of communication, because there are bad people. But that’s not sufficient reason to hinder good people from communicating. The world is terribly wasteful when it comes to using human resources. Communication, to let people associate, learn, teach, and otherwise express themselves, is one of the keys to making everyone better off. ---
**Author:** ![phs3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/8491ac/32.png) [@phs3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/phs3)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2025, 3:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-internet-better-30-years-ago/1018260/55 "2025-05-12T15:58:20Z")
Ah, the good old days. Cow-orker in next office wrote a web browser, because reasons. A feature he added because I asked for it was that when it finished downloading a page, it would un-minimize the window. Imagine explaining that to someone today! I had a product idea in about 1995: a device (in my mind, it looked like what we’d now call a tablet) that you’d plug into a cradle at night. Overnight it would dial up to the local paper and download it so you could read it in the morning. Brilliant, eh? (With a half-life of what, six months? But who knew? Right up there with the CueCat!) As for “Was it better?” I echo what everyone else has said. Mostly it was a different beast. I’d analogize it with cars: a 1970s car was much simpler to work on, which some people say was “better”. But cars now are safer, more efficient, more comfortable, etc. So, like most things, “It depends”. ---
**Author:** ![Shoeless](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/shoeless/32/7099_2.png) [@Shoeless](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shoeless)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2025, 5:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-internet-better-30-years-ago/1018260/56 "2025-05-12T17:07:26Z")
One of my “30 years ago” memories that stands out: we had _one guy_ in the office with internet access. If you wanted to look something up or research something, you had to go through him. You told him what you were looking for and he’d come back later to drop a stack of printed-out pages on your desk. I guess the company was afraid that if we _all_ had internet access, nothing would get done. ---
**Author:** ![dorvann](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/df705f/32.png) [@dorvann](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dorvann)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2025, 5:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-internet-better-30-years-ago/1018260/57 "2025-05-12T17:25:07Z")
So is are Usenet newsgroups still around? I I remember in the 90s being on rec.sport.pro-wrestling groups and it being fairly active. Most wrestling fans(including myself) I know have migrated to the Reddit pro wrestling board-- [r/SquaredCircle](http://old.reddit.com/r/SquaredCircle/) ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2025, 5:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-internet-better-30-years-ago/1018260/58 "2025-05-12T17:29:16Z")
The best Usenet groups still active, and how to sign on: [7 of the Best USENET Newsgroups Still Active Today - Make Tech Easier](https://www.maketecheasier.com/best-usenet-newsgroups/) ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2025, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-internet-better-30-years-ago/1018260/59 "2025-05-12T18:21:56Z")
I sort of feel like there have been four major eras of the Internet. First, there was the pre-Web internet. Email, gopher, usenet, and stuff along those lines. Very rudimentary by today’s standards, but highly interactive and the user base was highly educated, as most people were either university types or tech company types. Second, there was the noncommercial Web. That was 1993 or so through about 1997 or so. This was the era where most of it was homegrown, but people were learning a lot about how all this worked, what could be done, etc… This was still largely an educated user base, as it was mostly the same bunch as before, just using HTML and browsers. Third, there was the age of the Commercial Web. 1997-2008. This was the era of the increasing commercialization of the web. Everything was still PC-based, but it was now open to the wider world. Everything started getting more contentious, hostile, and lowest common denominator. But it still self-selected into people who were interested in the internet/web. Fourth- the age of the smartphone. This is the point when _everyone_ got on the internet through their phones. This is the point when the corporatization and general lowest common denominator of the content became ubiquitous. Everything became enshittified, mass-market, and largely ad-driven or subscription driven. It’s better in many ways now, but it’s absolutely lost that sense of wonder and quirkiness that it had in the early days. You just don’t see homegrown websites with all their delightful weirdness anymore. Even blogs have largely fizzled out now. ---
**Author:** ![themapleleaf](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/themapleleaf/32/14349_2.png) [@themapleleaf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/themapleleaf)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2025, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-internet-better-30-years-ago/1018260/60 "2025-05-12T19:32:16Z")
It was not better to be sure. There was less information, it was slower, there were no videos, you couldn’t use it for all the applications that it’s commonly used today. That said, I fondly rememember some things from the Internet of the 1990s: - Netscape Navigator and its ship’s wheel logo. Every time it spun around on that green background, something forward-looking seemed to be going on. - AltaVista, the main search engine I used before I switched to Google. - Web rings, which linked sites that were on the same topic in a loop. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-internet-better-30-years-ago/1018260.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-the-internet-better-30-years-ago/1018260.md?page=4)