# You unwittingly experienced an Internet Epoch **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [July 5, 2010, 6:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-unwittingly-experienced-an-internet-epoch/545619 "2010-07-05T18:49:59Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Max\_Torque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e9bcb4/32.png) [@Max\_Torque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Max_Torque)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2010, 2:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-unwittingly-experienced-an-internet-epoch/545619/21 "2010-07-08T14:16:34Z")
Holy crap, it’s been _fourteen years_ since [Mirsky’s Worst of the Web](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mirsky%27s_Worst_of_the_Web) stopped doing their shtick. That’s depressing. ---
**Author:** ![elmwood](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/elmwood/32/3060_2.png) [@elmwood](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elmwood)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2010, 3:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-unwittingly-experienced-an-internet-epoch/545619/22 "2010-07-08T15:23:26Z")
> [@Unintentionally\_Blank](#): > > I figured Web 2.0 was when things went all Ajaxy with instant feedback (Facebook, Gmail, Twitter, etc.) It was an arbitrary distinction. IMHO, I think we’re really at Web 5.0 now, with some overlap between the various epochs. **Web 1.0** (1990-1994): Obscurity. Gopher was still larger than the Web at this point. Almost all Web sites are academic and research-oriented. WorldWideWeb.app, Lynx and other text-oriented browsers. **Web 2.0** (1993-1996): Pre-commercial Web. Gopher declines. Majority of sites are at places of higher education and research institutions, with some basic sites at large corporations, non-profit groups and government agencies. Student-created home pages. Dominant browser is NCSA Mosaic. **Web 3.0** (1995-2001): Early commercialization. Dot-com boom. Gopher abandoned. Rise of retail and multimedia sites. Primitive search “spiders” and human-edited Web directories. User-created home pages and static content on local dial-up ISP accounts and free services like Geocities. Earliest memes that jump from the Web into mainstream culture; Mahir Cagr, dancing baby. Primitive porn and camwhore sites. Early webmail services. Dominant browser is Netscape; “Browser Wars” era. **Web 4.0** (2000-2006): Post-boom. The _real_ boom, IMHO. The Web is mainstream. Local governments, small businesses and organizations, elementary and high schools, and other groups all have Web sites. User-created dynamic content. Rise of blogs and message boards. Widespread news sites. Reliable search engines. Rise of CSS and stylesheets. Content management systems with PHP/MySQL back ends replace manually coded static pages. Dominant browser is Internet Explorer. **Web 5.0** (2005-present): Web 2.0. Widespread use of social and business networking sites (LiveJournal, MySpace, LinkedIn, Facebook, Foursquare). Ajax; instantly updated sites and Web apps. The Web is an integral part of real life culture; in developed nations, only most Luddite-oriented elderly and very poor aren’t online. No dominant browser. ---
**Author:** ![ftg](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ftg/32/2801_2.png) [@ftg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ftg)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2010, 8:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-unwittingly-experienced-an-internet-epoch/545619/23 "2010-07-08T20:30:55Z")
I really, really miss [Dr. Fun](http://www.ibiblio.org/Dave/). Cartoonists who are funny and just quit need to be punished. They should be forced to read “Cathy” strips over and over. Except Gary Larsen. He gets “Family Circle”. ---
**Author:** ![ToeJam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/dfb087/32.png) [@ToeJam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ToeJam)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2010, 10:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-unwittingly-experienced-an-internet-epoch/545619/24 "2010-07-08T22:23:15Z")
> [@ftg](#): > > He gets “Family Circle”. Do you mean the Family Circus? ---
**Author:** ![DiggitCamara](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/df788c/32.png) [@DiggitCamara](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DiggitCamara)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2010, 11:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-unwittingly-experienced-an-internet-epoch/545619/25 "2010-07-08T23:22:03Z")
> [@Canadjun](#): > > Remember [Bastard Operator from Hell](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bastard_Operator_From_Hell)? [You can still find him over here.](http://www.theregister.co.uk/odds/bofh/) ---
**Author:** ![KennerTheGreat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/a8b319/32.png) [@KennerTheGreat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KennerTheGreat)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2010, 1:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-unwittingly-experienced-an-internet-epoch/545619/26 "2010-07-09T01:00:24Z")
Whatever happened to the Acrophobia game? ---
**Author:** ![Taomist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/53a042/32.png) [@Taomist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Taomist)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2010, 1:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-unwittingly-experienced-an-internet-epoch/545619/27 "2010-07-09T01:28:19Z")
Dang, some of these are really triggering memories! And now I need to find…remember, rather, THEN find…my favorite comic while I was doing HP Tech support. It was an office of tech support guys, and my favorite was always the slightly older, pony-tailed hippie who never really got upset about anything because his expectations of people were so low to begin with. It was much much better than Dilbert, that’s all I’m saying. Oh and one of the tech guys was Russian, and the boss was the original pointy-haired boss, haha. Anyone know what I’m talking about? I’d love for it to be around still. FOUND IT! User Friendly. I am a very happy camper; thank you for starting this thread. \<3 ---
**Author:** ![Unintentionally\_Blank](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/unintentionally_blank/32/5418_2.png) [@Unintentionally\_Blank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Unintentionally_Blank)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2010, 12:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-unwittingly-experienced-an-internet-epoch/545619/28 "2010-07-09T12:12:21Z")
By Illiad! I always wondered at the hubris of a person that decided to call himself something from Homer. …and apparently still at it: [http://www.userfriendly.org/](http://www.userfriendly.org/) ---
**Author:** ![Clothahump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/51bf81/32.png) [@Clothahump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Clothahump)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2010, 2:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-unwittingly-experienced-an-internet-epoch/545619/29 "2010-07-13T14:58:52Z")
> [@Canadjun](#): > > Remember [Bastard Operator from Hell](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bastard_Operator_From_Hell)? Oh, who could forget it? BOFH was my hero. [The collected writings of the BOFH.](http://bofh.ntk.net/BOFH/index.php) ---
**Author:** ![Tom\_Scud](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f08c70/32.png) [@Tom\_Scud](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tom_Scud)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2010, 7:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-unwittingly-experienced-an-internet-epoch/545619/30 "2010-07-13T19:34:29Z")
Wow. The Find the Spam game is still online. Second [suck.com](http://suck.com), and throw in Usenet. ---
**Author:** ![Capt.Ridley\_s\_Shooting\_Party](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/cc9497/32.png) [@Capt.Ridley\_s\_Shooting\_Party](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Capt.Ridley_s_Shooting_Party)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2010, 8:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-unwittingly-experienced-an-internet-epoch/545619/31 "2010-07-13T20:41:57Z")
Usenet used to be cool before it became completely dominated by spammers. [Adequacy.org](http://Adequacy.org) was literally the greatest trolling site in the history of the web. The site is still up, and you can still read the comments on the articles of people who didn’t realise they were being wound up. ---
**Author:** ![Tom\_Scud](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f08c70/32.png) [@Tom\_Scud](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tom_Scud)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2010, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-unwittingly-experienced-an-internet-epoch/545619/32 "2010-07-13T20:43:37Z")
[Adequacy.org](http://Adequacy.org) was the site that published the “The Bombings Prove That I Am Right About Everything” essay, right? That one was brilliant. ---
**Author:** ![Capt.Ridley\_s\_Shooting\_Party](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/cc9497/32.png) [@Capt.Ridley\_s\_Shooting\_Party](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Capt.Ridley_s_Shooting_Party)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2010, 9:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-unwittingly-experienced-an-internet-epoch/545619/33 "2010-07-13T21:50:07Z")
[Yeah](http://www.adequacy.org/stories/2001.9.12.102423.271.html). Everything about that site was a troll. Even the icons they used for the different article categories (a scorpion for feminists, the challenger disaster for NASA, etc.) ---
**Author:** ![maisoui](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@maisoui](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/maisoui)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2010, 11:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-unwittingly-experienced-an-internet-epoch/545619/34 "2010-07-13T23:15:21Z")
> [@KennerTheGreat](#): > > Whatever happened to the Acrophobia game? > **[AcroChallenge! You don't have to be afraid of acronyms anymore.](http://www.acrochallenge.com/)** Disclaimer: I have had this link in my bookmarks for _ **ages** _, but haven’t checked it out, because I spent far too much of my time in the old game when my youngest was a baby keeping me up all night… Dang if I can even remember the name of my team, now, though. I do remember that we surrounded our names with \>(name))\> to look like fish, though. Those were the days… [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-unwittingly-experienced-an-internet-epoch/545619.md?page=1)