To wonder how our parents survived without the internet.

[ICanSeeTheSun]

I tend use the internet a lot, from paying bills to clothes shopping.

I also use it to gets medical advice, nothing major but things like normal temperature to treating bites from bugs.

Also I have used the internet to research autism, due to my DS having ASD.

To applying for school places and follow DC schools on twitter/Facebook to get latest updates

I do wonder how my parent managed to bring up 7 kids without the internet.

stardust- that's interesting.
My OH works in internet security too and won't use internet banking, he feel's it's just not secure enough.

I do all my transactions though a physical branch.

Nice to know I am not the only MNer to think so.... The first day of my last computer security course stated :

The Internet is not secure; it cannot be made secure; do not do anything that matters on it; do not use debit cards on it; do not do internet banking on it. Seemed emphatic enough for me.....

(and as for the latest .... "contactless payment" and mobile phone banking.... gives me shivers just to think about it. Just because we can does not mean we should.....)

The internet has a good side but only for those who do not let it rule there lives. I think people had more time to enjoy life and I still think a letter or a hand written card is a joy to receive and send.

I certainly think it has made work harder and more stressful and invades peoples privacy.

shopping is okay but some things are best tested before buying and I wouldn't want someone else choosing my fruit and vegetables.

I also wonder how some people would cope if the whole thing crashed tomorrow and couldn't be rebooted.

I shall continue to use it with caution safe in the knowledge that I could cope without it.

one of the earlier poster's made the observation that it would have been like science fiction to our mothers and as a lady who sews I've often thought that I'd like to bring a lady from the days of the first basic sewing machines and show her the state of the art modern embroidery machines and watch her amazement! technology changes all the time and one day we may give amusement to our children with our suspicion and lack of knowledge.

Writing down your internet banking password is probably safe enough as long as you trust everyone in your house! It's not like a burglar is going to sit there and type it all in while waiting to get caught (and getting their fingerprints all over your keyboard).

Internet shopping was absolutely brilliant and a lifesaver for me when I had a small child and no car.

It is really internet banking itself that is not secure enough, not jut the password thing.... if there is no dedicated device attached to a dedicated computer on a dedicated hard wired Ethernet link, with a fully encrypted database at the other end, then other people potentially have access to it....

malware is HUGE.... it is a multi billion pound world wide industry.

I did wonder how people found stuff out before the internet, so I asked my Mom (who barely touches a computer, but has just discovered this fascinating channel called "youtube" ) and her response was "I ask your Dad. And he looks it up for me". so that was no help.

You manage perfectly well with what you have at the time, because you don't know any better. I didn't use the internet till I started my MSc (in IT) and even then not very much. It was kind of cr*p in 1998.
I love being able to do anything online (I hate calling people) but its very distracting and I find myself lost in a sea of passwords and apps and frustrated that I have to use my phone to get another password to access my bank account etc etc. I couldn't be without it now though. Its literally opened up the world to me.

No internet made homework shit. I would have to go to the (small) library and find an old reference book, which provided me with one paragraph. Now, kids can find endless information online. It would be so easy to do research type homework these days.

I had a career gap after DS2 was born, returning to work 5 years later. In that time e-mail and the Internet came in. I was rather shocked on my return to work that everyone sat staring at their screens all day and no one popped in to discuss work ... or use the phone to communicate any more.

I think many of us over (say) 35 have probably enjoyed seeing the development of the 'net, but as has been said, you cannot miss what wasn't available, so while my old Mum didn't go on the internet herself, she was happy to use Teletext and so on, and used a computer until her death at 78, though that was often for printing letters, lists, and recipes, etc.

Boobz - you are definitely young. I've been in IT for 35+ years and networking for 30+ (around 30 years ago I was responsible for network testing (using Novell) running (3 IBM PCs on our dining room table, to start with), and in the the latter part of the 80s, for getting the place I worked {a Polytechnic} connected to the academic network, JANET.

I'm regularly amazed at the power in the handheld devices (phones and tablets) but perhaps because I get up with bigger video displays, tend to do most of my work, writing e-mail, etc, on anything but tablet or any of half a dozen phones (I glance at incoming mail, use text and voice, of course). My mobile is mostly sitting as a wi-fi hotspot for other phones and one of my laptops to use (30+ GB of data shifted so far this month), while I'm typing on one of a few iMacs this minute.

at "how our parents managed without the internet".... I.m 49 and managed without the internet for at least the first 30 years of my life.
My DC's, OTOH.....

s/I get up with bigger/ I started with bigger/ ... one iMac connected to a 42" TV as I don't watch TV these days :)

I well remember Lycos and Yahoo as some of the early search tools, but before them used Gopher (anyone else remember it ? was a way yo jump from server to server where the 'links' were to other servers, or to plain text documents... no images, no video, no sound)

When I moved job to North Wales, used dial-up at 1200 bps (then later 9600, 14.4, 28.8 and 56k modems), used FidoNet, and other systems (one running linux in Wolverhampton, I think, called Phoenix BBS), and later on used Zetnet from Shetland. Got NCSA Mosaic and started using Enterprise from Isle of Man, then joined Ultranet in USA and they sent a few floppy discs with Netscape Navigator and other stuff around 1994.

Ultranet billed me hardly anything (it was based on dial in, so they had rates for 2 hours up to 100 hours a month, from memory, and I really wanted it for e-mail and webspace, then in years 2 to 8 they didn't bill me a penny)... In 2003 they were taken over by RCN from Chicago and I lost my e-mail address (so got my own domains and web hosting).

Have to say that while I'm an eat-sleep-breathe internet user, and have spent 12-18 hours a day on the net for the past 10++ years, I don't touch FB or Twitter, do speak to neighbours and hardly use my mobile while out (it's there for calls or texts, and gets a bit of use if on a train to visit a client). Have to say I think some children do miss out on the attention of one or both parents if they are talking, or texting, or reading messages off FB/ Twitter while going to the shops, school, etc.

I am about to start "working nights" (switching to Economy 7, cutting down on internet use in the day and will probably walk 3 to 6 miles a day (as I want to lose 5+ stone). I'll also, hopefully, be able to promote my ISP and earn 1000 to 2000 a month that way (there are around 100,000 homes for me to leaflet, which will exercise my legs!). The other business idea will be a useful mobile App to help people with those lookups (don't you just hate finding a shop or whatever, in a search, and then find they closed or moved!)... so with most people using either laptop or mobile, offering them a search facility tailored to their device (and a guarantee the information a max of 3 months old), it might let me retire to the Med or Caribbean :)

Solo - "I think the internet has wrecked society! I reckon we'd still have jobs and less crime without the internet. And more besides. It's a blessing and a curse."

Nah - there was plenty of crime because of drugs and so on, well before the internet. MTV, well satellite TV and "must have" designer labels, on clothes, trainers, or things like iPods, iPhones, they've perhaps increased crime, because nowadays it seems there are lots wanting to be "cool" and have the latest, whether they can really afford it, or not.

Even though I'm in my mid 50s, we had a house phone from before I was born. Mum and Dad had run a small Post Office in Somerset and were first with TV and phone (Dad was into electronics, and they put the TV in the shop section and had more from 2 - 3 hours of running the TV (with 30 minutes for it to cool down !! like a cinema selling ice creams!) than in the daytime hours.

Best thing about working in IT is that I have probably learned new things every day of my working life. Nowadays, using NewsNow see headlines from any of 40,000 web sites, and only take in a fraction in IT, but know that if some event happens, there can be a dozen or more sources of news about it (assuming they are not all copying AP or Reuters). I may be fortunate in that there will be an overload of "news" in the future, and some will find it a strain... perhaps FB and Twitter and some people being 'hooked' on them to the degree they don't want to "miss" anything means overload is on the horizon already, for them.

However, unlike some, if I am on holiday, I can switch off from the internet completely (I'd research beforehand, the way I used to do in the 90s and 80s - Prestel was great for finding out places to visit in Canada in 1987, in the days when travel agents closed at 12 noon on Saturdays and online tickets were probably just starting)...

I've been thinking about this recently - I was an expat child, moving countries and continents every couple years. How the hell did my parents do that without the internet? How did they find houses, schools, sort packing, sort the travel?

How does anyone do a degree without the internet. Seriously. I wouldn't have got a 1st if the internet didn't exist.not just because I could revise, but most of my books were downloaded from online

belle we buy books or use a library. I gained a 1st in 1983.

It was a bastard, Bellezeboobian. There would be a stampede to the University library for the recommended set texts, and the library would hold around 10 copies of the books that 50+ people wanted. We all hated each other based on our library-rage.

I still have Mountains of Paper that contains the copies of papers I needed for my doctorate which I then never wrote up. The rainforest was destroyed at an alarming rate by academia alone….

I now work in a 'paper-light' environment, next to no paper. Right up until somebody want to transfer and all their records need to be printed out. On paper. To then be recoded at the other end

I now work in a 'paper-light' environment, next to no paper.

Me too... think I have printed 4 A4 pages in the last 15 years (and 1 was a test page as I was given 2 printers by a client but could only find drivers for one of them for the iMac)...

Nowadays: "I don't know. I'll google it."
Back then: "Ooooh, I don't know. I wonder!" Conversation moves on.

I don't think I rely 'too much' on internet but I suspect some people do ....
I am early 50s, had 4 Dc before the web - ds1 was about 10 before we got web access at home. We were late-ish with that. I got my first mobile later than that too. I still have a steam-driven Nokia. I recall the days in primary school when ds1 and a few others hand-wrote projects while others typed them. Quite socially divisive. In a sense anyway.

During pregnancies I had a pile of books beside my bed - the only thing I liked about Miriam Stoppard was the charts that showed very clearly what foetus was doing and how big etc at any given time. In them days I had local friends with small children and we drank coffee regularly, chatted and played together. We discussed lumps, bumps and rashes and do you think we need to see doctor then, in a similar way to MN and its ilk nowadays.

When I was dx with a serious and rare illness, I went to work, looked up a book, freaked out a little, chatted with a colleague (both experienced and knowledgeable nurses - she was none the wiser either). After work I went home via Waterstone's looked up some more books, freaked out a great deal more, went home. And worried a lot!! I did not know a single person with the same thing. TBH I still have never come across anyone with my exact variant but a few online who are 'close enough for jazz'.

Interesting difference too when ds2 was born and had various weird abnormalities, we only had books or what the docs told us. I'd read medical journals if I had time/freedom to visit the med library where I worked. Contact a Parent was a phone no. So much was by word of mouth. Years later ds4 was dx with Asperger's and I was looking online for info that very night.

In a few short years life has changed so much. With care it's certainly better. I think .....

My parents bought their first house in 1967, a 2 bed plus box room semi in Glasgow. It cost £1000. I have a document detailing the transaction. It is handwritten in a sort of Copperplate style.

We'll today I decided i rely to much on the internet, DS asked me a question which I would google. The question was on a t-Rex.

So I said to him we will look in a book at the library, we'll that went down like a lead balloon. We'll we went any way.

Got to the library to be told where the books on dinosaurs was, after 1/2 hour ( pretty good for ds) went home, googled it and got the answer within minutes

beating and hassled honestly I think librarys may have been better then, now you go and the book you really need is ALWAYS out of stock. You've no choice but to pay £40+ for a textbook or.. as we can do now, go online. I thank my lucky stars I was born in the age of the 'net