Old computing things you DO miss

[blank_dvth]

Counterpart to Old computing things you do NOT miss.

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I'll start off with a really vague one: the "old" internet in general; simple, flat, and functional UI design, the overall dynamic (old chatrooms, random forum/discussion boards, more genuine & interesting topics/conversations, etc.), lack of commercialization (and everything extending from that), more "anonymity" in general (not necessarily from a technical perspective, more so cultural, and how that shaped interactions), and so on...

I could keep going for a while (despite not having been lucky enough to be around for most of the early days), but I'll cut it there -- it was nice, especially looking at how things are shaping up now. Even looking at some of the early threads in the eGO forum is quite something.

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Oh, and actually owning the software you buy rather than a license to use it (*coughs* Adobe *coughs* games *coughs* just about everything else).

 

[Cascsiany]

The games, they were often graphically simple but challenging otherwise.

 

[Nouille Chinoise]

Msn messenger

 

[Prinzy]

Why can't I have a top 8 friends on every social media site? I need to let my friends know where they rank in my life. MySpace had it right.

 

[blank_dvth]

Why can't I have a top 8 friends on every social media site? I need to let my friends know where they rank in my life. MySpace had it right.

Let's hear them right now for eGO

 

[Luna]

Community run dedicated servers. Matchmaking basically killed all sense of community in gaming. Back then you basically just played on different community servers until you found one you like

 

[Simon]

 

[Leaf]

View attachment 22178

XFire + Hamachi to host old game servers !!

 

[Ric]

Getting terms of service violations on AOL for being a menace to society.

 

[GamingByTheMinute]

Getting terms of service violations on AOL for being a menace to society.

you? a menace to society? nah that don't sound right

 

[SirNico]

I always liked hearing the hard-drive making an audible noise when going through data.
I remember as a kid, at 2am when I was supposed to be sleeping, I would cover my computer and monitor with a blanket to drown out the sound of the loud CRT monitor start up, and my computer so I didn't wakeup my parents. They were easy sleepers.


I also missed hearing the doors open, and close on AIM (AOL Instant Messenger)

 

[Zemtex]

I really miss the old internet for sure. But I honestly miss CD's and DVD's. Physical media felt good because at least you owned your copy of that game and most of the time you could play it OFFLINE. I think going forward I will try to keep my own library of old games I can play offline on a harddrive or SSD so whenever I want I can plug it into a PC and have my games library offline aswell. I love STEAM but having everything not downloaded or not being able to just "plug and play" so to speak I really miss that. I miss just starting my playstation and pop in a disc to play a game.

 

[bennyj]

I'm with Zemtex, I absolutely love physical media, I spent numerous hours sorting out Truenas to allow me to Store Blu-ray and PS3 Games on the NAS, the whirr of the drive reminds me of when I was younger when everything was a Disc

 

[Drewerth]

I miss the old Skype emoticons.

 

[Buster]