The Internet

[Fiona]

Seeing as we're all on the web...

We all use the net for different, or similar reasons and it's alway been rather interesting to ask - but how do you use the Internet and what is your cyber-history? Do you use it for work, information seeking or for social reasons mainly?

[fordy]

I wouldn't have said social in the past, but this forum seems to be changing that   

My first foray into cyberspace was with "Compuserve" (now AOL) back in 19xx.  The web was small then.  I remember finding the page (maybe its still there) that proudly announced that you had "reached the end of the Internet".      Being in the IT business, I used the web (and still do) for looking up information about work, but as work is also my hobby ... well ... it sort of took over.

By 1997, businesses in New Zealand were waking up to the Internet.  As an experiment, I we tried to see whether we could book a touring holiday on line.  Everything had to be Internet bookable - air flights, car rental, accommodation.  That year we took our first Internet booked vacation.

As a writer, I find the web invaluable for research - it seems that there is nothing you can't find out with a quick visit to Wikipedia or Google.  Perhaps the quality of information can sometimes be suspect, but usually there is more than one source for verification.

It's difficult to imagine being able to live the life I do without the Internet.  I guess if it died, I'd have to find another life 

[Lynn10240]

I finished my degree, bought my first new car, looked for employment and made vacation reservations all via the Internet. I also use it for directions, research, some (but little) shopping, news and weather. Like fordy, I can't imagine living life any more without The World Wide Web.

I enjoy the social entertainment. I hardly ever watch TV. The Internet provides hours of fun and relaxation. I like getting to know unfamiliar people and places. Corresponding with others from various locations around the globe is fascinating.

So now I'll have another cup of coffee and conversation. 

[Gyppo]

I first started using 'the net' to shut up my Nephew, a little cyber-geek who insisted that some of my stuff should be 'on the web'.  For a long time my only interest was in e-mail, and the ability to hold a fairly rapid two way 'conversation' with people all over the world.  That is still my main use.

I use it for research, and entertainment, although I sometimes despair at some of the dross which passes for entertainment.

I discovered usenet - the wild unmoderated version of more civilised things like MWC - and realised there truly were more things in heaven or earth than any one person could ever imagine.  But I survived.

My nephew then convinced me that my little newsletter, initially going to only family and friends could become a world-wide 'publication'.  The fortnightly MSD has hovered at around three hundred readers for a long time now, gaining a few, losing a few.   It's a hobby, not a money maker ;-)  I shall have to check, but we must be coming up for the 10th anniversary.

For one glorious year - around 2000 - the MSD had a website as well, in collaboration with my Uncle in Canada, but then it returned to a text-only newsletter format.

I've printed off maps for road trips, but I refuse to mess around with E-bay because it just doesn't really appeal to me.  Maybe because as a Postie I had to try and deliver too many e-bay packages to people who weren't at home ;-(

I use it to query and submit to some publications and appreciate the - generally - quicker response from editors.

And so it goes on.  In many ways I'm still only flirting with the possibiities.  Maybe if I had a speedy broadband connection instead of dial-up I'd do more, but at the moment they say I'm too far from the exchange.  I can wait ;-)

Gyppo

[Alice, a Country Gal]

how do you use the Internet and what is your cyber-history? Do you use it for work, information seeking or for social reasons mainly? 

It's strange to think back to my first real desk top computer, that's not counting the Kaypro that was actually my first computer because all you had to do to pick it up and go was unplug the power cord, lock the keyboard over the monitor, grip the attached handle and go.

Anyway, when ordering my first desk top, I got it without a modem, thinking I had no use for or desire to be on The Web.  It was just a few weeks later that I ordered and installed a modem and with the help of my eldest son, suddenly I was online and discovering a whole new world.

I surfed around, exploring, seeing what there was to be seen.  From that point on I was off and running.

I use the Internet for many of the same reasons as others.  It's a great way to keep in touch with far flung friends and family.  Places like this are wonderful for making new friends and at the same time, learning a bit about different cultures, life styles and sharing our writing, warts and all, helping each other and improving along the way.

I am also one of those who like the 'Information Highway' it places right at my fingertips.  While looking for info on one thing, more than a few times I've stumbled across something that has started new story ideas rumbling around. 

And to think, I spent the first few years of my life living in a house in the country; no electricity, battery radio, outhouse instead of a bathroom, a #2 tub for baths and coal-oil (also known as kerosene) lamps for light. 

Things have come a long way since then. 

[orchid15]

Hi CountryGal

Life has changed so much in the last 150 years.  I am a great fan of the 'little house on the prairie' books.  It is hard to believe that the author crossd the prairie in a wagon and saw the building of a cross country railroad.  She died at the beginningof the spaceage, either just before or just after sputnik.

I remember the first computer our college had, with the program stored in a ribbon of paper with holes punched along it.

Being disabled, I use the internet for a social life, writing clubs, getting critiques, some shpping, research

orchid

[Lynn10240]

orchid,

When my daughter was four and I tired of stories like Pinocchio, I read Little House on the Prairie books to her. Instead of looking at pictures, I showed her how to imagine the story in her mind. This made our reading time together so much more enjoyable. We both came to love Laura Ingalls. The prairie life was simple, in a sense, compared to the stresses girls the same age are forced to deal with today. But the plots and the writing held interest for both a preschool girl and a full grown adult.

That was before The Internet came into our lives. Now My Space pages consume my daughter's attention. We no longer read together, but memories remain of the good old days. 

What an interesting life you've led. I'm glad you're now on the Internet, though, or we wouldn't have even met. Technology's amazing.

[Alex F]

I got online back in 1999 around the time I was revising for my GCSE's and so used it for Bitesize and things like that. However I soon began looking for writers and science fiction websites and soon joined TYWC (The Young Writer's Club) which provided me with a lot of ideas when I was in my mid teens and got me involved with talking to fellow writers across the world which was an eye opening experience, then i left that as I got older and as I went through college I expanded out into science fiction and Fantasy websites to which was fun and I began to talk about other things. Its been a godsend at some boring moments, now through university and at work, only the Internet filters tend to ruin a lot of things. I'm not a prolific poster, I never have been and only spend a small amount of time online every day but I thoroughly enjoy the time I do on this site and others. Nowadays I use Wiki more than anything else.

[Jenny]

Shopping when I should be working 

Jenny

[nassj]

Shopping when I should be working 

Jenny

Good stuff.

I go shopping too. I don't get sore feet, don't get ran over by trollies and no one jumps the line.
And I come here.
The kids play games and look up stuff for school, they play games mostly.

[CarrieSheppard]

The end... found it!

http://www.shibumi.org/eoti.htm

I started on email in the 1980s ... (yeah, I'm THAT old...) at work.  It was great, even at work I managed to strike up 'social' interactions with colleagues in our international offices.  Often wonder what happened to Paula in our Milan office...

Anyway - I use it for work mostly.  In my past job, there is no way I could have done it without the internet.  I would have needed to be a professional in the field I was working in to be able to resource the information I had to prepare.

Now?  I use it for work, I use it for pleasure, but this forum is the only place I've ever used it for my own creative development. 

It is a wonderful, and frightening thing.  I worry about my kids on it - knowing how easy it is to put up a false identity and create a whole persona that is false (ie on here - we are all writers, no challenge, eh?). 

But, without this 'internet' thing, I would not keep in touch with so many of my far flung friends, and I would not have made some of my more recent friends either. 

It is, like nuclear power, wonderful if you keep feeding it lotus leaves and be mindful that it bites.  There - how's that for a mixed metaphor??

Carpet.

[Cathy C]

We all use the net for different, or similar reasons and it's alway been rather interesting to ask - but how do you use the Internet and what is your cyber-history?

Use? I can use the internet, Fiona, seriously? ???Thought it was the other way round.

I'm a complete beginner - started here about a year ago, first time on the 'net'

Have looked in on e-bay and other 'buying' sites but too afraid to do anything. Mind you, booked a hotel on line last weeks, turned up and they didn't throw me out - so I guess I'm doing something right.

Wish I'd had computers at school - mostly I use it for here, or for research (when stupid comp allows ) but I'm getting better every day

[DixonAlexander]

By 1997, businesses in New Zealand were waking up to the Internet. 梯子 As an experiment, I we tried to see whether we could book a touring holiday online.  Everything had to be Internet bookable - air flights, car rental, accommodation.

[jt72]

Spam is spam whether its in Chinese or English...  jt

[trainer]

I use the internet for work and non-work-related browsing, which usually scares me witless. The extent of data mining--right from ISPs, apps, and now Pegasus (this one is not just mining of course)--troubles me deeply, but doesn't keep me off the internet, as one can clearly see.