When did you get Internet/Web access?

[WilyWestbrook0]

My family got our first PC in December of 1995, and we hooked up to the Internet that same month. I didn't get e-mail until the Spring of 1996, though. Remember Netscape Navigator, Eudora e-mail, CGI-BIN based chats, the advent and quick death of frames and blinking text, when javascript and java applets arrived, when animated GIFs were cool, etc.?

It seems that Internet access really boomed in 1999 or 2000, so I think my family was pretty early. Some ignorant people even thought I was a child prodigy at 11 and 12 because I designed web sites in 1996, lol! This was before CSS and java became big, so it wasn't that hard to learn HTML - but since most people were under the impression that the Internet was difficult and complicated, they thought I was precocious. My site called the Michael Jordan Shrine was pretty freaking big, and was the 8th site that appeared on Lycos' search engine when you searched "Michael Jordan" back in the day. One reference: http://mj23.tripod.com/~MD/guestbk1.html - the background sucks and you'll have to run your mouse over the text to even read it, but if you do a text search for "Khendra," you can see a guestbook entry I made on that guy's site in 1996, and a link to my long-defunct Jordan page. These ancient 1996 sites also still have links up to my old Jordan Shrine: http://www.geocities.com/SouthBeach/2903/links1.htm and http://money.cnn.tv/1996/11/18/bizbuzz/jordaninc_pkg/

It's amazing how big the net is now. Even in 2000, only 44.1% of the U.S. populace had access, compared to 72.5% in 2008: http://www.internetworldstats.com/am/us.htm

[garnett_21]

That's cool Khendra!

2001 for me, although we had it prior to that, but I wasn't on it - like 96-97 range, then didn't have it again until 01. Wasn't on it much for the first year or so, then started getting on more and more, and now am on multiple times per day...lol

[WilyWestbrook0]

I'm afraid I have been a total geek since the beginning. :D I was also quite fond of Usenet in the late 1990s. I was very argumentative on the basketball newsgroups back then. I'm more tactful now. :)

[OnePimpTiger]

We got it when I was either a freshman or sophomore in high school, so that would have been some time in 1995-97. I definitely remember Netscape Navigator, but I only used Usenet a little. I used ICQ a lot back then. It's still around now, but AIM, MSN Messenger, and Yahoo Messenger overtook it a long, long time ago. I still remember the high pitched "uh-oh" it made when you received a message. Several of my friends were on then and, in my small time, it seemed like space age stuff to go home after school and get on the internet! Good times....

[RenegadeLonghorn]

I got my first PC shortly after I started my freshman year in HS in 1997. I got AOHEll dialup at home.

[WilyWestbrook0]

OPT - Man, I forgot to mention ICQ! I used that a lot from about 1998-2003. Before that, PowWow was the big thing.

Looks like we have had a few early Internet people so far on SCF (1995-1997). I am on a video game forum, and most people there started from 1998-2002.

[RenegadeLonghorn]

I got my first PC shortly after I started my freshman year in HS in 1997. I got AOHEll dialup at home.

Prior to this I would use the internet at a public library across from my middle school.

[jonnyweb]

1997 for me.

[Star_Cards]

My first experience with it was in college in 1995. I remember one of my professors telling us about website squatters making crazy money simply because they registered big name company urls before said company could.

However, Since I was at school at least 6 days a week, I didn't get internet at home until around 1998 or so.

I remember a designer at my internship in 1997 telling me about eBay and that day I created an account and started selling.

[gladdyontherise]

i have no idea when i first got it but ever since i could remember i've had a computer. i was born in 1992 though so by the time i could start remembering things, it was the mid/late 1990s when computers were getting more and more popular