Geraldine and I were talking over dinner tonight about how ours (the current 25-30 year old age group) is essentially the last generation to experience a pre-Internet childhood. If you turned 18 after ~1999, your upbringing was probably impacted, at least in part, by the rise of the web (at least in regions with high Internet penetration rates). What will we tell our children about those fanciful days before search engines, websites, and on-demand knowledge wrapped themselves into our collective psyches?
Let’s explore:
- Looking up Facts in an Encyclopedia or Dictionary
At my house growing up, we had a huge encyclopedia that came with a magnifying glass in an attached cardboard drawer. You’d grab the appropriate volume and scan with the magnifying glass until you got to the right entry. Now, it’s as easy as misspelling the word in a search box and hitting “enter.” - Using the Phonebook
Flipping through the phonebook, trying to recall names, and wishing you had the fancy phonebook with the business white pages (we didn’t get ours until the late 1980’s) was the basic process for any informational or commercial query that couldn’t be solved without outside help. - The Dewey Decimal System & Library Card Files
Those huge bookcases filled with information cards dictated the structure of knowledge access. Between them and the librarians, there was no subject you couldn’t research. - Unresolvable News & Pop Culture Queries
Who was that actor in Back to the Future that played Biff? If you didn’t know his name, you’d have to wait until you could get your hands on a copy of a movie dictionary or an original VHS tape. Arguments about what year the British invaded the Falklands could go on for weeks, until access to source material could be found. - The Modem Connection Noise
Not really pre-Internet, but certainly something you never hear anymore – that long, ugly warbling is practically nostalgia to those of us who regularly fired up our 2800 baud dialers. - Unknown Values of Collectibles
Prior to eBay, anyone in the business of buying and selling goods with a solid dose of charm and charisma could make a veritable fortune buying low and selling high. Today, we just look to the web for a reliable price. - The Office Mailroom
Large and small offices alike once received an enormously greater quantity of business-relevant mail. I recall my Mom’s small marketing business constantly had invoices and checks, legal documents and business communiques coming in and going out. Today, we barely get anything but junk mail, catalogs, and physical goods in the mail. - No Asynchronous Contact (except Answering Machines)
No email, no IM, no text messages and until last year, no Twitter. Communication happened in real time between people, or it took place over telephone and radio waves. The postcard and handwritten letter served as the predeccesor to even these technological leaps. - Charting Maps & Directions
Clear the dining room table, pull out the maps, and let’s figure out the best route to Boise. Imagine all the wrong turns, poorly designed routes, and lost motorists – not that early versions of MapQuest didn’t cause their own problems 🙂 - Buying Airline Tickets in Person
I recall standing in line in downtown Seattle, waiting to get into the United Airlines sales office to buy plane tickets, or even driving down to the airport with my Mom to get them before a flight. - Newspaper Classifieds
Before the web, job hunting, scalping, and private sales were, by and large, conducted through the local papers’ classified ads. Today, this loss of revenue (largely from sites like Craigslist, Backpages, and Kijiji) is dampening newspapers’ ability to operate profitably offline. - Watching/Listening to the News for Weather, Traffic, & News
Do you remember when news, weather, and traffic weren’t available on demand? Nowadays, I pull them up on my mobile device almost daily, but before 1996 or so, your only option was to turn on the news and wait until they announced it over the airwaves. I remember sitting in the car as a young boy, watching my Dad flip the stations from one to the next, hoping that someone would have a traffic report. - Inaccessibility of Adult Content and Knowledge
Like it or not, this age group may be one of the final generations to learn about the birds & bees from our parents (or that tough kid on the playground in 7th grade – that no one believes at first).
As much as we complain about the search engines and even the web as a whole, they’ve brought an incredible tool to all of our lives. Our job as search marketers is to make more information more accessible. It’s quite remarkable, really 🙂
Queue Rand’s old man voice:
Back in my day, we had to walk to something called the library. It was uphill both ways, and since we didn’t have global warming, we had to trudge through the driving snow. But the librarians… Oh, those wonderful librarians with their button down shirts and sweater sets and eyeglasses. They didn’t always have the right answer, but they sure were a lot friendlier than that damned pocket Google you kids like so much!
So… What stories will you tell your kids about the time before the web?
p.s. Yes, you can file this post straight in the noise over signal file, but hopefully you’ll get a laugh before you do. Besides, I’m technically out of town, enjoying a romantic Monday night with my fiancee, so I shouldn’t even be blogging (clearly I’m addicted).
