the net is used by many of us to fill the gaps in our jobs when nothing happens,or when you can’t be bothered.
there are many more uses,but let’s focus on this aspect:
what did you do in the days before the internet in order to fill in the blanks in your working schedules?
[quote=“dablindfrog”]the net is used by many of us to fill the gaps in our jobs when nothing happens,or when you can’t be bothered.
there are many more uses,but let’s focus on this aspect:
what did you do in the days before the internet in order to fill in the blanks in your working schedules?[/quote]
Erm… I worked.
I actually spoke to the person sitting in the next cubicle, instead of emailing them.
not a lot… but I remember the day that the internet came to our house. We were the only people in the street to have it, so everybody came dressed in their Sunday best to read the internet in the parlour… Of course in them days you only went into the parlour on Sundays…
Yeah yeah, I bet you were the first to have colour internet too. 
What’s the internet??
We used to have a piano in the office. When we had spare time we’d have a jolly good ol’ sing a long. We made our own entertainment in them days.
In the days before the internet lonely fruitcakes didn’t have any friends. Now they have a whole text based world of excitement. 
I used to play solitaire, and mine sweeper.
I think I used to read…what are they called again?
Those things with lots of pages.
“Before the internet” ? Sorry, I don’t know what you mean.
Junior, you don’t know how good you’ve got it. Why when I was your age, people had to actually BUY pornography…in the form of glossy magazines! And there were only three kinds–none of the glorious diversity which we now enjoy.
In the old days, I had to physically mail letters to my family. Now all I have to do is copy / paste a few jokes, and presto! Problems solved. (No more paying a buck for greeting cards, neither.)
I used to have this book called “High Weirdness By Mail,” by Ivan Stang (of SubGenius fame). The idea was that if you were kind of bored, and easily amused, you could send SASE’s (look it up, youngsters) to various weird groups, and get literature back from them. But now…well, you know. (The second edition was entitled “High Weirdness By Internet.”)
On a more serious note, let’s say you were interested in something really obscure. Like the Vietnamese religion of Caodaism. If you lived near a good university library, then maybe you could find one or two books on it. (In San Francisco I found six, I think.) But now there’s lots of webstes, and you can e-mail actual Caodaists if you need clarification.
Ah, the INTERNE*T…
The Wide World of Wonders. And way too much crap…
That and Civilization I…
[quote=“lupillus”]I think I used to read…what are they called again?
Those things with lots of pages.[/quote]
Congressman Foley’s photo albums?
i was in china back then. teachers would cut up old papers and recycle them into memo pads. the same with any old bits of cardboard. there was always a chalkboard somewhere being done up in some really beautiful chalk work. seriously. if you’ve never seen any chinese chalkboard art such is your loss. the chinese english teachers would go over the papers they had graded many times (just to keep moving) and fiddle endlessly with the tea making gear.
we didn’t have a printer in the modern sense. we had this messy paper they would transfer onto this big roller contraption and churn out copies on really low grade pulpy paper. this was a seemingly endless chore and really needed more than one person to get it right. and ink always got everywhere
i would read the dictionary. it was great i shoulda stole it. it was an english-chinese dictionary printed at the height of china’s worker zeal. every example sentence was strident, saber rattling communism at its best, E.G. “development” would have a screed like “China shall continue the development of the peasants unabated”. just great stuff. mindless brainwashing for hours.
we could real the chinese english newspaper ( i forget the name) and be stunned how the same story could be covered so completely differently than in the old copies of time/newsweek my folks would send.
there were about 20 chinese english teachers, me and two british young women. it was all so political as to be sickening. single female teachers couldn’t talk to me when senior teachers were around. lotsa the “english” teachers were recently converted “russian” teachers who couldn’t speak a lick of english but of whom every agreed were “english grammar masters”. one of the english girls was there more to preach the gospel and gain converts. she was always trying to get folks to come to her bible study. she didn’t seem to care what would happen to them if they were found out. i was her foil. nothing like agreeing with atheists about the concept of god. those were some good chats. some of the chinese english teachers took to teasing her straight out about it: “your god doesn’t live here” and on. my desk was surrounded on all sides by two sets of married teachers (to keep me away from the xiaojies? or maybe the married couples had rank and got dibs on sitting next to the foreign teacher.).
the lady teachers all wore uniform polyester outfits. peach tops and black skirts. they all wore this ugly thick panty hose and their leg hairs popped out of all the mesh. hairry shins are sexy! not a look you see to often nowadays.
in the morning time we would wait in anticipation of lunch and in the afternoon we would wait in anticiapation of dinner.
everyweek or so someone had photo(s) of something and the office would be abuzz as everyone would discuss the content of the photos: “oh xiao hong, that flower is so pretty! how much did it cost?”“hmm…not wise. it is only a flower and flowers die. you should save your money for something permanent…like a bicycle” and on and on.
I guess for some people it’s like … they work inbetween going on the internet … 
My house was much cleaner.
I didn’t have a ring of fat around my waist.
There wasn’t the constant screem of PC cooling fan and hardrive downloading.
I didn’t have a fancy room with desks and computers rigged together.
My spelling was much worse than it seems to be now.
I wouldn’t have a clue what the real news was.
I spent a lot of money printing and mailing photos to people.
I had to purchase any software from a retailer.
I would remember people’s home addresses, without having to look them up.
I would spend 18,000nt per month making foreign calls on a mobile.
They have the Internet on computers now. Will wonders never cease?
Sorry to be picky, but I think it’s called the Innernets.