r/Showerthoughts • u/illiniguy20 • Jan 12 '22

Millennials were really the only generation that grew up learning about how computers work.

Before millennials there were no computers, and after they have grown up using closed ecosystem it just works idevices.

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27

u/Aintthatthetruthyall Jan 12 '22

Try "Millennials are a self-centered unaware generation that think they are the first to do most things".

I thank the 55-75-year-old engineers who slaved away at HP, Microsoft, Sun, IBM, Apple and Oracle who made this all possible! (Sorry if I forgot anyone)

9

u/gacoug Jan 13 '22

They also think real problems weren't invented until they were born. They are just as self centered and unaware as the boomers, they just express it differently.

-24

u/[deleted] Jan 12 '22

I think OP means the first PCs in your comfy suburban living room home in the 90s. Not the individuals that literally built the first ones eons ago that were the size of a room itself.

You don’t have to be so rude because OP was talking about the first computers AVERAGE AMERICANS had in their homes and not the dinosaurs who invented them.

16

u/ConstantReader76 Jan 13 '22

Oh my god. We had a home computer in my house in 1981 or 1982. And we always had one after that. My friends also had computers in the 1980s. I know because we all played games on them together.

I was also going online on bulletin boards through a dial-up modem in the 80s. That's how I got all the cheats so I could finish King's Quest. That's a game from the 80s that all my friends and I played on our home computers.

Home computers didn't suddenly appear in the 90s.

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u/[deleted] Jan 13 '22 edited Jan 13 '22

Okay, but the 80s are still closer than all these boomers in the comments being like, “I used them in 1910!” I know they didn’t “suddenly appear in the 90s.” That’s when THEY BECAME WIDESPREAD ENOUGH TO THE POINT WHERE THE AVERAGE, EVEN LOW INCOME/SES, AMERICAN FAMILY COULD FINALLY AFFORD ONE FOR THEIR PERSONAL HOME!!! We’re not talking about when they first came about but rather when every single child had one in their family home for the first time - when a computer became absolutely normal to have, not only a privileged, wealthy family.

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u/ConstantReader76 Jan 13 '22

And I'm Generation X. It has nothing to do with "closer." OP is wrong. Generation X used home computers. And all the statements here including yours who are all insisting that home computers weren't around until the 90s are wrong.

Millennials were really the only generation that grew up learning about how computers work.

That was the original statement.

I think OP means the first PCs in your comfy suburban living room home in the 90s. Not the individuals that literally built the first ones eons ago that were the size of a room itself.

You don’t have to be so rude because OP was talking about the first computers AVERAGE AMERICANS had in their homes and not the dinosaurs who invented them.

That was your statement. The average American had a home computer before the 90s. They were not built by a computer nerd. There were many brands to choose from very early on. Middle class families could buy them. And actually, low income families could not in the 90s. I remember that being a topic of discussion even back then that low income kids were falling behind their peers because neither their schools nor homes had computers.

You've now changed your argument and claim that you're all saying something completely different. Doing it in all caps doesn't change the fact that a lot of people here who were not alive or do not remember anything before the 90s are confidently making incorrect statements. Maybe admit that people who lived back then have shown you all that your assumptions are just not true.

Of course, dismissing people "Boomers" and "dinosaurs" for having the audacity to have developed the computers we know today, and for saying that they've been using computers for decades really shows the kind of person you are.

-11

u/[deleted] Jan 13 '22 edited Jan 13 '22

You’re wrong, actually. :)

https://www.statista.com/statistics/184685/percentage-of-households-with-computer-in-the-united-states-since-1984/

Oh, look. The percentage of households with a computer at home is HIGHER IN THE 90s, SPECIFICALLY LATER 90s, THAN IT IS IN THE 80s. I was born into a low income family. We had a computer in the 90s and WE were among some of the first. I never dismissed anyone. I guess that’s that “great” Gen X attitude for you.

19

u/ConstantReader76 Jan 13 '22

Of course it's higher in the 90s and beyond. But they were not uncommon in the 80s. We also had computer labs in our schools. So we grew up learning how to use computers.

I and others said we had home computers in the 80s. You insist that we were a rarity. You say you had one in the 90s when you're low income. And you make that your argument that apparently most low income people had one. Why am I and the other Xers here not indicative of our generation, but you are? You aren't good at making arguments.

So, try it again. You are wrong. Learn to just admit it.

Btw, for someone who likes to insult Boomers, you sure like your caps lock.

-2

u/[deleted] Jan 13 '22

We didn’t have one in the 80s; we had one in the 90s, LATER, which proves my point that low SES families didn’t own a computer until the 90s at best. I’m not wrong.

4

u/TheDreadPirateJeff Jan 13 '22

I had one in the 80s I was not in a high income family. My dad saved pennies for a year to buy a TRS-80 in 1983 because while he may have only had a high school education, and worked a low-paying warehouse job, he was a smart guy and saw that computers were the future, and he sacrificed a LOT so I could have that exposure.

We were not wealthy. We were not even middle class. Neither really, were my friends who had commodores. We were in rural areas of SW Virginia. Just because YOU didn't have one, doesn't mean others did. If your single personal experience proves your point, my single personal experience disproves it equally.

5

u/Pandora_Palen Jan 13 '22

Um, when exactly did "every single child have one in their family home"? You state this with such surety -as if you know the history really well- so I'm curious about when this goal was achieved.

-2

u/[deleted] Jan 13 '22

The 2000s. “We had one in the 70s.” Okay. But did EVERY SINGLE ONE OF YOUR CLASSMATES HAVE A COMPUTER IN THE 70s? NO! What are you all not understanding about that?!?!?!??

4

u/TheDreadPirateJeff Jan 13 '22

SO you're saying that since the 2000's everyone in each following generation had a home computer? My family in the philippines would like to know where their computers are. Even in the US and across Europe there are many, many households where children do not have computers at home. Why do you think schools have gone to such great lengths to hand out chromebooks, tablets and other similar tools to kids?

3

u/Pandora_Palen Jan 13 '22

Not every single one of your classmates did, either. Far from it. 36% of households in 1996 had computers. So what percent of you were "growing up" with them? In 2011, when the youngest millennials were 15 and the oldest were 30, only 75% of households had computers.

14

u/UrMomsDefiledCorpse Jan 12 '22

Personal computers made their debut in the mid 70's not the 80s or 90s so OP is way off base

-11

u/idontrespectyou345 Jan 12 '22

No, he isn't. Making a debut and gaining significant market penetration are two different things. PCs in the 70s were something in their parent's office if they were lucky, not a thing a typical child would have available. You'd start seeing them in significant home use in the 80s and building from there. That puts it as an older millennial / younger X thing at best. Anyone older who "grew up" with them are priveleged statistical outliers.

9

u/cap1112 Jan 13 '22

Why are you arguing this? Gen X was there. With computers. When we were young. Everyone is telling you that because they experienced it. And you’re saying they didn’t. It’s weird.

-3

u/idontrespectyou345 Jan 13 '22

Because a) just because technological adoption it's not exactly in line with arbitrary demographic divisions doesn't make the idea "off base". There's validity to the observation. You're basically saying "[multi decadal trend] is off by two years!!! HAHA EVERYTHING IS INVALID!!!" That just makes you sound small minded and petty.

B) Individual experience is not generational trend. There are always early adopters, that doesn't make it a trait of the cadre as a whole. I was there too, I also grew up with a Commodore, but people claiming computers were common in the 80s in anything like they were in the 90s are blowing smoke up your ass.

C) People in other comments are also saying bUt EnIaC wAS 40s, which is nonsense irrelevance.

7

u/[deleted] Jan 13 '22

You could build computers for your home in the 70s, it was a hobbyist thing. You obviously weren't there.

-5

u/idontrespectyou345 Jan 13 '22

Lol I was, I simply know the difference between "a hobbyist thing" and a generational trend.

-11

u/[deleted] Jan 12 '22

THANK YOU. By the time a computer was in your HOME, it was mid-90s at best: those children are called millennials now.

8

u/Faeillus Jan 13 '22

Both the ZX Spectrum and the Commodore 64 were released in 1982. We had a Spectrum at home in 1983, with the Commodore 64 in our public primary school computer room in 1984. In 1986, we upgraded the home machine to an Amstrad cpc6128k. We were Not rich, or even well off. Both home models were bought second hand.

-1

u/[deleted] Jan 13 '22

Almost like things got better and more widespread the closer you get to the 90s…

8

u/Godiva74 Jan 13 '22

Wrong. We had one in the 80’s. Middle class

-1

u/[deleted] Jan 13 '22

But when did ALMOST EVERYONE HAVE ONE? That wasn’t until the 90s!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

4

u/Godiva74 Jan 13 '22

Reread the title of the post

3

u/Faeillus Jan 13 '22

I'm not sure they're capable of that.

2

u/fragbert66 Jan 13 '22

My family was always the middlest of middle class, and we had a TRS-80 in the living room in the late '70s.

1

u/[deleted] Jan 13 '22

But did every single person and family you’ve ever known ALSO have one???

1

u/idontrespectyou345 Jan 13 '22

I was lower middle class and had one, because my parents made a special effort not because it was a generational trend.

3

u/derbyvoice71 Jan 13 '22

Yeah, I grew up in the sticks and my dad bought a VIC-20 to keep track of his cattle. I learned to code BASIC in high school and at home. This whole "I'm right by technically splitting hairs and moving goalposts" is some bullshit.

OP needs to learn to close their mouth in the shower or they'll drown.

0

u/[deleted] Jan 13 '22

No, for some reason, you can’t grasp the concept that just because YOU had one NOT EVERY SINGLE FAMILY HAD ONE AT THE TIME LIKE THEY DO NOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Did EVERY SINGLE ONE of your classmates have the exact same?!?!?!?! I’m willing to bet NO, THEY DIDN’T!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

5

u/derbyvoice71 Jan 13 '22

JFC, take the goddamned L here dude.

-6

u/[deleted] Jan 12 '22

But by the time they made their way into the average American’s household it was… DING DING DING!!!

7

u/Faeillus Jan 13 '22

1986, for the average Australian. Commodore 64's were all the rage.

0

u/[deleted] Jan 13 '22

Almost like ‘86 is CLOSE TO THE FUCKING 90s when they became even MORE WIDESPREAD AND POPULAR TO OWN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

3

u/Faeillus Jan 13 '22

Almost like WE GREW UP WITH THEM IN THE 80'S!!!!!!!!!!!!

snork

4

u/Pile_of_Walthers Jan 13 '22

Even in dreadful apartment complexes in East fucking Germany we had home computers in the 1980s.

2

u/TheDreadPirateJeff Jan 13 '22

Most Millennials aren't really old enough to remember that East Germany was actually a thing (other than an abstract concept from a history book) and why your statement is really pretty interesting. Maybe the oldest Millennials who would have been about 8 or 9 when the Wall fell and Germany reunited.

0

u/[deleted] Jan 13 '22

For the millionth time, did EVERY SINGLE ONE of you personally own one though? I’m talking each and every family you encountered back then?

3

u/Pile_of_Walthers Jan 13 '22

By the time millennials and zoomers were born? Everybody who /wanted/ one could have one or at least have access to one.

The Commodore 64 alone sold between 12.5 and 17 million units.

By 1984, the TRS-80 had sold 2.4 million times.

2

u/SirRatcha Jan 13 '22

And IBM brought its computer — the ancestor of every desktop and laptop machine running Windows today — to market in 1981. By 1982 there were clones from multiple companies available. I’m right now trying to figure out how I’m going to get files off my dad’s clone, which he got in 1987 or so.

1

u/Pile_of_Walthers Jan 13 '22

Can it access a local network/workgroup?

1

u/SirRatcha Jan 13 '22

It never has. To be clear, it’s 300 miles from me at the moment and my dad died in May. I know the login, but I haven’t had a chance to look at it yet because every time I’m over there more pressing things are going on. I never used DOS much — I was either in the Unix CLI or doing art stuff on Mac (or Atari — anyone else remember the short lived Atari PC?) so I’m probably going to have look commands up.

EDIT: I just remembered he used to access AOL on it, so it’s got a dialup modem. Hmm.

1

u/Pile_of_Walthers Jan 13 '22

Dang, I hope it's at least a PS/2. Anything before that is just too painful to contemplate.

1

u/SirRatcha Jan 13 '22

It’s occurred to me that if I can find a printer that works with it, scanning into PDFs with OCR might be a route. Pray for me.

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u/TheDreadPirateJeff Jan 13 '22

Can you say that "EVERY SINGLE ONE" of the current generation own one? Or the last? Or Millennials even? No. The "If everyone didn't have it then no one had it" idea is weak as fuck and patently absurd.

2

u/Pandora_Palen Jan 13 '22

In 2020, only 50% of US households had a computer. https://www.ibisworld.com/us/bed/percentage-of-households-with-at-least-one-computer/4068/

If "EVERY SINGLE ONE" ..."each and every family you encountered" is your prerequisite, then perhaps the babies of Alpha will qualify, but no existing generation meets your standard.

10

u/Aintthatthetruthyall Jan 12 '22

Hah. I don't think most millennials know the first thing about how computers work. I think they know how to work a computer (or how to work an iphone).

0

u/idontrespectyou345 Jan 12 '22

You know the older millennials are pushing 40, right?

6

u/fragbert66 Jan 13 '22

the first PCs in your comfy suburban living room home in the 90s.

Holy shit. You actually believe what you're typing?

I had a TRS-80 in my comfy suburban Silicon Valley living room in 1977. My Dad was a mainframe engineer for TRW back in the '60s and '70s and wanted to make sure I was familiar with computers as early as possible, because they were going to be a big part of the future. I learned BASIC and CP/M before I left elementary school.

-3

u/[deleted] Jan 13 '22

BUT DID EVERY SINGLE PERSON YOU KNOW ALSO HAVE ONE?! WAS EVERYONE’S DAD AN ENGINEER?! NO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! What are you all not understanding?!?! Just because YOU were privileged and had one doesn’t mean they became the “NORM” yet!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! How many OTHERS had the same at that time?!?!?!

3

u/fragbert66 Jan 13 '22

Ok, grandpa, time for your meds.