Exactly, someone born in 99 was like 7 or 8 by the time smart phones and social media were a things. Those people didn't get to experience much in the way of pre internet life.
I was born in the later 90s but didn’t have a computer in the home until I was at least 13. Didn’t get a phone until sophomore year of high school. Didn’t get a smart phone until senior year. I recognize there’s likely a lot of nuance to this!
That is just it though. By the time you were a teenager you lived in the world of social media. People born in the early 80s were the same age when the world wide web was first beginning, and even then the average household didn't have the web until the 00s. All of that shaped and changed culture and society, not just the individual users.
82 myself and I agree. I grew up like the kids from strange things until I was 12 and by the time I was out of high school I was on IM and ICQ playing Diablo online.
I would argue it was more the late-70s borns that got the best mix. We got to be kids during the peak cartoon/toy runs, got to high school when the best music was starting, got to college at the best time for tech/gaming/social aspects.
My bro is 83’ and had about the same as I, he was a little later to the internet cause 1 home computer, dial up and the oldest had dibs! He didn’t a lot of evening computer time till I was 17 and moved out!
1977! My little brother is 81, and my sister is 83. So we went through everything that these later Millennials did... and experienced it all with a greater understanding due to that age advantage... yet we were still kids/teenagers
I was born in 85 my sister in 79 and my brother in 81, we had the best childhood. Lived grew up in the riding bikes and going home when the street lights came on era, but also lived through MySpace and aol, CAR PHONES, beepers, flip phones. And look at us now, entire panic attack if I don’t feel my phone in my pocket for a second.
82 too! My first computer was a Commodore 64 at daycare, and in middle and high school, helped my mom run the computer labs in our school district.
And by "helping," I mean going in on weekends and summer days to play on the computer while she hooked everything up to the internet. Getting to wander schools when no one was around was the best.
I also worked at the local video store, and we had the same computer system as seen in Stranger Things.
80 has entered the chat. Oregon Trail microgen here. There are great r posts today: rip ebay and etsy. I miss Tom. I miss old google. I am mourning mid aughts internet so much.
I had a Atari 130xe before the c64 and I actually helped teach and supervise our computer course at my school. Helps when you need just 10 minutes to finish the programming test opposed to the 90 minutes allotted.
My people. We are the ones with living memory of the briefly dark day when the Super Mario Brothers Super Show was suddenly replaced by something called Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. We were very upset. For 15 minutes.
We really are. I’ve given a LOT of thought to it and I also think we make amazing parents because of it. (That last part is more opinion than fact lol)
As an 85er I feel like MySpace made me look at all social media and decide I wanted as little to do with it as possible(the irony of saying this on social media isn't lost on me). You graduated college before everyone in college went all in on Facebook and social media that followed.
Oh my God, you’re right that is Kirsten Dunst. I had to do a double take because I thought that was Taylor Swift… who was born in 1989. I know that because she released an album called 1989, and she looked far too young to have any significant memories of that year unless she just happened to remember being a baby… which is possible with privileged upbringings.
I was born in ‘78 and I think I got the perfect mix. I had time to basically fully develop before the internet became a daily use facet of life, but was still young enough to learn and adapt to its use and evolution over the past 25-30years.
The person who made this up, clearly is sad they missed the cutoff for the Xennial, which was the perfect mix of life before and after the internet.
*Side note- I wonder if you were outside of that timeframe and lived in a small town Xennial timeframe could be shifted as things seemed to take longer to get to those smaller communities, ie internet.
1981 and im starting to forget life before the Internet but im fully aware of how worse of we are as a species because of it. This is not the vision of the future I had back in my teen years in the 90s. Its a dystopian nightmare
I mean, it's exactly the future all those cyberpunk stories told me was coming. Well... Except it's a lot dumber than those stories predicted, they underestimated how dumb humans are even while we create more complex technologies.
I was on the internet in 1994. How come people born 5 years later could recall a time before? By 99 I was buying a lot of tennis gear, games, computer parts online. Heck, I was watching my uni lectures and not showing up…
I think 1979 - 1989 more accurate.
I was born in 1981 and the internet didn’t enter my life until 1996 at age 15. I think we’re the last generation to have a completely internet free childhood.
I peg the wide adoption of the internet to be in about 1995 or so so no, in order to clearly remember life without the internet you’d have to be born much earlier.
That’s still a relatively internet free childhood, or at least smart tech free. Most people didn’t have iPhones until the early 2010s. I had a slider phone until 2011.
I barely remember an internet-free time, and I was born in 1984. Smartphones were just the death knell where it became inescapable sll the time. If that hit when you were 8, I doubt you have a meaningful sense of life without it.
I was 9 when the iPhone came out. I was 10 or 11 when I used one for the first time. Before that the internet was just on a box in one room of the house. That’s very different from today.
All I’m saying is my childhood in the 00s cant be compared to those who came later. It look a long time for the internet to seep in and take over every element of life.
I can hear the dial up and smell the knotty pine as I patiently waited to get logged in on our family computer in the basement. Sometime in middle school so def early 90s.
Facebook was a cesspool when I finally deleted it... In 2011. And I'd been complaining about it going downhill for two years by that point. A 99 kid would have been 10 when the Internet started to go to crap. They almost completely missed the golden age of the internet (which I believe truly ended about 2015-ish).
Now you might say they remember a childhood before the ubiquity of smartphones... But by high school every one of those kids had a hand-down iPhone when their parents upgraded. They do not remember a childhood that wasn't completely digital. They've had Google since they were born.
I went to college in 1999…with a computer….that had internet. Don’t get me wrong, it was top of the line with a massive 12 gig hard drive 😆 but no one born in 1999 had any sort of life before internet.
Right? I’m like boomers had already descended upon Facebook and the POTUS had a twitter by the time you were 10. You were cataloging your life on the internet by the time you entered high school. lol @ this weird 99 cutoff
By 1997 I'd already used irc, had two different email addresses, and was about to sign up for this new service I heard about in a backpacker hostel in Seattle.... it was called Hotmail. Kids born 89-99 don't know shit about the pre- digital world order.
Facebook was a cesspool when I finally deleted it... In 2011. And I'd been complaining about it going downhill for two years by that point. A 99 kid would have been 10 when the Internet started to go to crap. They almost completely missed the golden age of the internet (which I believe truly ended about 2015-ish).
Now you might say they remember a childhood before the ubiquity of smartphones... But by high school every one of those kids had a hand-down iPhone when their parents upgraded. They do not remember a childhood that wasn't completely digital. They've had Google since they were born.
So happy to see someone else comment on this! Those Paisleys were rad. To non-guitarists they looked like wallpaper guitars, and it was such a joy to see them in the hands of an absolute ripper.
The blue paisley Teles were pretty too. I did NOT know what to think of that crystal clear guard, at first. It’s so funny to me what 20/ almost 30 years did/ have done. I have hit my mid-life and I am back to playing my old Strat and JM and teaching my daughter how to play her acoustic.
There’s no way someone born after like 94/95 remembers life before the Internet. Maybe THEY didn’t have the Internet, but that’s not the same as “life before the Internet”
84 here, and I can make a case for all the 78-83 folks. I think past 84-85, there is a drop off and by 89 it’s just a different world. Those kids grew up with the internet being readily available. I didn’t see that until I was about 12-13.
everytime i redownload reddit i delete it so fucking fast. the internet is dead folks… 1500 upvotes for something saying people born in 1999 had a perfect mix of life before the internet.
No researcher would use the word "perfect" to describe such an ambiguous and debatable topic. Someone was probably fishing for ideas and came across a study that found children who attended middle school before the Internet was widely used have better social skills or something. Snag a picture of a kid from The Before Time, slap some misleading text on it, and BOOM you got yourself a Podcast topic.
The study might have been about social media and/or mobile web. I've seen social media adaption listed as the dividing line for Millenials and Gen Z, with Gen Z being the first to have social media from the start of their middle school years.
That is technically true ya. I worked on a computer from '79 whose internet connected through serial. But I never had internet at home until late 90's.
Fully agree and I’m being very pedantic but the prompt was “known no life without the internet” not “known no life without the wide adoption of the internet”.
I think you can make the argument that when people say internet, they mean the World Wide Web, which was created in 1989. The average person was unaware of the internet before the WWW.
By the time those born in 1989 were in kindergarten the family was figuring out how to manage using the World Wide Web when someone was expecting a phone call.
Us Xennial middle schoolers would just hop on a bike and go wherever the fuck until it got dark. Maybe you called from a friend's house so Mom wouldn't worry. Napster was already a nationwide scandal by the time those kids were eighth graders.
In college 99-01: the photography department had both digital cameras and all the manual cameras from medium format to 4x5. I learned it all while simultaneously taking video editing class: adobe premiere & graphic design: photoshop. We all knew the digital image was going to kill it all and there were so many intellectual convos about it. What happened? Death of so much media. What has risen from ashes? AI.
I was in high school, but yeah, I was selling burned CDs from Napster in '99 because I was one of the few kids that had both a cable modem and a CD burner.
It has to be 79-89. I was born in 79 and I clearly remember life before the internet. I started working when some retail stores I worked still used knuckle buster credit card machines. I still remember when I first started paying bills the only way to pay my utility bill was to go to said utility and pay at the counter or in the drop box. But I do remember chat rooms and AOL when I was in middle school being a huge deal. From 12-21 was a perfect blend of the way things were and the way they have become now. Still wouldn’t trade it for anything.
I was checking out at a store recently and mentioned the old physical credit card paper slips and the contraption used to the clerks. They looked at me like I had three heads. Then I realized they were in their 20’s and I’m in my 40’s.
I remember when I was a kid and they had a huge book of stolen/cancelled credit card numbers that they would look up to make sure you're card was not in the list
Gas station I ran still had one in 2012 when I left. It was only used for when certain types of fleet cards (cops, ambulances, truckers) wouldn't read for whatever reason. We'd have a few a week.
I had a job in college working at a call center for credit cards. I worked in a department they called “Want to Honor” where we would call establishments that chose to accept Amex to make sure they had their stickers up letting their patrons know they accept the card. Part of our script was of your machine isn’t working, we remind you to use the imprint machine to capture purchases. Simple job, simpler time. Sometimes I’d love to go back to that repetitive, simple job. 🤣
Went I Ecuador in 2013 and the hostel I stayed in had the triplicate forms but my credit card was a chase sapphire with minimally raised numbers and on checkout the owner ringing me up had to put some folded napkins under my card to create enough pressure for the carbon paper get the imprints
Yeah, my first job at a fast food place, they still used a manual cash register. Did the ka-ching sound as it popped open the drawer each time. At the end of each shift, the manager had to take the receipt paper from the register and manually tally up the totals.
And I remember paying my bills by check! Having to balance your checkbook.
My first time filing income taxes for my little after school job at County Seat was on one of these little 2 page "pamphlets". The internet was for browsing and chatting.
Yeah, I feel like at least by the time Windows 95 is around, there's an established internet. If you're born in the 90s at all, let alone 1999, you don't remember much or any life without the internet.
My household connected via TCP Trumpet Winsock on windows 3.11 and we weren’t the first house on the street with internet.
Also, BBS access was prevalent in the years prior to 3.11, I can remember we were all playing our daily turns on LORD well before there was much worth doing on the internet.
Yeah, trumpet winsock! That was back in the day where there were local ISP's and you actually had options to choose from.
Our first computer came with a 14.4 modem. It got upgraded to a US Robotics 28.8 modem later, and turns out it was a model where they later released a firmware update that flashed it to make it a 33.6!
In 1992 during my first year of university, a nerd I worked with on campus introduced me to IRC, which I used to talk to my long distance boyfriend. So yeah. Them 80s babies don't know shit about pre- internet life.
Even then, it was not very ubiquitous. I worked at an internet startup in 1995. Most businesses didn’t even have websites yet. When I went to college in 1997, my dorm had just been wired for non dial up internet.
I feel like it didn’t really get traction until the very late 90s. And really not until smart phones with apps around 2010 or so. That’s when people like my parents reached the level of social media usage where they started having drama.
You barely used it except the same way you might use tv - so in a very structured way, at home, and when you were not home you weren’t using it. It wasn’t ubiquitous, as in 24/7 access via phone, until like 2008 and even then it wasn’t common for kids until like what 2012 or so. So that’s the rub, those ages grew up with it but not like absorbed in it, you still had to have computer skills to use it for the most part
Okay... the first commercial ISPs hit in 1994. 1995 was when the internet became known by the general public. So, unless your parents were military or university researchers, I am calling BS on that one.
AOL was not an ISP, back then, though. It was an online service separate from the internet, similar to CompuServe and Prodigy. They started offering usenet around 1994, and TCP/IP connectivity later on.
Nobody refers to BBS as "the internet". It was a completely different system with hundreds of boards that were segregated from eachother. Not to mention it was a niche service that was nowhere near as popular as even the first year of the internet.
I remember my dad using compuserve to load up a weather radar image on the computer and it included a little santa because it was late december. I was pretty young so it couldn't have been as recently as 95. I even do enterprise networking for a living but I am just now learning that wasn't a full proper ISP
Memory unlocked. We used Netscape Navigator and I still remember a guy in a chat room calling it Nutscape because it was "so bad". Before that I thought Netscape was "the internet". That's when I first started playing around, learning, and getting a grasp on what the internet really was. Then we got windows 95 and Internet Explorer.
Wow. My brother was 86 and I’m sure he remembers life pre-internet. Even in high school, he was constantly outdoors riding bikes, rollerblading, exploring, and he had multiple broken bones to show for it. I don’t remember the internet becoming a bigger thing in my life until high school, so he would have been high school (or at least junior high by then). But we didn’t have AOL continuously and even when we did, it was dial up and a limited number of minutes, so we’d just sign in, get our email, and sign out. Maybe it depends on how quickly each family adopted the new technology?
I didn't say it wasn't possible. What are the odds that this person's sister was there as well? You were in an incredibly small group of people. The WWW wasn't even public until 1993, which would have made their sister 7, and didn't really take off until 95 or 96, making the sister 9 or 10. I very much doubt they don't have memories of life from before that age.
That proves my point even more. If the person I'm replying to got internet in 1997 then their sister would have been 11. No memories of life before 11 years old? Really?
Only about 20% of households had home internet in 1997, so the odds are that they got it later than that, so now the sister's age is creeping up even more.
I was born in 90 and it was perfect for me. A childhood free of tech, then cellphones catching on big in jr high and then high school was MySpace, etc.
I disagree. People born in 1989 were 10 in 1999 and by the the Internet was already growing into an important part of pop culture. I was born in 1984 and by 1999 I was doing web development, involved in online communities, talking to real-life friends online after school, etc. People born even at the earliest end of the 1989-1999 spectrum barely got a taste of pre-internet life. Pre-smartphone, sure. But not pre-internet.
I think a lot of people mix up pre-internet and pre-smartphones. Young people don’t know the difference. Before smartphones there were nothing according to them.
People born in 1999 have always had internet. In 2005 they were only ) years old, they definitely grew up with the internet. They’ve also grown up with cell phones & smart phones. Can’t even compare to the decade before
Exactly. I got my first cell phone in 1999 and by then my friends already had one. A person born in ’99 can’t be serious if they tell me they had an analogue childhood unless they were brought up in the rural parts of a developing country.
98' here and yeah, I was raised like a millennial because both my siblings are. My household didnt get wifi until 2014. I didnt get a phone until I was 15. The moment I did though, it was just full on gen z lol
I was born mid seventies and i didn’t have internet access till university. So I grew up analog but was able to adopt to technology very easily. So I think mid to late seventies is peak Xennial duality benefit.
These numbers can be correct. I was born in 1983 and didnt know what the internet was until I was 13. First time I used it was probably 14 and I didnt have my own computer until I was 16(a month away form 17). My experience isn't the same as everyone else, but this is what most of my friends experience was with the internet. Almost as if I puberty and the internet showed up at the same time.
I was born in 1976 and I think I had a perfect mix of life before and after internet. We got internet when I was a senior in high school. It was nearly useless for research while I was in college, it was just too new, but there was lots of games and people to chat with. I started building websites in 1995 when the web was the wild west.
1974 here. I got all the way through high school without internet but in my first year of university irc chat was a thing so I feel like if you were born after the 70s you did not get to experience an internet free childhood.
Born 78, and I sometimes think that was a little late. I first used the internet at 15, so 1993/4, If I was born a few years earlier, I would of got more into the peak of the BBS scene before moving to the internet, I missed out on Rave culture being 11 in 1988. I did get to witness computers going from 8 bit to current times though.
Ummm... the internet existed in 1989, and I can show archived posts I made to comp.sys.amiga.programmer before Spring Break 1990 as receipts. :-)
Smartphones with PalmOS & internet connectivity arrived in 2001 (Samsung SPH-i300, I owned one), but Palm Pilots tethered to phones as modems existed in 1997... or earlier, if you had an IBM Simon like my friend's dad.
I am not sure their is a "perfect " year because of how much tech someone had access to or was required to use varies so much by region/socioeconomic background. I was born in 81 and know a friend who had their own pc in 93,but also knew people from my hs whoutside of a flip phone were entirely living like it's a predigital world with no daily internet usage as recent as the late 00's.
99?? I had Internet at home by like 1996. I had a cell phone in 2001 I think. Kids born in 99 absolutely did not know what pre internet life was. Who the fuck wrote this
i'm born in 1983 and start to have internet in 1999, at 16. This is a real before/after.
I still grew up playing outside, using a phone book, and having games on floppy disks.
Idk how someone born in 1999 can know a 'before'
My oldest was born in 1999. It wasn't the digital age it is now with my youngest, but it wasn't like it was for Xennials.
I showed her a rotary phone at an antique store and it blew her mind. The only landline she had access to was at her grandparents. The only wired phone is in the kitchen. None of it was standard.
Really though. If you're born in 1989, you had zero formative years pre-internet cuz the WWW went public in the early 1990s. And smart phones were ubiquitous by the time you became a teen.
I was born in 1990 and we didn’t have internet at home until 2000/2001 which was pretty standard. The first iPhone came out when I was 17. They were extremely expensive. I didn’t know anyone who actually had one at that time so they definitely weren’t ubiquitous. I got my first smartphone my senior year of college (2012). My life up until age 10/11 I pretty much didn’t experience the internet at all and I don’t think I was an outlier
Thank you for this cause I remember getting on the Internet in elementary school and people keep saying late 90s and I was thinking I'm crazy for a sec. I know for sure I was in elementary school when I got on the Internet. I was a teenager in the late 90s so it wasn't adding up.
If you were born in 1999 then you don’t know life before computers. I was born in 82. I know life before and after computers. I think I had a great year to be born.
I'm an '82 model. I hit it pretty much perfect on the benefits of life before and after the internet. But, do we REALLY have it good with the internet these days? Lol
There is no way this is possible. The oldest person would have been 10 in 1999. The internet really blew up in 1995. In 1995 almost everyone had internet connection. The oldest person would have been 5. The youngest person would have been -5.
Only about 15% of households in the US had an internet connection in 1995. That’s a decent amount of people but it was still rare/uncommon. It was in about 50% of US households in 2000-2001. I agree most people born in the late 90s wouldn’t remember a life pre-internet but I think most born in the early 90s would. Of course it somewhat depends on each person’s household though and how/where they grew up
Internet didn't become a household thing till 1995 right? So anyone born between 1980-1990 got to live life with no Internet untill they were already a teenager or young adult. 1989 for me and i remember xenga and aol instant messagner. But also being outside with the gang all day till the sun went down. Sleep overs. School without phones. Well we had flip phones that you weren't allowed to be seen with. But not these crazy addictive smart phones. I'm with the boomers on this phone garbage. It's poison that needs to be massively reformed or restricted.
Even people born in 1989 would have only been about 5 years old at the point when the Internet was really taking off and many households were getting it.
They are trying to steal our flavor. They didn't even get to enjoy the 80s and 90s. If you were in diapers for your 90s experience, you didn't experience it in any real level.
Most of their teens were ruled by smart phones and Facebook. That sounds dystopian..
This is so not life. 2012 feels like it swapped to synthetic. I chased technology as a kid, now I chase my roots and hate the rise. 40 is a strange one, full of surprises. 86 was a good year, showed up too early for young parents, like I knew. Gotta go now! It’s gonna go poop by 15!
There is no way anyone born in that range truly experienced and understood the "Y2K bug" prep insanity....
Used my first computer in like 1988, Telex by the early 90s to play L.O.R.D (Legend of the Red Dragon) online. Dad had a cell phone, satellite TV, and a "black box" same timeframe....
My parents are in their 80s, as far as I’m concerned they’ve seen plenty of life after internet. I personally don’t care to see anymore it’s already a disaster. I mean just look at me brain rotting away posting to Reddit.
1989 baby here. Growing up, I never realized how good I had it until recently , raising teens and a 5 year old, how sad it is they will never have a childhood like mine. 😟 now it’s no personal devices at school then when they can and earn device time after school or on the weekend, they have 0 motivation to go outside and play
Maybe up to 95 or so not 99. I was born in 90 and we got AOL when I was in 5th grade and WiFi when I was a freshman in high school which was pretty on-par with most of the other kids I knew
I was born in 1979 and I had my first email address around 1995. I’d argue that you have to be old enough to have witnessed and remember the actual beginnings of the internet to really know what it’s been like.
This seems off by at least 4 years. I was born in 86, and PCs were just starting becoming fairly common around the time I was 7-9. Not *internet*, just having a pc. By the time I was 10 it was uncommon for people to not have one. But I don’t recall seeing the internet in use until maybe age 12-13 through school computer lab and it was still quite basic.
I’ve seen this meme go around for weeks, maybe longer. And it’s funny how the years change to reflect anything from the mid 60s to the entirety of the 90s.
No they didn't. The internet while not in every home was a thing throughout the 90s both in influence and in pop culture.
My school was using the internet pretty heavily both in middle school and high school in the 90s. It was definitely not the "pre-internet" era some imagine it was.
I'm guessing that in the article they are talking about social media as if it's the entire internet.
We like to think this about ourselves but the truth is the vast majority of our lives will still be spent with the internet at our fingertips and all the bullshit that comes with it. We were just the last generation to be born without the availability of the internet.
No way in hell. If you were born in 1999 your teenage years are going to be racked with full unchecked social media and you turn 21 during Covid. That just sucks.
We got dialup internet in 1996. My little brother born in 1995 has had internet his entire life. Yeah he was a year old before we got it but wouldnt remember not having it. It would be like me saying I experienced the Detroit Tigers win the world series because I was born in 84 a few months before they won it.
No study ever concluded that “people born within this arbitrarily ten-year range” had a perfect experience of anything at all, except perhaps the experience of being born within those particular years.
Yeah apparently missing consideration that we had ample opportunity to get in on the cushy job market if you just knew what HTML stood for. Our timing was perfect for the transition.
drc500free@reddit
Literally a picture of someone born in 1982.
PuzzleheadedActive68@reddit
There is a computer next to the desk.
Lumpy_Branch_552@reddit
Which is the real answer
upthedips@reddit
Exactly, someone born in 99 was like 7 or 8 by the time smart phones and social media were a things. Those people didn't get to experience much in the way of pre internet life.
lil-barista@reddit
I was born in the later 90s but didn’t have a computer in the home until I was at least 13. Didn’t get a phone until sophomore year of high school. Didn’t get a smart phone until senior year. I recognize there’s likely a lot of nuance to this!
upthedips@reddit
That is just it though. By the time you were a teenager you lived in the world of social media. People born in the early 80s were the same age when the world wide web was first beginning, and even then the average household didn't have the web until the 00s. All of that shaped and changed culture and society, not just the individual users.
OlHeavyHeart@reddit
Bingo!!!
Klutzy-Delivery-5792@reddit
I feel us 82's are the peak Xennial age.
Necandus@reddit (OP)
82 myself and I agree. I grew up like the kids from strange things until I was 12 and by the time I was out of high school I was on IM and ICQ playing Diablo online.
Comfortable_Horse277@reddit
I still remember my ICQ number. 9259621
SquirrelyMcNutz@reddit
I would argue it was more the late-70s borns that got the best mix. We got to be kids during the peak cartoon/toy runs, got to high school when the best music was starting, got to college at the best time for tech/gaming/social aspects.
aubreypizza@reddit
Agree as a ‘79er
Scrabblewiener@reddit
‘81 here an I agree with both the 79’ and 82’!
My bro is 83’ and had about the same as I, he was a little later to the internet cause 1 home computer, dial up and the oldest had dibs! He didn’t a lot of evening computer time till I was 17 and moved out!
Safe to say 75’ - 85’ for a good 10 year range.
nickooze@reddit
b.1977, can confirm!
FalseQuestion7864@reddit
Definitely!
1977! My little brother is 81, and my sister is 83. So we went through everything that these later Millennials did... and experienced it all with a greater understanding due to that age advantage... yet we were still kids/teenagers
BearCat1478@reddit
'78 here and yes, most definitely correct!!!
quietlikesnow@reddit
Agree! I got to discover the internet when it was an escape from everyone in my high school
PantstheOG@reddit
I was born in 85 my sister in 79 and my brother in 81, we had the best childhood. Lived grew up in the riding bikes and going home when the street lights came on era, but also lived through MySpace and aol, CAR PHONES, beepers, flip phones. And look at us now, entire panic attack if I don’t feel my phone in my pocket for a second.
PatchworkGirl82@reddit
82 too! My first computer was a Commodore 64 at daycare, and in middle and high school, helped my mom run the computer labs in our school district.
And by "helping," I mean going in on weekends and summer days to play on the computer while she hooked everything up to the internet. Getting to wander schools when no one was around was the best.
I also worked at the local video store, and we had the same computer system as seen in Stranger Things.
ATheeStallion@reddit
80 has entered the chat. Oregon Trail microgen here. There are great r posts today: rip ebay and etsy. I miss Tom. I miss old google. I am mourning mid aughts internet so much.
husheveryone@reddit
🎯 We know dysentery can kill.
erindizmo@reddit
Mid-aughts internet really was the best internet. I made online friends then that I still have to this day.
nerdymom27@reddit
Same. My best internet friend I’ve never physically met but we’ve been in each other’s lives for 25 years. We met on a Big Wolf on Campus fan forum
pieduke88@reddit
C64 was my first as well!!!
daydreams83@reddit
Commodore 64!! I’m a year younger than you, but the C64 was the only computer we had until about 1996ish or so. LOAD“*”,8,1
ChiefBroady@reddit
I had a Atari 130xe before the c64 and I actually helped teach and supervise our computer course at my school. Helps when you need just 10 minutes to finish the programming test opposed to the 90 minutes allotted.
dredgedskeleton@reddit
I was born in 82 and was on AOL in 6th grade lol -- also, playing diablo, red alert, and quake online as a freshman
invuvn@reddit
Aw sheet, class of ‘00! Here we go again!
Remote-Moon@reddit
Born in December of 81, so right there with you guys!
ihavenoidea81@reddit
81 gang RISE UP
ThatEvanFowler@reddit
My people. We are the ones with living memory of the briefly dark day when the Super Mario Brothers Super Show was suddenly replaced by something called Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. We were very upset. For 15 minutes.
GarblingCumfarts@reddit
Pfft. Real OG's watched Captain N and pretended it was good!
emptyhead416@reddit
... And none of us thought Mega Man ACTUALLY sounded like that.
ThatEvanFowler@reddit
Hey, I still pretend that Captain N was good. That’s why to this day my Simon Belmont impression remains indistinguishable from Launchpad McQuack.
pieduke88@reddit
So true!!!
Cinderhazed15@reddit
Are you me? Except I’m 85
RoundTheBend6@reddit
Damn how did I forget about ICQ. Memory unlocked.
Nach0Maker@reddit
3412769
d3dk0w@reddit
Currently playing Diablo 4
neuro_space_explorer@reddit
Peak
Klutzy-Delivery-5792@reddit
Ditto
APFernweh@reddit
Hey there, Twinsie!
Comfortable_Horse277@reddit
Indeed. She was a month younger than me.
CoachAngBlxGrl@reddit
We really are. I’ve given a LOT of thought to it and I also think we make amazing parents because of it. (That last part is more opinion than fact lol)
quietlikesnow@reddit
You are. I feel like I lean towards Gen X, whilst my ‘82 sister is slightly more Xennial.
SnugglyCoderGuy@reddit
Lies, its 84
ThirdWorldOrder@reddit
plus most of us 82's graduated in 2000 so how more perfect can it get
The_Fell_Opian@reddit
"Smoke free class of 2000." We are the OG millennials.
Specialist-Leek8645@reddit
If I had just been born 2 weeks later..
LopensCouisin@reddit
I missed 1980 by 3 months…
Puffyfugu8@reddit
I missed it by three days 🥲
Hntrbdnshog@reddit
Missed it by 5 months the other direction.
ApprehensiveGrade400@reddit
Nobody’s perfect. You could have been born in ‘86 and missed out on remembering much of the ‘80s at all.
Specialist-Leek8645@reddit
Hello, way over there in 1983!
hoopstick@reddit
I was a month late
Specialist-Leek8645@reddit
It's OK, i think we're close enough to be second class citizens.
timsea99@reddit
If I was born a couple weeks earlier I'd be an '81er
Specialist-Leek8645@reddit
Cool I have a friend born right around there. She's one tough cookie.
Ws6fiend@reddit
As an 85er I feel like MySpace made me look at all social media and decide I wanted as little to do with it as possible(the irony of saying this on social media isn't lost on me). You graduated college before everyone in college went all in on Facebook and social media that followed.
Temporary_Brain_475@reddit
86, but only by 3 days, and I agree
NostalgiaBell@reddit
us 82'ers broke the fucking mold.
ThirdWorldOrder@reddit
82ers will rise up one day
ChiefBroady@reddit
Gotta disagree. 80 is the goat.
thrance@reddit
1983 would like to object. Really though, it’s pretty much the same
Marginally_Witty@reddit
Preach
Specialist-Leek8645@reddit
If I had just been born 2 weeks later.....
frougle_mcdugal@reddit
TheDukeofArgyll@reddit
Summerie@reddit
ForceGhost47@reddit
I had the biggest crush on her
Bluesphamy@reddit
Had?
There's not really a reason to stop having a crush on her
Global-Jury8810@reddit
Oh my God, you’re right that is Kirsten Dunst. I had to do a double take because I thought that was Taylor Swift… who was born in 1989. I know that because she released an album called 1989, and she looked far too young to have any significant memories of that year unless she just happened to remember being a baby… which is possible with privileged upbringings.
tgerz@reddit
I’m one day older than her. That’s all I got.
I_M_urbanspaceman@reddit
At first I thought it was Taylor Swift. Lol
mmanyquestionss@reddit
this comment is how i find out it's not lol
Year3030@reddit
I was gonna say, you gotta go back to '82 doc
umimama@reddit
DustedGorilla82@reddit
UWO_Throw_Away@reddit
The voice of Kiki from Kiki’s Delivery Service! :)
Aceguy55@reddit
They have an Internet modem and a PC on the floor by their desk....
GoddamnDiva@reddit
Because computers existed in the 90s, they just typically didn’t have internet on them, not until the very late 90s.
nottomelvinbrag@reddit
Na, that printer is pure 90's
Sufficient_Turn_9209@reddit
Uh huh. That's not the problem.
ChiefBroady@reddit
Yeah. Looks like a hp 720c from ‘97. Not sure why you’re downvoted. Girl in the pic looks 14-15, which would make her a 82-83 year. It all fist.
Hossflex@reddit
Same with the tower pc.
Maxfunky@reddit
And was the person in the picture apparently born the same day the photo was taken?
Hossflex@reddit
Nah I missed the first comment. I have no clue who is in the picture. I was skimming through and saw the same PC my family had in the 90’s.
neuro_space_explorer@reddit
Jesus dude, just think a little.
Ckn-bns-jns@reddit
Found the Zillennial
anyb0dyme@reddit
Maxfunky@reddit
Yeah but she's like 13... The math is easy here.
graveybrains@reddit
Sufficient_Turn_9209@reddit
This was every 16 year old girl's room IN 1999. Or 96, 97, 98.
ezmoney98@reddit
Well she is a Vampire
Sufficient-Quote-431@reddit
Your ten years off but good job taking our history millennial….
Remember your culture is Barney the dinosaur and go-gurt
Stop trying to steal our identity because yours sucks
Iocnar@reddit
They would've completely missed comic books which were part of daily American life from 1930-1992
Olelander@reddit
I was born in ‘78 and I think I got the perfect mix. I had time to basically fully develop before the internet became a daily use facet of life, but was still young enough to learn and adapt to its use and evolution over the past 25-30years.
BilingualClothes27@reddit
Damn right! Now if only people actually listened to us!!!!!
haventsleptforyears@reddit
Pffffffft who made this study, millennials??
Helpful-Salt4034@reddit
I'd say the sweetspot is probably more like 85-92
Far-Veterinarian6465@reddit
The person who made this up, clearly is sad they missed the cutoff for the Xennial, which was the perfect mix of life before and after the internet.
*Side note- I wonder if you were outside of that timeframe and lived in a small town Xennial timeframe could be shifted as things seemed to take longer to get to those smaller communities, ie internet.
plekplek@reddit
I could have done with more pre-internet frankly.
longbreaddinosaur@reddit
If they missed AIM and ICQ in middle school, they missed the best part of the early internet.
FifanomicsFC@reddit
1982 was the optimal year for this
ssaall58214@reddit
Intrepid_Block_11b@reddit
I was 12 years old in 1995 when I got my first email address
narcowake@reddit
That study was AI driven probably
BBWDLLUVER@reddit
thematrixhasyoum8@reddit
1981 and im starting to forget life before the Internet but im fully aware of how worse of we are as a species because of it. This is not the vision of the future I had back in my teen years in the 90s. Its a dystopian nightmare
LazarusDark@reddit
I mean, it's exactly the future all those cyberpunk stories told me was coming. Well... Except it's a lot dumber than those stories predicted, they underestimated how dumb humans are even while we create more complex technologies.
mofonz@reddit
I was on the internet in 1994. How come people born 5 years later could recall a time before? By 99 I was buying a lot of tennis gear, games, computer parts online. Heck, I was watching my uni lectures and not showing up…
I think 1979 - 1989 more accurate.
valentinegirl81@reddit
I was born in 1981 and the internet didn’t enter my life until 1996 at age 15. I think we’re the last generation to have a completely internet free childhood.
Nick_Fotiu_Is_God@reddit
I peg the wide adoption of the internet to be in about 1995 or so so no, in order to clearly remember life without the internet you’d have to be born much earlier.
WritingNerdy@reddit
Pretty sure the internet came out before then but go off, headline
BurantX40@reddit
I mean, I would say that the internet as we know it today didn't kick off until the mid to late 2000s, so it's close. Just barely.
Daylight-Silence@reddit
If you were born in 1999, iPhones came out when you were 8. Get outta here
ConnorFin22@reddit
That’s still a relatively internet free childhood, or at least smart tech free. Most people didn’t have iPhones until the early 2010s. I had a slider phone until 2011.
LazarusDark@reddit
That's not what the picture is talking about. It's not talking about smartphones.
Daylight-Silence@reddit
The dot-com crash was in 2000.
I barely remember an internet-free time, and I was born in 1984. Smartphones were just the death knell where it became inescapable sll the time. If that hit when you were 8, I doubt you have a meaningful sense of life without it.
thedoginthewok@reddit
I had the exact same thought (bout not remembering the pre-internet times), I was born in 1991.
It's just highly ridiculous to claim people born in 1999 have any idea about the pre-internet times.
ConnorFin22@reddit
I was 9 when the iPhone came out. I was 10 or 11 when I used one for the first time. Before that the internet was just on a box in one room of the house. That’s very different from today.
All I’m saying is my childhood in the 00s cant be compared to those who came later. It look a long time for the internet to seep in and take over every element of life.
AppropriatelyWild@reddit
I was using the Internet in 96
darksidemags@reddit
I was using irc in 1992
Zealousideal_Job5986@reddit
Wow didn't know it was that old 😳
darksidemags@reddit
I'm going to pretend I didn't read "that old" haha. The protocol was developed in 1988.
bluecyanic@reddit
Which protocol? The internet was a thing well before 88
rlovelock@reddit
Right there with ya! a/s/l?
addisonclark@reddit
I can hear the dial up and smell the knotty pine as I patiently waited to get logged in on our family computer in the basement. Sometime in middle school so def early 90s.
temporary_bob@reddit
Yeah this is idiotic. I was online in 95 at college. Wtf.
LazarusDark@reddit
Facebook was a cesspool when I finally deleted it... In 2011. And I'd been complaining about it going downhill for two years by that point. A 99 kid would have been 10 when the Internet started to go to crap. They almost completely missed the golden age of the internet (which I believe truly ended about 2015-ish).
Now you might say they remember a childhood before the ubiquity of smartphones... But by high school every one of those kids had a hand-down iPhone when their parents upgraded. They do not remember a childhood that wasn't completely digital. They've had Google since they were born.
pittdancer@reddit
I went to college in 1999…with a computer….that had internet. Don’t get me wrong, it was top of the line with a massive 12 gig hard drive 😆 but no one born in 1999 had any sort of life before internet.
_-Emperor@reddit
What’s the problem with that? We clearly remember a time before iPhones and after iPhones
ShortBrownAndUgly@reddit
Yeah, what a stupid conclusion for this stidy
gonzo0815@reddit
I don't see a study, just an image with the word "study".
FoppyRETURNS@reddit
My wife cites these "studies,"
anshityo@reddit
I’d have to disagree. Born in 98 but grew up with 90’s tech and tools until about 2008. After that my family started catching up more.
Day2205@reddit
Right? I’m like boomers had already descended upon Facebook and the POTUS had a twitter by the time you were 10. You were cataloging your life on the internet by the time you entered high school. lol @ this weird 99 cutoff
darksidemags@reddit
By 1997 I'd already used irc, had two different email addresses, and was about to sign up for this new service I heard about in a backpacker hostel in Seattle.... it was called Hotmail. Kids born 89-99 don't know shit about the pre- digital world order.
EiichiroKumetsu@reddit
yes, because everyone is from usa and had money for an iphone in 2007
BigBlueMountainStar@reddit
And the internet was already starting to go down the drain by the time you’d have been old enough to use it
Efficient-Ride2039@reddit
This is dumb. Kids born in 1999 were assigned iPads at birth
LazarusDark@reddit
Facebook was a cesspool when I finally deleted it... In 2011. And I'd been complaining about it going downhill for two years by that point. A 99 kid would have been 10 when the Internet started to go to crap. They almost completely missed the golden age of the internet (which I believe truly ended about 2015-ish).
Now you might say they remember a childhood before the ubiquity of smartphones... But by high school every one of those kids had a hand-down iPhone when their parents upgraded. They do not remember a childhood that wasn't completely digital. They've had Google since they were born.
f33tSp3ak@reddit
iPads didn’t exist in 1999 ffs
CeleryintheButt@reddit
Palm Pilots
OnlyGuestsMusic@reddit
2010 lol
Blackbird136@reddit
Right!! They’d have had DSL/cable connection before even starting kindergarten.
p8nt_junkie@reddit
Pink Paisley Telecaster run through a small Tweed Fender tube amp is heaven especially during 1989-1999.
peachtuba@reddit
So happy to see someone else comment on this! Those Paisleys were rad. To non-guitarists they looked like wallpaper guitars, and it was such a joy to see them in the hands of an absolute ripper.
p8nt_junkie@reddit
The blue paisley Teles were pretty too. I did NOT know what to think of that crystal clear guard, at first. It’s so funny to me what 20/ almost 30 years did/ have done. I have hit my mid-life and I am back to playing my old Strat and JM and teaching my daughter how to play her acoustic.
Hey, have a fun day!
greenwoodgiant@reddit
There’s no way someone born after like 94/95 remembers life before the Internet. Maybe THEY didn’t have the Internet, but that’s not the same as “life before the Internet”
joelkeys0519@reddit
84 here, and I can make a case for all the 78-83 folks. I think past 84-85, there is a drop off and by 89 it’s just a different world. Those kids grew up with the internet being readily available. I didn’t see that until I was about 12-13.
Regardless, 1999? FFS 🤦♂️
PantstheOG@reddit
Those dates are off try 1979-1994, half the people born in 1999 didn’t know what a pay phone was until maroon 5 made a song about it.
fatstupidlazypoor@reddit
when I was 12 and 13 years old, I was on BBSes
When I was 25 years old, I was building an ISP
Now I'm 49 years and a spec-based/agentic developer
My arc has been wild
Unique_Drummer_6515@reddit
everytime i redownload reddit i delete it so fucking fast. the internet is dead folks… 1500 upvotes for something saying people born in 1999 had a perfect mix of life before the internet.
jbergman420@reddit
People born in 99 never knew life without internet. Do better
Odd-Scarcity5288@reddit
Fucking Millennials trying the “I’m special…blah blah blah” bullshit again! Get over it already
gpo321@reddit
79-89 is a better timeline.
Immorpher@reddit
I'd like to know that study; its probably bogus. Those born in 1999 know no life without the internet.
LopensCouisin@reddit
I went off to college in 1999 and was excited for plug in Ethernet access!
HicJacetMelilla@reddit
Same. It was SO FAST
33ff00@reddit
It was from Rage Bait U, I believe. Department of Slightly Incorrect to Drive Engagement.
sey5_venn@reddit
No researcher would use the word "perfect" to describe such an ambiguous and debatable topic. Someone was probably fishing for ideas and came across a study that found children who attended middle school before the Internet was widely used have better social skills or something. Snag a picture of a kid from The Before Time, slap some misleading text on it, and BOOM you got yourself a Podcast topic.
burjja@reddit
The study might have been about social media and/or mobile web. I've seen social media adaption listed as the dividing line for Millenials and Gen Z, with Gen Z being the first to have social media from the start of their middle school years.
LabOwn9800@reddit
To be fair the first parts of the internet happened in 1969. So most of Gen X doesn’t remember a time before the internet as well.
Immorpher@reddit
That is technically true ya. I worked on a computer from '79 whose internet connected through serial. But I never had internet at home until late 90's.
LabOwn9800@reddit
Fully agree and I’m being very pedantic but the prompt was “known no life without the internet” not “known no life without the wide adoption of the internet”.
burjja@reddit
I think you can make the argument that when people say internet, they mean the World Wide Web, which was created in 1989. The average person was unaware of the internet before the WWW.
MediumLanguageModel@reddit
By the time those born in 1989 were in kindergarten the family was figuring out how to manage using the World Wide Web when someone was expecting a phone call.
Us Xennial middle schoolers would just hop on a bike and go wherever the fuck until it got dark. Maybe you called from a friend's house so Mom wouldn't worry. Napster was already a nationwide scandal by the time those kids were eighth graders.
Immorpher@reddit
Yup! Indeed!
Not-a-Kitten@reddit
I first used the internet w pictures in 1995 (text only first in 1992). Maybe they are talking about smartphones?
CReeseRozz@reddit
SpaceBowie2008@reddit
You guys fell for rage bait engagement by upvoting this stupid post.
LongStrongAndWrong@reddit
*Study lead by someone born between 1989 and 1999.
FoppyRETURNS@reddit
1999? You mean people who grew up with broadband?
muempire93@reddit
Whenever I see a post that starts with study says, I'm led to believe its complete horse shit.
cityfireguy@reddit
It's bait. They get the years wrong intentionally, that gets you mad, that makes you comment, that's engagement.
We live in hell. Start picking up on the rules.
cacecil1@reddit
Huh? How absurd. I was getting on the Internet in 1992.
BondsOfFriendship@reddit
I’d argue the early dial-up internet still was something different. Like Siri and ChatGPT.
ramalledas@reddit
A paisley tele and a tweed amp? What kind of training has this IA had?
TiaHatesSocials@reddit
Nah. Thats bs. Way too late. I could absolutely use more life before internet
ATheeStallion@reddit
In college 99-01: the photography department had both digital cameras and all the manual cameras from medium format to 4x5. I learned it all while simultaneously taking video editing class: adobe premiere & graphic design: photoshop. We all knew the digital image was going to kill it all and there were so many intellectual convos about it. What happened? Death of so much media. What has risen from ashes? AI.
LemonCitron47@reddit
Did they mean 1979-1989? Otherwise this makes no sense.
ADMINlSTRAT0R@reddit
I was already on T1 connection at my dorm by the end of the era OP posted.
zaminDDH@reddit
I was in high school, but yeah, I was selling burned CDs from Napster in '99 because I was one of the few kids that had both a cable modem and a CD burner.
ATheeStallion@reddit
Ooooh I haven’t thought about napster & torrent tech in so long. 99 was peak napster.
gabigboy93@reddit
It has to be 79-89. I was born in 79 and I clearly remember life before the internet. I started working when some retail stores I worked still used knuckle buster credit card machines. I still remember when I first started paying bills the only way to pay my utility bill was to go to said utility and pay at the counter or in the drop box. But I do remember chat rooms and AOL when I was in middle school being a huge deal. From 12-21 was a perfect blend of the way things were and the way they have become now. Still wouldn’t trade it for anything.
Dean_Proffitt@reddit
I was checking out at a store recently and mentioned the old physical credit card paper slips and the contraption used to the clerks. They looked at me like I had three heads. Then I realized they were in their 20’s and I’m in my 40’s.
ATheeStallion@reddit
I barely remember them.
Automaticman01@reddit
I remember when I was a kid and they had a huge book of stolen/cancelled credit card numbers that they would look up to make sure you're card was not in the list
Triette@reddit
Exactly all of this.
DjQball@reddit
I worked at a gas station car wash that had a knucklebuster up until 2002!
HostilePile@reddit
We had those knuckle busters as backups well into the early 00s
zaminDDH@reddit
Gas station I ran still had one in 2012 when I left. It was only used for when certain types of fleet cards (cops, ambulances, truckers) wouldn't read for whatever reason. We'd have a few a week.
gabigboy93@reddit
I had a job in college working at a call center for credit cards. I worked in a department they called “Want to Honor” where we would call establishments that chose to accept Amex to make sure they had their stickers up letting their patrons know they accept the card. Part of our script was of your machine isn’t working, we remind you to use the imprint machine to capture purchases. Simple job, simpler time. Sometimes I’d love to go back to that repetitive, simple job. 🤣
a_solid_6@reddit
It's just dawning on me that that's the reason they stopped bothering to make credit cards with the raised numbers.
Awesam@reddit
Went I Ecuador in 2013 and the hostel I stayed in had the triplicate forms but my credit card was a chase sapphire with minimally raised numbers and on checkout the owner ringing me up had to put some folded napkins under my card to create enough pressure for the carbon paper get the imprints
gabigboy93@reddit
That has never occurred to me until right now. Wow.
TP_Crisis_2020@reddit
Yeah, my first job at a fast food place, they still used a manual cash register. Did the ka-ching sound as it popped open the drawer each time. At the end of each shift, the manager had to take the receipt paper from the register and manually tally up the totals.
And I remember paying my bills by check! Having to balance your checkbook.
LopensCouisin@reddit
I used to use those chat rooms all the time!
prettyokdiscgolfer@reddit
Born 1980. Can confirm.
Sufficient_Turn_9209@reddit
My first time filing income taxes for my little after school job at County Seat was on one of these little 2 page "pamphlets". The internet was for browsing and chatting.
FastWalkingShortGuy@reddit
When I first started paying bills, you still had to write a paper check and snail mail it.
quixotica726@reddit
I remember it was called "franking."
BigBlueMountainStar@reddit
Or maybe they meant 74-75?
Key_Permission_3351@reddit
Yeah, I feel like at least by the time Windows 95 is around, there's an established internet. If you're born in the 90s at all, let alone 1999, you don't remember much or any life without the internet.
musical_shares@reddit
At least.
My household connected via TCP Trumpet Winsock on windows 3.11 and we weren’t the first house on the street with internet.
Also, BBS access was prevalent in the years prior to 3.11, I can remember we were all playing our daily turns on LORD well before there was much worth doing on the internet.
Squidflex@reddit
BBSes were the jam. I liked LORD, but I mostly played TradeWars or Usurper (by Jakob Dangarden).
jasonrubik@reddit
Lord was fun but Lunatix was my jam.
TP_Crisis_2020@reddit
Yeah, trumpet winsock! That was back in the day where there were local ISP's and you actually had options to choose from.
Our first computer came with a 14.4 modem. It got upgraded to a US Robotics 28.8 modem later, and turns out it was a model where they later released a firmware update that flashed it to make it a 33.6!
danielleiellle@reddit
darksidemags@reddit
In 1992 during my first year of university, a nerd I worked with on campus introduced me to IRC, which I used to talk to my long distance boyfriend. So yeah. Them 80s babies don't know shit about pre- internet life.
doktorhladnjak@reddit
Even then, it was not very ubiquitous. I worked at an internet startup in 1995. Most businesses didn’t even have websites yet. When I went to college in 1997, my dorm had just been wired for non dial up internet.
I feel like it didn’t really get traction until the very late 90s. And really not until smart phones with apps around 2010 or so. That’s when people like my parents reached the level of social media usage where they started having drama.
WellHung67@reddit
You barely used it except the same way you might use tv - so in a very structured way, at home, and when you were not home you weren’t using it. It wasn’t ubiquitous, as in 24/7 access via phone, until like 2008 and even then it wasn’t common for kids until like what 2012 or so. So that’s the rub, those ages grew up with it but not like absorbed in it, you still had to have computer skills to use it for the most part
Impossible_Angle752@reddit
If you were born in 1999, you probably don't even remember not having high speed internet.
Disastrous_Bother173@reddit
Eh, my sister was born in 86 and even she doesn't remember life before the internet. We are truly a niche era.
Tall-Introduction414@reddit
She doesn't remember being 7 years old?
Disastrous_Bother173@reddit
We had dial up at home from the early 90s.
Tall-Introduction414@reddit
Okay... the first commercial ISPs hit in 1994. 1995 was when the internet became known by the general public. So, unless your parents were military or university researchers, I am calling BS on that one.
Disastrous_Bother173@reddit
According to wiki which had its own issues by 1995 AOL had 3 million users.
Tall-Introduction414@reddit
AOL was not an ISP, back then, though. It was an online service separate from the internet, similar to CompuServe and Prodigy. They started offering usenet around 1994, and TCP/IP connectivity later on.
TP_Crisis_2020@reddit
The Eternal September!
Person2984@reddit
Those were separate from the Web, but those were all part of the Internet.
shiddedandfarded69@reddit
Nobody refers to BBS as "the internet". It was a completely different system with hundreds of boards that were segregated from eachother. Not to mention it was a niche service that was nowhere near as popular as even the first year of the internet.
mastawyrm@reddit
I remember my dad using compuserve to load up a weather radar image on the computer and it included a little santa because it was late december. I was pretty young so it couldn't have been as recently as 95. I even do enterprise networking for a living but I am just now learning that wasn't a full proper ISP
Sufficient_Turn_9209@reddit
Memory unlocked. We used Netscape Navigator and I still remember a guy in a chat room calling it Nutscape because it was "so bad". Before that I thought Netscape was "the internet". That's when I first started playing around, learning, and getting a grasp on what the internet really was. Then we got windows 95 and Internet Explorer.
chadwickipedia@reddit
I’m 40 and I 100% remember life before internet. First time I saw the internet was 96
ChiMara777@reddit
Wow. My brother was 86 and I’m sure he remembers life pre-internet. Even in high school, he was constantly outdoors riding bikes, rollerblading, exploring, and he had multiple broken bones to show for it. I don’t remember the internet becoming a bigger thing in my life until high school, so he would have been high school (or at least junior high by then). But we didn’t have AOL continuously and even when we did, it was dial up and a limited number of minutes, so we’d just sign in, get our email, and sign out. Maybe it depends on how quickly each family adopted the new technology?
mblaser@reddit
Really? You must have either gotten internet before most people or your sister has a terrible memory of her childhood lol.
Internet adoption really only started to take off in the second half of the 90's, especially with AOL in 95. (1996 here, when I was 17).
ferret96@reddit
I was on the internet in early 90s through a college based freenet as a young teenager.
mblaser@reddit
I didn't say it wasn't possible. What are the odds that this person's sister was there as well? You were in an incredibly small group of people. The WWW wasn't even public until 1993, which would have made their sister 7, and didn't really take off until 95 or 96, making the sister 9 or 10. I very much doubt they don't have memories of life from before that age.
greenmky@reddit
Sure
But I only knew 2-3 people with Internet in 1997
I experienced a little dialup at my gf's place during the summer of 1997. Most of my first real Internet exposure was broadband at college that fall.
mblaser@reddit
That proves my point even more. If the person I'm replying to got internet in 1997 then their sister would have been 11. No memories of life before 11 years old? Really?
Only about 20% of households had home internet in 1997, so the odds are that they got it later than that, so now the sister's age is creeping up even more.
Tiny-Reading5982@reddit
How? I was born in 84 and my house didn't have internet until 1998. I was 13.
LemonCitron47@reddit
My brother was born in 86 as well and remembers life before the internet.
drainbamage1011@reddit
My sister was born in '88 and remembers before we got internet at home. (It was '99ish, with some reluctance by my dad.)
Downvote_me_dumbass@reddit
I was born in ‘86 and remember a time before the internet, so either your sister has a bad memory or you don’t know your sister
Kuros_Of_Sindarin@reddit
I would imagine a lot of it depends on how you grew up. I was born in 86 as well but we didn't get the Internet until I was a teenager.
nola_mike@reddit
That would make her 39/40. There is no way she doesn't remember life pre Internet.
driventhin@reddit
I had full dial up in my college apartment in 1997-1998, but yes let’s pretend people born in 1999 know what the pre-internet era was…. 🙄
sdcasurf01@reddit
89-99 in Eastern Montana, maybe.
ThrowAwayColor2023@reddit
Came here to say this.
taraky97@reddit
Right 79 was perfect to experience both fully.
cjbr3eze@reddit
This makes more sense. Mid to late 90s births had a much shorter period of peace.
TrumpsATraitorSoAreU@reddit
I was born in 90 and it was perfect for me. A childhood free of tech, then cellphones catching on big in jr high and then high school was MySpace, etc.
ATheeStallion@reddit
Tbh as a certified 90s mall rat, I do not miss malls.
Valuable_Exercise85@reddit
Global-Jury8810@reddit
I think 79 to 89 is more accurate. If we want to be even closer to the article, probably more like 85 to 95.
DiogenesK9@reddit
How stupid...
Gregory_GTO@reddit
I was born in 78 am I'm glad there were no cameras when I was in school 💯
TenBear@reddit
They keep changing the dates
Bluffwatcher@reddit
ITT - People fall for engagement bait.
Cornelius_Physales@reddit
That remains to be seen... Everything seems to get downhill and I see no silver lining. I'm tired
Maxaloo@reddit
Was the study done by some born between those dates? Lol. Cause they're wrong
mcjangus@reddit
I disagree. People born in 1989 were 10 in 1999 and by the the Internet was already growing into an important part of pop culture. I was born in 1984 and by 1999 I was doing web development, involved in online communities, talking to real-life friends online after school, etc. People born even at the earliest end of the 1989-1999 spectrum barely got a taste of pre-internet life. Pre-smartphone, sure. But not pre-internet.
Acrobatic_Ad7061@reddit
I think a lot of people mix up pre-internet and pre-smartphones. Young people don’t know the difference. Before smartphones there were nothing according to them.
jsusbidud@reddit
That's just a picture someone has made. And they didn't do any maths.
CookieTX2022@reddit
People born in 1999 have always had internet. In 2005 they were only ) years old, they definitely grew up with the internet. They’ve also grown up with cell phones & smart phones. Can’t even compare to the decade before
Acrobatic_Ad7061@reddit
Exactly. I got my first cell phone in 1999 and by then my friends already had one. A person born in ’99 can’t be serious if they tell me they had an analogue childhood unless they were brought up in the rural parts of a developing country.
Hammy-Cheeks@reddit
98' here and yeah, I was raised like a millennial because both my siblings are. My household didnt get wifi until 2014. I didnt get a phone until I was 15. The moment I did though, it was just full on gen z lol
Acrobatic_Ad7061@reddit
If you were raised as a millennial why didn’t you have a phone until 2013?
Dudelbug2000@reddit
I was born mid seventies and i didn’t have internet access till university. So I grew up analog but was able to adopt to technology very easily. So I think mid to late seventies is peak Xennial duality benefit.
Acrobatic_Ad7061@reddit
Yes but every generation want to be special. People born in ’99 want a piece of the analogue-cake to brag about.
babe_ruthless3@reddit
These numbers can be correct. I was born in 1983 and didnt know what the internet was until I was 13. First time I used it was probably 14 and I didnt have my own computer until I was 16(a month away form 17). My experience isn't the same as everyone else, but this is what most of my friends experience was with the internet. Almost as if I puberty and the internet showed up at the same time.
Acrobatic_Ad7061@reddit
But you’re born in 1983, not 1999. Nobody born in 1999 could go 13 years without knowing about internet.
thomasjmarlowe@reddit
What the fuck? 5 years old when the internet started to get widespread?
Antique-Ad-4422@reddit
I have a kid who was born in 1999. I can positively say this statement is not true.
Uneventful_Badger@reddit
I mean I definitely remember life before and after the net and I was mid 80s baby.
Unusual-Minimum9306@reddit
If you couldn’t get into a bar before the first iPhone came out get the fuck outta here!
Puffyfugu8@reddit
If you couldn’t go to a bodega when you were 11 and get sold a beer with no questions asked, get out of here!
Unusual-Minimum9306@reddit
I used to ride my bike to the gas station and buy the news paper and a pack of Salem’s for my grandfather when I was about 10
RadiantChange2238@reddit
Teenagers existed in the 2000s. They are millennials
CplHicks_LV426@reddit
I was born in 1976 and I think I had a perfect mix of life before and after internet. We got internet when I was a senior in high school. It was nearly useless for research while I was in college, it was just too new, but there was lots of games and people to chat with. I started building websites in 1995 when the web was the wild west.
volission@reddit
Born mid 90s can confirm it’s true
weltvonalex@reddit
Except for Balkan people....
Zeppo_Ennui@reddit
What study?
Two middle aged stoners sitting in a room?
HisMrsAraya@reddit
81 here and this is me for sure. It's our Micro generation! Lol
pir8salt@reddit
HS Class of 2000. We had the pron but not the bullying. '81 FTW
imagine-meatloaf@reddit
People born between 1889 - 1899 got perfect mix of life before and after internet.
Jillet-Ben_Coe@reddit
I love how upset people are about this. Gen Z is just entirely fucked lmao
jadethebard@reddit
I had over a hundred Angelfire sites in 1999. lmao
Cutthechitchata-hole@reddit
Ummmmm. Id say more like the micro gen born between 75 and 85
TheHighDruid@reddit
Installed my first cable modem sometime in 2000 and was playing far too much EverQuest.
darksidemags@reddit
1974 here. I got all the way through high school without internet but in my first year of university irc chat was a thing so I feel like if you were born after the 70s you did not get to experience an internet free childhood.
sneekeruk@reddit
Born 78, and I sometimes think that was a little late. I first used the internet at 15, so 1993/4, If I was born a few years earlier, I would of got more into the peak of the BBS scene before moving to the internet, I missed out on Rave culture being 11 in 1988. I did get to witness computers going from 8 bit to current times though.
Rhiannon1307@reddit
Must be a typo/other error, either meant to be 80 or 79 to 89 or 90.
LukeLovesLakes@reddit
Anyone born in 1999 completely missed the golden age of the internet. It was over by 2007.
vabello@reddit
I was using the Internet in 1995…
Kandurux@reddit
Yeah at home, in school before that, but not much.
SarkSouls008@reddit
It’s rage bait. People keep using this same image and changing the years lol
ThanksALotBud@reddit
Off by a decade.
Its 1979 to 1989
feydrautha124@reddit
Study done
PDXBishop@reddit
If you were born in 1999, you've never known a moment where the internet didn't exist.
litesaber5@reddit
Why does this keep popping up. It’s obviously people born between 79 and like 85
XClamX@reddit
Those years are 10 too many.
ThisSideOfHistory@reddit
Lol
Rare-Extension-6023@reddit
a 'study' is mentioning a 'perfect' mix? cmon. what BS
59apache01@reddit
Sign made by a person born in 2004.....
PantherkittySoftware@reddit
Ummm... the internet existed in 1989, and I can show archived posts I made to comp.sys.amiga.programmer before Spring Break 1990 as receipts. :-)
Smartphones with PalmOS & internet connectivity arrived in 2001 (Samsung SPH-i300, I owned one), but Palm Pilots tethered to phones as modems existed in 1997... or earlier, if you had an IBM Simon like my friend's dad.
Logical_Still_9856@reddit
1975 born ftw. Bicentennial baby
SmileyPiesUntilIDrop@reddit
I am not sure their is a "perfect " year because of how much tech someone had access to or was required to use varies so much by region/socioeconomic background. I was born in 81 and know a friend who had their own pc in 93,but also knew people from my hs whoutside of a flip phone were entirely living like it's a predigital world with no daily internet usage as recent as the late 00's.
Queen_Of_InnisLear@reddit
99?? I had Internet at home by like 1996. I had a cell phone in 2001 I think. Kids born in 99 absolutely did not know what pre internet life was. Who the fuck wrote this
Numerous-Process2981@reddit
If by perfect mix you mean I am keenly aware that we are deep into the enshittification now and technology has destroyed everyone’s brain
YellowBelliedCoward@reddit
This is definitely more true of people born in the 80s
Adventurous_Pin_344@reddit
-One-Man-Bukkake-@reddit
Anyone who died before the internet got the perfect balance
AlissonHarlan@reddit
i'm born in 1983 and start to have internet in 1999, at 16. This is a real before/after.
I still grew up playing outside, using a phone book, and having games on floppy disks.
Idk how someone born in 1999 can know a 'before'
Konnorwolf@reddit
Someone born in 1999 should have always had the internet.
KaleidoscopeThis5159@reddit
someone born in the late 90s may not even remember dialup but i was so poor I had it until almost the mid 2010s
lakebistcho@reddit
These numbers seem off
Shane-O-Mac1@reddit
Just missed it.
monobluemill@reddit
That is a sweet, sweet Tele, damn
T4cchi@reddit
Saw this on some other channel 92-97. The internet is dead
Blurby-Blurbyblurb@reddit
My oldest was born in 1999. It wasn't the digital age it is now with my youngest, but it wasn't like it was for Xennials.
I showed her a rotary phone at an antique store and it blew her mind. The only landline she had access to was at her grandparents. The only wired phone is in the kitchen. None of it was standard.
Turbulent_Tale6497@reddit
Is that actually a picture of Clarissa? She explained a lot
frankreynoldsrumham@reddit
Explains it all
Jesta23@reddit
82 here and I was at the perfect spot.
In my 20’s when everything started being monetized, and just young enough to grow up programming as a teen.
I wrote punters and anti punters for AOL. (Programs that could make someone’s computer reboot or log out of aol through instant messaging)
Dreaming_of_Rlyeh@reddit
Study says that adding "Study says" to a meme does not make it real.
BittenBeads@reddit
Really though. If you're born in 1989, you had zero formative years pre-internet cuz the WWW went public in the early 1990s. And smart phones were ubiquitous by the time you became a teen.
babylegs_@reddit
I was born in 1990 and we didn’t have internet at home until 2000/2001 which was pretty standard. The first iPhone came out when I was 17. They were extremely expensive. I didn’t know anyone who actually had one at that time so they definitely weren’t ubiquitous. I got my first smartphone my senior year of college (2012). My life up until age 10/11 I pretty much didn’t experience the internet at all and I don’t think I was an outlier
InternationalRow1653@reddit
Thank you for this cause I remember getting on the Internet in elementary school and people keep saying late 90s and I was thinking I'm crazy for a sec. I know for sure I was in elementary school when I got on the Internet. I was a teenager in the late 90s so it wasn't adding up.
MmmSteaky@reddit
Yeah, we had Prodigy dial-up in the early ‘90s, and the standalone Juno email client in the mid ‘90s.
Dreaming_of_Rlyeh@reddit
I agree that the statement isn’t true, but I was actually meaning the “study” isn’t even real haha
akchahal@reddit
Internet was pretty widely adopted and used by like 1998.
Littlelolapickles@reddit
If you were born in 1999 then you don’t know life before computers. I was born in 82. I know life before and after computers. I think I had a great year to be born.
mari815@reddit
1979-1989
stykface@reddit
I'm an '82 model. I hit it pretty much perfect on the benefits of life before and after the internet. But, do we REALLY have it good with the internet these days? Lol
Conscious-Lunch-5733@reddit
This makes absolutely no sense...
gone_smell_blind@reddit
Lol this is rage bait. This same picture was posted yesterday on a different sup with a different age range on it
famousanonamos@reddit
So true. NOT!
Major-Tourist-5696@reddit
Make it 79-89 and then yes.
PremiumTVforDogs@reddit
I was born in 84 and I don't feel like I got a perfect mix. My dad was a scientist and I've been online my entire life.
smoothAsH20@reddit
WRONG
There is no way this is possible. The oldest person would have been 10 in 1999. The internet really blew up in 1995. In 1995 almost everyone had internet connection. The oldest person would have been 5. The youngest person would have been -5.
babylegs_@reddit
Only about 15% of households in the US had an internet connection in 1995. That’s a decent amount of people but it was still rare/uncommon. It was in about 50% of US households in 2000-2001. I agree most people born in the late 90s wouldn’t remember a life pre-internet but I think most born in the early 90s would. Of course it somewhat depends on each person’s household though and how/where they grew up
mettle_dad@reddit
Internet didn't become a household thing till 1995 right? So anyone born between 1980-1990 got to live life with no Internet untill they were already a teenager or young adult. 1989 for me and i remember xenga and aol instant messagner. But also being outside with the gang all day till the sun went down. Sleep overs. School without phones. Well we had flip phones that you weren't allowed to be seen with. But not these crazy addictive smart phones. I'm with the boomers on this phone garbage. It's poison that needs to be massively reformed or restricted.
Asleep_Onion@reddit
Even people born in 1989 would have only been about 5 years old at the point when the Internet was really taking off and many households were getting it.
Paddlesons@reddit
Nah, trust me....1979
maroonfalcon@reddit
‘79 was a good time to be born.
OffMeta13@reddit
We had a rotary phone that is still attached to my parent’s wall. And they had an old black and white tv in their bedroom for a long time.
pchs26@reddit
1999? Internet existed - granted it was more dial up...but still...
MarketCrache@reddit
Peak internet was about 2003.
Rshields_388@reddit
This makes no sense...
Zerocool_6687@reddit
1989? We went online in 1995… so the 6 year olds had a great fucken life prior to the everyday interest lol…
Agreeable-Chart-5561@reddit
Not true at all
USConservativeVegan@reddit
They are trying to steal our flavor. They didn't even get to enjoy the 80s and 90s. If you were in diapers for your 90s experience, you didn't experience it in any real level.
Most of their teens were ruled by smart phones and Facebook. That sounds dystopian..
UnjustifiedBDE@reddit
I like 75! Got the full 80's experience. I could see up to 81.
You want to be out of school before Colombine.
prettyokdiscgolfer@reddit
Born 1980. Can confirm.
sweaty_perineum96@reddit
Dang
Firebolt164@reddit
Lol people born in 1999 grew up with he internet
sassyblondechik@reddit
Yeah ok 👌 1977 here. I think late 70s early 80s have the perfect mix.
WonderfulHearing8726@reddit
Huh???? They’d be like 2 before the internet came online.
stsOddMonkey@reddit
Cool, cool. cool whatever..... I just want that pink paisley telecaster.
Tasty_Needleworker13@reddit
1979-1989 maybe but that's pushing it for sure.
Total_Blueberry_5799@reddit
84 here
DJWGibson@reddit
Ah, yes, a "study."
It's also absurd to call people born in 1999 as "before" the internet. They were barely able to read and Facebook was already a huge hit.
Silent_Creme3278@reddit
There is no perfect life after internet. It’s was good for about 2 years. After that it all went to shit.
MoarFlavor@reddit
It’s cute how badly they want to be us. Now bring in the “at least you tried” cake.
Ok_Fox_1770@reddit
This is so not life. 2012 feels like it swapped to synthetic. I chased technology as a kid, now I chase my roots and hate the rise. 40 is a strange one, full of surprises. 86 was a good year, showed up too early for young parents, like I knew. Gotta go now! It’s gonna go poop by 15!
carlivar@reddit
There was no before Internet in 1999. They probably mean social media.
cjbr3eze@reddit
This is bogus. If you weren't at least 10 before 2007 then you probably don't know what life was like before smartphones and social media.
ProtonCanon@reddit
...what study?
Skulls_of_Ink@reddit
There is no way anyone born in that range truly experienced and understood the "Y2K bug" prep insanity....
Used my first computer in like 1988, Telex by the early 90s to play L.O.R.D (Legend of the Red Dragon) online. Dad had a cell phone, satellite TV, and a "black box" same timeframe....
I was such a nerd....
donutseason@reddit
“Study by people will very cool older siblings and cousins pretend they get it” 😋
FadedDice@reddit
Generational claiming has hit a new peak, with this sentence.
Cptalcaine@reddit
Wrong. Gen X has the best mix.
neph36@reddit
In 1999 I had already graduated from BBS's and Sierra Online to AOL/Internet.
jojobizou@reddit
That is so cute
Hannibal0341@reddit
Born 1982. My childhood was absolutely perfect.
snorday@reddit
Well, that's just a stupid meme and this so called "study" doesn't exist. So that's that.
FlatRooster4561@reddit
I scoff at ‘82
Listening_Stranger82@reddit
So where's the study then?
ChrisAplin@reddit
I enjoyed my childhood but do we have to act like we had the best childhood? I love nostalgia but we’re not better than younger people.
bigDogNJ23@reddit
My parents are in their 80s, as far as I’m concerned they’ve seen plenty of life after internet. I personally don’t care to see anymore it’s already a disaster. I mean just look at me brain rotting away posting to Reddit.
DeeSt11@reddit
Un no lol
538_Jean@reddit
Where is the study?
SpectreInvestor@reddit
Can you believe those idiots didnt think we wouldn't eventually always have a calculator within reach.
muhredditone@reddit
I had a feature phone in 1999.
Bijou9@reddit
1989 baby here. Growing up, I never realized how good I had it until recently , raising teens and a 5 year old, how sad it is they will never have a childhood like mine. 😟 now it’s no personal devices at school then when they can and earn device time after school or on the weekend, they have 0 motivation to go outside and play
RyNysDad0722@reddit
89??? Not sure they even played Oregon Trail
babylegs_@reddit
Maybe up to 95 or so not 99. I was born in 90 and we got AOL when I was in 5th grade and WiFi when I was a freshman in high school which was pretty on-par with most of the other kids I knew
Strange_Airships@reddit
People born between 1989 and 1999 didn’t experience a world before the internet. They were fetuses at best.
Objective_Site3528@reddit
I was born in 1979 and I had my first email address around 1995. I’d argue that you have to be old enough to have witnessed and remember the actual beginnings of the internet to really know what it’s been like.
InternationalRow1653@reddit
82 here as well and they don't know wth they are talking about, 89-99 my ass
dark4181@reddit
I've become convinced that everyone should have an analogue childhood.
RustedMauss@reddit
This seems off by at least 4 years. I was born in 86, and PCs were just starting becoming fairly common around the time I was 7-9. Not *internet*, just having a pc. By the time I was 10 it was uncommon for people to not have one. But I don’t recall seeing the internet in use until maybe age 12-13 through school computer lab and it was still quite basic.
123456789_ok@reddit
Lol. $1700 fender
Exotic_Pay6994@reddit
1989, but I lived in Russia until 2000 and internet wasn't easy to access there even in cyber cafes.
So perhaps they don't mean only Americans born between 1989-1999.
Crans10@reddit
I was on the internet by 1994.
ChristyLovesGuitars@reddit
I’ve seen this meme go around for weeks, maybe longer. And it’s funny how the years change to reflect anything from the mid 60s to the entirety of the 90s.
BrainFartTheFirst@reddit
1999? My eBay account is older than that.
Emergency_Air_1548@reddit
1984 here. Oregon trail in 5th grade...
Terakahn@reddit
Study is wrong
Boo-Boo97@reddit
We had prodigy in my house in 1992/3 ish. It wasn't todays internet but it was there.
sixstringsikness@reddit
I know I want that Telecaster.
squanderedprivilege@reddit
Study says that a specific arbitrary decade got the "perfect mix", like what the hell is this study
MmmSteaky@reddit
Study: This Study Is Dumb
she-dont-use-jellyyy@reddit
Yet this is Kirsten Dunst... born in 1982.
Express-Cow190@reddit
Ah yes good old pre internet 1999…
Sad_Apple_3387@reddit
My 1999 born child would beg to differ. They have internet their entire life.
RandomlyGenaratedUsr@reddit
Seeing how I was on the internet in the late 90's, this doesn't make any sense. Unless they messed up the numbers, 79-89.
WaterAirSoil@reddit
This must be an AI hallucination
sailphish@reddit
People who were older kids/ teens in that time. Born in 1999 means internet was a major part of your life as far as you can remember
CarbonatedBrainSauce@reddit
This is either a typo, or it's engagement bait.
rolypoly817@reddit
Nah more like 82-92
henningknows@reddit
That girl went on to start a band called vampire weekend

henningknows@reddit
1999? Huh?
taleofbenji@reddit
Ah yes those glorious prenatal days before the Internet.
jackfaire@reddit
No they didn't. The internet while not in every home was a thing throughout the 90s both in influence and in pop culture.
My school was using the internet pretty heavily both in middle school and high school in the 90s. It was definitely not the "pre-internet" era some imagine it was.
I'm guessing that in the article they are talking about social media as if it's the entire internet.
Specialist-Leek8645@reddit
Does that mean we got too much pre-Internet life?
I agree with the comments, this is basically ragebait.
yomamaeatcorn@reddit
Pretty sure they had internet in 1999
InternetConfessional@reddit
1981 here. By 1999 I was already prohibited from going back on the internet until I turned 18 by federal probation!
sgrams04@reddit
Wrong years
AllDressedKetchup@reddit
90s kids barely knew a life before the internet.
nyXhcinPDX@reddit
I disagree. I would shift that from 1984 to 1990.
GenerationKrill@reddit
We like to think this about ourselves but the truth is the vast majority of our lives will still be spent with the internet at our fingertips and all the bullshit that comes with it. We were just the last generation to be born without the availability of the internet.
StaunchVictorianTV@reddit
Is Study the name of some lying child making shit up on the playground?
Dextropic@reddit
It's the guy in the circle.
Doodle_bug_24@reddit
This is definitely what they should have said.
ChiaGuava@reddit
You can’t make the claim that someone born when AIM was the biggest thing when I was a senior in high school knows life before the internet
mcg_090@reddit
*1979-1989
AdRadiant9379@reddit
Why a crock of shit. I was 12 when we got dial up at home in 93 , after having computers for 10 years…..
Plastic-Sentence9429@reddit
Study says that a picture with a caption on the internet isn't a study.
GravyPainter@reddit
1999? Before the Internet? I was unknowingly pirating entire albums on napster, chatting on yahoo! And pwning newbs on Starcraft.
Senor-Cockblock@reddit
1999? Before?
I already had a cable modem in my dorm room and was downloading music for my sick mix CDs.
Sdog1981@reddit
No way in hell. If you were born in 1999 your teenage years are going to be racked with full unchecked social media and you turn 21 during Covid. That just sucks.
_ism_@reddit
but the internet was born before half of those kids? what? did AI write this
Justincrediballs@reddit
The internet went mainstream in '95 when win95 came out as a internet friendly OS and AOL started mailing out those CD's.
CasualEveryday@reddit
Before ALL of those kids.
TheLastBoat@reddit
The study must have been conducted by Millennial Scientists. We need Dinosaucers, they had Barney. Losers.
iredditoninternet@reddit
More like 1979-89
Glittering-Grab7547@reddit
That’s Kiersten Dunst, a Xennial, right?
hamburgler26@reddit
Yes, whatever this study was smoking it was some bad shit.
sonsofthedesert@reddit
1977 you mean
GuitarPlayingGuy71@reddit
Hi! 1971 here. Was there for the first home computers, and still using modern tech now - obviously. I’ll just go fuck myself, right?
Turbulent_Ad9508@reddit
Maybe 79-89
dart51984@reddit
Well being born in 1984, I vividly remember the brown and beige of the 80’s literally everywhere and suddenly overnight dot com everything.
selftaughtgenius@reddit
People born when the internet was very much a thing got a “perfect mix of life before and after the internet”? 🧐
JohnnyLuchador@reddit
Fuckin comical, we all know us looked over Xennials are the true generation.
https://i.redd.it/b6xuu1lp5tyg1.gif
frougle_mcdugal@reddit
https://i.redd.it/x3pt8v5o6tyg1.gif
Accadius@reddit
We got dialup internet in 1996. My little brother born in 1995 has had internet his entire life. Yeah he was a year old before we got it but wouldnt remember not having it. It would be like me saying I experienced the Detroit Tigers win the world series because I was born in 84 a few months before they won it.
Slim-Jim89@reddit
1989, yes. 1999? I don't think so
andimacg@reddit
By '99 (age 18) I already had a phone and laptop with internet. '79-'89 is more like it.
Timmonidus@reddit
Nah, if you didnt fly before 2001 you missed out on how much fun it was to travel.
Rhianna83@reddit
Thereminz@reddit
do they not know when the internet came out
Flat-While2521@reddit
No study ever concluded that “people born within this arbitrarily ten-year range” had a perfect experience of anything at all, except perhaps the experience of being born within those particular years.
stevemmhmm@reddit
Bought the same amp and still have it!
Far-Veterinarian6465@reddit
6ohm@reddit
Study says: No internet - bad!
rjcpl@reddit
Yeah apparently missing consideration that we had ample opportunity to get in on the cushy job market if you just knew what HTML stood for. Our timing was perfect for the transition.
Upbeat_Main_7141@reddit
As in, died in 1999?