[hobbitstan]

I pity those who missed out on those tech golden decades of the 80's and 90's. The very idea of email was revolutionary. Getting news on demand while others waited for newspaper deliveries or set time TV shows was thrilling.

This is probably why Weird Science is one of my favorite films, because it captures that period where imaginations ran wild. The simple video games were fine as we used our imagination to fill in the gaps.

Tech these days has long lost it's magic. The 'AI' boom tried to recreate the buzz with nonsensical claims that it has failed to deliver. It's all smoke and mirrors these days.

I think the last time I was truly wowed was when Shazam appeared. That was 23 years ago.

[timknauf]

I’ve seen this sentiment a lot, and I do understand it but… I just feel so completely differently. The 2000s web, early web apps and Flash, the iPhone and smartphone revolution, the incredible buffet that is modern video games, virtual and mixed reality, and yes, even (imperfect, fraught) AI have all seemed as magical to me as those wonderful things from the 80s and 90s. Probably not coincidentally, many of those things have featured in my working life pretty heavily!

[macintux]

I remember chatting online (MUD) with a friend in Sweden in 1990. I sent her an email, and she confirmed it arrived moments later, and my mind was blown. For some reason I felt “mail” surely couldn’t arrive that fast, even though we were chatting interactively in real time.

[z0r]

I visited a relative last summer and tried on their Meta Quest 3 headset, the first time I ever tried a modern VR headset. I was blown away by the interface overlaying my vision. I tried a VR minigolf game (Walkabout mini golf? I'm not certain) and was amazed by how immersive it was.

Your comment has prompted my response because it reminded me that I thought Shazam was great too, and it made me think of what more recent incredible technological experiences I've had. I don't know if you've tried on a VR (or more accurately AR) headset recently but the engineering is really something.

[shever73]

I was wowed when I first got home Internet in 1995 because it was so much more than the BBSs I’d been using up to that point, but nothing has recreated the sense of wonder I had on 8-bit machines in the 80s. Even when I bought a secondhand PC in the late 80s, going through the hand-labelled disks was like a treasure hunt. That’s how I first discovered Hack/Nethack, played Leygref’s Castle and started learning Borland Turbo Pascal.

[b112]

If you get ice crean for dessert nightly, it's not exciting or even a joy.

It needs to be rare, or new, to be a treat.

I think now, there's always a computer near me. How can it still be special?

Even the change in sound and graphics was astonishing, now it's minor tweaks.

[unyttigfjelltol]

I still remember my first Internet search-- Phineas Gage-- and bewilderment at where this information came from. The recursive beauty is the story itself has been transformed by the Internet, and has been filled in very differently than was reported back in the mid 90s.[1]

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phineas_Gage