Throwback Thursday: Do you remember how to send an email 80s style?
Once upon a time in 1984, sending an email took some real dedication. Watch this flashback and you’ll never complain about emails again.
It’s hard to believe that there was a once a time when sending an email took more than just typing and clicking send. In 1984, it was a completely different story as demonstrated by this episode of a Thames TV program Database, which was aimed at early computer geeks and tech enthusiasts.
In this episode of the show, the spotlight was on email technology. Microcomputer user Julian Green shows audiences how a Prestel (short for “press telephone”) user had to dial up the main Prestel system in order to connect, which he does with a rotary telephone. The early IP he uses is Micronet 800, which has a “letters page” where users can write publicly to the provider and its other users.
Julian and his wife share their computer with several other people and it makes sense since Prestel’s database was expensive, almost the equivalent of £16 000 (R358 807) per year in today’s terms.
According to IBM, South Africa had its first real computers delivered to a brokerage firm in 1959.
Watch the video and reminisce below:
