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overeager overeater
Oct 16, 2011

"The cosmonauts were transfixed with wonderment as the sun set - over the Earth - there lucklessly, untethered Comrade Todd on fire."



Datasmurf posted:

Hey now, it's still active in Norway. My maternal grandmother use it often, and I've spent many a day just browsing through it. Sure, it's 15-20 years ago, but hey. If I'm bored and the TV is on, I fire up the old teletext and surf through it. Read the news, see if any of the old games are still active (they usually aren't) et cetera.

They even have online versions as well!

e: Slightly off topic, but what VM setup have you had the most success with for getting old PDA software to work? I have a VTech Helio (with dock and USB-RS232 adapter) and I haven't been able to make it work with QEMU/Windows 98 yet, for some reason.

overeager overeater has a new favorite as of 14:01 on Sep 27, 2012

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DrBouvenstein
Feb 28, 2007

I think I'm a doctor, but that doesn't make me a doctor. This fancy avatar does.

You Are A Elf posted:

Should have gotten yourself a 1950s-ish office desk. These things can support the weight of six elephants, are fully functional with plentiful drawer space, can be found at most thrift stores and on Craigslist for incredibly cheap, and will be the only remnants of humans ever existing long after we're gone.



I looked. No dice. I swear, anytime someone on SA says "you can find item X for cheap at any thrift store/Salvation Army/Goodwill/Craigslist" it's a guarantee I will never find it at any of these places.

Though I realized when I was considering making an offer to my boss for an old desk like that from work that it would be too big for my bedroom.

Setzer Gabbiani
Oct 13, 2004

For the longest time, I thought this was just something I made up as a kid, but once I thought about it more, I remember seeing this in the back of some Lands End-esqe computer magazine, thinking HOLY poo poo THE FUTURE IS NOW because you're now directly-interfaced with your PC, and sure enough, this weird loving thing exists



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C6atr1gIHcA

MINDDRIVE, it looks like the only purpose of this was to play games, considering we heard nothing about the super-revolutionary Miramax films utilizing this. Also: the games look really lovely. It sorta looks like that thing for the Wii you would clip on your finger that was never released

And the entire MindDrive collection can be yours for a steal at $450! There's always something both hilarious and sad about ancient developers still trying to sell their games for the same price as they were almost three decades ago, PLEASE PURCHASE THESE GAMES

Fozaldo
Apr 18, 2004

Serenity Now. Serenity Now.
:respek::respek::respek::respek::respek:

Setzer Gabbiani posted:

PLEASE PURCHASE THESE GAMES

So I'm guessing the only way those games were controlled was by speeding up and slowing down your heart rate ? :psyduck:

Libluini
May 18, 2012

I gravitated towards the Greens, eventually even joining the party itself.

The Linke is a party I grudgingly accept exists, but I've learned enough about DDR-history I can't bring myself to trust a party that was once the SED, a party leading the corrupt state apparatus ...
Grimey Drawer

lenitic posted:

Teletext was another ancient technology; its high point was beaming a picture of an ejaculating penis through the airwaves into every British household, excused by the caption "Turner the Worm being sick"

Datasmurf posted:

Hey now, it's still active in Norway. My maternal grandmother use it often, and I've spent many a day just browsing through it. Sure, it's 15-20 years ago, but hey. If I'm bored and the TV is on, I fire up the old teletext and surf through it. Read the news, see if any of the old games are still active (they usually aren't) et cetera.

A similar system was used by the German Postalservice as a sort-of online service.

The so called Btx (Bildschirmtext "Screen Text") came into being because someone named Eric Danke (later a board member of T-Online) saw Teletext-Technology described in a technical publication and was impressed enough to try to develop a German version of the system. Two years later, German Postmaster General Kurt Gscheidle proudly demonstrated this "inovation" 1977 on the IFA (Internationale Funkausstellung Berlin).

After testruns and lots of bureaucracy the system was implemented nationwide just a mere six years later, starting 1st September of 1983. Btx ran in Germany until 2007, thanks to underhanded ploys like tricking T-Online customers into buying internet access with Btx-Service included. (To pretend Btx had more users than they actually had, I suppose. I hetch my bets most of the so aquired new users never really used Btx. On the other hand, you could send emails via Btx, so it wasn't completely like Teletext. Oh -and lots of businesses and government agencies used it, at least until the "real" Internet became cheaper then the convoluted schemes of the postal service (and later, the T-Online corporation after the postal service was split up and turned into two new private corporations. On for postal, on for phone services.)

Now let's go back from 2007 into the 90s, with teenaged me playing around with an old C64 computer. And finding an old acoustic coupler lying in one of the boxes the computer came with. So since I had read lots of old computer magazines from the 80s at the time (my parents bought several boxes worth of stuff from the previous owner of my C64), I already knew about Btx and was keen on trying that stuff out.



The Btx-"website" of our federal police.


Fun fact: I blindly stumbled around while using Btx, randomly finding sites and half the time not even connecting succesfully. Nowadays I think I may accidentally hacked the network, since my family at the time only ever paid for a normal phone line, nothing more. (And Btx was notoriously unsafe.) Me using old numbers and tips from old magazines to dial up into Btx? Maybe I did it the right and normal way, maybe not. I can't even remember what exactly I was doing all those years ago, just that it worked, then it didn't. Then it worked again.

Well, maybe it explains why my mother was always angry with me during that time. She, in even more technical ignorance than me, explained our abnormaly high phone bills with me "talking to much with my friends" over the phone. Which I didn't. I just dialed into Btx and was confused what my mother was talking about. I just put weird-looking toys over the phone and dialed seemingly random numbers, I wasn't actually "calling" someone.

At the time, I thought you actually had to call someone to make the call "count". Machines weren't included as "someone".

I was a dumb teenager. :downs:

JediTalentAgent
Jun 5, 2005
Hey, look. Look, if- if you screw me on this, I shall become more powerful than you can possibly imagine, you rat bastard!

Setzer Gabbiani posted:

MINDDRIVE, it looks like the only purpose of this was to play games, considering we heard nothing about the super-revolutionary Miramax films utilizing this. Also: the games look really lovely. It sorta looks like that thing for the Wii you would clip on your finger that was never released

Back in the 80s or so I seem to recall some various biofeedback devices being advertized for home computers, too. I don't really have any information on them other than I think most of them were more along the lines of probably just capturing a pulse rate and and giving you video/audio patterns to focus on to help do so.

StupidSexyMothman
Aug 9, 2010

Libluini posted:

Well, maybe it explains why my mother was always angry with me during that time. She, in even more technical ignorance than me, explained our abnormaly high phone bills with me "talking to much with my friends" over the phone. Which I didn't. I just dialed into Btx and was confused what my mother was talking about. I just put weird-looking toys over the phone and dialed seemingly random numbers, I wasn't actually "calling" someone.

At the time, I thought you actually had to call someone to make the call "count". Machines weren't included as "someone".

I was a dumb teenager. :downs:

Oh, man, this reminded me of a technology that I don't think even exists any more.

My mom signed us up for USA Datanet long distance service, back when that was a thing that wasn't "free unlimited" on every telephone plan (cellular or land line). The idea was you called a free 800 number, and then after connecting to them you'd dial the number of the person you wanted to call. It was ten cents a minute with a cap of 99 cents per call if they were in the same general region of the country as you, and $1.99 anywhere else in the US. The perfect balance between paying the outrageous charge for sporadic long-distance calls without a long distance plan & paying the big fee for a long-distance calling plan and then having to come up with reasons to keep talking to these far-away people.

Cue me calling my long-distance girlfriend a state away...except I'd keep hanging up on her & re-dialing because the kitchen phone had a flashing indicator when the line was busy & I didn't want anyone knowing I was making the calls, so every time someone got up I hung up and waited for them to sit back down before re-calling. And I wondered how we ended up with hundreds of dollars in long-distance calls! Good god I was stupid.

Shame Boy
Mar 2, 2010

Fozaldo posted:

So I'm guessing the only way those games were controlled was by speeding up and slowing down your heart rate ? :psyduck:

The video says it's "something like a lie detector" so i'm guessing it's just a skin conductivity sensor.

Also control Jackie Chan with your mind. Man the 90's were loving awesome.

Zamujasa
Oct 27, 2010



Bread Liar

The_Franz posted:

Within that last 12 months IE6 use has dropped below 1% in North America, Europe and Australia. Asians, however, seem to love it as 21% of China and 4.7% of Japan still use it for some reason.

Totally anecdotal evidence here, but I've found through my sites that pretty much 100% of the IE6 traffic are just zombies pretending to be IE6. I haven't seen a legitimate IE6 user in a long time (based on log analysis or browsing habits).

Unless they're accounting for zombie computers I'd hesitate to take a reading of 21% -- especially for China, of all places -- seriously.

mystes
May 31, 2006

Zamujasa posted:

Totally anecdotal evidence here, but I've found through my sites that pretty much 100% of the IE6 traffic are just zombies pretending to be IE6. I haven't seen a legitimate IE6 user in a long time (based on log analysis or browsing habits).
This makes sense; I know that when I've written scripts to scrape content from sites I've tended to use the Windows XP IE6 user agent string in the past. I guess it's a bit old for it to look innocuous now, though!

AveMachina
Aug 30, 2008

God knows what COVIDs you people have



Hit up a thrift store today to add to my typewriter collection, picked up an Adler Satellite for $7. It so happens that my dad actually wrote his PhD dissertation on one of these (with a Russian keyboard)! (Photos aren't mine)


Made in West Germany :ussr:

Others:


Royal Sabre, 1970s. Surprisingly light, I actually use this one the most, and since it looks the least-delicate, people love typing silly things on it when they see it. I keep a sheet of paper loaded into it so guests can play with it, and took off the ribbon cover on mine.


Remington Rand No. 17, 1943. My fat, 60+ lb baby.

They all still work and are great for hipster poo poo like art projects. They make your fingers freaky-strong too. I love the way these smell; wet ink, cigarettes and oil. You can practically see the sharply-dressed, cognac-sipping secretary tapping away!

I've had a thing for mechanical typewriters ever since I found my grandmother's old one from the Soviet days when I was a kid. Something about all of those springs, levers, and just the whole mechanism gliding up and tapping the paper is really elegant to me. Also, all of the ones I own I got for less than $10, so it's a cheap hobby for a college kid.

Konstantin
Jun 20, 2005
And the Lord said, "Look, they are one people, and they have all one language; and this is only the beginning of what they will do; nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them.

mystes posted:

This makes sense; I know that when I've written scripts to scrape content from sites I've tended to use the Windows XP IE6 user agent string in the past. I guess it's a bit old for it to look innocuous now, though!

Yeah, in general, most of the people who use IE6 use it because their corporate IT department forces it on them, usually because there is some ancient but critical software that only works with IE6. The fact that the employees can't "waste time" going to popular websites with IE6 is considered a feature.

KING EGG
Dec 1, 2000

Saturday is "Treat Day"


May I introduce the Amstrad NC100

Word processor. Calculator. Personal organiser. It came with a Parallel and Serial port and a PC port on the side that could take a whopping 1MB flash card which I spent ages trying to find as a kid, but never did. You could also program in BBC basic and it had a little speaker in it.

I got it for a couple of bucks when my old high school had a "fundraiser auction" read: "it'll cost us money to take it to the dump so lets get these dumbasses to pay US for it". One of my teachers was a bit of an enthusiast and gave me his NC100. I put little programs on it and typed up assignments. Connected it to a modem and got it to dial out. Basically the thing was obsolete and useless when I got it but I had fun.

My high school was full of obsolete tech - in 1996/97 we learnt LOGO on BBC micros. The other computer lab wasn't much better, full of Acorn RISC OS machines. We finally got PCs in 97/98, they were P100s with 16MB of RAM. The school techs didn't understand why they were slow running Windows NT4. We finally got decent machines when I left year 12 in 2001. P3-800s with 64MB of RAM. The media lab had old video equipment from the 70's.

Dick Trauma
Nov 30, 2007

God damn it, you've got to be kind.
This lovely device is a very early ATM, from 1918. The user would insert their passbook and turn the dial to indicate the next blank line where the transaction information would be stamped. Then they'd move the lever to indicate how much money they were depositing.



EDIT: For the youngsters a "passbook" was a small book like a check register that would keep track of all your transactions at the bank. Initially they were manual but eventually they'd insert them into a computer to print the transaction onto a page.

EDIT 2: Oh man some of you probably don't know what a "check register" is. :corsair:

Shame Boy
Mar 2, 2010

Dick Trauma posted:

EDIT 2: Oh man some of you probably don't know what a "check register" is. :corsair:

Is that like an old-timey Google Wallet :downs:

Anyway I love old, massively overbuilt mechanical devices like this. The early 20th century was awesome in terms of giant steel things and huge gears :allears:

Farecoal
Oct 15, 2011

There he go

Dick Trauma posted:

EDIT 2: Oh man some of you probably don't know what a "check register" is. :corsair:

I actually don't. What is it?

madlilnerd
Jan 4, 2009

a bush with baggage

Jr. posted:

I've had a thing for mechanical typewriters ever since I found my grandmother's old one from the Soviet days when I was a kid. Something about all of those springs, levers, and just the whole mechanism gliding up and tapping the paper is really elegant to me. Also, all of the ones I own I got for less than $10, so it's a cheap hobby for a college kid.

There used to be a Barbie one that they had at the back of the Argos catalogue and I spent most of my childhood staring dreamily at that thing.

Now I have a blue Silvette II, but it wasn't that cheap- £25 + £10 shipping from Ebay. You can get the bigger models for free a lot of the time if you agree to go pick them up. If I wasn't so nomadic at the moment, I'd love an Underwood.

Dick Trauma
Nov 30, 2007

God damn it, you've got to be kind.

Farecoal posted:

I actually don't. What is it?

It's for keeping a manual record of your checking account. The bank (or check printing companies) give you one to go along with your paper checks so that as you write checks you can keep track of them and balance your account. Quicken gives you a virtual version that looks similar.

Super Waffle
Sep 25, 2007

I'm a hermaphrodite and my parents (40K nerds) named me Slaanesh, THANKS MOM
While we're on the subject, checks belong in this thread. I am 25 years old, I have never written a check, needed to write a check, or in fact ever had checks. The entire concept of them baffles me to be honest. I can see why they were once needed, but in this day and age they seem pointless.

Kwyndig
Sep 23, 2006

Heeeeeey


Super Waffle posted:

While we're on the subject, checks belong in this thread. I am 25 years old, I have never written a check, needed to write a check, or in fact ever had checks. The entire concept of them baffles me to be honest. I can see why they were once needed, but in this day and age they seem pointless.

Old people. If you ever want to know why something still exists, the answer is usually old people being unwilling to change.

Jasta
Apr 13, 2012

Kwyndig posted:

Old people. If you ever want to know why something still exists, the answer is usually old people being unwilling to change.

Yeah, I pay rent to older people and have to write them cheques, but that's the only time when I use them.

Bunni-kat
May 25, 2010

Service Desk B-b-bunny...
How can-ca-caaaaan I
help-p-p-p you?

Jasta posted:

Yeah, I pay rent to older people and have to write them cheques, but that's the only time when I use them.

Old people? Try lazy-rear end landlords. Previous landlord was a nice guy, but took ages to deposit the cheques, to the point of sometimes a couple weeks before it came out of my account. But it would take him time and effort to set up electronic payment methods like Internet bill payers or direct debit for every new tenant. So, cheques.

Cmdr Tomalak
Aug 13, 2007

How long shall we stare at each other across the Neutral Zone?

Jasta posted:

Yeah, I pay rent to older people and have to write them cheques, but that's the only time when I use them.

How else would you pay rent? I would never pay cash, there's no way to have a firm record that you've paid it.

Mister Kingdom
Dec 14, 2005

And the tears that fall
On the city wall
Will fade away
With the rays of morning light

Jasta posted:

Yeah, I pay rent to older people and have to write them cheques, but that's the only time when I use them.

The apartment complex where I live just started offering the opportunity to pay online.

For a $10 "convenience" fee.

I can get a box of checks for about $8 AND I live 30 feet from the office. I'll keep on writing checks.

Dick Trauma
Nov 30, 2007

God damn it, you've got to be kind.

Kwyndig posted:

Old people. If you ever want to know why something still exists, the answer is usually old people being unwilling to change.

I pay my rent via check. I pay most of my medical bills via check as well. Everything else is cash or electronic.

You complain about old people the same way they do about young people!

Killer robot
Sep 6, 2010

I was having the most wonderful dream. I think you were in it!
Pillbug
My landlord only takes checks. I think, still. Since I just got a new bank and they gave me a box of checks that means I have enough for ten years anyway and the box is downstairs, so :effort:

I haven't used a check for anything else in years now though, I think. I used to pay some bills that way but now it's all online.

Shame Boy
Mar 2, 2010

Yeah checks are nice because you, personally, get a distinct record that you made out a check to the person, and you and an authoritative third party (the bank) gets a record they cashed it for the amount you said it was worth. You can't really do that reliably with cash even if you get a receipt, and most not-companies don't take credit cards. It's a pretty good choice when you're just dealing with some other person.

I set it up so that I only have access to my savings account through checks and raw deposits/withdrawals, which is nice because it means I can't spend the money easily :downs:

madlilnerd
Jan 4, 2009

a bush with baggage

Cmdr Tomalak posted:

How else would you pay rent? I would never pay cash, there's no way to have a firm record that you've paid it.

Here in the UK we do bank transfers. It's really easy if you have internet banking, or you can do it from some ATMs.

GoGoGadgetChris
Mar 18, 2010

i powder a
granite monument
in a soundless flash

showering the grass
with molten drops of
its gold inlay

sending smoking
chips of stone
skipping into the fog
Every apartment I've ever lived in has required checks. Those that have offered online payment always charge $10 to $35 for it. What gives with that? How is an online payment anything but easier for them? Paypal fees?

Astrobastard
Dec 31, 2008



Winky Face
I never really saw it to such an extent in the UK, but since moving to Paris (I cant speak for France as a whole) I've seen people write cheques for less than 10€, and cheque users are fairly common in general. Drives me up the loving wall how stuck in the past some aspects of France are, although its a lot better than it was 6 years ago. But yeah I agree they come in handy for dealing with non-business payments, and apartment deposits etc. Also most Dentists and Doctors here will accept postdated cheques so you don't get hit hard at a lovely time in the month, even if you can technically afford it at the time.

Apparently if one of your cheques bounce in France, you lose the ability to have a proper bank account for 5 years or something crazy.

Shai-Hulud
Jul 10, 2008

But it feels so right!
Lipstick Apathy

madlilnerd posted:

Here in the UK we do bank transfers. It's really easy if you have internet banking, or you can do it from some ATMs.

Yeah its really strange that bank transfers aren't really used in the US. Everything i need to pay on a regular basis just gets transfered automatically at the end of the month. Paying my rent in cash or with a checks? What?

Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."

Parallel Paraplegic posted:

Yeah checks are nice because you, personally, get a distinct record that you made out a check to the person, and you and an authoritative third party (the bank) gets a record they cashed it for the amount you said it was worth. You can't really do that reliably with cash even if you get a receipt, and most not-companies don't take credit cards. It's a pretty good choice when you're just dealing with some other person.
Here in Europe we just use bank transfers. I've only once in my lifetime seen a check and I received it from my septuagenarian landlady.

Flipperwaldt
Nov 11, 2011

Won't somebody think of the starving hamsters in China?



Shai-Hulud posted:

Yeah its really strange that bank transfers aren't really used in the US. Everything i need to pay on a regular basis just gets transfered automatically at the end of the month. Paying my rent in cash or with a checks? What?
Indeed. I was just writing up a whole post about how it blows my mind. It's ridiculously convenient. If I owe my sister 10€, I'll pay her back through bank transfer, and she lives like three miles away from me.

I can't even imagine what it's like to have to forgo that convenience.

Mister Kingdom
Dec 14, 2005

And the tears that fall
On the city wall
Will fade away
With the rays of morning light

GoGoGadgetChris posted:

Every apartment I've ever lived in has required checks. Those that have offered online payment always charge $10 to $35 for it. What gives with that? How is an online payment anything but easier for them? Paypal fees?

Back when I lived in a natural-gas heated house, I paid with a check. If I paid over the phone, it costs $9.95. If I paid online, it cost $4.95.

When I asked them why they would charge me to pay online and get their money instantly, but not charge me to pay with a check which could take days, they had no answer.

Killer robot
Sep 6, 2010

I was having the most wonderful dream. I think you were in it!
Pillbug

Mister Kingdom posted:

Back when I lived in a natural-gas heated house, I paid with a check. If I paid over the phone, it costs $9.95. If I paid online, it cost $4.95.

When I asked them why they would charge me to pay online and get their money instantly, but not charge me to pay with a check which could take days, they had no answer.

It's a pretty common progression: things meant to save the company money through automation also provide the customer convenience, so instead of being a money-saving measure management gets to viewing them as a revenue stream for a premium product. See also: digital media sales that cost more than a physical copy, banks that charge more to perform operations via ATM than by taking it to a teller. You really need to have the right sort of business management insanity for it to make sense.

Colonel K
Jun 29, 2009
I'm in the UK and use cheques reasonably frequently. Both with my work and personally. I find it far more convenient to write a cheque sometimes than bother with a bank transfer.

Mu Zeta
Oct 17, 2002

Me crush ass to dust

In the US I think we closely associate bank transfers with scams so it's not common.

BoutrosBoutros
Dec 6, 2010
What I don't get about old people writing checks at the grocery store and poo poo is, they obviously have a checking account, and I'm pretty sure if you have a checking account the bank gives you a debit card. And unless they're 120 freaking years old they know how paying by card works, I mean they have probably had credit cards before in their lives. They can still write their card purchases down in their check register too if they want to keep track. There's just no excuse for old people to write checks.

Mister Kingdom
Dec 14, 2005

And the tears that fall
On the city wall
Will fade away
With the rays of morning light

BoutrosBoutros posted:

There's just no excuse for old people to write checks.

No, but you have to understand that "old people" are set in their ways. Some will adapt to newer tech and some will not.

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redmercer
Sep 15, 2011

by Fistgrrl
Checks suck, and anyone who requires a check will without exception also accept a money order. The big advantage is that when you buy a money order, that money is out of your account then and there; instead of leaving whenever they take their sweet-rear end time cashing the fucker, and denying your bank the chance to eat another slice of your rear end with an overdraft or bounce.

But really, who loving cares? This ain't the thread for it. gently caress you, have a Sapphire Ball Stylus:



The big advantage of the Pathephone Sapphire Ball needle over a regular phonograph needle is that the ball slides through the groove rather than scratching. Or something, here's an old ad for it

At the very least Pathephone made a drat fine gramophone:

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