Today, for some reason, i started reminiscing about a time not too long ago, when gadgets were not so popular. It must have been 10 years ago at most, but now it feels like an eternity has passed. I couldn't help but notice the stark contrast, or call it rapid progress, that we have made.
Lets flashback to - the days of technological yore
I remember my junior college days when music was the only entertainment during those long train journeys. There were no MP3 players then, all we had was the humble little walk-man and countless audio cassettes. We also had the FM radio, for times when the walk-man battery was too low to play cassettes. My Aiwa walkman cost me 1800rs back then, and that too was expensive for a student. Then came along the disc-man which only a few rich students could shell out 5-7k for.
Piracy too was different back then. Audio cassettes used to cost 150rs, and to save some cash we used to buy blank tapes and record over them by borrowing the original cassettes from friends. Normal and high speed dubbing were the only advanced options we had.
Cellphones were almost non-existent then, we used to actually remember land-line numbers. A few kids started to get cellphones, but the call rates were still too high @ 3-5rs for an outgoing call. The guy with the latest nokia 3310 which cost rs 5500 and had snake II was the most popular guy in class. The first person to get a phone with a colored screen became a celebrity overnight. Sending ringtones from the composer of the old nokia phones was the cool thing to do in our spare time.
Owning a computer was considered a luxury. My first computer cost 45 grand, for just a pentium 3 with 64mb ram and windows 98. But back then, it was the best one money could by and it could run all the latest games (NFS 3 anyone?).
The internet was still largely inaccessible, and we learnt how to connect using a dial up connection and register for an email address in the school computer lab. Cyber cafes were plenty, and used to charge 20bucks an hour. They had many kids flocking to them, some who used to carry 3 1/2 " floppy disks to carry their precious data home. Then came the cheaper dial-up connections, with the modems that made weird sounds, which we could only use late in the night so that the phone line remained available during the day. Downloading a song used to take half an hour then. Kids these days will never know what a dial up modem sounds like.
Digital cameras were not available back then, and we used to carry around those old film cameras, which could only click 36 precious pictures on a single roll of film. We had to wait 3 days to get the pictures developed, and sharing it meant carrying the album around, or actually sharing the negatives. The Digital cameras arrived soon, with astronomical price tags and sensors in the range of 2-3 megapixels. Kids these days will never know that cameras also came with a rewind button.
Let's get back to the present now -
Walk-mans and disc-mans are almost non existant, the MP3 player is also a dying breed, and almost all music is stored on phones. Piracy now means downloading not just songs, but also movies off the internet and transferring it to the phone, all this in a matter of minutes.
Everyone has a cellphone now, even a 10year old school going kid has a cellphone. It's a pity they will never have to remember a phone number or call their friends on the land-line wondering what to say if their parents answer the phone.
Owning a laptop/desktop become a necessity, and almost every household has one with a broadband connection that's always on. The kids these days don't have to worry about high phone bills for using the internet. Writing this post made me feel old, but when i think about it, we have made a lot of progress in the past 10 years. At this rate, it may not be too long before we have flying cars .
Lets flashback to - the days of technological yore
I remember my junior college days when music was the only entertainment during those long train journeys. There were no MP3 players then, all we had was the humble little walk-man and countless audio cassettes. We also had the FM radio, for times when the walk-man battery was too low to play cassettes. My Aiwa walkman cost me 1800rs back then, and that too was expensive for a student. Then came along the disc-man which only a few rich students could shell out 5-7k for.
Piracy too was different back then. Audio cassettes used to cost 150rs, and to save some cash we used to buy blank tapes and record over them by borrowing the original cassettes from friends. Normal and high speed dubbing were the only advanced options we had.
Cellphones were almost non-existent then, we used to actually remember land-line numbers. A few kids started to get cellphones, but the call rates were still too high @ 3-5rs for an outgoing call. The guy with the latest nokia 3310 which cost rs 5500 and had snake II was the most popular guy in class. The first person to get a phone with a colored screen became a celebrity overnight. Sending ringtones from the composer of the old nokia phones was the cool thing to do in our spare time.
Owning a computer was considered a luxury. My first computer cost 45 grand, for just a pentium 3 with 64mb ram and windows 98. But back then, it was the best one money could by and it could run all the latest games (NFS 3 anyone?).
The internet was still largely inaccessible, and we learnt how to connect using a dial up connection and register for an email address in the school computer lab. Cyber cafes were plenty, and used to charge 20bucks an hour. They had many kids flocking to them, some who used to carry 3 1/2 " floppy disks to carry their precious data home. Then came the cheaper dial-up connections, with the modems that made weird sounds, which we could only use late in the night so that the phone line remained available during the day. Downloading a song used to take half an hour then. Kids these days will never know what a dial up modem sounds like.
Digital cameras were not available back then, and we used to carry around those old film cameras, which could only click 36 precious pictures on a single roll of film. We had to wait 3 days to get the pictures developed, and sharing it meant carrying the album around, or actually sharing the negatives. The Digital cameras arrived soon, with astronomical price tags and sensors in the range of 2-3 megapixels. Kids these days will never know that cameras also came with a rewind button.
Let's get back to the present now -
Walk-mans and disc-mans are almost non existant, the MP3 player is also a dying breed, and almost all music is stored on phones. Piracy now means downloading not just songs, but also movies off the internet and transferring it to the phone, all this in a matter of minutes.
Everyone has a cellphone now, even a 10year old school going kid has a cellphone. It's a pity they will never have to remember a phone number or call their friends on the land-line wondering what to say if their parents answer the phone.
Owning a laptop/desktop become a necessity, and almost every household has one with a broadband connection that's always on. The kids these days don't have to worry about high phone bills for using the internet. Writing this post made me feel old, but when i think about it, we have made a lot of progress in the past 10 years. At this rate, it may not be too long before we have flying cars .
