What does everybody think the PCs influence on the 80s was? Thanks for responding, Im doing a paper on this topic and Im curious as to what people out there think. TY

Tyler

> What does everybody think the PCs influence on the 80s was? Thanks for
> responding, Im doing a paper on this topic and Im curious as to what
> people out there think. TY

> Tyler

I'm not really knowledgable enough about PCs to answer your question in a broad, cultural sense - but I can talk about it from what I observed as a teenager at the time in my community of Savannah, GA. I remember my public high school having a computer class (as an elective) in the early 80s. Only the "smart students" ever signed up for it, and few of them at that. What you could do with a PC was very limited for this was before the fancy word processing programs and such. All the PC games were extremely crude by current CD-ROM standards.

Basically, we thought of PCs as fancy calculators and, later, as an expensive replacemant for typewriters and file cabinets. I never dreamed that they would become standard household items in so short a period of time, nor did I think I would ever own one. I think that the average person in the 80s viewed a household PC as a nonessential, expensive toy (note that I'm talking about for personal use, they quickly became important for businesses). E-mail and the internet were interesting but not a big part of the average person's life and many of us had little or no desire to get caught up with all that "techno-babble." Many of us were also apprehensive about learning to use what appeared to be a very complex machine (and there was a time when they were not "user friendly" at all).

Once more, this is simply the viewpoint that I, along with many of my friends and family, had during the 80s (and here I'm thinking mostly of the early and mid-eighties). My full name is Eric Filmer, if any of this is helpful for your paper then please feel free to quote me.

-Class of '84

> I'm not really knowledgable enough about PCs to answer your question in a
> broad, cultural sense - but I can talk about it from what I observed as a
> teenager at the time in my community of Savannah, GA. I remember my public
> high school having a computer class (as an elective) in the early 80s.
> Only the "smart students" ever signed up for it, and few of them
> at that. What you could do with a PC was very limited for this was before
> the fancy word processing programs and such. All the PC games were
> extremely crude by current CD-ROM standards.

> Basically, we thought of PCs as fancy calculators and, later, as an
> expensive replacemant for typewriters and file cabinets. I never dreamed
> that they would become standard household items in so short a period of
> time, nor did I think I would ever own one. I think that the average
> person in the 80s viewed a household PC as a nonessential, expensive toy
> (note that I'm talking about for personal use, they quickly became
> important for businesses). E-mail and the internet were interesting but
> not a big part of the average person's life and many of us had little or
> no desire to get caught up with all that "techno-babble." Many
> of us were also apprehensive about learning to use what appeared to be a
> very complex machine (and there was a time when they were not "user
> friendly" at all).

> Once more, this is simply the viewpoint that I, along with many of my
> friends and family, had during the 80s (and here I'm thinking mostly of
> the early and mid-eighties). My full name is Eric Filmer, if any of this
> is helpful for your paper then please feel free to quote me.

> -Class of '84

This post got me thinking. I also graduated from high school in 1984. I remember taking an introduction to computers class my senior year. I don't remember much about it , but we learned to program some very simple line codes in some extinct computer language. I don't remember what type of computers we used or their specifications, etc., but the monitors had a black background with green lettering and graphics. If you hit some combination of keys, the colors would invert (WOW!!!). Also, all of the diskettes were the old style 5-inch "floppy disks". Likewise, we had the old 9-pin printers that were very noisy and slow. I did use the school computer to type and print a term paper for my English class, and this was back in the days before spellchecker.

I was wondering how high school and college kids write research papers today. When I was in school, this meant long hours in the school and public libraries, looking through the card catalogues (do these still exists?) and searching rows of books listed under the Dewey Decimal system. There was usually a minimum number of 10 sources required for the bibliography, and the teachers at my school would forbid the using encyclopedias as references, because they said it was an insult to your intelligence. Needless to say, this was before widespread use of the internet and search engines. I assume that students today do all or most of their research online, but I was wondering, do they just cite a webpage URL as a reference in the bibliography, or with links included in the text? Also do they print out the paper, or just hand the teacher a disk? Sorry to sound ignorant, but I've been out of school for a long time.

> This post got me thinking. I also graduated from high school in 1984. I
> remember taking an introduction to computers class my senior year. I don't
> remember much about it , but we learned to program some very simple line
> codes in some extinct computer language. I don't remember what type of
> computers we used or their specifications, etc., but the monitors had a
> black background with green lettering and graphics. If you hit some
> combination of keys, the colors would invert (WOW!!!). Also, all of the
> diskettes were the old style 5-inch "floppy disks". Likewise, we
> had the old 9-pin printers that were very noisy and slow. I did use the
> school computer to type and print a term paper for my English class, and
> this was back in the days before spellchecker.

> I was wondering how high school and college kids write research papers
> today. When I was in school, this meant long hours in the school and
> public libraries, looking through the card catalogues (do these still
> exists?) and searching rows of books listed under the Dewey Decimal
> system. There was usually a minimum number of 10 sources required for the
> bibliography, and the teachers at my school would forbid the using
> encyclopedias as references, because they said it was an insult to your
> intelligence. Needless to say, this was before widespread use of the
> internet and search engines. I assume that students today do all or most
> of their research online, but I was wondering, do they just cite a webpage
> URL as a reference in the bibliography, or with links included in the
> text? Also do they print out the paper, or just hand the teacher a disk?
> Sorry to sound ignorant, but I've been out of school for a long time.

Actually I am currently a grad student so I'm still doing research papers and can answer your questions. Like you, I remember using card catelogs in the past but all the libraries I visit now have small computers with specialized search engines. Some of my instructors (who also teach undergrads) do not allow resources to be cited from the internet. On the other hand, one of my professors actually required that we learn to use the internet and cite at least one internet source. The general rule is that you can use the internet but only if you are reasonably sure that the webpage constitutes being an authority. As for citing webpages in the Reference section of a term paper - some writing handbooks offer general suggestions (we use Turabian and Chicago MLA). None of these handbooks covers all the possible examples that may spring up. For example, what if the webpage does not give you the author's name? Referencing the internet is still a fairly new thing so the instructors say just cite them as best as you can. I usually list out the entire web address along with the date and time I accessed it.

At my college we use word processors, print out the reports and turn them in. Personally I have never had a class where I simply turned in a floopy disc, except for a computer science.

Take care, -Class of '84