OT - Happy 25th :-)

[Josette]

I have no idea if it's true; I suspect many claim to be the first, but supposedly a professor at Carnegie-Mellon University was the first to use :-) as a smiley face 25 years ago, and today (yesterday by now) they were celebrating it's 25th!!

As they have a lot of advanced computer and robotics, etc. there, I imagine it could be true.

[MagnusTrask]

Just as long as he didn't develop the yellow smiley face Have a Nice Day thing.....

[Midnite]

As they have a lot of advanced computer and robotics, etc. there, I imagine it could be true.

Internet bulletin boards have been around since the late 70s, and it wasn't only scientists that had access to computers in 1982 but also computer hobbyists.  I'm guessing MB did.  MB?  ;-)

[Mysterious Benefactor]

'85 actually.    But it was a mainframe, with disk drives the size of washing machines, that had to be in an air conditioned room all its own. Technically it belonged to the school where I worked - but I was the Systems Analyst - and the only person in the building who really knew how it worked - so, it was really my "toy". 

I didn't buy my first personal computer until '86. But even at that I didn't brave the Internet until '94. And compared to today '94 was the Dark Ages, with many people still using text-only access at 2400 baud, which was basically dial-up at 2.4K instead of 56K! And 2.4K was if you were lucky because that was the maximum connection speed!! 

Ah, the good 'ole days. ... NOT!! 

[Gothick]

Twenty-five years of smiley faces.

How simply, sickeningly, gut-wrenchingly ... lovely.

G. (can you tell I'm clenching my teeth?)

[MagnusTrask]

At the start of the series Lou Grant, in 1978, they're replacing their typewriters with desk computers.

[Nancy]

Neat to read this, MB.  I was online in 1990 but couldn't post because I could only access the computer while at work.   I got my own personal computer sometime in the summer or fall of 1998 and there's been no looking back!!

nancy

'85 actually.    But it was a mainframe, with disk drives the size of washing machines, that had to be in an air conditioned room all its own. Technically it belonged to the school where I worked - but I was the Systems Analyst - and the only person in the building who really knew how it worked - so, it was really my "toy". 

I didn't buy my first personal computer until '86. But even at that I didn't brave the Internet until '94. And compared to today '94 was the Dark Ages, with many people still using text-only access at 2400 baud, which was basically dial-up at 2.4K instead of 56K! And 2.4K was if you were lucky because that was the maximum connection speed!! 

Ah, the good 'ole days. ... NOT!! 

[Mysterious Benefactor]

I got my own personal computer sometime in the summer or fall of 1998 and there's been no looking back!!

I know exactly what you mean.