My boyfriend went abroad to Chile this term. As I was anticipating him leaving, my Mom and Dad (ever so politely) reminded me that it won’t be that bad because of all the technology that I have at my fingertips.
A little background...my Mom and Dad dated for eight years before they got married. Six of those eight years were long distance. All those years my parents had two ways to keep in touch with one another: snail mail and a telephone (and part of that time the telephone was stationed in the hall of a dormitory). Fast-forward 30 years, and I have email, iMessage, Skype, cell phones, and Facebook to all help me and my boyfriend stay in touch this term.
Naturally having been told about all the years of snail mail, I assumed that none of these social media wonders were ever thought about until the 1980s, 1990s, and on. However, as Daniela Hernandez writes about in “Facebook?! Twitter?! Instagram?! We did that 40 Years Ago?!” these social media concepts were already around. Contraptions like the first ever smart phone, the IMB Simon phone, came about in 1993. The original way to Skype was first around in 1964, it was called the Bell Picturephone. It was a wacky shaped contraption and cost $16 dollars to make a 15 minute call. Oh, and the only place you even had the ability to use it? New York, D.C., and Chicago.
As Daniela showed us in her article, these social media contraptions were around earlier then the 1990s, they were just not available to everyone, impractical, and expensive. However, the ideas for the very honed and available programs and contraptions we have at our disposal today are what they are because of these original pioneers. So, thank you Bell Picturephone and IMB Simon Phone for leading in my right hand through these next few months!
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| My boyfriend embracing the use of Facebook and webcam! |
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