Greetings, Professor Falkin....

Only the biggest geeks out there would recognize that line from "War Games" with Matthew Broderick. That movie was a turning point -- I went from loving really cheesy rock bands to becoming obsessed with computers. Not that I could remotely approach the art of hacking into my school computer and changing my grades. But it was nice to dream about.

Here are some highmark moments in technology during the 80s:
-- Video games: From Space Invaders to Asteroids to Donkey Kong. From Pong to Atari and beyond.
-- VCRs: I still remember the first two movies my family rented when we bought our first VCR -- Caddyshack and Urban Cowboy. (Strangely enough the only one I own today is Urban Cowboy .... part of a John Travolta 3-pack of DVDs).
-- Apple's Macintosh: The first truly easy to operate (and easy to crash) home computer.

If all goes according to plan, I'm going to talk Gina into making a podcast soon on 80s technology. So share your favorite techie memories of the decade here, and we'll give you a shoutout.

Comments

[Sherrie]

I must be quite the geek, because I could totally hear that line in the computer voice from the movie.My big 80's technology moment, circa 1985/86- in 11th grade composition class, they installed a lone computer in the classroom! We could each buy a big old 5 1/4 inch floppy disk at Radio Shack, and if we successfully did that we could do word processing on the computer. None of us ever imagined we could do anything beyond games and word processing on those things!

[Steve Spears]

I used to have a Franklin Ace 1200, which was basically a Apple II clone. I used it as my personal computer through college. Today, it wouldn't be sophisticated enough to run my toaster.

[Sherrie]

My first computer was a Mac LC that I purchased in 1990. It cost over $2,500.00, and it couldn't even access the Internet once that came to be. I think it was 16 mHz. I can't believe I spent essentially the cost of a semester of college on a 16 mHz computer! My bargain basement $399 model now is 7 times the mHz as that old LC- frightening.

[chriss]

Shall we play a game ... Count me in with the geeks. I loved that movie. My first computer class was senior year ('85-'86) of high school on an Apple IIe I think. Space Invaders was my favorite game and one of three games we had for our first Atari. Strangely enough, I don't remember our first VCR -- but I do remember the BETA and the Laserdisc if that counts. ;)

[Wendy O]

Hey all...for fun 80's type technology, visit www.homestarrunner.com. Not only the most hilarious site on the net, but they also offer great Videlectrix games like "Peasants Quest" and "Strong Bad Zone" that will whisk you back to the days of Atari. My personal favorite is "Trogdor."

[erin]

Our first computer was a Commodore 64. I loved that thing and used to play Frogger for hours. We also had a bunch of videodiscs, my dad actually used to work for RCA and helped make them. I religiously watched a Duran Duran videodisc over and over until I knew every word to "Hungry Like the Wolf" and "Rio." I think I was about 9 or 10 at the time. I also used to think Oregan Trail was the coolest game ever. Wow they've come a long way.

[Christina]

I remember in my 8th grade computer class (1986) we had to draw a design on a piece of graph paper, then plot the points on a computer. Once you spent hours doing this, you had a drawing! If I had known about Photoshop, I wouldn't have wasted my time.Around the same time, I bought my very first computer. It cost me $200. It was only a keyboard and I plugged it into my 13 in tv set. I had hours of fun trying to figure out how the dang thing worked!Let's just say it ended up in the garage about 2 weeks later.

[Chase Squires]

Oh, man, first computer? I had a mail-order Sinclair .. $100 bought you a wimpy computer that you plugged into your teevee .. it had this tiny keyboard that was more like a touchpad than typing surface .. but you could buy an "upgraded" keyboard.My first computer class was on the Trash-80.