I made my first remote connection in 1992, using a Macintosh “cube”. BBS’es and file transfers were the purpose. Soon I was online with both Windows and Macs using programs such as Crosstalk.
While intriguing, it wasn’t until I logged onto the Internet in 1994 that I was hooked. Using a 386 PC with a 9,600 baud modem I hooked up to the Internet via Chicago service provider AIS. Their package came on one floppy and included the entire Netmanage Chameleon set of tools.
I’ve never really used the internet for entertainment, though I did check “The Spot” and such in the early days (they had an image map for entry!). My use was much more the gathering of information and files related to my job as a multimedia technician with CMI Business Communications.
My purest internet experience was “watching” the 1995 Tour De France live on the Internet. Coming into work each day I would log on and hit “refresh” every ten minutes or so for four+ hours, “seeing” stages of the Tour live, something that was impossible in any media form in the United States at that time. Didn’t hurt that when I emailed the crew covering the race that my college friend and racer James Startt emailed back “I’m in the back of a van going up hill with a laptop….”