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Everyday life improvements since the 90s (2022)

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Re: Everyday life improvements since the 90s (2022)

#81

Post by nunez »

MarkusWandel wrote: post #3

Fact: In the 1990s a reasonable capable computer was a significant expense on the order of $1K, and likely to be obsolete within 5 years. My best present laptop is 5 years old and perfectly capable and was free because its previous owner didn't want it any more because of a minor defect. That's an exception, but the fact is, being somewhat tolerant to less than state-of-the-art computers, I haven't bought a new one,…

Spot on.

Reading through IBM computer brochures and fooling around with the desktops and laptops in our local Costco were favorite past-times of mine.

Cheap desktops existed but were universally terri-bad. Low spec Celeron processors with anemic memory and disk space. They _just barely_ ran Windows and ground to a halt after most users got done installing their IE toolbars and some form of Office. (Remember when Office Professional was EXPENSIVE?!)

Cheap laptops didn't exist before netbooks. Like, they just _weren't_ things.

You can get an M4 MacBook Air these days for $999. A laptop that can do just about anything, including and up to CAD and photoshop work, for at least $1000 (today's prices, NOT today's real prices) less than a middling Thinkpad 600 that had maybe three hours of battery life and was good enough for word docs but not much else.

Re: Everyday life improvements since the 90s (2022)

#82

Post by nunez »

giantrobot wrote: post #4
MarkusWandel wrote: post #3

Fact: In the 1990s a reasonable capable computer was a significant expense on the order of $1K, and likely to be obsolete within 5 years. My best present laptop is 5 years old and perfectly capable and was free because its previous owner didn't want it any more because of a minor defect. That's an exception, but the fact is, being somewhat tolerant to less than state-of-the-art computers, I haven't bought a new one,…

> I'm not entirely sure that being on the "elecronic leash" 24/7 has made life better. My phone is always on silent and I have almost zero notifications allowed. It has built in CallerID so I know exactly who is calling. Unless it's from a very small list of people it goes to voicemail and maybe I return the call later. Also many things that used to be calls are now a couple texts back and forth, again something I ca…

I've just embraced using a separate phone. On with all the notifications when I'm on; off (and not with me, usually) when I'm not. I hated this at first; won't do it any other way now.

Re: Everyday life improvements since the 90s (2022)

#83

Post by nunez »

MattGrommes wrote: post #48
patapong wrote: post #19

International communication! I lived across the atlantic for many years, and was able to call with people important to me every day, for free, even with video. Further, I can have a cultural exchange and shared cultural reference points with billions of people across the planet.

In the book of 2001, one of the big "events" of that far-future world was all the phone companies making long-distance free on 1/1/2000. Even when I read the book in probably 1990, I remember my dad thinking that was ridiculous. Now the idea of even international long distance call charges are going away and most calling is as you say, done for free via the internet, including with video!

Long distance still exists, but long distance now is a different country code vs a different area code. And it's cheaper!

That said, people still use calling cards to save money on international calls!

Re: Everyday life improvements since the 90s (2022)

#84

Post by nunez »

Karrot_Kream wrote: post #52

Agreement with the list: Induction Stoves. We've switched to an induction stove and love it. We cook a lot and I'm fairly sensitive to gas. The air quality in the house is so much better after doing a lot of cooking, but also the second order effects. No more face and arms feeling singed after looking over 3 flame burners. No more sauces getting singed on the side of pots or pots being burned on the sides due to gas.…

Agree big time on induction ranges and convection stoves.

This was one of the first appliances I got after buying a house. I LOVE using it. No fume, no waste heat, and, most importantly, I never have to worry about the range being left on by accident ever again! The cooktops won't turn on if there isn't a ferromagnetic surface on top, but even if they somehow did, the glass cooktop is cool to the touch.

Between this and our heat-pump dryer, I wish I could remove gas in our house for good. Unfortunately, gas furnaces are still much better than heat-pump options.

Re: Everyday life improvements since the 90s (2022)

#85

Post by nunez »

nonrandomstring wrote: post #21

As someone who loves to cook I think kitchen advances are somewhat overlooked, from pressure cookers to microwaves to air-fryers, IR ovens and all sorts of amazing combos, hand blenders and whatnot Time to make good home food got much shorter and more energy efficient. Edit: showing my age, cos that's 80s, not 90s. In fact I think pressure cookers got popular in the mid 70s.

Affordable thermometers! This is a huge improvement. No more food poisoning because your guess on the chicken being cooked enough was wrong.

Re: Everyday life improvements since the 90s (2022)

#86

Post by GregDavidson »

The biggest difference between now and the 1990s is in the reduction of abject poverty worldwide. Death and disability from food shortage was extremely common in many countries. A huge improvement in the 1990s over the 1980s is that I could own my own computer (I bought a Sun-2 with Solaris) instead of having everything I created owned by the institution which owned the computer I needed. Today's consumer products, though, are a mixed bag. As an example, I wish I could buy a microwave oven as good as my first one. It was larger, had a temperature probe that could be used instead of time and it used a small internal metal wheel to distribute the microwaves evenly throughout the oven instead of wasting space for the silly rotating platter.

https://ourworldindata.org/extreme-poverty-in-brief

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enshittification

Re: Everyday life improvements since the 90s (2022)

#87

Post by tabbytown »

Aloisius wrote: post #62
mrob wrote: post #6

Some more not mentioned in the article: Filtered milk. Tastes the same as ordinary homogenized milk but double (or better) the shelf life. Very convenient if you only use small quantities at a time, e.g. for adding to tea. Microfiber cloths. Much better cleaning than traditional cloths. In many cases all you need is water, or use them dry for dusting. Reusable too. SSDs. In my opinion, the biggest computer upgrade in…

> Filtered milk. Tastes the same as ordinary homogenized milk but double (or better) the shelf life. I had to look this one up. I don't think I've ever seen filtered milk in the US, but it looks like the ones sold here are specialty high protein/low lactose milks which I can't imagine tastes the same. They also appear to expire 9-14 days after opening which doesn't seem all that different from other milk with practic…

> which I can't imagine tastes the same

Fairlife tastes excellent. I switched for the extra protein as I'm a bodybuilder. I bought the 3.25% fat version at first because I love the silky mouthfeel of a whole milk cappuccino. Then I found the 2% Fairlife satisfies in the same way as 3.25%, with less fat calories, and froths up beautifully in the pitcher.

> They also appear to expire 9-14 days after opening which doesn't seem all that different from other milk with practice?

Anecdotally I think it's better. I've never had to toss one (but they are half gallons) while I find myself tossing sour regular milk frequently.

Re: Everyday life improvements since the 90s (2022)

#89

Post by wink »

varjag wrote: post #5

Some of the improvements on the list are non-issues best described as cultural differences. Consider: …not making a dozen phone calls playing Phone Tag, to set up something as simple as a play date Well this is why hardly anyone was bothering with setting up play dates back in the day† and were letting kids roam. Different culture facilitated by poor connectivity and scarcity of content. † The title says the 90s but…

Yes and no. I think you're right about the reason being a bit off, but let's say to coordinate some birthday party or "let's take the kids to the zoo or whatever" it was still absolutely true, just not a daily occurrence.

Re: Everyday life improvements since the 90s (2022)

#90

Post by wink »

jonathanlydall wrote: post #65
tharne wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Eh. I'd argue while some of the objects have improved - I'm not sure my life has improved because of them. This is exactly right. So many "improvements" are cool or interesting, but either provide no meaningful improvement to one's life (e.g. streaming vs. VHS) or actually detract from our lives on balance, e.g. smartphones.

I’m 43 and disagree. Streaming TV shows means I can watch them at a convenient time for me, pausing at leisure, not having to waste time on adverts. In practice this means my wife and I can work through series 45 minutes a night, perhaps only one or two nights a week at whatever time it happens to be after kids are down. Smartphones can be used in unhealthy ways for sure, but they are almost unreal when you consider…

Yeah, it's handy - and maybe my teenage years were an exception here, but for me the deciding change was internet access and not the smartphone. As long as you could coordinate with your friends online, the actual meeting up outside wasn't a big problem anymore. Talking late 90s, early 00s here - everyone had ICQ or at least email and as long as people were checking this after school/in the afternoon, the plans for the night were easy to mass communicate.
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