Question:
I need someone elderly to answer questions about technology?
anonymous
1970-01-01 00:00:00 UTC
I need someone elderly to answer questions about technology?
Twenty answers:
DeeJay
2010-11-28 23:13:24 UTC
I was born in 1935. I'm 75 years old.



1. Q: Growing up, what was the one electronic you and your family used the most?

A: The radio. Maytag wringer washing machine and toaster. We didn't have electric stove. We used wood and coal to cook and for heat.



2. Q: Did you have any video games when you were younger?

A: They didn't exist. My children never had a video game.



3. Q: What did the computers look like in the 1940s? When did you first see one?

A: Never heard of a computer until 1979 - when I went to work for the state. They had a main frame. No Internet - not even for our State Government.



4. Q: What was the biggest major technological invention that you remember?

A: Television - The Space Crafts. Texas Instrument calculater.



5. Q: What inventions do we have today that you never imagined we would have?

A: All the technological inventions.



6. How much did a computer cost when they first came out?

A:We paid three thousand dollars in the 80's. It was nothing more than a glorified word processor. No Internet yet.



7. How has technology changed since you were younger?

A: After the Space age - then came the computer - from there on it has been forever changing. It will continue to do so. In 1935 - we had the telegraph - the radio record player.



Some people had the Bendix washing machines and televisions - we didn't have Television until I got married in 1957.

DeeJay.
Old School Hero
2010-11-28 22:25:41 UTC
1. Q: Growing up, what was the one electronic you and your family used the most?

A: Radio



2. Q: Did you have any video games when you were younger?

A: No. Not even close to such a thing.



3. Q: What did the computers look like in the 1940s? When did you first see one?

A: The first picture I saw of a computer was the Univac -- in the early 50s, I believe. Huge rooms full of vacuum tubes.



4. Q: What was the biggest major technological invention that you remember?

A: Television.



5. Q: What inventions do we have today that you never imagined we would have?

A: Internet. There wasn't the merest hint of such a thing.



6. How much did a computer cost when they first came out?

A: I would guess (in today's dollars), Univac probably cost at least $1.2M.



7. How has technology changed since you were younger?

A: Fewer moving parts ... seriously. Think about a '40s movie projector and a modern DVD player.
Beulah
2010-11-29 17:19:20 UTC
I am 62



1. Q: Growing up, what was the one electronic you and your family used the most?

A: The radio



2. Q: Did you have any video games when you were younger?

A: They had not been invented



3. Q: What did the computers look like in the 1940s? When did you first see one?

A:They were huge. Special rooms were constructed to house them in a dust free environment.



4. Q: What was the biggest major technological invention that you remember?

A:satellites



5. Q: What inventions do we have today that you never imagined we would have?

A: the internet



6. How much did a computer cost when they first came out?

A: The first home computer we had (About 1982 I think) was a Sinclair ZX81 and cost around £200. do not know what the cost in usa was for them.



7. How has technology changed since you were younger?

A: for home and personal use - beyond anything I could have imagined.

For example from wind up gramophones to MP3 players.





Good luck

beulah
Goddess of Laundry
2010-11-29 03:37:56 UTC
1. Q: Growing up, what was the one electronic you and your family used the most?

A: Radio. It was on in the morning to get weather, news and traffic. (TV was mostly in the evening)



2. Q: Did you have any video games when you were younger?

A:Pong is the earliest I can remember



3. Q: What did the computers look like in the 1940s? When did you first see one?

A:It filled an entire building. It belonged to the federal government, but that was back in the sixties.



4. Q: What was the biggest major technological invention that you remember?

A: Rockets that could conquer space.



5. Q: What inventions do we have today that you never imagined we would have?

A: Cellphone, Blackberry-Smartphones, internet communication



6. How much did a computer cost when they first came out?

A:It was very expensive, as I recall. You could look it up,(I love Google Search Engine):

Commodore 64 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commodore_64



7. How has technology changed since you were younger?

A: Far more affordable, more diverse, more accessible for the average person,it has become woven into our everyday lives. Telephones,Radio,TV, movies were all available, but the computer-internet, search engines,internet sites,portable communication are the revolution.
Dinah
2010-11-28 21:36:22 UTC
I'm 63. From '47 - '57, was growing to 10, in '60, 14, birthday early in the year.



1. Q: Growing up, what was the one electronic you and your family used the most?

A: The television and the toaster.



2. Q: Did you have any video games when you were younger?

A: Nope.



3. Q: What did the computers look like in the 1940s? When did you first see one?

A: Dunno. First saw one in the data department at what was then Western Electric where I worked. Hole-punched cards in a loud, mammoth machine with collating catch slots.



4. Q: What was the biggest major technological invention that you remember?

A: Going from black-and-white TV to color. My father waited til "they got the bugs out" to buy one.



5. Q: What inventions do we have today that you never imagined we would have?

A: Never imagined as a child we'd have electric can openers, for one. Still don't have one. Don't want one. Additional noise pollution. Swing-a-Way hand-held is easy enough.



6. How much did a computer cost when they first came out?

A: Don't know. Have priced current prices since. This one was a gift from friends.



7. How has technology changed since you were younger?

A: Oh please. How about the '69 moon landing?
?
2010-11-28 20:47:36 UTC
1. Q: Growing up, what was the one electronic you and your family used the most?

A:Toaster



2. Q: Did you have any video games when you were younger?

A:No



3. Q: What did the computers look like in the 1940s? When did you first see one?

A:There were none then. My first was a Kaypro II, I think in 1971 or so. It ran CPM, had 2-5 1/4 floppy drives (no HDD), no graphics, no mouse, no sound other than beep. It was awesome.



4. Q: What was the biggest major technological invention that you remember?

A:Color TV



5. Q: What inventions do we have today that you never imagined we would have?

A:Tunneling microscopes



6. How much did a computer cost when they first came out?

A:$1500



7. How has technology changed since you were younger?

A:Smaller, faster, cheaper



1951
anonymous
2010-11-28 22:28:33 UTC
Television.



As a youngster in the 1950s I went to the science museum and played tic-tac-toe with a computer. The computer won of course, but it's not a very difficult game and I wasn't really very impressed.



In the 1940s? Computers at that time were made of thousands and thousands of vacuum tubes and were the size of buildings. And I don't think anybody got to see them unless they worked for the government or some big university.



The biggest technological thing in my lifetime so far is high-speed internet connections. WHICH I STILL CAN'T GET IN THIS TOWN.



Facial Recognition Technology. Which I Still don't quite believe in. I'd like to see some hard numbers on how accurate such systems are.



A pocket calculator that today costs one or two dollars cost several hundred bucks in the early 1970s.



It has produced a culture that is a mile wide and an inch deep.
?
2010-11-28 20:40:56 UTC
I was born in 1956.



Your questions are as follows:



1. Telephone and TV. We did get a microwave in in the 70's and that was great.



2. No video games. Sorry. I think I got a video game in late 70's, early 80's.



3. First computer I worked around was in the late 70's and it was a main-frame computer at work. Took up an entire room. In the 1980's, I got a Commador 64 and had a cassette drive and that was the 80's.



4. The VCR was a huge technical invention - we got to watch movies pre-recorded -- on our TV.



5. E-mail - - internet -- smartphones - very nice.



6. My Commador 64 was about $800. A microwave oven was also $800.



7. Technology is changing so fast I can't even describe how fast and how much it's changed. It is ridiculous.



Good luck.
Kini
2010-11-29 18:08:40 UTC
1. No electronics in the 1950s for consumer use when I was a teenager. We had a TV and a party-line telephone. My father had a fax machine in his office, the old type with the clinder.

2. Video games did not exist. Neither did videos for home use, or DVDs or CDs or VHS tapes. No way to play them.

3. The only computers were for use by science labs and the military in the 1940s. I saw a Wang word processor in the 1970s.

4. The biggest invention in my childhood was the IBM keypunch machine.

5. cell phones, PCs, IPADs, software programs, GPS, DVDs

6. About $2500 was what I paid in 1990 when they were available for home use.

7. Everything is electronic, rather than electro-mechanical.
Mike K
2010-11-28 20:26:04 UTC
Hello,



1. Q: Growing up, what was the one electronic you and your family used the most?

A: The television



2. Q: Did you have any video games when you were younger?

A: No.



3. Q: What did the computers look like in the 1940s? When did you first see one?

A: In the early 60's. In the 40's the first ones filled the whole floor of an office building and were using tube technology.



4. Q: What was the biggest major technological invention that you remember?

A: The LASER



5. Q: What inventions do we have today that you never imagined we would have?

A: Cell phones in combo with the internet. We expected air cars, rocket belts and a moon and Martian colony by now.



6. How much did a computer cost when they first came out?

A: In the tens of millions and only a few high priestly like scientists could run them. There were many computer languages to learn.



7. How has technology changed since you were younger?



Mostly computer electronics, digital TV and the net. Stereos to cars were just as good and many were more powerful than they are today. I have 3 cells and must use them but I can't stand cell phones as they really wreck good social atmosphere and get togethers. I hate being a slave to them.



Cheers,



Michael Kelly (1952)
HOOK
2010-11-30 13:15:44 UTC
1) The TV,, ours was a Dumont

2) NO, the only thing we did have was Called Winkie Dink and YOU, you placed a clear plastic film on the TV screen and would draw along with the character on the screen with crayons

3) The first Computer was the Univac, it literally took up an entire Room, only saw it in print from LOOK magazine, and Popular Science mag

4) The Space Rockets that took astronauts to the moon,

5) Personal Computers, Cell Phones, Nuclear weapons, Lasers,

6) We paid $ 1,500. for our first computer

7) Technology has advanced by leaps and bounds, We have lap top computers, cell phones that do more than make phone calls. Jet planes that fly at super sonic speeds, Laser guided weaponry, Robots and drones. Flat screen TV's , the list is way long,
Bob K
2010-11-30 16:44:24 UTC
I am an Inupiaq, Eskimo, pushing 63.

And the first and only piece of electronics I was aware of was a battery operated, wind charged,Hallicrafter radio. The battery was like a couple inches wide by 3 to 4 inches tall and like 6 to 8 inches long. Dad had a copper wire stretched east to west on the end of posts on the roof. And I remember short wave broadcasts from all over the world plus am radio, KICY radio, armed forces radio and the most intriguing radio static ever imaginable! There was no electricity at our village, each house was heated by wood stoves and cooking was done with wood also. Some houses had brand spanking new oil stoves for heating AND cooking! Wow! Warm and so easy to cook on. Honest.



No video games but lots of real games like miachi (eskimo baseball), mona-mona, translated to american english- hide and seek game, moacq-no smiling staring game, mock hunting and fishing, and so many more games people played alone, together or in groups.



Nobody had an inkling of computers and the only pic i saw was in Life magazine.



The biggest tech innovation was the dizzying array of newer and faster and most cooler looking high wing-single engine mail and passenger and freight planes that landed once a week or so on the beach and out on the Bering Sea once the sea froze up and there was a good long stretch of flat ice for the planes to land on, sometimes miles from our village.



I never imagined microwave cooking, synthetic materials for aircraft, handguns.



And I will not comment on computers as my first was given to me by my brother

And technology has changed so much since I was a kid.

Oil fired stoves are much more efficient for heating and cooking. Aircraft-you can see what is available now...all Buck Rogerish ! And the cars, trucks, snow machines, motorcycles, bicycles.

Firearms look the same on the outside, but on the details, holly cow! much better steels, manufacturing techniques, better reliability, accuracy, usefulness and utility.

And communicating was by speaking or letters or going to whoever you wanted to speak with. There were corded rotary phones, then digital and now cordless and cell. Early cell phones were larger then vhf radios and now are pocket size and even have cameras, internet, apps and lotsa stuff I do not understand. (all the extra tuff is kinds-sorta useless me not understanding their use...) Shoes are now much more comfortable. I just love my Nubalance walkers, breathable and water proof to boot! (Pun intended!)



Technology has changed, much for the better. Some of the old things, technology are far superior though, one area freezing temperatures to extreme cold weather. As long as the old technology is still available for understanding and use, I see new becoming more useful and commonplace. And the old technology has to be available...just in case.
*~STEVIE~* *~B~*
2010-11-29 07:23:24 UTC
1.The telly.

2. No

3. I`ve no idea. The first time I saw a computer was in the 90`s.

4. Smart phones.

5. Microwave, mobile phones, laptops.

6. Probably thousands.

7. There wasn`t any everyday technology we used when I was younger.
SandyO
2010-11-29 17:50:03 UTC
The radio- the family gathered round it in the evening to hear what was going on



Video games did not exist-- kids played outside



I saw a picture of a computer the Army had , one of the first ones and it was hugh, filled half a room.



Tv-- we got one around 1948 or 49 and it was the only one for miles around and everyone for miles around would come over on Friday nights to watch friday night fights ( which was boxing ) even though they had to get up early to get their chores done.it was the high light of the week.



There are so many--microwave, GPS,computers,all technology



I have no idea



There was no technology, the kind we have today, when I was young.
?
2016-05-31 17:41:25 UTC
There are an awful lot of questions here and they can't all be answered because people everywhere are different. I think, in the main that most people prefer to work in a group as opposed to on their own. The main religion is Church of England with Catholicism second. Texting and phoning are very popular forms of communication. The laws are quite liberal although only for minor misdemeanors. The most appropriate greeting for families in a public setting would be hugs and kisses, the same between friends (in general), strangers are treated with distance and respect. Body language is an important factor in any relationship (some people say one thing but mean another!) Personal space is a obligatory and no-one likes to be touched too much especially by someone they don't know very well. By personal space, I mean a margin of about 3 feet all around. I'm not sure what you mean by 'tone of voice to communicate' We speak gently to our children (in general) and firmer to our older relatives and with respect to our parents/grandparents. Eye contact is OK. Race is a very big issue in England. We have a good sense of humour and it is across the board from childish jokes to more sophisticated styles and 'toilet' humour. All families differ in their relationships. Mine is a very loving tactile family whereas others might be more reserved in showing their affections.
anonymous
2010-11-29 04:59:59 UTC
For those of us 'over the age of 60', we would have grown up before much 'electronics' were available.

1. Record player (that's as close as we got to 'electronic' in the 50's/60's.

2. No, we played BOARD GAMES, and played marbles, and many other non-electronic games. No such thing as VIDEO GAMES for those of us growing up if we're over 60 now. The first video game I remember was PONG around 1980. And I often lost at that.

3. The first picture of a computer I saw was HUGE....what can sit on our desk today would need a huge room to do what my PC does.

4. The space satellite....Sputnik and Telstar.

5. Hand held phones, wrist communicators (Dick Tracy comics had them), flat screen TVS, ...

6. I don't know but I do know I couldn't afford a hand held calculator when they came out.

7. Supposedly technology is supposed to give us more free time. WRONG. Because of technology, we have more work to do by less people in less time. Even U.S. Navy ships require smaller crews because of today's technology.

The first computers I had contact with were the IBM AN-UYK/7 which had huge tape reels that spun back and forth looking for data. We had to use a machine to punch holes in cards, then feed them into the reader which would load the data to the tapes. Then the reports would be printed out using many small dots to make the letters/numbers (called DOT MATRIX). Sometimes the Data Processor wasn't paying attention and put the cards in backwards. The words on the readout pages came out backwards (not the letters, just the words). There was a notch in the upper left hand corner of the card so you would know you were putting them in correctly. Now that information is loaded by a keyboard and printed out where you sit (or close by).

I almost forgot...the TRANSISTOR RADIO. One Christmas I got one and an earphone came with it. I was sitting about 1/2 way back in my 7th grade (1959) science class and we were watching a movie. My teacher came up to me, saw the ear piece leading to my shirt pocket and said, "Don, I never knew you had a hearing aid." I was listening to rock music on WIBG out of Philadelphia.

(DOB 1946, USN retired 1965-85)
anonymous
2010-11-29 05:44:43 UTC
1. Radio

2. No

3. There were no computers (PC's) in the 1940's

4. The television

5. Cell phones, GPS

6. $1500

7. We got our first television when I was 10 years old.
Malcom
2010-11-28 20:51:07 UTC
1. There were no electronic things

2. No

3. There were none

4. The telegraph

5. GPS

6. The first one in my town was an IBM, if filled a large room and cost about $85,000

7. The kids used to play outside, now they watch TV, play on the cell phone, and ipod. on the couch.
fcm703
2010-11-29 10:14:51 UTC
1. Toaster

2. No

3. Room sized

4. Talking pictures

5. Too numerous to mention

6. Millions of government money

7. Vastly
ssparkle63
2010-11-29 12:45:23 UTC
that depends on where you were born, city, or back woods, I am 67 and city,

1.tv

2no

3.1940??? giant ones in caves

4color tv

5.computer and information highway.

6 lots

7everything has changed


This content was originally posted on Y! Answers, a Q&A website that shut down in 2021.
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