Found an old 1995 article claiming the internet was just a fad

Was digging through my dad's old computer magazines in his garage and found a PC World piece from 1995 saying the internet would never replace shopping malls. The author literally called it "a digital toy for hobbyists" which is pretty funny considering I just ordered my groceries online 10 minutes ago.

2 comments

2 Comments

linda_mason8215d ago

1995 was the same year Amazon first launched, selling books out of Bezos's garage. That "digital toy for hobbyists" line is gold though, especially since by 1997 there were already people starting online businesses that would outlast half the malls they were comparing it to lol. The author probably thought VHS was gonna stick around forever too. It's wild how fast things shifted once people realized you could buy almost anything without putting on pants.

ivan87314d ago

Funny thing is, that "hobbyist" mindset actually helped some of the early adopters figure out what worked before the big money moved in. A buddy of mine ran a small site selling used guitar strings back in '97, and he swore the lack of pressure let him experiment without worrying about quarterly profits. Also worth noting that most of those early online stores had terrible security, but people didn't care because they were just buying weird stuff you couldn't find locally. Kind of feels like the same "this is just for fun" attitude that drove startup culture until the dot-com crash sorted out who was actually serious.