What Would Most Surprise A Visitor from 1991?

[Faeelin]

Btw, you ignorant Hungarin prole,

It's really cute seeing one slav call another ignorant. Bless your heart.

[Barrister]

I have to strongly agree with those that said "the internet".

I was 16 in 1991.  I remember being fascinated with dial-up BBMs at the time - the idea you could communicate with people across town was amazing.  The internet, of course, came a few years later and has profoundly changed the way a number of businesses take place, though to call in the greatest invention of the 20th century goes much too far.  My vote for greatest invention of the 20th century would be something more medical - probably either penicillin or birth control pill, or maybe the "green revolution" in food production.

I have to disagree with those who say "restrictions on free speech", or 9/11.  9/11 was of course one of the largest tragedies that has ever touched my life, but 10 years on the impact of it on history is becoming more limited.  As for free speech - I simply don't see it at all.  If anything because of the disruptive nature of the internet speech is far more free than it was back then.

GIven specifically the 1991 start date, I think a visitor from 20 years ago would be disappointed at how Russia turned out.

[CountDeMoney]

1991?  Biggest surprise would be how long it took me to fucking graduate from college.

[Martim Silva]

I was an adult in 1991.

What I find most amazing today is:

- The little things called 'smartphones', or their smaller brethren 'cellphones', which are like portable telephones, but much more, which allow people to phone each other, SEE each other, take MOVIES and PHOTOS of everything and send them instantly, and messaging everyone. You can be reached anywhere about anything by anyone. Which is a pain in the ass.

- We FINALLY have the Internet! Woot! It's close to what I imagined it to be in '91, though less immersive. But things have gone a long way. It's finally not a big thing to tell everyone that 'I got a letter from Britain!'. And we get to speak with people from all over the world all the time! Lots of different perspectives. And often in real time!

With this net, we can get anything from anywhere! I get to buy stuff abroad on a very regular basis! And it doesn't cost an arm and a leg! And argue with salespeople from the other side of the globe almost in real time.

People watch movies in gigantic monitors. And they look great. And games, music and videos can all be obtained for free. And there are places where we can put our own movies, which are easy to make with modern cameras and computers, and watch those of others. Or see for free and immediately all the series past and present that we want. Really.

- TVs have gone GIANT. I mean, really, really, HUGE. I never thought I'd see such a big image outsice of a cinema. And movies now come in little disks. With some called a 'Blu-Ray' having a GREAT image, really life-like. And households have many TVs. And high-scale sound systems, just like in movie theaters.

- As expected, computers have become even more AMAZING, even if they are still not able to render 100% life-like stuff. But consoles seem to have become even more popular. And they're great now, with cool images and lots of different games. We don't need to go to the Arcade to shoot plastic guns at a screen.  And there are games where millions of people from all over the world play at the same time, together. Insane.

- Faxes have all but died. Weird. And floppy disks are gone. There are storage disks that take gigabytes of stuff, but the net allows for quick storage and transfer of information.

- Printers are dirt cheap now and can do lots of stuff, including scanning images to and from the computer.

- There are lots of pre-prepared foods in the supermarkets now that are just tasty. Microwave ovens are cheap, so single males can eat good food without getting married. Also, there are now machines that prepare delicious full meals as long as you dump the right ingredients in there.

- America was attacked by terrorists in 2001, and it was just INCREDIBLE. They rammed large commercial jets in the WTC, which went down like a deck of cards and the Pentagon got hit. Thousands died. I kid you not. New York was covered in smoke like if it had been bombed. You have to have seen it to believe it. There was a guy called Bin Laden that have a James Bond-like organization al-Qaeda that terrorised the planet and blew lots of stuff in London and Madrid. Inbelievable!

- Europe now has a single currency! YAY! Yeah, we all have the same money! I can't even believe it. But everyone get indebted to their eyeballs, and it seems like everybody will go bankrupt now.

- America elected a Black president! No, I won't pull the other one, it's TRUE! Stop laughting, it really is the truth!

- There has been inflation, but relative to wages most stuff is now way cheaper. Plane tickets are now very cheap. And thanks to the net, you can book your passage yourself in a few minutes, instead of putting up with a travel agency. And you just print the tickets and that's it. No more wait for them to arrive. And those cool movies - assuming you don't get them free in the web - are now cheap to buy, whereas the VHS tapes used to cost a bundle. Everybody now has many movies at home to watch. Computers are widespread.

- China GREW. I mean, it fucking GREW. No, more than that. It's the second largest economy now. And there's about a billion and a half chinamen now. They're everywhere. It seems that the 'Yellow Danger' was real after all.

- Lots of map changes. Yugoslavia is gone. And man, was that a messy affair. Slovenia, Croatia, Montenegro, Bosnia, Serbia and a bit of the South of that country are now all independent. Czechoslovakia is also gone the way of the dodo. But no bloodshed. Sudan broke in two. East Timor split from Indonesia.

- America ended up invading Iraq. Took them 12 years.

- Big revolutions in the Muslim world! Revolts everywhere! Regimes collapsing! Just like in the Warsaw Pact countries, but with more bullets!

- The price of Oil went from $9 to WAY over $100 per barrel. Insane. They used to say that would be the end of the world.

- Wall Street rose a LOT. People complain if the Dow falls to 'near' 10,000 points! WTF! It used to be a good day when it surpassed the 3,000 points!

- Gays are getting married legally. Double WTF!

- On the reverse side, women got even more rights, so it's madness to marry now. Divorces skyrocketed.

- We can't speak freely anymore. Anything we say is construed as 'offensive' by someone, and oddly you can get fined/arrested for it. Even if it was just a kind-hearted joke. Common expressions have become 'hate speech'. And don't even try to look at an underage girl in the street if you're male, you'll be thought of as a paedophile.

- People started to hate body hair and kids - as well as some adults from our time who should know better - shave EVERYTHING. I do mean EVERTTHING. And then they wonder about paedophilia...

- There is now an encouragement of couples black male-white female. They're all the rage these days.

- People got obsessed with Nazis the Holocaust. There seems to be a general hysteria about them, with daily articles in the news about stuff that was old in 1991.

- Israel and the Palestinans are still at it. It's good to see some things never change.

[Martinus]

They would of course be upset by the lack of flying cars. And also suprised that the US can't put people into space anymore, though the Russians can.

No kidding. Isn't Blade Runner set more or less in our times?

[Martinus]

I was an adult in 1991.

What I find most amazing today is:

- The little things called 'smartphones', or their smaller brethren 'cellphones', which are like portable telephones, but much more, which allow people to phone each other, SEE each other, take MOVIES and PHOTOS of everything and send them instantly, and messaging everyone. You can be reached anywhere about anything by anyone. Which is a pain in the ass.

- We FINALLY have the Internet! Woot! It's close to what I imagined it to be in '91, though less immersive. But things have gone a long way. It's finally not a big thing to tell everyone that 'I got a letter from Britain!'. And we get to speak with people from all over the world all the time! Lots of different perspectives. And often in real time!

With this net, we can get anything from anywhere! I get to buy stuff abroad on a very regular basis! And it doesn't cost an arm and a leg! And argue with salespeople from the other side of the globe almost in real time.

People watch movies in gigantic monitors. And they look great. And games, music and videos can all be obtained for free. And there are places where we can put our own movies, which are easy to make with modern cameras and computers, and watch those of others. Or see for free and immediately all the series past and present that we want. Really.

- TVs have gone GIANT. I mean, really, really, HUGE. I never thought I'd see such a big image outsice of a cinema. And movies now come in little disks. With some called a 'Blu-Ray' having a GREAT image, really life-like. And households have many TVs. And high-scale sound systems, just like in movie theaters.

- As expected, computers have become even more AMAZING, even if they are still not able to render 100% life-like stuff. But consoles seem to have become even more popular. And they're great now, with cool images and lots of different games. We don't need to go to the Arcade to shoot plastic guns at a screen.  And there are games where millions of people from all over the world play at the same time, together. Insane.

- Faxes have all but died. Weird. And floppy disks are gone. There are storage disks that take gigabytes of stuff, but the net allows for quick storage and transfer of information.

- Printers are dirt cheap now and can do lots of stuff, including scanning images to and from the computer.

- There are lots of pre-prepared foods in the supermarkets now that are just tasty. Microwave ovens are cheap, so single males can eat good food without getting married. Also, there are now machines that prepare delicious full meals as long as you dump the right ingredients in there.

- America was attacked by terrorists in 2001, and it was just INCREDIBLE. They rammed large commercial jets in the WTC, which went down like a deck of cards and the Pentagon got hit. Thousands died. I kid you not. New York was covered in smoke like if it had been bombed. You have to have seen it to believe it. There was a guy called Bin Laden that have a James Bond-like organization al-Qaeda that terrorised the planet and blew lots of stuff in London and Madrid. Inbelievable!

- Europe now has a single currency! YAY! Yeah, we all have the same money! I can't even believe it. But everyone get indebted to their eyeballs, and it seems like everybody will go bankrupt now.

- America elected a Black president! No, I won't pull the other one, it's TRUE! Stop laughting, it really is the truth!

- There has been inflation, but relative to wages most stuff is now way cheaper. Plane tickets are now very cheap. And thanks to the net, you can book your passage yourself in a few minutes, instead of putting up with a travel agency. And you just print the tickets and that's it. No more wait for them to arrive. And those cool movies - assuming you don't get them free in the web - are now cheap to buy, whereas the VHS tapes used to cost a bundle. Everybody now has many movies at home to watch. Computers are widespread.

- China GREW. I mean, it fucking GREW. No, more than that. It's the second largest economy now. And there's about a billion and a half chinamen now. They're everywhere. It seems that the 'Yellow Danger' was real after all.

- Lots of map changes. Yugoslavia is gone. And man, was that a messy affair. Slovenia, Croatia, Montenegro, Bosnia, Serbia and a bit of the South of that country are now all independent. Czechoslovakia is also gone the way of the dodo. But no bloodshed. Sudan broke in two. East Timor split from Indonesia.

- America ended up invading Iraq. Took them 12 years.

- Big revolutions in the Muslim world! Revolts everywhere! Regimes collapsing! Just like in the Warsaw Pact countries, but with more bullets!

- The price of Oil went from $9 to WAY over $100 per barrel. Insane. They used to say that would be the end of the world.

- Wall Street rose a LOT. People complain if the Dow falls to 'near' 10,000 points! WTF! It used to be a good day when it surpassed the 3,000 points!

- Gays are getting married legally. Double WTF!

- On the reverse side, women got even more rights, so it's madness to marry now. Divorces skyrocketed.

- We can't speak freely anymore. Anything we say is construed as 'offensive' by someone, and oddly you can get fined/arrested for it. Even if it was just a kind-hearted joke. Common expressions have become 'hate speech'. And don't even try to look at an underage girl in the street if you're male, you'll be thought of as a paedophile.

- People started to hate body hair and kids - as well as some adults from our time who should know better - shave EVERYTHING. I do mean EVERTTHING. And then they wonder about paedophilia...

- There is now an encouragement of couples black male-white female. They're all the rage these days.

- People got obsessed with Nazis the Holocaust. There seems to be a general hysteria about them, with daily articles in the news about stuff that was old in 1991.

- Israel and the Palestinans are still at it. It's good to see some things never change.

[Martinus]

Btw, you ignorant Hungarin prole,

It's really cute seeing one slav call another ignorant. Bless your heart.

Uhm, Hungarians are not Slavs. 

[Barrister]

Btw, you ignorant Hungarin prole,

It's really cute seeing one slav call another ignorant. Bless your heart.

Uhm, Hungarians are not Slavs. 

As much as I'd like to disown them too, I'm afraid genetically they are.

[Martinus]

Btw, you ignorant Hungarin prole,

It's really cute seeing one slav call another ignorant. Bless your heart.

Uhm, Hungarians are not Slavs. 

As much as I'd like to disown them too, I'm afraid genetically they are.

I thought they were related to Finns.

[Warspite]

I think smartphones would surprise the 1991 visitor the most. The idea of some kind of international network with data and media flowing around I think conceptually was not so far out. To the visitor, it would look a bit like an interactive version of cable TV.

Whereas today's smartphones can do things no consumer PC could do back in 1991 and would have only really been imagined in science fiction.

Although, I do accept that a lot of what makes smartphones so useful and mind-bogglingly surprising to the 1991 time traveller is that they are hooked into global telecommunication networks.

[Barrister]

Btw, you ignorant Hungarin prole,

It's really cute seeing one slav call another ignorant. Bless your heart.

Uhm, Hungarians are not Slavs. 

As much as I'd like to disown them too, I'm afraid genetically they are.

I thought they were related to Finns.

Linguistically, yes.  But the number of magyars was so small, and they have interbred with the surrounding population so well, that genetically they are indistinguishable from all other slavs.

Unfortunately.

[Warspite]

Btw, you ignorant Hungarin prole,

It's really cute seeing one slav call another ignorant. Bless your heart.

Uhm, Hungarians are not Slavs. 

As much as I'd like to disown them too, I'm afraid genetically they are.

Linguistically they are not Slavic, and they don't consider themselves Slavs, and really that's as good a definition as any to be determined as an ethnic group.

[CountDeMoney]

Isn't Blade Runner set more or less in our times?

Depends on how you define "less".  You retard.

[Ideologue]

Isn't Blade Runner set more or less in our times?

Depends on how you define "less".  You retard.

[HVC]

Going with smart phones. You can do more game/computation wise on phones now then you could do on computers in 91. it also throws in the internet and video chatting. it;s 1991 science fiction shit. It's like if someone was transported from the 50's to the 70's and flying cars were actually real.