Floppy disks, pagers, Batibot: #HowOldAreYou throwback to simpler days

October 3, 2018 - 2:43 PM
5774
This twitter trend is giving people a glimpse into life before internet, Facebook and Netflix. (Artwork by Uela Altar-Badayos)

#HowOldAreYou is trending on Twitter, and Filipinos are looking back to simpler times.

The hosts of radio program “The Morning Rush” invited Filipinos to join the #HowOldAreYou trend that sprung up on Twitter in the past few days.

The mechanics are simple: post a few memories from your younger days to give others an idea of your actual age.

Some shared how their profession was like in the time before internet, laptops and smart phones. ABS-CBN news editor Jojo Malig shared some memories of his early days as a journalist.

One seasoned gamer posted a photo of a collection of the first to third generations of the Pokemon video game series that dominated the market for handheld games in the 90’s and early 2000s.

The Pokemon series and the Nintendo Game Boy and Game Boy Advance handheld consoles are credited with ushering in the age of handheld gaming, decades before smartphones took over the market.

Other old school gamers also dug deeper and revived one of the video game industry’s grandfathers.

The Nintendo Entertainment System was released in the 1980s and was considered the top-of-the-line gaming console at the time, with 8-bit graphics and a 1.79 MHz processor.

Some are sharing the lineup of local television networks from long ago, in the days when cable was not as accessible and Netflix and online streaming were yet to be invented.

One user meanwhile reminded the world of a time before USBs, cloud storage and emails.

The floppy disk, first invented in 1967 with newer versions produced in the 80’s and 90’s, could store just less than two megabytes. Before the coming of universal serial bus drives and external hard drives that can carry up to 1 terabyte became available in the market, disks were the go-to method for computer users to exchange data.

One Filipino meanwhile gave a glimpse of how the Philippines’ paper bills once looked like.

The two-peso bank note featuring Jose Rizal, five-peso note featuring Andres Bonifacio and ten-peso note featuring Apolinario Mabini have since been demonetized but are considered collector’s items. Their value as collector’s items can be checked online.—Artwork by Uela Altar Badayos