Remembrances of Things Past

Network Working Group S. Greenfield Request for Comments: 1300 Ziff-Davis February 1992

Remembrances of Things Past

Status of this Memo

This memo provides information for the Internet community. It does not specify an Internet standard. Distribution of this memo is unlimited.

Discussion

When Shannon was a river and Turing was a car When Banyan was a tree and buses travelled far

dBase was where you ran to after you hit the ball Often we were ANSI RISC aversive not at all

Windows were for looking out of in a Tandem, two could take a spin Bridges were for crossing a frame was to keep pictures in

A semi-conductor was a maestro not in the big time yet A port you sought in a storm fishermen used a net

Woody Guthrie sang of "My LAN" WAN was a despairing mood LATAs were for high places menus featured food

If a cursor used four letter words a sensor cut them out The sight of a mouse in an office was sure to raise a shout

Haloid perfected photocopying and thereby made a hoard Then came Japanese competition and its "ox" was gored

Frequency was measured in cycles Hertz referred to multiple pain Modem was a harvesting command for bringing in the grain

Modelling was at fashion shows bauds were ladies of the night Prompting was helping actors contesting for resources, a fight

Walking and chewing gum concurrently requires considerable skill We called it multi-tasking and by gosh we always will

We had no electronic calculators just slide rules by Keuffel & Esser I am still a true believer Keufel & Esser war besser

Chips were used for gambling von Neuman was a pup Monte Carlo a place to visit squaring the circle ... well, we gave up

A Sprint was less than 880 a relay was a team Greene was just a color breaking up AT&T a dream

Coherent was applied to speech not a spectral line excited Multi-media meant prose and song and Noel Coward was knighted

Cerf was found at the beach a Rose was a Rose was a Rose Jobs were to look for and Gates were to close

"2B" was an elementary school class and "D" a failing grade A router was a tool a server was a maid

Lotus was a flower adobe was a brick Postscript was an afterthought joy a popsicle stick

We called a plotter a CAD a token ring a sham A buffer was for buffing a male goat was a ram

The best noise supressor was ... ssh we knew little of egos and ids For archival storage and encryption we looked to the pyramids

Now in accordance with Greenfield's Law in voice both loud and clear Here's to exponential growth in memory & operating speed next year.

--srg

Security Considerations

Security issues are not discussed in this memo.

Author's Address

Stanley R. Greenfield Ziff-Davis One Park Avenue New York, NY 10016

EMail: 0004689513@mcimail.com

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