Created: prior to 2018
When did I first start using the World Wide Web? Well, it was in a VERY limited way, back in about December 1991, after receiving advice from my contacts in Sybase who suggested that with the introduction of the WWW in the middle of 1991, that compuserve and other networks like AOL were going to start to lose their dominance. Things progressed very quickly after that!
When did I first start to use International Computer Networks? Long before the Word Wide Web was invested! I used Compuserve heavily before the WWW, and I used a variety of bulletin boards - including one I hosted myself in Calgary in one of my companies. I started using them for corporate purposes in 1981 or 1982 (I was running a company while going to University). Of course, I used even more limited versions starting in 1980 (at University, on a Honeywell Multics system, then I started to use the much more frustrating UNIX one, then thankfully switched back to Multics before graduating from the University in 1983. After leaving University, it was on to bulletin boards, then AOL then Compuserve (I still don't like AOL), then the WWW which is what, in my opinion, allowed all the companies to "make" the internet what it is today. Prior to the WWW, it was, in my opinion, the internet was really just a glorified University document sharing and email system,
And, compared to AOL and Compuserve, the Internet was terrible when I first made the jump. But the WWW 'promised' to make the Internet much better than Compuserve, and indeed, in most ways, it did do that - and my kids have never even heard of Compuserve!