I don’t mean, what if we took the internet away… all of a sudden… but rather if it didn’t exist at all today (2026). Although that would be an interesting situation to contemplate, for sure – stripping it away from our current, completely reliant selves all of a sudden. I’m not going to lie, that would probably be all kinds of horrible… This, of course, brings up another question: Would this scenario also imply that we do not
have smartphones? Yes, and No. I’ll touch on this a little later…
Also, before we get started… This isn’t just an essay written for nostalgia’s sake. Even though I do get a little nostalgic when thinking about some of these things from the past. But rather it’s to point out how we have gained certain incredible advancements with the internet, but have lost some of our human experiences in the process. Would it have been better to remain without the internet? Maybe that’s a better title – I don’t know… To be clear, I guess I still want (NEED…) the internet, but……..
Radio Shack and Sears Would Still be a Thing
I don’t know about you, but I miss going to places like Radio Shack, Sears & Roebuck, Blockbuster Movie Rentals (I’ll mention again later), etc. Like many other establishments you can probably mention, having to go to the physical location was part of the whole experience.
My Grandfather was an amateur radio guy, or HAM Radio. There seems to be a little bit of debate over what HAM actually stands for, but at any rate… He was a communications guy in WWII, and that interest followed him (and a lot of men during that era) once he exited the Army (Army Air Corps). Because of this, I kind of got caught up in the electronic experiment project mindset along with him, since I was always
interested in what he was doing, although I never became a HAM or an electrical engineer. I remember helping him run cable through his attic for a new, really tall antenna that he erected in his backyard. I did take a drafting class at a vocational school where we drew basic mechanical and electrical schematics for two years, but that’s another completely different story for another day.
With a combination of basic electrical systems and audio equipment needs always on the horizon, I found myself frequenting Radio Shack. Oh!… And, Circuit City. Remember that place? I almost forgot about it. I would go to Radio Shack for things like RCA cables, headphone adapters (mini to ¼”, etc.), hard-to-find batteries, walkie talkies, and possibly a power strip / surge protector (before Walmart’s were more prevalent). It’s difficult to discern how many “regular physical stores” are actually still in operation. At least, as far as the way they used to operate (department store and repair services – seems like a lot are just repair services now – don’t quote me)…
Sears & Roebuck used to rule my local mall due to its size and the variety of sales departments it covered. Even though I was a little younger at the time, I still liked going through the tools section when I was in the mall. And their catalog you could order from was HUGE, to say the least. My brother and I always picked out an item each Christmas (maybe two on occasion if small). But that store eventually closed as well. However, it appears they may still exist in Florida, Texas, Massachusetts, and California.
Back to Circuit City… As a musician and just overall music lover, Circuit City was an amazing store. I used to have an Onkyo receiver, a JVC cassette tape deck, and a CD player that I purchased with saved-up money quite some time ago. My Dad and brother still have theirs (the Onkyo receivers). But, like the other stores, I just missed the whole experience of walking around in the store looking at and listening to the different pieces of audio gear. If I remember correctly, I picked out my first car stereo system at Circuit City. I think it was a Pioneer system. Whatever it was, I loved it. I would also purchase blank cassette tapes there (Radio Shack sometimes too) – Your TDKs, BASFs, and Memorex’s… Typing this out brought back the memory of the smell of the new cassettes when the outer plastic is being peeled off…
Now, a definite CON to only having the physical locations of these establishments was that you had to wait a bit longer than today’s waiting periods for items that were not in stock and had to be ordered. If you were at the store at the time of deciding on an item, the store could usually order it for you, but other times, you might have had to physically send in the order yourself via the USPS. But that was life back then, and sometimes the anticipation added to the excitement upon receiving the item in the mail.
An Actual Person Would Answer The Phone
Remember when you could call a company and have a real person answer the phone? Or, at least, have a shorter, less detailed voice mail system to navigate through and then still find a real person at the end?… Quite rare these days, I’m sure you’ll agree… Not having internet back in the day usually meant more attention was given to the physical location of businesses. This also meant more people employed by the
business, therefore having someone available to answer the phone. Again, we were actually talking more to each other in everyday situations.
Streaming Services Wouldn’t Exist
Ok, maybe there’s some benefit to having any music, video, or podcast dialed up on your phone anytime you want it (on your phone over cellular anyway), but we still miss out on part of the whole experience when we don’t have to put in a CD or cassette, to lay down a Vinyl record on the physical record player (look for the 45 adapter if necessary), etc. Let’s not forget the Album / CD art as well, because that (to me) was
just as much a part of the experience as listening to the music.
I realize that for most people my age (over 50), I’m speaking to the choir here, but streaming services have also taken away the ability of music artists to provide their fans with the full experience for the same reasons already mentioned: fans can’t hold the album art in their hands, so they miss the immersive effect when listening to the music.
Lastly, for the music side of things… As most of us know, streaming services have certainly decreased artists’ financial means by offering subscriptions to the streaming service rather than paying the artist directly. Also, by offering single song sales versus the entire album. “Back in the day,” if you liked one song on an album, you still had to buy the whole album or CD in order to listen to that one song, and just hope you liked the rest, or most of them, or could learn to like them… Either way…
I think, if you look hard enough (online, of course), you can still find a few vintage record stores still around in certain areas… But there would be record stores everywhere like before without the internet. Records, or CDs that could be bought, then recorded onto a TDK, BASF, or Memorex cassette tape and played in your Sony Walkman (mine was a Sony anyway)…
And Blockbuster movie rentals… Part of watching a rented video from Blockbuster was actually going to Blockbuster in hopes of finding said movie. Realizing the movie you wanted to rent was actually available was sometimes like winning the lottery (especially if it was a new release). Then, you go home, take the movie out of its casing, rewind it because the person before you was too lazy to do so and Blockbuster failed to catch it (or didn’t care – we’re talking VHS tape here folks), and finally enjoy the show… I experienced both sides of this experience as I worked for a similar store, Pick-A-Flick, for a few years. Which reminds me of sometimes trying to call to reserve a movie. Another part of the experience… We did that at Pick-A-Flick for folks on occasion. Can’t remember if Blockbuster would reserve one or not over the phone…
Would We Feel Cut Off, or More Grounded?
With regard to the rest of the world, I mean… On the one hand, I think we would be more involved within our own communities if we didn’t have access to the surrounding communities, states, countries… (planets…) etc. info via the internet. We didn’t know what we didn’t know back then… and maybe that’s not always a bad thing… We wouldn’t be as influenced by the extra tidbits of information we pick up outside of
the news that comes across our television networks, since there wouldn’t be as much of it available at our fingertips anyway. If we needed to find contact information for a person or business, we would simply look in our phone books, newspapers, etc.
Going Into The Bank to Make a Deposit
Remember taking your weekly wages check to the bank to deposit in person (or at the drive-thru window)? Checks are still used today, but you certainly do not have to deposit one in person any longer. I’m horrible at maintaining a 100% accurate account of my money in our current (2026) personal banking situation. I pretty much just trust the bank now, unfortunately. I maintained a much more stable checkbook when I needed to ensure I physically wrote down every transaction amount that took place.
Smart Phones But No Internet?
First, let’s just say, no smartphones… We would have much more concise versions of things like weather status and alerts. We could still receive text messages from the providers of our “dumb phones,” or alerts across our television screens, but not the data-heavy experiences we have with our current smart phone environment. For example, being able to view a digital map of a storm provides a clearer visual of what’s approaching our location. That’s a pretty handy capability that doesn’t require an internet connection to access and isn’t nearly as capable on older cell phones or landlines.
It wouldn’t make sense for a society to have that kind of capability (smartphones) and not have the internet. Even though they are completely different technologies, it still seems a bit far-fetched. Especially since, if we follow our actual technological progression, our smartphones came along after we had decent internet. So, for this current scenario, we’re saying no smartphones either, which is maybe an essay all in of
itself. Yes, I think that’s one for the writing as well. So, for this whole situation, we’ll just say that we got stuck somewhere in 1990…
What I Haven’t Touched On
- Work – What about remote work? Wouldn’t be a lot that I guess…
- Education – No online college degrees or certificates. Having experiencedcollege in both settings, I strongly favor in-person versus online for a few reasons reasons: better access to professors and total immersion within the classroom environment. Of course, my writing may make you feel I barely graduated from high school school (which is not far from the truth, actually).
Conclusion
If you’ve read thus far… Wow, you’re a Real Trooper, or a CIA, FBI, or NSA rep with a horrible assignment, or more likely just an AI bot with nothing better to do… At any rate, please forgive my meanderings. Hopefully, some of it stayed on point and somehow happened to make sense.
Word Count for this post: 1980 – Good year…
Until Next Time! …
Musician Still Making a GO! … Armchair Philosopher & Would-be Blogger…