History TechnologyMarchesOn / Computers

* Done intentionally in the ''Literature/PastDoctorAdventures'' novel ''Blue Box'', written in 2003 as though it had been written in The80s. The narrator explains what ARPANET is, and adds that some computer scientists think it might double in size by the year 2000. In general, the book is very careful about writing a technothriller with (by 2003 standards) outdated technology; bulletin boards and UsefulNotes/{{Usenet}} instead of discussion forums, needing physical access to systems because everything is ''not'' online, and even having to gimmick ''payphones'' to gain network access. The Doctor's computer of choice is an Apple II, and at one point a "meeting in cyberspace" scene is handled through a MultiUserDungeon.

* A couple of ''TabletopGame/{{GURPS}}'' books published in the '90s feature flavor text made up of discussions which appear to be taking place on UsefulNotes/{{Usenet}}.

* And even some businesses. It would cost more to train the IT department (who has probably documented all issues for the past 20+ years) and the normal users of the program than it would to just keep the old system. Upgrading hardware doesn't tend to be an issue thanks to UsefulNotes/DOSBox and virtual machines now able to run on consumer level computers (unless you happen to need DOS to drive some ancient hardware that uses a connector that no longer exists on modern computers). But so help you if your entire system was on a [=PDP-8=].

* According to ''Film/BackToTheFuturePartII'', the UsefulNotes/LaserDisc format will have ''just'' gone out of style in 2015.

* The forgettable and all-but-forgotten 2001 film ''Film/OneNightAtMcCools'' features numerous characters oohing and awwing over the fact that one of the characters owns... a UsefulNotes/{{DVD}} player. It'd be a minor thing, but the movie just keeps harping on it, with two characters even deciding to rob the DVD player owner's house, and arguing heatedly about who get to keep this fine luxury item. This was bordering on dated even in 2001, when DVD players were falling rapidly in price. Might have made more sense circa '97-98 when they were still very new.

* The makers of ''Film/FreeEnterprise'', a 1998 film, were avid collectors of movies on UsefulNotes/LaserDisc, as were the film's characters. The movie includes a scene filmed on location in UsefulNotes/LosAngeles' premier [=LaserDisc=] shop, and the long-awaited [=LaserDisc=] release of ''Film/LogansRun'' even provides one of the movie's central metaphors. The format was already in its death throes while the movie was being made. By the time most audiences ''saw'' the film, it was quite dead, and those audiences almost certainly were watching it on... DVD. ''Free Enterprise'' also has the distinction of being one of the last films to be ''released'' in the [=LaserDisc=] format.

** ''Literature/FoundationsEdge'' (published [[The80s 1982]]) has the main characters Trevize and Pelorat carrying a very important historic library aboard spaceship ''on one disk''. This is treated as some major technological breakthrough [[TimeAbyss 15 000 years into the future]]. It wouldn't exceed the capabilites of [[UsefulNotes/CompactDisc a mid-1980s CD]].

* In ''Series/{{Wishbone}}'', the episode "One Thousand & One Tails" features a bad '90s understanding of the Internet. Joe and Sam "ooh!" and "ah!" as David logs onto the Internet for the first time, repeatedly gasping "Go to that one!" before he's even online. Also, the Internet is apparently a ViewerFriendlyInterface, labeled "Internet Online Access" and consisting of a few icons. David accesses a coded chatroom run by cybercriminals by clicking on the oh-so-not-suspicious icon of someone wearing a ConspicuousTrenchcoat, which is helpfully labeled "Private" and is apparently [[ItsASmallNetAfterAll one of only four chat groups which exist on the Internet]]. He accidently logs into his dad's bank account while investigating this chatroom, which somehow causes three million dollars to get transferred into his dad's bank account. FBI agents show up at their house [[InstantEmergencyResponse about five minutes later]]. ''Where to start??''

** When Nedry's seemingly talking on a videoconference call, he's actually just talking to some [=QuickTime=] movies. Moviegoers these days are more likely to detect and understand the scrollbars on the bottom of the screen.

* InUniverse, this is a major plot point in ''16bit Sensation: Another Layer''. When Konoha, a BishoujoGame illustrator from 2023, finds herself magically transported to 1992, she joins Alcohol Soft with the expectation that she'll be able to use her knowledge and experience from the future to get ahead in the industry. As she learns the hard way, technology has marched on ''so much'' in the intervening three decades that her skills are practically useless: drawing 4K artwork on a tablet, and drawing UsefulNotes/PC98 artwork using a mouse, are two very different skills. She has to essentially relearn how to draw to be of any use whatsoever.

** Many of the computers were actually running a real workstation operating system, [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NeXTSTEP NeXTSTEP]]. It should be noted that [=NeXTSTEP=] is the direct antecedent of UsefulNotes/MacOS X and iOS making the series even more [[VindicatedByHistory ahead of its time]]. Also, if you have Linux you can actually install a [=NeXTSTEP=]-like UI on your system -- it's a window manager called [[http://windowmaker.org/ Window Maker]] and quite a few people still use it because it's small and lightning fast.

* PlayedForLaughs in ''Anime/HiScooolSehaGirls'': [[UsefulNotes/SegaDreamcast Dreamcast]] can access the internet, but her ability to do so is hampered by both dial-up speeds (the console she represents having been released in the late 90s) and the time of day (she gets the best speeds only when accessing the net at night).

** Virtual architecture still reflects the designs of yesteryear. On Microsoft [=OSes=], A:\ used to be the floppy directory, because the first few editions of MS-DOS had to be booted from a floppy. Because the floppy had to remain in the drive, if you wanted to move something out of your computer you required a second floppy drive, which was B:\; if you had a hard drive, it would get mounted to C:\. Today, floppy disks are long obsolete, but on [[UsefulNotes/MicrosoftWindows Windows]] the default hard drive directory remains C:\, and poorly written programs will often malfunction if for some reason you didn't choose C:\ as your system partition's letter. The convention of having filenames end with a three letter filetype also comes from the old days of MS-DOS, which limited filenames to 8 letters and a 3-letter filetype.

* The use of password-based saving in video games has effectively gone away fully. In the days of systems that used cartridges like the UsefulNotes/NintendoEntertainmentSystem, it was more expensive to produce cartidges that had a built-in battery to save gameplay progress. To mitigate production costs certain companies used a system of passwords to save the game, effectivly a string of code that set parameters for the status of gameplay at any particular moment. By the sixth generation of video games all of the main consoles (UsefulNotes/SegaDreamcast, UsefulNotes/NintendoGameCube, UsefulNotes/PlayStation2, and UsefulNotes/{{Xbox}}) all used discs and saved to an external memory card, which effectively eliminated password saving for home consoles. Password saves still existed for budget titles on the handheld UsefulNotes/GameBoyAdvance, but the successor UsefulNotes/NintendoDS virtually eliminated them in the handheld market as well by using EEPROM-based saves right to the game card. Any handhelds or hybrid consoles released after the DS (Sony's UsefulNotes/PlayStationPortable and UsefulNotes/PlayStationVita, and Nintendo's UsefulNotes/Nintendo3DS and hybrid UsefulNotes/NintendoSwitch) used memory cards of some kind, with the 3DS also supporting EEPROM saves. This effectivelly killed off the use of password saving entirely, except with homebrew games for older systems and the occasional indie game.

* In ''WebVideo/{{Caddicarus}}'' ' review of Putty Squad, Caddy really wants you to know what the game was released on the UsefulNotes/PlayStation4.

** Even before PCI, you had ISA and MCA on [[UsefulNotes/IBMPersonalComputer [=PCs=]]], [=NuBus=] on [[UsefulNotes/AppleMacintosh Macs]], Zorro slots on Platform/{{Amiga}}s, and various other expansion card interfaces that were all eventually deprecated by PCI.

* Virtual reality on a home computer is OlderThanTheyThink, with the Forte Technologies [=VFX1=] predating the UsefulNotes/OculusRift and UsefulNotes/HTCVive by ''two decades'', but the [=VFX1=] was quickly doomed due to dependency on a litany of deprecated interfaces. It relied on an ISA card that connected to a graphics card with a VESA feature connector and also hosted a motion-sensing Cyberpuck controller through an ACCESS.bus port — a standard that was ultimately displaced by USB.

** Even before PCI, you had ISA and MCA on [[UsefulNotes/IBMPersonalComputer [=PCs=]]], [=NuBus=] on [[UsefulNotes/AppleMacintosh Macs]], Zorro slots on [[UsefulNotes/CommodoreAmiga Amigas]], and various other expansion card interfaces that were all eventually deprecated by PCI.

* ''Webcomic/SabrinaOnline'' staked a lot of its early personality on the author's love of Amiga computers, the titular character Sabrina was a massive Amiga fan and her roommate Amy had even been ''used'' in various Amiga magazine articles and tech demos in Real Life during the late 1980's into the early 1990's. However by the time the webcomic itself launched in 1996, the Amiga was already looking like a dying tech brand; and the comic skirted by with WebcomicTime as a crutch to justify keeping the Amiga computers featured prominently. By the 2020's the strip finally caved that the continued Amiga use was beginning to look increasingly anachronistic; and Sabrina replaced her Amiga with a Raspberry Pi emulator card.

* Despite possessing artificial intelligence, advanced cybernetics and genetics, the ability to deconstruct matter and create it into something useful... The world of ''VideoGame/{{Fallout}}'' continue to use computers that boast a whopping 64KB of RAM and use a command line like interface. This is, of course, part of the game's {{Zeerust}} aesthetic, set in a world where nuclear technology advanced by leaps and bounds while computer technology stagnated (the transistor was never invented).

* ''Franchise/MetalGear'':

** InUniverse -- in ''VideoGame/MetalGearSolid'', the character Psycho Mantis' claim to fame was reading data off your memory card. In ''VideoGame/MetalGearSolid4'', Psycho Mantis' ghost comes back to haunt Snake and tries the same trick, only to freak out when he sees that the [=PS3=] uses an internal hard drive for data storage and thus has no memory card.

* In an odd non-SF example, Rachel in ''Literature/PetSematary'' (which was written in the mid-1980s) recounts a lecture about the human brain's superiority over computers: "He made a persuasive case for this incredible assertion, telling them that the human mind was a computer with staggering numbers of memory chips -- not 16K, or 32K, or 64K, but perhaps as much as ''one billion K'': Literally, a thousand billion.". In other words, a terabyte. By the end of TheNewTens, you could fit it in a fingernail-sized [=MicroSDXC=] card. And we've yet to figure out what the closest approximation to the "storage" capacity of the human brain is, [[http://io9.com/if-your-brain-were-a-computer-how-much-storage-space-w-509687776 estimates range from 1 TB to 2.5 PB to "not a clue"]].
** All of this assumes each "brain memory chip" contains one byte of storage. The book goes on to mention the entire contents of the Encyclopedia Britannica being able to be stored in 2 or 3 memory cells. The [[http://support.britannica.com/2015/ursd15/win/index.htm 2015 version]] of the Encyclopedia Britannica Ultimate Reference Suite can be stored on 4.75 GB. If the human brain stored that much per memory cell and had "one billion K" cells it would have a capacity of 2.375 to 14.25 zettabytes; close to estimates of the amount of data generated worldwide by the middle of the TheNewTens.

* The original ''Franchise/StarWars'' trilogy doesn't have anything akin to the Internet despite being at least centuries ahead of modern day Earth in terms of technology, due to it being made in TheSeventies and TheEighties. The prequels added a "holonet" which is basically the same thing, though that has the side effect of causing EarlyInstallmentWeirdness as it makes you wonder why the holonet is never mentioned in the original trilogy.

* Done intentionally in the ''Literature/PastDoctorAdventures'' novel ''Blue Box'', written in 2003 as though it had been written in TheEighties. The narrator explains what ARPANET is, and adds that some computer scientists think it might double in size by the year 2000. In general, the book is very careful about writing a technothriller with (by 2003 standards) outdated technology; bulletin boards and UsefulNotes/{{Usenet}} instead of discussion forums, needing physical access to systems because everything is ''not'' online, and even having to gimmick ''payphones'' to gain network access. The Doctor's computer of choice is an Apple II, and at one point a "meeting in cyberspace" scene is handled through a MultiUserDungeon.

* The HollywoodHacking simulator ''VideoGame/{{Uplink}}'' mispredicted the future in a telling way: It takes place in a 2010 where a 60 Ghz computer is considered slow. In RealLife late 2010 a quad-core 3 Gig is seen as solid. For the tech-savvy, this makes it a bit of a PeriodPiece. During TheNineties, computing power was mostly boosted by increasing the clock frequency and this prediction was no doubt based on that trend continuing, probably helped by the PC market focusing on the [=MHz=] as selling point. In reality, clock frequency didn't change all that much during other decades, and is unlikely to ever grow much beyond current values. For one thing, current clock frequencies are well within the microwave range, and microwave electronics are ''different''. There is also the matter of clock cycle length putting an upper bound on the physical size of the computing device, by speed of light. You are able to buy better computers with space for more processors, in a core-like fashion, but really only for a higher amount of clock cycles.

* In the original 1992 version of the ''Manga/SailorMoon'' manga and TheNineties [[Anime/SailorMoon anime]], Ami's seminar used floppy discs [[spoiler:for brainwashing]]. Following the OrwellianRetcon in the UpdatedRerelease of the manga, Act 2 of ContinuityReboot ''Anime/SailorMoonCrystal'' uses a CD-ROM.[[note]]CD-[=ROM=]s existed in 1992, but were not in widespread use.[[/note]]

** ''Literature/FoundationsEdge'' (published [[TheEighties 1982]]) has the main characters Trevize and Pelorat carrying a very important historic library aboard spaceship ''on one disk''. This is treated as some major technological breakthrough [[TimeAbyss 15 000 years into the future]]. It wouldn't exceed the capabilites of [[UsefulNotes/CompactDisc a mid-1980s CD]].

* ''Literature/TheMurderOfRogerAckroyd'' is one of the first murder mysteries to feature the use of a sound recorder as part of the murder plot (written in TheRoaringTwenties). Specifically a Dictaphone is used, and part of the reason the murderer is found out is that he needed to move furniture to conceal the large machine.

** One exception (though it might not be in a few years' time) was when they gave the storage capacity of Data's positronic brain in ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' as "eight hundred quadrillion bits". In other words, one hundred petabytes, which is ''still'' one hundred thousand times larger than the average computer hard drive in 2011. Quite brave considering the episode was written in TheEighties.

** In many ways, ''Avenue Q'' is a love letter to TheNineties. Using Gary Coleman as fodder for comedy was a decade-old joke at that point, and even in 2003 few people were still making mix tapes. They were burning [=CDs=] instead.

* ''{{WesternAnimation/Recess}}'': Gretchen Grundler has a Personal Digital Assistant called Galileo, which was a big deal in the [[TheNineties 1990s]]. Forward to 2010 and beyond, where having Smartphone is SeriousBusiness.

** Similarly in the episode [[Recap/SouthParkS13E1TheRing "The Ring"]] (the one making fun of the Jonas Brothers) Kenny and his girlfriend are said to be watching Creator/{{Netflix}}, a statement that at first glance has aged rather well at least through the late [[TheNewTens New Tens]], until it's shown that this means [=DVDs=] delivered in red envelopes. Yeah, remember when that was Netflix?[[note]]Technically, as of 2019, Netflix still has their [=DVD=] mailing service, but it's been a small part of their business for some time now.[[/note]]

** In TheNineties, various attempts were made to replace the floppy[[note]]Wikipedia has a breakdown [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Floppy_disk_variants here]] [[/note]]. Like Betamax, Zip drives, "superdisks" (aka LS-120), Jaz Drives and other removable media all died as [=CDs=] became cheaper. Zip disks had technical problems, Jaz drives were expensive and the LS-120 (as souped-up floppy disk) was slow, and portable storage today is taken care of by either cheap USB drives, or cloud-based storage like Dropbox or Google Drive, which eliminates even the need to carry a physical object around. Around the {{Turn of the Millennium}} Apple just removed floppy drives altogether, other computer makes followed suit.

* As of TheNewTens, [[ArtifactTitle motion pictures are still often called ''films'']], despite the fact that a large number are no longer shot on or projected with film. Similarly, directors often talk about ''filming a scene''.

* Universal Serial Bus (USB) and Serial ATA (SATA) killed off a lot of connectors. [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PC_Card PCMCIA]], [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SCSI SCSI]], most of the "[[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serial_port serial]]" and "[[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parallel_port parallel]]" connectors. Before TheNewTens it was common for printers, cameras and other devices to have special connectors so they could be hooked into a computer. Aside from Apple, most now use USB and most drives use SATA.

* In the short story ''Mind-Sifter'', based on ''Series/StarTrekTheOriginalSeries'', Kirk is captured by the Klingons and driven insane after being subjected to their Mind-Sifter interrogation device. Under the device, the Klingons learn about the Guardian of Forever, and travel to their planet. While there, an insane Kirk breaks free and jumps into the Guardian, trying to reunite with Edith Keeler. While everyone else knows nothing about this and assumes Kirk is dead, Spock received a telepathic signal from Kirk and knows he's trapped in the past. A major plot point is Spock spending all his free time for ''months'' at the library computer, laboriously searching archived news story for any mention of Kirk. Finally, he finds a newspaper clipping on a story on an insane patient who calls himself "Captain James T. Kirk" and includes a picture of Kirk in his uniform. Considering the technology of his time, all he would have had to do is tell the computer to check all historical records for any mention of a "Captain James T. Kirk" that occurred in the past.

* In the short story ''Mind-Sifter'', based on ''Series/StarTrekTOS'', Kirk is captured by the Klingons and driven insane after being subjected to their Mind-Sifter interrogation device. Under the device, the Klingons learn about the Guardian of Forever, and travel to their planet. While there, an insane Kirk breaks free and jumps into the Guardian, trying to reunite with Edith Keeler. While everyone else knows nothing about this and assumes Kirk is dead, Spock received a telepathic signal from Kirk and knows he's trapped in the past. A major plot point is Spock spending all his free time for ''months'' at the library computer, laboriously searching archived news story for any mention of Kirk. Finally, he finds a newspaper clipping on a story on an insane patient who calls himself "Captain James T. Kirk" and includes a picture of Kirk in his uniform. Considering the technology of his time, all he would have had to do is tell the computer to check all historical records for any mention of a "Captain James T. Kirk" that occurred in the past.

* The 1999 revival of ''Series/{{Zoom}}'' was doomed by the rise of social media, most especially the launch of Website/YouTube, which took place the year the show was canceled. Nowadays, it and other social media sites enable the average person to put out information faster than the show's website was or could could be updated and much faster than new episodes of the show could be produced. [[note]] Due of the nature of its own production process, ''WesternAnimation/SouthPark'' was able to respond to current events more rapidly than ''Zoom'' before the latter even premiered. [[/note]]Then there's how it relied solely on snail mail, which is one of the slower communication media, to get material suggestions from viewers.

* Various ''Series/{{Columbo}}'' episodes feature tech that was advanced or uncommon for the time of the episode, but commonplace today. These include a home video camera security system (relatively common for anyone who wishes to install one now), sound activated electronics (the release of devices such as The Clapper brought that into the home), a staircase elevator for a wheelchair (relatively common in homes with stairs where an occupant uses a wheelchair), machines to record phone conversations (way too common to do this now), a watch that prints the time in digital numbers (for the early '70s, advanced--as of the '80s into today, nothing special), a home security alarm(being a late-'60s episode, something owned more by the wealthy rather than the common homeowner) a cell phone (something of a luxury at the time of the '80s episode, of course- not so much now) and as in the Rockford example above, a computer system that takes up a room yet takes 5 minutes just to print a single sheet of paper containing an employee's basic information, one line of text at a time (again, this was the '70s).

[[folder: Real Life]]

* There are numerous situations in books, television and movies that simply could not happen today because of cellphones, GPS and surveillance/security cameras.

* In ''VideoGame/ShadowrunReturns: Dragonfall'' -- which is set in the future, the player happens upon a pile of ancient optical discs that are identified by an older character as DVD re-writables. A brief quest ensues to find a DVD-player in the year 2054.

* Scanners were once a must-have piece of computer hardware in the 90s and 2000s due to their ability to digitally immortalize paper photographs, as well as letting the user restore faded or damaged photos with imaging software. But with digital photography superseding old-school paper photos, scanners have declined in relevance. Nowadays they're only used in professional settings. For someone who simply wants to share an old photo of their grandparents on Instagram, it's faster and easier to just use their phone to [[ShapedLikeItself take a photo of the photo]] and crop out the background. Smartphones today are even able to detect what you're trying to do and go into "scanner mode," which crops out the background automatically.

** However, it's also worth noting that the technology is hardy enough to withstand electromagnetic effects from a nuclear blast, as well as last through two hundred years of neglect and downright abuse. Also worth noting is that the primary storage medium is a tape that can be used to hold anything from an audio recording to programming instructions for a robot, and is compatible with practically anything that has some level of processing capability.

* A minor one concerning ''Franchise/SpiderMan'' character Cindy Moon/Silk. She'd been locked away in a GildedCage since the late '90s-early 2000s (or since the days after being bitten by the radioactive spider), thus she suffers a bit of FishOutOfTemporalWater when, in her attempt to find her parents, she's left utterly confused at the fact that the last web browser she used, Netscape Navigator, isn't on Peter's computer. Pete also realizes that something like Facebook would be way over her head as it would have been barely started when she was locked away.
* As part of its SettingUpdate for the character of Peter Parker, ''ComicBook/UltimateSpiderMan'' has him being hired by J. Jonah Jameson to run the ''Daily Bugle'''s newly launched website, rather than as a photographer.
* Due in large part to its iconic status, ''Franchise/{{Superman}}'' has bent over backwards to justify the continued existance of the ''Daily Planet'' in recent decades. Back in the Golden Age through the Bronze Age, the primary reason that Clark Kent got a job there was doing so would enable him to keep abreast of any major disasters. Following the rise of the internet (along with, to a lesser extant, cable [=TV=]), this reasoning is no longer applicable.

* Some of the jokes in {{Music/Weird Al|Yankovic}}'s song "It's All About the Pentiums" haven't aged well (Y2K, the trademark "Pentium" itself has moved from top-of-the-line [=CPUs=] to cheap bottom-shelf models, etc.), but the "Hundred Gigabytes of RAM" remains a ludicrously large amount [[note]]Not unattainable, just expensive and mostly unnecessary; only in 2019 are games that are requiring 32g of RAM coming out[[/note]], and the "Flat Screen Monitor Forty Inches Wide" is still huge. [[note]]Although most [=TVs=] since 2019 or so can easily display a computer's output if the computer can provide HDMI, which is most modern computers.[[/note]]

** Then there's PCI-X, the loser of the next-gen PCI wars, its opponent being [=PCIe=]. It was supported by Apple, IBM and Compaq, but spurned by other manufacturers who supported [=PCIe=] instead. Disappeared the moment Apple switched over to Intel CPUs and was dead by 2005.

* VirtualReality on a home computer is OlderThanTheyThink, with the Forte Technologies [=VFX1=] predating the UsefulNotes/OculusRift and UsefulNotes/HTCVive by ''two decades'', but the [=VFX1=] was quickly doomed due to dependency on a litany of deprecated interfaces. It relied on an ISA card that connected to a graphics card with a VESA feature connector and also hosted a motion-sensing Cyberpuck controller through an ACCESS.bus port — a standard that was ultimately displaced by USB.

* In Music/DestinysChild's song "Survivor" from 2001, many people laughed at Kelly Rowland's line in the third verse, "You know I'm not gonna diss you on the internet," thinking it was just an attempt at [[TotallyRadical sounding current]]. A decade after the song's release, social media would come to play a huge role in everyday life, especially for celebrities, giving the line much more legitimacy than it had in 2001.

* ''Theatre/{{RENT}}'': One of the many things that make ''RENT'' an UnintentionalPeriodPiece is Benny's plan to raze a homeless camp to build a cyber café. That is, a place where customers can pay by the hour to browse the internet. Cyber cafes have been obsolete in the United States since the early 2010's, when personal computers (especially laptops) and smartphones came way down in price.

* Poked fun at in "300MB" by Creator/NeilCicierega, a song in the 2017 [[Music/MouthAlbums ''Mouth Moods]''] album, where the "lyrics" are audio of someone giving a sales pitch about how massive [[PunctuatedForEmphasis "Three. Hundred. Megabytes!"]] of storage capacity is.