Gen X on the forum

[thomcat00]

I think the greatest skill set of Generation X that other generations simply won’t understand is the art of the mix tape! It’s truly a lost art.

And related to that, who remembers trying to hit play and record at precisely the right moment to not get the DJ’s voice when recording songs off the radio?

Gone are the days when the djs would announce “taper alerts” playing either new music or requests with the intent to give clean airplay to a song, or in the case of Philadelphia airwaves when we’d sometimes get album sides or even complete albums (WMMR’s “Sunday Night Sixpack”) announced ahead of time.

[thomcat00]

I devoured Douglas Coupland’s book Generation X when it came out, was it about 1990 or so. Great writer and a great voice for observation of our times.

[strapline]

Been a while since I last checked in, but I found this thread very interesting. Since I was last on here Andrew appears to have become Drew, is that right? Anyway, I'm curious as to what criteria is used to define a generation. It doesn't appear to be the window of time itself as most of the latter generations to the present seem to occupy a fifteen year window, with some of the earlier generations being seventeen years, or even twenty-six years in the case of the 'Greatest Generation'. It doesn't even appear to be bookends between significant global events like world wars.

But in answer to your original question, Drew, I'm Gen X, too. And a very significant event happened the day I was born - MLK was assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee.

Des

[rkovars]

@strapline I don’t think this is something to be taken too seriously. Of course there will be overlaps and there will be people who simply don’t fit into the “one-size-fits-all” descriptors of their generation or category.

Sure, the era into which you were born will affect your experience, outlook and development. So will nationality, socioeconomic “class”, education, ethnicity, self-identified gender and so on.

Odd, isn’t it, that at the same time as proclaiming the universal rights and freedoms of the Individual, humans still seem to feel this compulsive need to categorise and homogenise themselves and each other?

Sorry, I drifted off into amateur anthropological observation for a moment there. Back to the fun, which was the point of the thread, I think.

[albionphoto]

Gen X and proud of it. I remember the shift to decimalisation (just), the 1969 moonlanding (just), cassette tapes, landlines and even teletext.

[0uatiOW]

fixing cassettes with a pencil etc. Happy days!

I remember the days we used to baffle “young people” by talking about cassettes. Now we can do it by talking about CDs & DVDs & “television”.

This week I was speaking to a junior at work who had no idea what a zip file was.

[RichM]

fixing cassettes with a pencil etc. Happy days!

I remember the days we used to baffle “young people” by talking about cassettes. Now we can do it by talking about CDs & DVDs & “television”.

This week I was speaking to a junior at work who had no idea what a zip file was.

I'd forgotten about zip files! 3.5" and 5.25" floppy disks I recall and 'parking heads' on computers before switching them off. I remember asking for blank CDs when they first came out. And unfolding the sleeve of a cassette in the hope the lyrics would be printed inside. Although at work, it's only in the last 2 years or so we've stopped using faxes. An actual fax. Mindblowing.

[iain]

I’m sure we all remember setting the timer on the video to record a program we wanted to watch later.

By the time my daughter was growing up videos had gone but we had a hard drive type recorder to save programs on. The verb we used as a family to describe the process of recording something was “tape” ie
“Don’t forget to tape match of the day”
“Shall we tape it watch it later”
“There’s nothing on. Shall we see what we’ve got on tape”

Of course my daughter had no clue of the origins of the word tape and only realised what it was when she used it in conversation with friends who had no clue what she was talking about.

[missF]

My first inkling of the world of commerce and competition was the Betamax v VHS wars. Two video tape formats requiring different bits of operating kit. We got a VHS video tape recorder so landed on the right side of history

[rkovars]

I saw this earlier on Facebook. It seems appropriate – I think @jkbarnes might appreciate it.

[daveodz]

Hi

1963 and thus Baby Boomer and proud of it!

Dave

[jkbarnes]

@Amor Vincit Omnia, that’s fantastic!

[jkbarnes]

@Amor Vincit Omnia, that’s fantastic!

Let’s add to it:

11. You don’t understand the sudden outpouring of sundials in vibrant colours.

[iain]

12. You struggle to choose between shark mesh or Milanese for your chain Mail.

[iain]

13. You prefer Lance hands over sword hands on your sundial