 Clearly, the internet is very, very nostalgic for the 90s, but the question is, was that actually a better time? Welcome everybody to the Hop Hop Boys, we got a big, fun list for you today. I mean you guys have seen the memes, you guys have seen the Reddit posts, obviously right now I do think a lot of the samples and the music, a lot of the fashion, even some of the IP like Top Guns, the top movie again, that's from like the late 80s, early 90s. There's so much nostalgia for the 1990s. I don't know if that's driven by uncertainty about the future or just the every generation just become like this when they get older, but you guys, we got to talk about it. Well, let's find out today because we got a list of 30 things from the 90s that don't exist anymore. So let us know in the comments down below if you remember these things or if you miss these things, you want them back or, you know, maybe these things are new to you because you didn't grow up in the 90s. So make sure you hit that like button and click your notification bell for more episodes of the Hop Hop Boys. David, let's start the list with number one. Point number one, you had a disc man connected to a cassette player connected to your car. You had a binder full of CDs that you were trying to change while you were driving. Man, one thing I remember about the disc man is looking for that G protection. How much suspension did your CD player have so that you could shake it for like 60 seconds without it skipping? And, and oh my God, God forbid that your CDs ever got scratched because then it would skip while it played. And then basically there's no way to fix it. Right. Then of course it went to iPods and iPod Nanos and now the iPhone. I will say this, I think that the process of connecting your phone to Bluetooth in 2022 in a car, especially if it's like a Uber or something is unbelievably clunky. Like that didn't necessarily get way better. Moving on, point number two, Andrew, trying to talk to your friend's mom to see if they were home or if you were trying to talk to a girl, you had to talk to her dad on the phone and like make sure he was okay with you just to talk to her. And then if you really wanted to talk to this person, you'd call them multiple times and then kick them off their dial up internet. So this was so nerve wracking. Of course, as a kid, you have to call the home, talk to this like mean ass sounding dad. Hey, who's calling? Every dad had a deep voice in the 90s. Who are you? What's your name? You want to talk to Katie, huh? And of course nowadays in 2022, every kid's got three to five social media accounts. Their parents don't even know what social media accounts they have. Overall, it's probably still way better. It's way easier to communicate nowadays. Point number three, Andrew. You could wait by the gate to pick somebody up or drop somebody off at the airport. So I mean, this was like it made for a lot of like good movie moments. Yeah, obviously, you know, the whole like dramatic send off where you're like, all right, you're jumping on the plane and then they turn around and then literally walk onto the plane. Those days are over, obviously. But yeah, I mean, nowadays you're basically a terrorist until otherwise because you can't go through security. No, it's true. Yeah. I mean, this is the modern day. Unfortunately, there are some events that like led us to this. But like basically everybody is a evil person in the airport until they clearly prove they are not bad. Hey, now you got to say goodbyes and cry at the departure when you pull out the luggage. OK, bye. Point number four, you had to call a movie theater for the movie times because you literally had no idea when any movie was unless you looked in the newspaper. Bro, looking at the newspaper for movie times. And then if you didn't know, you had to call. And then it was sometimes it was a recorded person that had all the the showtimes or you had to talk to an actual person that would tell you. Yeah. And I think the crazy thing is in 2022, they've got like regal unlimited passes and still nobody signs up for it because people just don't really enjoy like the movie going experience anymore. Well, I think the environment's changed, too, obviously, with everything that's happened. Right. Safety and things like that. Also, you've got like a bootleg like app on your iPad that's got like every single leg. I mean, you know what I'm talking about guys out there. You can stream movies. I don't know. Point number five, I mean, having a discussion about something or argument about something and literally everybody asking like two other people. And then if those two other people didn't have the answer, if five people did not have the answer, it was a wrap. Everybody was like, well, I guess we'll never find out. Well, you know, nowadays you can just bust out your phone and Google up the facts in the middle of an argument. But you know what's really funny, David is some people nowadays still don't do that. Yeah. They still don't do that or they look it up or they'll try to find a competing expert to argue their point. Dude, you would argue about sports forever and just nobody would have the right answer. Right. But there's like like there's no more arguing over like who invented the Simpsons anymore though. That that's because you would just look that up now. Point number six, the Dewey Decimal System was used with Manila folders in the library. Everything was analog, not digital. Man, that's crazy because actually a lot of American libraries now to this day still kind of use the Dewey Decimal System where you have to look up all these different numbers and then you find the aisle and you walk there and find your book. And I remember when we started using computers at libraries, they were the computers that were super throwback and it was just like green font like the like the matrix like ones and zeros and then you type it in and then it tell you all the info and then basically it's super old school. Yeah. I mean, it's way better nowadays guys. Interestingly enough, under 2022 library tech way better. Nobody goes to the library. Yeah. Point number seven, pressing play and record at the same time when your favorite song came on the radio. I remember we used to do this with our older sister to listen to TLC, Alanis Morissette. Dude, if you wanted to make a mixed cassette tape off of your stereo, you'd click, yeah, press and record at the same time and then it'd record that from the radio and then you could actually make a mix on a cassette. But you wouldn't want to record over the wrong cassette because it would race everything that was already on it. And then when Burn CDs came along, you could kind of make your own mixes. And then of course nowadays it's just like what's your Spotify playlist? Point number eight, Andrew, the yellow pages. Let's just say you needed a plumber or an electrician. This is where you would go. You would have no idea what the pricing was. You would have no idea the reviews if these people were even good at what they did, but you just had to call them. Yeah, I'll take it one step crazier, David. Phone books. Your phone number would be in a phone book for everybody to see wild. The white pages. Point number nine, Andrew, renting movies not just from Blockbuster or a local video store, but you could rent game systems, DVD players, VHS systems, and you would get fined if you didn't rewind the movie before you returned it. Dude, I remember, yeah, I mean, walking in all these video stores and the video guys would obviously know every single movie that was out there. You would talk to them. It would look like the guy on The Simpsons. Yeah, it would be just like a movie, guys. However it was depicted in the movie, it was just like that. And yeah, I mean, you could really mess up those tapes really easily. Obviously now there's Netflix and streaming, but Netflix started sending DVDs to your home back and forth. Yeah, I mean, who would have thought back then that all the gamers would have gotten built their own universe? Yeah. Like it became such a deep identity. And overall, it's still better, but I definitely think, you know, I don't know if like everybody becoming a gamer is a A plus version of the future, to be honest. Moving on. I didn't say you went to watch Pulp Fiction. I love that movie. Number 10, there was a list of important numbers written or printed out on the refrigerator. Yeah, man, I'm not gonna lie. I think Mom still does this to an extent where, you know, you're just gonna have your like go-to kind of like favorite list on your refrigerator so you can always look back at it. Obviously personal phone books are crazy. They have all little notes written on the side and then there's whiteout. And then you got to rewrite numbers when people change their numbers. Oh, and if you change your number, you got to like call everybody on your list to tell them that you changed your number. Yeah, well, people change numbers a ton now because there's so many like robocalls and things like that. But you know, back then it was tough. Number 11, people had pen pals in school to try to teach them how to socialize but also practice their handwriting. Yeah, I believe some schools still do this and it might be with international kids. But this was the only way back then that you would talk to a kid from another state. Like if this was before Myspace or anything, so I'm writing to a kid in like Indiana or like I'm finding out what life is like in Minnesota or Texas through this kid. To be honest, I think the modern day version, the TikTok comment for somebody across the world, it is better. Yeah. The TikTok comment is better than the pen pal. Dude, some of the kid can just make a TikTok comment. In a way, though, it's worse if you're like an unappealing video product, though. Yeah, well, now no one's gonna talk to you. Yeah, but back then in school, you had someone to talk to, at least one friend. Number 12, Andrew, floppy disks that had two megabytes of information on them. Bro, so before floppy disks, there was even the eight by eight super floppies and that was like kinda got phased out and then from the floppy disk, it went to the zip drives but then nobody used the zip disks and then it turned into now CDs and then USB drives. Number 13, Andrew, waiting for the bus with absolutely nothing to do because even though back then they had CD players, they were expensive and you might not have had a good one, I might have ran out of batteries. Dude, you just had so much time to yourself, man. I remember riding the bus for 40, almost like an hour long, going up from the city down to where we lived and it was just like, dude, you just had to sit there and observe people. You just had to people watch, right? That was your hobby. I think it's way more easier nowadays to feel stimulated and just get something or talk with your friends but you're definitely less observant and contemplative. I mean, I remember seeing some crazy stuff, especially on those bus rides through Rainier Valley, through the South Side, all the way back up. Man, point number 14, your parents' eavesdropping on your phone call from another room if they tried to pick up the phone or pick up the phone call in the middle of your conversation. Yeah, I mean, obviously this is for landlines where if you have multiple phones in the house, you can just pick up one end and you might hear that click though and then you're like, hey, mom, are you on the phone? And I know mom would sometimes pick it up and then just like, she didn't even mean the eavesdrop. She just be like, what's going on on the phone? Right. Hey, mom, I'm on the phone. Please get off. I would say that I think this one's kind of neutral because in 2022, there's so many people who are not monitoring their kids. That's a good point. And then you got all this euphoria stuff going on and I'm not saying, you know, I think as a parent, you're probably wondering like, what conversations are my kids having right now? Because I have no idea. I have no ways to eavesdrop. Point number 15, Andrew AOL, America online CDs coming like four to eight times a month. People saying ASL in chat rooms, cat fishing people, but on AOL, instant messenger instead of Instagram. Yeah, it's true. Before Omegle, obviously you had the chat rooms and you would all have screen names and then you'd hit up someone say age, sex, location. You know, I mean, this is just how people talk. I mean, to this day, that's like still relevant. Oh yeah, shout out to Asian avenues. Number 16, just showing up at your neighbor's house to say hi or can this person play? Yeah, I mean, you know, you couldn't, before you even wanted to call them and bother them, you would just walk over to the house, knock on the door and be like, hey, it's like Tyler here. And then you just be like, hey, can they come out and play? And then the, again, the parent is probably gonna reject you or say that they can. Point number 17, there was 007 on N64 with a quad split TV, but you had to change the channel to channel three to make sure you had the right input number. Dude, the golden gun, all right. Come on, the soundtrack to 007, that's one of the best soundtracks to any video game to date. Right, there's a lot of nostalgia about that soundtrack, very progressive musically for that time. Someone needs to sample it and rap over it or sing over it. Point number 18, MapQuest, where you had to print out a bunch of directions beforehand. So you, obviously there was the internet and you could get directions on the internet, but you had to print them out so you're flipping through it while you're driving or the more advanced version was getting text message directions to your phone step by step, but it didn't really track where you were at, it would just give you a list of it so you could look it up on your phone. Obviously there was no pictures at the time. Number 19, a pet Tamagotchi or a Digimon. Man, I think like, man, Japanese culture has always been so advanced and this was one of those things that like, it was almost like people's like first pet. They're like, you know, you got to walk your Tamagotchi. It was like on your key chain and then there was like a Digimon TV show. In a way nowadays people just sort of like take care and curate their social media presence instead of taking care of a Tamagotchi pooping on a little screen. Yeah. Number 20, MTV actually used to play music videos. I know this was when it was actually literally music television. There was Total Request live. Also there was BET106 in park, obviously, that went on into the 2000s, but yeah, there was all these VJs. That was actually how you saw all the newest music videos and back then music videos, they would put like so much money into them. Oh yeah, some of them would even cost like, I believe a million dollars. And back then millions was even more than like today. Yeah, that was like five million dollars. They were like movies basically. Ever also remember, some people say they remember watching a scrambled version of the Spice Channel. Number 21, back then people used to literally every day touch a landline phone, camcorder, film, camera, tube TV, VCR, touch their modem, a pager, and had a newspaper subscription. And literally those, all those things have been replaced in 2022 by an iPhone. Yeah, dude, not to mention cable boxes. I mean, everything is just compact now. Obviously it's the technology, you know? And not only that, Andrew, I think that in the future there may be more apps like WeChat is in China where everything's even more combined. I know we've talked a lot about it. And literally at least the only company that comes to mind right now that could pull it off is Apple. Apple could replace your wallet guys calling it. Point number 22, going to the mall to hang out. Nowadays, most people view the mall as whack, but back then, man, that was the whole hangout scene. Yo, there was no discord. There was no even like barely chat rooms at this time. You had to go to the mall, bring your freshest fate. You'd meet other groups of kids. It would be like a fashion show too. But, you know, I think some people still go to the mall, but it's just not as popular because, you know, people are just shopping less in person. Yeah, I think that the mall stores at the mall are less appealing. They're not as hipster as boutique as everybody's like tastes have become. But also there's maybe a security issue as well. Dude, that was the first time like you would go talk to girls that you didn't know, man. I remember hanging out at the food court. Good times, also stressful times. Number 23, crystal clear Pepsi, kush balls, frutopia, orbits. The little shag balls. There's also all these little weird toys that would like stick to the wall or those little gummy hands that you would get from the, you'd crank them from that vending machine and then you'd slap it on people. Guys, there was just so many goofy toys back then. Yeah, because obviously nowadays everything is more replaced by apps, right? That is the general trend. Number 24, smoking, cigarettes was everywhere. Even like airline seats, restaurants had smoking, non-smoking sections, literally you could smoke like anywhere. Yeah, yeah, no, they only outlawed smoking in all indoor settings. Like I want to say less than 20 or 15 years ago, you know. So yeah, things really smelled like smoke for sure. Number 25, roller rinks were still popular. Yeah, you know, I think depending on which region of the states that you were in, but rollerblading is definitely that one culture from the 70s and 80s that carried over. But I'm assuming now a lot of the skating rinks are closed down, unless you're like in the South, you know. Also maybe there's like physical liability issues too if people get hurt. Yeah, no, I remember those having the school nights there though. Number 26, World War II veterans were still around to tell you how the old days were. Yeah, I mean, and this is just interesting because like World War II was such like a major defining event of America and especially of that generation. And when that generation was around, you would hear all these stories and you'd hear their perspective, obviously. And that did color a lot of people's like, I guess want to say maybe political views or geopolitical views at the time. For sure, for sure. And probably still does to some extent. And you know, obviously certain parts of the country more than others. And we actually had a white guy at our church who was very close to the Chinese community and he would always tell the story about shooting down two German fighter planes. Yeah, man. And hearing those stories is different. Like nowadays, you probably know some people who maybe went to the military and went to like the Middle East to fight or whatever, but like shooting down German planes, that's a different story. There's white on white. Number 27, Andrew, this is the stereotypical dressing in the 90s, Andrew. They said that a lot of white skaters would wear Jinko jeans. Maybe for the black crowd, Iceberg was big wearing like all the patches and everything like that. All the Disney characters. For Asians, they would wear wild, yellow, neon, Gore-Tex and upside down visors. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Gelled hair, headbands, all the AZN stuff, you know what it is. Yeah, and then Latinos would wear like cholo clothes. Yeah, obviously this is not 100 out of 100 or even 50 out of 50, but that was the person you would think of when you would see this close. If you're talking about the stereotypical most distinct outfits, yeah. For every group of people, yeah. Andrew, number 28. Okay, all right, sorry, I got to add in Abercrombie. Was that a little later? That was a little later. That was the 2000s for white guys. Number 28, someone said finding stuff in the woods that was cool and adult like some old playboys. I don't know about the woods, but man, I got some stories where let's just say in sixth grade, there was a friend and his dad wasn't home and then we went to go see his dad's stash of all these tapes. And that was an interesting experience, man. Because that was the stuff that you did as a kid. You would just huddle around a small TV and pop in these X-rated tapes and just like get exposed to all these perms. But literally that was the only way you could see things that young guys- Yeah, inappropriate stuff, yeah, for sure. Like to see, but it's bad. Nowadays, bro, man, I don't know. You just got on your phone. Number 29, kids were taught to write in cursive at that time. I have never used cursive since. Yeah, cursive got replaced by all the internet speech. By typing, just learn how to type and write. Yeah, cursive, I guess it's more romantic or meaningful or when all the letters connect, it's cool. And last but not least, number 30, this is something from the 90s you guys will never, ever, ever have to worry about was worrying about the Y2K issue. Bro, we had some neighbors. They were Caucasian-American. I think more on the conservative spectrum, but either way- They were these doomsday guys. And they basically, in their basement, they had racks and racks of canned food and all this stuff gearing up for Y2K. And I remember going down there and seeing it one time because I think they were showing it off to the neighborhood. Everybody thought that the computer systems were not designed to handle the year 2000 and everything was gonna shut down. Think about it. You thought computers were going to crash. People thought that missiles were gonna launch in the air. Just because it was going to go to zero, zero in the last two digits of the year. And everything was gonna go to hell. Yeah. I mean, long story short, guys, just to wrap up these 30 points, and I hope it was a fun trip down memory lane or educational if you weren't from that era. I'd say this, man, clearly technology has improved a lot. So when people say the 90s were the best era, unless you're like just being nostalgic and missing doing some of these old school things, clearly the flow of information, technology gadgets have made our life way easier in 2022. It's way easier to communicate, but I will say this, what are we communicating with each other? That's a good question, guys. Also, my overall takeaway is like, I think every generation that's older looks at the younger generation and is like, ah, these kids are soft. You know, like that's how a lot of millennials are even looking at Gen Z, to be honest, but hey, man, a lot of Gen X and Boomers are looking at millennials, like we're soft because we grew up with all the technology that they didn't have. So I'm just saying, it's just a pecking order, guys. It just happens almost every generation, but again, to your point, it's way easier to communicate with everybody. You're going straight to other kids, but like what are you communicating? That's the question. Maybe with all this nostalgia from the 1990s, people need to look at just what's wrong with like human nature, because once you gave human nature the tools to immediately connect with anybody instantly, it just seems like the internet turned into, obviously, like some people say like, you know, social media is toxic, et cetera, et cetera, whatever. Did it make people better or just let people be who they are or did it make people be the worst version of themselves? Anyways, let us know in the comments down below what you think about this list. What do you miss? What did you think that should be on that list? So yeah, let us know in the comments down below. Thank you so much for watching. Hit that thumbs up, click subscribe, hit your notification bell for more episodes of the hot pop boys, and until next time, we out. Peace.