I remember being very excited when this came out. What impressed me right off was the java.net package -- back then, few language environments (except in Unix-

I remember being very excited when this came out. What impressed me right off was the java.net package -- back then, few language environments (except in Unix-land) had built-in networking support. That was usually a (kludgy) add-on package. That, along with Threads made Java really stand out as the language for the era of distributed computing. Applets were a great idea that unfortunately didn't pan out. It still has a lot of good qualities, but is one of my least favorite languages to use (much more into Go now).