3 ms·

A bit of a tangent, but I'm surprised to hear that Clinton was the first sitting president to send an email, in 1998. The Queen sent her first in 1976, which i

by soneil 3y ago

A bit of a tangent, but I'm surprised to hear that Clinton was the first sitting president to send an email, in 1998. The Queen sent her first in 1976, which is quite a gap.

ghaff 3y ago
'76 is really early. I'd be curious about the circumstances. [Apparently a photo op at a military research base.] Ray Tomlinson at BBN was credited with sending the first email in 1971 and, other than a few chat messages, I wasn't sending email until a fair bit later. National Archives say that Bill Clinton had a public-facing email address in 1993 and that was probably around the time that (some) normal people were starting to get addresses and sending email.
- cogman10 3y ago
  '98, on the other hand seems really late for sending an email. America was online at that point. In fact, in '98 the concept of email was so ubiquitous that we got "You've got mail" [1] as a movie. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/You%27ve_Got_Mail https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/You%27ve_Got_Mail
  - ghaff 3y ago
    A lot of people had AOL dialup. I probably had (personal) broadband by then but not by more than a year or two. In any case I'm not sure whatever photo-ops heads of state choose to do says a lot beyond something some advisor pitched to them.
    - cogman10 3y ago
      > In any case I'm not sure whatever photo-ops heads of state choose to do says a lot beyond something some advisor pitched to them. IDK about the 76 email by the queen, but by the time the 90's rolled around I would have thought that electronic communications would have been pretty advantageous. Having everything printed out and hand delivered just seems like a waste of time. Particularly for something as large as the executive branch where there are so many secretaries that need to communicate. Heck, DHS was primarily pitched and founded because of the 9/11 communication breakdown. I have to wonder how much of that was due to the fact that communications were papers flying around everywhere.
      - ghaff 3y ago
        In the early 90s--and even into the mid--at a computer hardware company there were still execs who had their admins take care of all that stuff. There was a big mindset to break, probably mostly with a new generation, for many senior people in the computer industry. (To be clear, most people used email all the time--initially internal and then external as well over time.)
  - jacobgkau 3y ago
    I was born in '98, and I remember when my family got our first computer and an AOL connection, which means it was at least a few years later than '98. I was in a middle-class family in the Midwest. While parts of America may have gotten online earlier, the late 90's and early 2000's were still totally within the period of when Americans adopted the internet.
  - nullhole 3y ago
    otoh he did have one of the first viral videos: "The Final Days" White House Correspondents' Dinner Skit https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PbbUYhyoWz8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PbbUYhyoWz8
hx8 3y ago
President of The United States has a reputation of being a low-tech job. The level of security around him means all electronic devices he uses have gone through the wringer of best in class "cyber security." While '98 feels a bit late Clinton was in office between '93-'00. This sounds like the timeframe e-mail became a critical part of daily life.

by soneil 3y ago

A bit of a tangent, but I'm surprised to hear that Clinton was the first sitting president to send an email, in 1998. The Queen sent her first in 1976, which is quite a gap.

ghaff 3y ago

'76 is really early. I'd be curious about the circumstances. [Apparently a photo op at a military research base.] Ray Tomlinson at BBN was credited with sending the first email in 1971 and, other than a few chat messages, I wasn't sending email until a fair bit later. National Archives say that Bill Clinton had a public-facing email address in 1993 and that was probably around the time that (some) normal people were starting to get addresses and sending email.

cogman10 3y ago
'98, on the other hand seems really late for sending an email. America was online at that point. In fact, in '98 the concept of email was so ubiquitous that we got "You've got mail" [1] as a movie. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/You%27ve_Got_Mail https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/You%27ve_Got_Mail
- ghaff 3y ago
  A lot of people had AOL dialup. I probably had (personal) broadband by then but not by more than a year or two. In any case I'm not sure whatever photo-ops heads of state choose to do says a lot beyond something some advisor pitched to them.
  - cogman10 3y ago
    > In any case I'm not sure whatever photo-ops heads of state choose to do says a lot beyond something some advisor pitched to them. IDK about the 76 email by the queen, but by the time the 90's rolled around I would have thought that electronic communications would have been pretty advantageous. Having everything printed out and hand delivered just seems like a waste of time. Particularly for something as large as the executive branch where there are so many secretaries that need to communicate. Heck, DHS was primarily pitched and founded because of the 9/11 communication breakdown. I have to wonder how much of that was due to the fact that communications were papers flying around everywhere.
    - ghaff 3y ago
      In the early 90s--and even into the mid--at a computer hardware company there were still execs who had their admins take care of all that stuff. There was a big mindset to break, probably mostly with a new generation, for many senior people in the computer industry. (To be clear, most people used email all the time--initially internal and then external as well over time.)
- jacobgkau 3y ago
  I was born in '98, and I remember when my family got our first computer and an AOL connection, which means it was at least a few years later than '98. I was in a middle-class family in the Midwest. While parts of America may have gotten online earlier, the late 90's and early 2000's were still totally within the period of when Americans adopted the internet.
- nullhole 3y ago
  otoh he did have one of the first viral videos: "The Final Days" White House Correspondents' Dinner Skit https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PbbUYhyoWz8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PbbUYhyoWz8

hx8 3y ago

President of The United States has a reputation of being a low-tech job. The level of security around him means all electronic devices he uses have gone through the wringer of best in class "cyber security." While '98 feels a bit late Clinton was in office between '93-'00. This sounds like the timeframe e-mail became a critical part of daily life.