“30 years ago today, the World Wide Web was born........ many of Warwick School’s teachers and parents would have been in high school, university or the first few years of paid work. There were no mobile phones, no ipods and no laptops. A computer less powerful than an A Level calculator cost over £1,000. That's £2,100 in today's money….. their entire hard drive had less memory storage than a current iPhone photograph would need. I called home from a coin-operated telephone box on the landing near my room at University about once a fortnight.  Virtually all information was passed around on paper.  People communicated by sending letters and memos. No SnapChat, FaceTime, WhatsApp, text… or even e-mail. If you needed to know cinema times you looked in the newspaper or telephoned the cinema box office and spoke to someone. Amazon and eBay didn't exist, Next was a clothes shop with a mail-order catalogue. You stayed in touch with friends by speaking face to face in a pub, over a cup of tea or chatting on the telephone – no image, just intonation.  Music was recorded on cassettes. People travelled less, read books and newspapers more and there were 4 channels of television (Sky was in its infancy).  It wasn't better, it was just different. The current generation of Warwick School parents will be the last generation to know a world before the technology revolution.  It will never be the same.  We had fewer contacts, less e-mail and less busy diaries in most cases.  It is an interesting day to pause, be still for a moment and to notice how life feels now in comparison. Notice also the rose-tinted nostalgia.  This is how life is – permanent change, accelerated in our time by a technology revolution. There are lessons to learn from people who know how to live without technology.  There is also wisdom to be found in the space available to us when we pause and step out of the frantic tempo of our data-driven world (which we have made for ourselves, by the way!). Take time to talk with older people about the world, daily life and friendships before the World Wide Web.  Listen to wisdom that can enhance the quality of the moments you’re living.  Appreciate the lessons we can gain from reflection and self-awareness, and enjoy the stories from those who built our world and made some of humankind’s greatest discoveries before computers, before the internet, before they're gone.”

Mr Callan, Mindfulness Coach