Lately, I've seen a lot of TikToks being posted of old videos of teens in high school in the late '90s and early '00s, and aside from the comments about people looking old back then (um, rude), the comments tend to be about how the vibes are much more relaxed and how everyone acts different from today's high schoolers. Heck, there are even comments about how people didn't know how to act on camera because they weren't used to it.

So in the spirit of those TikToks, I put together a list of what everyday things would have been like for Y2K teens, and yes, of course, I am aware that having such advanced technology now plays a huge difference in the way teens live today. I am also not saying that growing up back then was better than today, or that this is a "Millennials are better than Gen Z'ers" debate (it's not). It's just a fun look back at what life was like!!!

1

Nobody really owned cellphones. Yes, in the late '90s and early '00s, they were becoming popular, but they were still incredibly expensive, and most people would not have gotten one for their kids. And if you were a teen with a phone, you used it sparingly because there was a limit on how many minutes you could use a month, and if you went over, it got very pricey.

2

You shared an entire landline with everyone in your house, but if you were lucky, you could get an extension in your room so you could talk in your bedroom (which, of course, also meant your parents could listen in or demand that you get off when they needed to talk). And if you knew someone who did have their own private line, then not only would you be jealous, but you would also go over to use their phone if you wanted to talk to a crush, etc.

3

You would also use AIM to talk to your friends — especially as soon as you got home so that you could catch up with as many of them at once on what the day's gossip was. Also, you'd leave cryptic "Away Messages" if you were in the mood to start drama.

4

Most families shared one computer, and it was usually in a home office or "computer room." Also, fighting between siblings over who got to use it so they could get on the internet was an almost everyday occurrence.

5

Aside from the computer lab, no classrooms had computers. And if they did, it was probably for the teacher or for very specific uses...basically, you weren't doing anything on a computer.

6

You'd schedule* your week around your favorite TV shows. If you weren't home and missed it, you literally had to wait until summertime to watch it again in reruns.

7

*DVRs weren't super common, and the only other way not to be home was to program your VCR (which could be a bit tricky to figure out how to do sometimes).

More likely than not, you were pretty dependent on TV Guide or the newspaper television guide to see what shows were on, which shows were reruns, and which ones were new episodes.

8

Bands and artists would have world premieres of their newest music videos on MTV — so you'd watch an entire episode of the making of it just so you could catch the premiere of the video at the end.

9

You literally would watch MTV in hopes that it would play the music videos you liked at the time.

10

You would tape music videos you liked when they aired — that way, you could watch them "on demand."

If you had a crush or made a new friend and wanted to give them your phone number, you'd have to write it down on a piece of paper, give it to them, and hope they didn't lose it.

11

You likely owned a telephone book or spiral notebook where you had written down the phone numbers, email addresses, and home addresses of all the people whose numbers you didn't already have memorized.

12