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↑7 Computer: CGI, Dialup Internet, Multitasking (1995-1999)

Right before the towers fell, circa ’99: this was catalogs, travel blogs, a chat room or two.

Welcome to the Internet (Bo Burnham, 2021)

Netscape Navigator
(1995, Windows 95)

Winamp
(1997, Windows 95)

Grand Theft Auto III
(2001, PS2)

In 1995, the ↑7 PC came around. A 16-bit OS can really stretch to use ↑6 memory, but to use ↑7 memory you need a 32-bit OS, like Windows 95 (1995) or Linux (v1.0, 1994).

This is just fundamentally different from what came before.

↑8 Computer: Broadband (1999-2004)

Counter-Strike
(1999)

Napster
(1999)

Skype
(2003)

A ↑8 computer has 128MB to 1GB of RAM. What do we get for it?

↑9 Computer: Social (2005-2012)

Facebook
(2005)

YouTube
(2005)

Google Maps
(2005)

A ↑9 computer has 1GB to 8GB of main memory, plus a smaller amount of GPU RAM. These computers can be 32-bit or 64-bit.

↑10 Computer: Unlimited (2012-2020)

Software is eating the world.

– Marc Andreessen (2011)

Twitch
(2011)

CryptoPunks NFT
(2017)

Midjourney
(2023)

A ↑10 computer has 12GB to 96GB of RAM and is 64-bit. This is so much memory that this level is characterized by deliberate waste and ubiquitous computing overkill.

↑11+ Computer: Supercomputer (2020-)

A ↑11 computer has 128GB to 1TB of RAM. These are modern computers with high-end GPUs.

An A100 has ↑10 RAM and does ↑14 FLOPS, which combined might be considered a ↑11 or ↑12 computer.

The fastest supercomputer is made up of ↑4 of these CPUs and GPUs, for a total of ↑15 RAM and ↑18 FLOPS.