When our children were toddlers, I remember frequently asking my wife if she could postpone using the phone so I could check my e-mails. Back then, e-mail was usually accessed via dial-up telephone lines, forcing families like ours to choose between making a phone call and using the internet—you couldn’t do both at the same time. Home internet connections were dreadfully slow with 14.4 kbps modems being the standard. You should see us now.
