Remember getting photos developed? How about waiting at your computer for the modem to connect to dial-up internet access? That noise it made? What about watching videos on your VHS recorder? Buying SINGLES? Since the year 2000 new and developing technology has changed the way we live, our methods of communicating and many things we previously used on a daily basis have now become obsolete.
Check out our gallery below for a quick blast from the past……
What became obsolete in YOUR life in the last decade? Midriff tops? Your virginity? Your marriage? Nappies?
Encyclopedias
[Idea via the Huffington Post]
Comments
248 Comments so far
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Well, a few things that could become obsolete within the NEXT 10 years:
Desktop PCs- The only thing that we could do on a desktop PCs that we can’t do with an iPhone is…well… if iPads becomes PC-smart, then desktop PCs is becomming a big clunky box. That, along with your desk and monitor. Practically, tablet PCs could become the next thing used to play games, edit videos, write documents, surf the Internet, etc.
Buying/renting a game- With the advent of Sony and Microsoft releasing some software that lets you create stuff, and consumers eager to create, and Little Big Planet, the way we receive video games via Playstation Network or from a store will go the way of the Arcade. We can just pay 99 cents for a virtual action figure, create some landscapes with powerful software, and you have blanket licenses from “component” distributers. Hey, we have about 1,000 games in your retail store, but in this setup, man, there’s an infinite number of games online that’s almost free of charge. The best game of 2020 is not a game, but software that creates games.
Patrolium Powered Vehicles- Well…not entirely, but rising gas prices causes people to ditch gasoline with either electric/hydro-power cars, while farmers trade in their tracters and revert back to horses and mules.
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Am I the only one who doesn’t even own a mobile phone? Can’t stand them, I know, if I got one, then I’d forevermore be dependant on it so best left alone – an expense I can do without. Landline or nothing for me. I think mobiles have a tendency to make otherwise polite people rude without thinking.
I adore my cookbooks, and I don’t care how many great recipes there are online, it is just not the same as settling in with a few books to flick through, I desperately don’t want cookbooks, or books of any kind for that matter, to be obsolete. I can accept, I suppose the decline of the encyclopaedia, that’s understandable, but please, eBooks remain an option, not the be all.
I still have an answering machine.
I love to write and receive hand written mail, true it’s a rarity, but somehow that makes it more precious.
K, and I am all embracing of digital cameras! I love that I can take shot after shot (kids, animals, even cooking creations) and it doesn’t matter how many are dodgy as long as there is one good one. I did like the sound of my old analogue camera though…
Re classifieds: My youngest is still only two years old, and we absolutely put a notice in the paper – are people not doing this any longer?
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i loved singles! i always liked the b-sides and remixes more than the actual song
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My list:
Phonebooks,
petticoats,
books(although I am a troglodyte because you can’t lend someone your kindle)
walking to things (not much is in walking distance these days and who has the time?)
paper payslips
velcro rollers (big hair is no more)
hair spray (it’s all mousse, mud and wax)
baking (time – no more time)
fixing things (things are so cheaply made it’s seldom worth it)
magazines (hardly buy them now that this sort of trivia is on the net)
Encyclopaedias
The dewey decimal system (you just look the book up and don’t need to understand where things are).
I’m sure there will be many, many other things.
I do miss film canisters. They are SO useful. Someone should just make them for the sake of it, or package their product this way so I could buy it and get the handy canister as a bonus. My kids really miss them. We make rockets out of them with seltzer.
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I dont agree with this one.
There are so many things that you are calling obsolete.
1. Answering machines – I call people for work all the time and will always get an answering machine.
2. We get cheques all the time at my work for payment. Very few people that pay us use credit card.
3. Travel agents I use all the time whenever I go to book a holiday and if I dont make an appointment I usually would have a 3 hr wait to see someone.
4. Fax machines – at work we get up to 50 faxes everyday and send alot of faxes everyday.
5. I talk to people all the time so
6. I buy CD’s mostly cause I dunno find it more fun and alot of people still use and buy cd’s
7. landline? really? buisnesses dont run only on mobiles. I call landline homes all the time more often then mobiles.
8. Classifieds have just cahnged and moved to the internet (eBay anyone)
9. 1900 numbers are still in full swing. I work near a 1900 call centre and a few girls have said how busy they always are so not obsolete.
10. Yellow/white pages have now moved to phone and internet mostly now so its not like they dont exsist they just went electronic oh and we got out delivery of hardcopy last week.
11. Cashiers really? only 2 stores in my area have self serve and only have 4 machines, dont see cashiers going anywhee in a hurry.
12. wires, we still have them everywhere. A TV connects through wires, surround sound, computers. Still sooo many wires.
All in all 60% of the 22 are still in use today through the decade. 12 that are not obsolete but this article chooses to think they are. What is obsolete to one person isnt to another or many people.
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Consider this….every time something becomes obsolete another human being is dropped onto the employment scrapheap.
Become a Luddite just like me. It’s the most caring, sharing thing that you can do for mankind.
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A nice sentiment, Bradley, but every time a new technology is developed, lots of people get new jobs.
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Exactly what I was going to say. If you keep yourself educated and your skills up to date you shouldn’t be out of a job.
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I have to agree with Bradley on this (why do I picture a little fairy dying everytime I write this?).
Some new jobs are created when new technology evolves, but usually the jobs go offshore and are less. Our manufacturing industry has gone. There was a fascinating doco on Fletcher Jones and how it is dying.
When the only way you can afford to expand your business is to have share holders profit becomes the imperative. The only way you get profit once you’ve reached maximum market share is to make product for less. To do that you either screw wages, reduce staff, import more or offshore the work.
Yup, I wait my extra 2 minutes in a queue to have a real person serve me. Those entry level jobs are important to kids going to uni or dipping their toe in the water of employment with their first job.
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Thank you for highlighting what I didn’t mention. The jobs move offshore as the technology changes.
Lulu……Mumbai, anyone ?
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Flutterby…another thank you. Nice to know that I’m not wrong all of the time. Even a clock that doesn’t work is right twice a day.
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Don’t worry, Bradley, my mamamia clock was smashed long ago, it’s never right…
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I tried to put a new spring in it, and then realised it was a grandfather clock.
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Although some here will reckon it’s a cuckoo clock…
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I’ve used a phone booth twice in the last year – first when my phone battery died and I needed to call to let someone know where to meet me, and the second time when Vodaphone service failed during the Qld floods and, again, I was not at home and needed to call someone. So I don’t think they’re obsolete at all. Same for travel agents – though I HAVEN’T used that twice this year, unfortunately, I just hope to in the future =P And I use a fax machine every day at work. And a landline. And CDs!
I also refuse to EVER use eBooks. The only time I will concede that books are obsolete is when my entire collection is destroyed in flood/fire and they’re no longer available to buy. I know that wasn’t on the list, but I’m thinking to the future, when everyone except me has an iPad/similar.
Maybe I’m just not “moving forward” with the rest of Australia…after all, I DO have a typewriter…
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Shannon, I love the technology. The eighties were exciting, my first Apple Mac; the nineties even more so, the internet. This past decade, with the iphone, ipad, ipod, and almost universal adoption of broadband has changed the way I live, and work. Of course, as a performing musician the same technology has been instrumental (!!) in the loss of live music jobs.
But I wouldn’t have it any other way. I remember fondly the typewriter, not the electric one, the original mechanical thing. My Dad brought them home from his office in the 70s. I wrote my love letters on them. I frequented public telephone boxes to ring girlfriends because it was too embarrassing to do so in front of my parents at home. We didn’t have two phones back then.
My fax machine is gathering dust, and thanks to a commenter here I’ve bought the Sign’n'Send app, so no longer have to persevere with it to sign and return a document.
As for eBooks, I can’t speak highly enough of the Stanza app and the epub format. Rather than the towering number of books threatening to bury me, I can now have access to many, indeed hundreds, at a touch. I can also take them with me. Travelling, train, plane, whatever.
I won’t ever get rid of my treasured hard cover editions. I love the feel of a real book, but all those paperbacks? I’m glad to see the back of them. Just as vinyl hasn’t disappeared, neither will hard cover books. They are a thing to be treasured, but the detritus of pulp fiction that we accumulate throughout our lives is better off being in digital format.
The beauty of this technology is also that books take up very little space on an ipod, kindle, ipad or iphone. Much less than mp3s. For the space of an album by your favourite artist, you can have the complete works of the masters of literature.
What’s not to love?
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What’s not to love? Book sellers like me now make less money! Although I guess you have a point about the pulp fiction. I sell second hand, mainly hard covers and classics so hopefully people will continue to want them.
I know I’ll cave in and buy an eBook eventually but I’ll still be keeping my ‘real’ book collection.
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You put up a good argument, Gig! Fear not, I’m no technophobe – I have two laptops, an iPod, use mobile phones etc. I just like a bit of history!
You can’t put an eBook on display in a bookcase. I have books dating back to the 19th century, and I love having that tiny piece of history in my house. I can fall asleep reading a book in bed (not one of those valuable ones, obviously, that would be irresponsible! They get special reading treatment) and not worry about it. If I fall asleep with my iPad, I could roll onto it and break it. An iPad just doesn’t feel the same as a good book in my hands. I think it’s the routine of it – for me, a book is just what feels *right* – even in paperback. The smell of the pages. Oh, what’s not to love about *that*?
I have a similar (but less passionate) love of CDs. Any artists I REALLY love, I buy their CDs. I like having my items in physical form, I suppose! I can look at them, appreciate them. Hold those fond memories in my hot little hands.
But I’m a collector, I suppose. I’d pick a $1000 classic over a $10 version for an iPad/similar.
Once I get my typewriter fixed, I’ll be using that again just for the feel of it, though I do my serious writing on my laptop. Well, I use the term “serious” loosely as I’m far from being an author…I’m just a girl who writes stories with no chance of getting published!
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Living in France at the moment… they are ten years behind in anything administrative… I was exhausted,over it and standing in a supermarket line the other day when a woman three people ahead of me pulls out a cheque book to pay for her groceries. Cheque books not so obsolete in France.
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Perhaps it was me! I love cheques.
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Ha ha! I love this!
Floopy disks spring to mind! And diskmans!
I just turned 24 so the past decade 13-23 had so many changes! i.e. The 2000′s to me involved finishing high school, learning a language, going to uni, graduating from uni, getting my first job, my first boyfriend, my first kiss, turning 18, turning 21…soo much!
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Simple, polite good manners.
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Kate Hunter’s piece reminded me of another: liquid paper or white out. Nothing is ever hand written in good copy any more. Although I guess school kids still write their homework?
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I use correction tape all the time at work. Still in use as we get hard copies of things and sometimes well alot have to change things.
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My wife and I were out having dinner on Tuesday night. We noticed that as diners arrived, they checked their phones as they were seated. As they went to pay for their meals, they checked their phones.
I find that sad. Imagine someone outbidding you on Ebay in that hour that you were incommunicado ?
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unless they were turning their phones off as they arrived & then back on again…
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I should have added that they stared at the screens on the phones intently for a period of time far longer than the action of turning the off button to on requires.
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I’m only speaking for myself here but my phone is old by today’s standards (Motorola razr v3x) so it takes longer than is necessary to switch on and off. I’m constantly having friends tell me to get out of the eighties when I pull my phone out!! I got it in 2006 so I’m pretty impressed that it’s lasted so long!!
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Trust me, as someone who uses a ten year old mobile phone, I can pick out one of those new fangled do everything except give birth mobiles in a darkened room whilst I’m wearing a blindfold. Or should that be visually impairedfold ? Now there’s another thing that’s becoming obsolete…the English language. Alter every word lest you offend.
But I digress, what we saw people switching on and off weren’t no telephonic museum pieces.
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who cares?
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Checking there were no calls from the babysitter, perhaps?
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Lulu, you disagree with me for the sake of disagreeing with me. Yes, I’m sure that they were checking to see if the babysitter had called them. My observation was clearly incorrect.
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Went to the movies this morning. The youths all around us were looking at their phones (you could actually see the screens glowing in the semi-darkness !) right up until the movie started.
As the final credits began rolling and they left the cinema the friendly glow of the mobile became apparent.
Just checking in with Mum, for sure ?
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haha you know you are old when you call young people ‘youths’
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I think patience is obsolete. Everything is instant, got to have it now don’t want to wait for it.
My youth also feels obsolete reading through that list.
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Actually I had a job last year where I was paid my salary by cheque because the secretary was too damn lazy to update the system.
When I found out I was going to be paid by cheque I asked if I could have a bank transfer instead.
She replied ‘No we don’t dot that. Is there any reason why you don’t want to be paid by cheque?’
And I said ‘Um.. yeah. Because it’s not 1985.’
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LOL at the marriage…that it did
I don’t miss CDs, they’re the worst visual clutter EVER. Ugly ugly ugly. There is just no such thing as attractive CD storage.
I use the Kindle app on the iPad and thank the heavens for it every time. I love books, but I love having a mothership of a device that has every single thing I could need on it. LOL
What I do miss is film. I’m a professional photographer who was one of the last to go digital and the loss of film still weighs heavily. I heartily recommend printing your digital images as well. It’s a bit of a personal crusade. I can’t tell you how many clients I have that have lost every single photo of their kids because they were all kept on a computer or CD. CD/DVDs have a shelf life of 2-5 years, after which the data corrupts. Hard drives fail. All of them. So print them! It’s the only way to archive a photograph. Do it for your kids
They love flip albums full of photos of the people that they love. They’ll love it more when they have their own kids and they’re wandering around trying to find somewhere that reads CDs. If the CD survives that long.
What I really miss is a time where you didn’t have to be contactable every minute of every day. It’s now considered acceptable that a mobile phone number gives round the clock access. We coped perfectly well before, why do I have to be receiving texts (about nothing in particular) at midnight?
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I am so with you on printing photos! I make a point of sitting down and printing out the best pics every month, and while I may have a whole bookcase dedicated to photo albums, my friends and family love it because no-one else ever bothers to print theirs, so when they come to my place people can spend hours sitting and looking through the pics, reminiscing.
And I discovered one of the best gifts you can give someone is a book made up with their photos from facebook! I think that’s now the reason they don’t print their own photos, coz they know I’ll get them a photo book (seeing as most of their facebook photos are ones I’ve taken anyway! Lol!)
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One of my kids asked what we did before mobile phones. I pointed out that half the time her or her brother (or any of the countless clients I try to contact at work) often don’t answer the phone because they’re screening, so it madevery little difference anyway. We just had more solid arrangements back in the day.
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I have my cds stored in a wooden bookcase (cd case?) specially made for the purpose, with extra shelving, so they fit just right. Doesn’t look any worse than the records stored the same way.
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I assure you cheques are not obselete. Not only do I use them all the time in business but hundreds of our customers pay us by cheque. A lot of people prefer them.
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In my job I also have hundreds of customers who pay by cheque. Most of our customers are farmers, so not much chance of them giving up cheques for a very long time! A lot of them wouldn’t even own an atm card or know what one was.
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I am so behind the times, I still use my old camera and film cos I prefer the quality to my digital and I love getting the photos developed and never knowing exactly what you are going to get!! I still use an anserwing machine and land line as I don’t have a mobile (no I’m not 80, I am only 38!), and I still buy CD’s as I have never downloaded music in my life!!
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I have a VHS collection of about 150 classic films from the 70s, 80s and 90s (Flying High, Coming to America, The Goonies etc.) – so I can’t give up on them just yet. I have a DVD VCR dual unit. I can watch a DVD and tape TV at the same time! I know there are more advanced ways to do this now but I’m still impressed.
Yes, I do get laughed at. Ha
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You haven’t lived until you’ve watched the Goonies on Blu-Ray
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Oh I don’t doubt you, Melissa! But I just.can’t.let.go!
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As a kid, I loved my guitar, but before I had a guitar, I loved records. Records were to us what ipods, ipads, itunes and digital music are to kids today. Maybe more. Of course we had magazines, telling us what records to listen to and buy, but it all came back to records.
Kids lined up at the record shop to buy the latest single. I remember having to go away on army camp and telling my Mum the new Led Zeppelin album would be released on Monday, and she had better go down to David Jones to buy it or else I would miss out. Spoilt brat I was.
Thankfully, she did, because the cover was worth every penny. Unlike cassettes and cds, album covers were works of art. Not only that, they were a gateway into the mind of the band you were listening to. Put on ‘Sergeant Peppers’, and you couldn’t properly listen to it if you didn’t have that magnificent cover in your lap. A double fold, with pictures and lyrics.
‘Dark Side of the Moon’ was even more intense, even though you were older, and secretly smoking a joint in your parents’ house. The cover was not only the cover art, but subliminal suggestion. As Pink Floyd played the songs, you were there!
And then came the eight track. The eight track was clever, you bought a couple of albums, before realising that you had already bought these albums on record. But they worked in your car.
Then came the cassette; and the romance of the album cover, the record, was lost forever. The cassette was a plastic thing in a plastic box. There was no history in this little box. A cassette was as about as sexy as well, a plastic thing in a plastic box.
I gave up on technology at that time. No album covers? Surely the world would come to an end. But the world went one better and introduced the CD. A slick platinum looking thing, that was really once again, just a a plastic thing in a box.
And now we have digital music, music on demand. This surely has to be one of the most game-changing advances in pop culture. My vinyl collection is now safely ensconced in a cupboard, my digital collection stored somewhere in the cloud.
I’ve made the leap from vinyl to digital. The steps in between were just awkward baby steps. No one really wants a cassette or a cd in a plastic box.
I do miss the record covers, though. Sgt Peppers, Satanic Majesties, Dark Side of the Moon, Tommy, et al. Beautiful artwork that supported brilliant music.
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Speak for yourself !
I love my CD collection and I love my collection of old LP’s. Over in the UK, vinyl still sells extremely well.
Personally, I wouldn’t have an Ipod if you paid me. Lose the darn thing and there goes your music collection.
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Also apart from the tops artwork, LP covers (actually 45 covers too) are easier to get autographed! My records are at Mum’s!
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No, your music collection would still be on iTunes. It’s stored on both.
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I’ve still got my Lps. My youngest kids think there quite bizarre. The 10 year old has just gotten her first iPod.
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I’ve still got all my record, LPs, singles & EPs. And the turntable to play them on (and a local shop that still sells stylus’). I have cds too, they’re easier, but don’t sound as good.
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Gig, I have an old 1956 Les Paul Goldtop. Should I throw it away? It can’t be worth much………
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I got sent a handwritten letter from my grandmother the other day, with a photo enclosed of my siblings and I with our dad. Taken with her camera that uses real film. It’s incredibly vain, but I stared at the photo for ages admiring how lovely we all looked compared to ultra-sharp digital photos of us.
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nooo not the cashiers! I effing HATE those self service check outs.
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They take longer than the cashiers, and the other day I saw a staff member standing there helping people with the self-service machine, which seems to completely defeat the purpose of the thing.
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I refuse to use them, because 1) they cost jobs and 2) for some socially isolated people the cashier may be the only person they talk to that day.
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What a load of crap!
- I booked my last holiday through a travel agent
- I used a fax machine on tuesday
- Fairly sure I still speak to people
- I own CDs
- I spoke to my friend of the home phone for an hour tonight.
- I always read the classified ads
And I’m 21 years old.
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One thing i truly miss is the old “HAVE.YOU.GOT.WHAT.YOU.PAID.FOR.?.” clip at the start of VHS tapes.It always made my siblings and I giggle back in the day. Fast forward seemed like real time!
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I hope that the good old Checkout Chick never goes out of style. I refuse point blank to use those darn robots in the supermarkets. Only recently I was in Woolies with just a few items in my trolley. I lined up in the 15 items or less queue and within seconds I had someone directing me towards the “robot”. She wasn’t impressed when I refused citing that the darn things cost people their jobs.
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You got that right, Bradley. The Check Out Chick is an Aussie icon.
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I know someone (who may or may not be my husband) who protests by not scanning all of his fruit and veg. If he buys 2 chilli’s he will only weigh one, or hold an apple off the scale so it’s full weight isn’t recorded. Mind you, he only saves about 20 cents but he says it serves them right!
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Awesome. That’ll teach them.
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I take extra plastic bags. But then I feel guilty about the environment. I do re-use them though.
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Not trying to be picky, but his protestsounds like 2 wrongs not making a right. I don’t like the supermarkets penny pinching, but I dunno if theft (albeit on a tiny scale) is the way to go either. Just my thoughts.
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Exactly. Don’t they seen they’re making themselves redundant? NIB does the same: I went it to make a claim and they said ‘did you know you could do this online?’ I felt like saying, ‘do you know you’ll be out of a job in six months?’
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I’m sure they do know – but they’re obliged to say it.
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When I was a bank teller, we had to try and push people to close their passbook accounts and go to card accounts. Believe me, we knew we were talking ourselves out of jobs.
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Not the way NIB’s online services (don’t) work. I WISH I could claim online but alas they rarely work. Of course they’ve shut all but one retail outlet in Canberra, making that difficult too.
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Achievements based on merit. Remember the “good old days” when you had to work at your craft in order to become the best that you could be ? Now, all you need is a video on YouTube and you’re a star.
Remember how you worked your way up the ladder of success ? Your success was dependent upon your level of skill and wisdom. Wisdom was achieved via experience. Now, if you haven’t got that experience under your belt by the time you hit twenty-five….forget it, because by the time you hit thirty you’re past it !
Stand up for dinosaurs, I say !
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I’m obviously obsolete …. Still buy CDs, much prefer flipping through a hard copy of the yellow pages, still use a landline, write cheques, and use a fax machine. There is also a phone booth opposite my apartment. Oh, and I’m generation Y! (albeit at the older end)
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Wow, retro is in I guess.
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Street directories will probably end up obsolete. I’ve taught my 2 oldest how to use them and they each have one in the car but I think they’ll go eventually. I prefer (and still remember) the old red complete phone booth to the one in the picture. At least if you had no money you could still “prank” someone with 3 rings before they picked up and they’d know it was you.
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Receiving a hand written letter from your best friend who’s interstate or overseas or even just a few suburbs away is the best thing ever. I hope that never becomes truly obsolete.
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My mum still writes me letters, although she does do a quick text here and there, but if it’s important, it’s always a letter.
And it’s the only letter I get these days, except for a sweet and lovely girl here on MM who sent me one once.
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Your mother texts? Mine doesn’t even have a mobile phone.
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Yep, she’s got a touch screen phone, but she doesn’t want the internet. Most of her friends are online though. Not bad for 70 and 80 year olds. The phone is the biggie though, they’ve all got ‘em, and are like kids comparing who has the best phone. On a recent visit I met a friend of hers who had bought a blue-tooth earpiece. Now that was a game-changer!
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I have to text for my Dad, in his own words, ‘I’ll learn how to do it later.’ His mother learnt to text before him and she’s 84. But Dad just prefers the old fashioned way!
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Encylopedias wont be redundant…in my house anyway. I just got the whole set from my mum that i used growing up for my 6yr old boys. I can’t wait to show them how to be resourceful looking things up in these etc rather than going to online encyclopedias and ‘googling’. I know..old school….
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I’ve just done the same thing. Kids still need to understand how to look up a book for information!
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The only problem is that the information in those books is now probably completely wrong. Think about all the things that have changed since you were at school. Pluto not being a planet anymore, for example, and all of the historical events missing from those editions. This is why the Internet is a useful resource; it’s real time and it’s intangible and doesn’t need to be replaced (at great cost) every year.
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pluto isn’t a planet anymore???! Damn those Funk & Wagnels…
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I still haven’t come to terms with that. It’s like my whole childhood was wrong. All those science projects, wrong. Pluto should be an honorary planet!
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Carbon paper – last century’s Kindle …
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How funny, I was just thinking earlier this morning that it is 10 years since I was a backpacking gal and how every couple of months when I was in a location for a week or so, I would get all my films developed! How times have changed.
I rarely use CD’s anymore, all on ipod. Except for a few kids stories that we listen to on CD in the car. And yet, about 9 years ago, on my first day at a new job in London some guy showed me a gadget called an MP3 player (which could hold about 6 songs) and I was totally baffled by it. Could not understand what it was all about!
Plane tickets have pretty gone haven’t they? Particularly for domestic travel. E-tickets the way to go now.
One thing that has gone in the opposite direction for me is that I used to have all my appointments kept electronically at work but since being a mum at home, I have a good old wall calendar and have to refer to it several times a day!
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I still buy CD’s, I like to have something physical for my purchase and I enjoy looking through the cd booklet. I will miss the day when they stop making CD’s.
I still use a diary and write in it every day for work, it’s my bible and can never replace my iPhone.
I still have to write cheques for school fees and daughters horse riding lessons as neither have eftpos.
I still use the yellow and white pages as I am considered to be living in the country and our numbers are not on the net sometimes.
Having said that I am an iPhone addict and can’t remember the last time I turned on my lap top to surf the net!
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And the funny thing is that my mother in law still uses money orders! Bless her.
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I wonder what will be on this list in 10 years time?!
SCARY!
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Today’s social attitudes for a start.
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Marriage being only for straight people, growing up in a house with a backyard being the norm…?
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It’s funny… ALL of those things (ok, except maybe film cameras and floppy disks!) are still very much a part of daily life in Europe! You’re nobody unless you carry a checkbook (or two!) everywhere with you in France!!!! And most companies ask you to send your cover letter HANDWRITTEN so they can analyse your handwriting… I seriously struggled to pick my jaw up off the floor when I signed up to a French university a few years ago and the lady at the desk pulled out a piece of paper, folded it in half, took out a coloured texter (not even a pen!) and proceeded to handwrite my subject list!!!!!!!!! Cra-zi-ness!! Sometimes I think I’m still living in the 80′s!!!
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That’s interesting about France.
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Agreed, but it’s kind of nice sometimes
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I noticed this, too, when we were in Europe last year. Every place we stayed at (B&B’s/Hotels.Houseboats) all could only be paid for via cash and many restaurants were the same.
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I remember VHS. I was a crack shot at taping movies off the TV! No ads. Now I can hit record on my Foxtel IQ.
I remember using phone booths, dial up internet, Nokia 3310!
I remember taping songs off the radio onto cassette. I got an album by Mandy Moore on cassette.
I also remember the video shop sign “Be kind – rewind” haha! We would get home with a video and the last person didn’t rewind the tape so the credits were still rolling. That was so annoying.
I never post letters anymore – I only use the post office to pick up parcels from eBay.
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Something that’s become obsolete, for me anyway, is spam mail. I only realised recently that I used to spend ages sifting through all the promises of money and certain body-part enlargements every single day. It’s been a few years since I’ve seen those. Maybe it’s just my email provider that’s really good.
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Last week, I was struck by someone having a violent argument over the phone in a phone booth and I thought, ‘Oh my God… he’s using a pay phone?’
MySpace also became obsolete for anyone other than musicians.
As for things that went obsolete for me in the past decade – g-strings. They gave way to full briefs/shapewear. Thank goodness, because I didn’t particularly enjoy having my bum flossed every day.
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If only I could stop the white and yellow pages being delivered to my door, total waste of paper. Got all nostalgic, missing cassettes and how I used to record the Top 40 on Sunday nights by pressing play and record at the same time lol!
I don’t think books will become obsolete, nothin will change the feeling of snuggling up with a good book. Plus, who wants to take a Kindle to the beAch??!
What do I think will become obsolete? Heavy school textbooks, diaries/planners and wall calendars, landlines, paper bills (already almost there anyway), and sadly, post offices.
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Meerkath, you can stop getting your white and yellow pages! There was a post on here about that very thing not long ago. Search it and you will find the link to stop delivery of it.
xx
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I tried that and it got delivered anyway, but schools and childcare centres use phone books
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What for? Paper mache?
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door stops
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Computer monitor stand.
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Oh yes! I am going to try, it’s so wasteful!
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I tried this; you can only do it if you own the place and live in a detached house. In our apartment building we use them for holding open the door sometimes.
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I would like to lose these things:
Singlets for kids – at least in Australia. One less item to wash, fold and store.
White socks with black shoes
Long socks with short dresses as part of school uniform
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Our oldest one is 12 – we still don’t need one. Hang in there. It has its good side. I can be finished with all the housework before the kids go to school. And we play board games and the kids a fresh and not cranky
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Dial up isn’t obselete- not for me anyway!
I live 50kms from Sydney (I can see the bridge from the hill behind us) yet we have no broadband. All the net companies tell me to get wireless broadband but we don’t have any mobile reception either so that doesn’t work. It’s ridiculous.
Though on the bright side it does mean that I can’t waste hours on facebook or constantly checking my phone for messages every day!
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My alarm clock became obsolete the day I gave birth to my now three year old.
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HAHAHAHA! My 8yo son just listened to this, and asked ‘Is that an alien signal?’
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I always thought it was connecting to the galaxy too. Netscape’s splash screen was sci-fi plus, and then lo and behold, you could talk to someone across the world. It was magical.
even though it was just a phone line
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The last ten years…
I havent changed much of my purchasing manner (ie personal) but I add now, internet shopping, and of course Ebay
I shop OS – bookdepository – because it’s safe, free postage and good price.
Watches. I hardly ever wear one – got a lot tho’ – use my iphone
Cannot live without an ADSL connection, and a new(ish) piece of hardware to operate on it!
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Cloth nappies!
Ten years ago I used them on my baby – can you even buy them anymore – I mean the basic white terry squares? Any new mums out there can you enlighten me?
Once they had done baby duty mine were soaked and re-used over and over for washing the car, cleaning the stairs etc. and even today some still lurk in that cupboard under the laundry!
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I have seen cloth nappies at Kmart. I used disposable but bought a dozen cloth nappies as chuck rags, etc. One of the most useful baby items ever!
And now I use them for cleaning.
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u can still get the squares which are easy and have so many uses. Howeves there are tonnes of fancy fitted cloth nappies out there which are more comfy, not as bulky and super cute!
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And $20 EACH!
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I use cloth squares every day! My son wears MCNs (modern cloth nappies) but the squares are great. Available from target!
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Old cloth nappies are THE BEST cleaning cloths, mine are 15 years & two kids old and are still going strong.
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Hey good to know they are still around – and doing double duty as clean up cloths!
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A diary. All dates are on my phone now and birthdays too. And with Facebook you need never remember another birthday again! I do wish more invitations or thankyous were handwritten though. And corks! Apparently 95% of bottles are now screw cap.
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Yahoo – thank goodness for screw cap wine – no more worries about forgetting the bottle opener at picnics!
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Re. the corks – in Australia yes… but not in France so maybe you need to move there!!
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I use a diary! I find that if I don’t write things down by hand, I forget them.
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Phone gets lost or stolen….what am I doing on February 5 ? Can’t remember. Hope that I’m not doing anything important. Better ring around.
No. I think that the diary is here to stay.
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Bradley, this and the iPod comment lead me to think that you need to learn about backing up properly. The reason I’ve gonebdigital with a lot of those things is precisely because my phone numbers, calendars, music, photos etc are saved in multiple places and backed up!
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I would have to agree with you.
But in the meantime, I’ll continue to use my ten year old mobile that only takes and makes phone calls, buy CD’s, read books and magazines made from paper and use a pen to write down all important dates in my diary.
Technology is there to assist me, but I won’t let it control me.
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Remember when you called a long distance telephone number and you heard the three beeps on the line when it was connected? I don’t know when that stopped, but it did!
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And remember waiting until a Sunday to ring STD because it was HEAPS cheaper?
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Yes, that was when it was easy to understand what you were paying for. Now we have confusing plans…
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I don’t miss cassette tapes or CDs. iPhones/iPods/all in one phones are far more convient. I don’t miss DVDs either. Pains in the arse.
What will I miss in the coming decade? Books. Children’s books will survive, no doubt, but most paperbacks will simply go electronic. After using the kindle app on my iPad, iPhone and desktop I can see the appeal – it is SO convenient. Waiting for a bus? Open up the iPhone app and it’s on the page you were on when you were reading the night before on the iPad. Get back to your iPad, it knows how much you read on the bus.
Sure, there is a couple of problems: you can’t lend good books to friends, someone is more likely to mug you for your iphone than a $10 Popular Penguin, no power: books still work. And you can’t display your electronic book stores?
How are you going to get laid by having the right books and authors but they’re in your computer instead of on display on a well placed bookshelf? Yes, I DO read Jared Diamond little miss enviro-girl!…
And finally, I love how books feel.
Hmmm… maybe paper books will last a while longer too.
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We’ve been told that newspapers are obsolete for 10 years, and we’ve still got them because people like the feel. I don’t believe books will disappear. But I think less will be available in print.
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Hmmm… disagree. Most newspapers are struggling. Just have a look at commuters to and from work, hardly everyone is readng the paper these days, everyone is on their phones or IPads.
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I think the Sunday papers will always be around. There is nothing like reading the physical paper whilst having breakfast on a Sunday morning.
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So true. I love my iPad and reading books on there is certainly a high-light…except when you are flying, and you are in that first/ last 20mins and there is ‘no electronic devices allowed’! Really annoys me as I watch people reading books and I have to sit there and flick through the in-flight magazine when I am really intrigued as to what is going on in my book!
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I’ll never stop buying paper books. I love second hand bookstores, I love knowing how far through the story I am just by the amount of pages in each hand. I love the way they make our living room look cosy sitting on all their shelves. and I love all my big fashion and art books. how do you put those on an ipod? the pictures would be too small.
also, ever since I got my first laptop at age 13 (it was a very old one of my dad’s, I wasn’t spoiled) I’ve been strict about turning it off and reading a real book before bed so that I get a good night’s sleep. isn’t the theory that looking at electronic screens before going to bed disrupts your sleep patterns?
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i choose not to make things obsolete,by sticking with what i have and not buying the next in gadget i have an overseas holiday every year. Film is alive and well and making a comeback in the artistic world(actually it never went away with me). Will my decendants be happy to find a hard drive full of HDR cropped images, i don’t think so.I love running out the front in my jammies to get the paper or taking the dog to the local shop to get a paper, not reading it online.How will the cool guy at the cafe know what i am reading if i have a kindle? i still buy cds, there are 10 or so tracks in a particular order for a reason. i have joined postcrossing to get postcards from strangers around the world because friends don’t send them.
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Kerry, I could have written this post!!
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so with you on the kindle thing! and you’re right about cds, I don’t buy them anymore because I don’t have the space but I try to now buy only full albums on iTunes rather than individual songs, and listen to them in order from start to finish. it’s the way they are meant to be enjoyed!
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“cool guy at the cafe” – exactly my point about using books to get laid (above). Doesn’t work if they’re all stored electronically.
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Well said. I deliberately rebel against all of the electronic gizmos that ultimately make people redundant. I know that there is a word for this, but the little grey cells aren’t working yet.
Help, anybody ?
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Luddite?
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I’ll wear the word as a badge of honour !
Luddite and proud of it !
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I’m a bit of a luddite, myself.
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Snap crotch bodysuits
Being on time (because you have a mobile you can text someone if you’re running late)
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Not so much on the bodysuits, I saw one in a shop at lunchtime today and ive seen a few around over the last couple of months.
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Snap crotch bodysuits? I remember them, had to learn to unhook ‘em, just like a bra, only the reward was better….