Posted on 03/18/2017 6:04:20 PM PDT by upchuck
Complete article here: http://www.kiplinger.com/slideshow/business/T057-S001-7-things-that-will-soon-disappear/index.html
Quick list:
1. Keys - Keys, at least in the sense of a piece of brass cut to a specific shape, are going away.
2. Blackouts - Frustrating power outages that leave people with fridges full of ruined food are on their way out as our electrical grid becomes increasingly intelligent – and resilient.
3. Fast-food workers - Burger-flippers have targets on their backs as fast-food executives are eager to replace them with machines, particularly as minimum wages in a variety of states are set to rise to $15.
4. The clutch pedal - Every year it seems that an additional car model loses the manual transmission option. Even the Ford F-150 pickup truck can’t be purchased with a stick anymore.
5. College textbooks - By the end of this decade, digital formats for tablets and e-readers will displace physical books for assigned reading on college campuses. K–12 schools won’t be far behind, though they’ll mostly stick with larger computers as their platform of choice.
6. Dial-up Internet - According to a study from the Pew Foundation, only 3% of U.S. households went online via a dial-up connection in 2013. Thirteen years before that, only 3% had broadband (Today, 70% have home broadband). Massive federal spending on broadband initiatives, passed during the last recession to encourage economic recovery, has helped considerably.
7. The plow - Modern farmers have little use for it. It provides a deep tillage that turns up too much soil, encouraging erosion because the plow leaves no plant material on the surface to stop wind and rain water from carrying the soil away. It also requires a huge amount of diesel fuel to plow, compared with other tillage methods, cutting into farmers' profits. The final straw: It releases more carbon dioxide into the air than other tillage methods.
8. Your neighborhood mail collection box - The amount of mail people are sending is plummeting, down 57% from 2004 to 2015 for stamped first-class pieces. So, around the country, the U.S. Postal Service has been cutting back on those iconic blue collection boxes. The number has fallen by more than half since the mid 1980s. Since it costs time and fuel for mail carriers to stop by each one, the USPS monitors usage and pulls out boxes that don't see enough traffic.
9. Your privacy - If you are online, you had better assume that you already have no privacy and act accordingly. Every mouse click and keystroke is tracked, logged and potentially analyzed and eventually used by Web site product managers, marketers, hackers and others. To use most services, users have to opt-in to lengthy terms and conditions that allow their data to be crunched by all sorts of actors.
10. The incandescent lightbulb - No, government energy cops are not coming for your bulbs. But the traditional incandescent lightbulb that traces its roots back to Thomas Edison is definitely on its way out. As of January 1, 2014, the manufacture and importation of 40- to 100-watt incandescent bulbs became illegal in the U.S., part of a much broader effort to get Americans to use less electricity.
Apparently, GE has stopped making squiggly bulbs (compact fluorescent) altogether.
They possess several years of back log, but they and Phillips have retooled their factories to solely make LED bulbs.
“F-150 with a stick”
Drove to work in one today, shaking that stick.
You don't know the first thing about me, so I'll recap some of the things I listed here and some that I haven't. Perhaps you can then figure out just WHY you are making suggestions to someone, with extremely different taste and needs from you.
We don't want wall sized T.V.s, nor even just slightly smaller ones than that. But we don't have oldish, cheapo crapola either.
I watch news, pretty old movies, discs of very old movies, and Brit and Aussies shows. During the season, I watch baseball. I DON'T NEED CRAZY MICROSCOPIC KIND OF RECEPTION FOR WHAT I WATCH !
Just WHERE did I EVER say that I don't watch some YouTube stuff? I do, on my laptop and what I do watch, there's less than NO need for some overtly large screen.
And as far as "learning" things.....you could stand some remedial reading comprehension classes, as well as classes in etiquette, and what people from different classes find "important"/needed to buy; though nowadays, our culture is so debased, that money, or lack thereof is hardly a criteria for many things.
You bet that I'm a bit of a Luddite and PROUD of it! There are many items, that are now no longer available, that were far better than their present day replacements...IF there even ARE any replacements to be had.
But unlike you, I shan't waste any bandwidth, telling you why and how much you are wrong; but I'll leave you with this: different people have different wants and needs and one size doesn't fit all.
There were quite a few SIX reel movies, made by others, a year or more than Griffth's racist, controversial, alternate history film. And it was too long!
OTOH...his INTOLERANCE would have sold your case. ;^)
Well there you go. Have fun. There is virtually no major product made today that is not better than its counterpart 20 years ago but feel free to use whatever you want, I do.
For too many classed you have to have the stupid code to submit assignments
For but one example....DVRS, where you are able to record a show or movie and then make a disc out it. These are no longer made; which stinks! Sure you can buy discs ( though not everything that is shown on T.V. [movies], or they cost a HUGE/OUTRAGEOUS amount of money !) and so we just keep getting these machines repaired.
There are MANY such things, some of which ( cooking implements especially ), MANY OF WHICH ARE 50 YEARS OLD, that you can't get anymore, or what you can get are completely inadequate/useless.
Then there are clothes.....
So much new furniture, even very expensive furniture, is now made in China and is utter CRAP!
Pens....one of my favorite pens, that I got 40+ years ago, used a felt tip refill, but was was made of a Bakelite substance, overlaid with filagree sterling silver. They stopped making the refills, rendering the pen case useless.
China.....about 42 years ago, I bought a lovely set of chins, from England. The company is still in business, bit the product is a cheaper quality and the pattern is also done badly.
Another set of china, also from England is still made, but is now made in China and Indonesia and is LOUSY and more expensive.
Now...do you wanna talk about washing machines and toilets? Nether of the ones made today, holds a candle to what I bought 27 years ago! And all of MY products are still working as though they were new; whereas people I know ( especially re washing machines and I'm talking about the TOP OF THE LINE, BY THE BEST MANUFACTURERS! ) STINK in comparison.
I can go on, but since you are so enamored of today's CRAPPY STUFF, that you find right up your alley, I'll say it again....EACH TO HIS OWN! ;^)
“everyone will ALWAYS need to sign their names to things”
It will take on a different form than what we’re used to, I’m afraid, since cursive isn’t being taught any more. My friend’s grandchildren are in middle and high school and can’t read cursive. It simply isn’t taught.
So that’s another thing will soon disappear: Cursive.
N.Y. state has awoken and has now reintroduced the teaching of cursive as a requirement for ALL schools now. And I'm sure that it is still being taught in private schools there.
My grandson is in school, in Texas, and it is being taught in his private school, as well in the public schools some of his friend attend. These are NOT isolated instances.
It may take a while for other states to reintroduce cursive, but it has now come roaring back. Not as thoroughly as it was taught, when I was in the third & fourth grades ( they no longer teach it with kids using a straight pen, with inkwells in the desks, but it IS being taught with kids using a different type of pen.
Sadly, they threw the Palmer method out of school, about 40+ years ago ( and I don't care for the methods being used now, but oh well...), but my grandson dies have a lovely hand, which is not "usual", for boys today.
Where do your friend's grands live?
Thank you for the permission.For but one example....DVRS, where you are able to record a show or movie and then make a disc out it.
From any iPhone or iPad or Computer, but I won't burn a DVD I will save it as a file on a hard drive and if I need a copy I will put it on an SD card or thumb drive. Or just share it on my private network.
DVRS, where you are able to record a show or movie and then make a disc out it.
I have a Tivo that records 6 channels at once, which lets me do that, but I also have an item called EyeTV that lets me record from the cable box and has the best editing software for amateurs on the market. Beside I don't know anyone that owns a Video Tape recorder or DVD player. Some have Blue Rays but only because they have other software built in. I actually do Have a DVD drive in one of my computers.Now...do you wanna talk about washing machines and toilets? Nether of the ones made today, holds a candle to what I bought 27 years ago!I can see you have a fondness for the old stuff of the past but the only reason you think most of it is superior is you don't know what the new stuff does.
Washing machines I can agree with but toilets are a 100 times better than the ones we had when I was kid, they were technology that hadn't changed in over a 100 years, well I changed about 7 years ago and can tell you that my toilet flushes first time every time and almost silently, try one and you may agree.I remember when stainless razor blade came out, one of my uncles that stropped his old Gillette blades claimed his was better, one of his friends walked back home and brought him his razor with a used Stainless blade to try. Well the rest is history.When is the last time you had a TV or radio break well modern one anyway. I haven't had one break for years, but every 711 of Get and Go used to have tube testers to check out your OZ 4 on Saturday night because your TV went of during wrestling.
I am trying to keep this calm and informative but I am 78 years old and have seen a lot of stuff come and go, almost all of what went was replaced by some thing better. In some cases some thing were replaced by cheaper but not better products but they were good enough.
Betamax was a superior product to VSH tape but VHS tape was good enough and cheaper. Do you remember when you could rent movie on a large record and play it on a rented player? By the way you get a better quality picture over the air than you do cable unless your cable company is providing 4k broadcast and you have a 4k TV.
The reason you have to have higher resolution is that 720x480 DVD video doesn't look so good blown up to 70 inch which is beginning to be a minimum TV in most homes. Some of us remember 6 inch screens, I prefer 70 over that.
Not trying to make enemies here just new friends to share opinions with.
These disappeared because of the stupid aZZ copyright laws that congress has changed from temporary to permanent.
Tennessee.
I said "TO EACH HIS OWN, many times over, yet YOU continually trashed me and you're wrong about most of what you trashed me over.
I meant DVD...though I did say DISCS!
I don't want to EVER watch ANYTHING on a teensy phone screen, on my laptop, nor a wall sized T.V. screen; you do.WHY THE BLEEDING HELL SHOULD I HAVE TO CONFORM TO WHAT YOU WANT TO DO?
Did I ever tell YOU that YOU must do what I want to do? NO! Neither did I trash you and/or impugn your taste or abject lack thereof.
And yes, I still have VCR tapes, which we have been slowly putting on disc. I have a very large library of films on disc and still have movies and cartoons on actual FILMS. It's a difference experience and everyone I know, enjoys movie night parties at our house.
TIVOS are soooooooooooooooooooooooo OLD FASHIONED; get with it! And beside, you can't make discs from that kind of a machine. OTOH, I can and do, record far more than 6 films/programs on my two different kind of machines and some day soon, I really have to catch up on "TABOO", which is sitting in one, waiting for me to see. ;^)
I KNOW what new stuff is and find it WANTING/CRAP/NOT ANYTHING USEFUL FOR ME! Just because something is "new" never has and never shall always make it superior, to what is older.
Today's movies STINK ON ICE. Music? You can't call that crap music! Plays? You've got to be kidding! Books? Oh give me a freaking break! T.V. shows? IN WHAT UNIVERSE? Silicone spatulas? NEVER!
I get it, I get it....you see yourself as "MODERN" and probably "HIP". Well goody goody for you. LOL
You'd rather watch something on your tiny screen phone screen, which is smaller that the 16" T.V. screen that my parents bought in 1949, or on a still small iPad, or some GIGANTIC T.V. screen. Fine, but neither makes a movie nor a show "better". ;^)
You must have grown up with inferior poddies! I have used rather ancient toilets in my grandmother's house, a bit more modern ones in my parents, back to ancient ones in the amazingly beautiful bathrooms in the old Waldorf Towers, as well in my homes in Chicago and they ALL flushed the first time and got rid of the effluvia quicker and better than any brand new poddy of today.
Psssssssssssst....we still own a T.V. ( it's in the laundry room )that my spouse has had, long ago, which was bought in the late '50s, which has NEVER broken and hooked up to the cable box, works like a dream. And diddums, T.V.s haven't had tubes since the end of the '50s, or the beginning of the '60s!
Yes, we have much, much, MUCH newer ones in other rooms. LOL
I'm not as old as you are, but "oldish" and unlike you, do NOT find something, just because it's "new" to be better; usually, it isn't.
Are you kidding me..."70 INCH T.V.S ARE NOW THE norm?
Sure some people have those behemothic and larger T.V.s, but I find them STUPID! SIZE DOESN'T MAKE WHAT YOU'RE WATCHING "BETTER".
HD T.V. ( or whatever you're talking about )doesn't make a silent movie, nor even ones from the '30s-80s better/clearer. I don't want to see a gigantic Juan Williams ( well, I don't want to see or hear him in any size, so I mute the T.V. when he's on ), Bill O'REALLY ( misspelled on purpose ), or even President Trump blown up to the size of my old movie screen.
OTOH....yes, I am delighted that I can record movies off the T.V. and either watch them at my leisure and/or put them on tape ( no longer do that, but I'm going back a ways to prove a point! ) and now to a disc, without having to BUY them as a disc, or pay Netflix or Amazon ( which I don't have ,nor want )and have that money to spend on other things.
You ignored my points re clothing ( add shoes to that mix; long ago, you could buy shoes in multiple lasts, that stopped, for good and all, many decades ago, unless you buy bespoke shoes), furniture, china, and cooking implements.
Just as you refuse to see my side of things, I don't appreciate you telling me that EVERYTHING, except lousy modern washing machines, I've posted about, is wrong.
I'm more than willing to let this now drop and hope that you are as well.
I meant the DVD recorders, from which you can then transfer the recorded movie or T.V. show, are now gone ( so we keep getting them repaired ), because the makers of TIVO and other such machines, which did NOT allow one to make discs from, petitioned the government to get rid of them, and the stinking government ( who were being paid off ) stopped the others from ever again being made. Oh, we can still do that using the upgraded cablebox we have, but it’s not an improvement.
It has been proved, that learning how to write in cursive, expands the brain and is a great benefit to all children's abilities to learn other subjects.
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