Technology has come a long way and nothing drives that point home like the tech of yester-year. Today’s tech wouldn’t exist if not for these five golden age tech gadgets that are laughably outdated by today’s standards.
Floppy Disks
When I was an employee at a major electronics retailer, an older women walked and asked a question that I hadn’t heard in years, “Where are your floppy disks?” Shocked and confused, I asked the customer if she was looking for a flash drive and she insisted that she was looking for floppy disks. I honestly didn’t know if we still sold floppy disks and tried to sell her a flash drive, but her mentioning this outdated tech got me to thinking about just how far technology had come over the years. Back in the days floppy disks were the best thing since sliced bread, but they held less memory than a current email and constantly ran into formatting issues. With the shortcomings of floppy disks, they still play a major part in pop-culture and even as I write this article [in Microsoft Office] the icon for saving this document is still a 3.5 inch floppy.
Before home phones were invented, people were forced to spread messages the old-fashioned way; by writing a letter, using a telegraph, by going to see someone or even by way of carrier pigeon. The home phone is one of the greatest technological inventions that had the most positive effect on the world, but it’s been totally overshadowed by cell phones to the point that most people have no need for them anymore. In order to make phone calls in the past, both parties would have to be physically located in their respective home – which is a silly idea by today’s standards.
Honestly, DVDs are becoming substandard, but VHS tapes have bitten the technological dust years ago. Do you remember having a large movie collection that took up an entire wall in your living room, watching previews before the actual movie started, and rewinding? VHS tapes gave rise to an entirely new industry and eventually gave rise to current tech staples like Netflix and Blu-Ray players.
Pagers
Way before cell-phones become the “go-to” gadget of everyday life, pagers were the only way of knowing that someone was trying to get in contact with you if you were away from your home. Simply mentioning the word “pager” nowadays will arouse laughter, but back in their heyday, they were considered a serious piece of tech – and having one was a sign of social status.
Cassettes
Before there was the Apple iPod, there was the Sony Walkman and cassette tapes were the standard audio formats. Staples of the cassette tape era of music are the mix-tape, “boom box” / master blaster, and the phrase that still lives on till this day “taping something.” Cassettes fell from grace for just about the same reasons that VHS tapes did and both represent a time when analog reigned before the digital world took over.
