As the 1979 song by the Buggles chanted “video killed the radio star,” honoring those musicians whose career was cut short by the television, it looks like 30 years later history is repeating itself as digital technologies have taken over our traditional TV’s, DVD players and cell phones allowing consumers to solely fulfill their entertainment needs through wireless and broadband services.
It today’s Web 2.0 world, traditional technologies seem to be getting lost in the translation by the latest Blue Ray players, laptops and smart phones. Instead of planning your evening activities around what time your favorite show is on, you can now record it through DVR/TiVo, watch it on the internet or even directly on your mobile phone.
For your movie needs, in a couple years your local Blockbuster/video stores will be obsolete as more and more people opt to receive their DVD rentals through the mail, download it on the internet or even through my latest obsession RedBox. As I like to call it a – stroke of genius – this new concept allows you to rent your favorite movies for $1 per day through one of their kiosk locations (conveniently located at Walmarts and McDonalds). Our Friday night movie night has been slightly modified to include selecting our movie online at RedBox.com, going to the location and swiping a credit card and voilà… our movie is dispensed in less than a minute.
One device that may transform the way we read our favorite books, magazines and newspapers is the e-book. The Kindle, which has taken the marketplace by storm within the past year, gives you instant access to the latest summer read, local newspapers and your favorite magazines. Personally, as an avid reader the only thing stopping me from purchasing a Kindle is its steep price-tag, which saw its first reduction last week, and hopefully for my sake, won’t be its last.
Lastly, what in my opinion has seen the most transformation over the past thirty years is the internet. I can still remember my first experience with America Online (more commonly known today as AOL) trying to connect through our home phone line. After selecting the dial-in number and hitting connect, I would sit there with my fingers crossed listening to that painful high-pitch screeching noise and waiting for those famous words “welcome, you’ve got mail.” Today, internet connections can be found anywhere and pretty much everywhere, even 30,000 feet above the ground on an airplane. In my opinion, one of the coolest devices to have launched this year, the MiFi available by Verizon Wireless, allows you to create your own personal hot spot that follows you everywhere.
With new technology and devices being launched everyday, it's evident that we will continue to see our current “tech-toys” be replaced over time with the latest apparatus. What devices are you hoping will make the cut and what futuristic contraptions are you hoping to see released in the future?
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