Society has been heavily reliant on technology. It plays a big part in our everyday lives. Technology has been advancing as time passes by. In a decade, we went from walkman to iPods or MP3s, typewriters to computers, landlines to cellphones. In 20 years, we went from VHS and movie rental video stores to streaming series and movies in Netflix. We went from buying albums at Record City to streaming music in Spotify. Technology has come a long way, and as it advances more, it also means that another invented technology becomes obsolete. Obsolete refers to outdated technology, services, computer hardware, and software that are no longer in use.

We have enumerated several obsolete technologies that were invented not so long ago:

Fax Machines

Before emails were invented, people, especially offices, have used fax machines to send documents. To the young ones that are baffled by this idea, this was a common practice in the early days. Audio-frequency tones over phone lines are used to transmit documents in the before.

Typewriters

Typewriters are no longer in use, but you can still see these in old films. You can also sometimes see this on some people’s houses as a vintage decoration as there is something iconic on this piece of technology. It’s now, of course, replaced with laptops and computers.

Landlines

Some homes still have landlines, but I bet they don’t even know their home phone number. Those were the days that people chat with their friends over the landline for hours until your mom starts yelling at you to hang up. Today, we have our cellphones, and we talk through messaging apps.

Cassette Tapes, CDs, MP3s

We used to buy our favorite artists’ albums in the form of cassette tapes and CDs. We would listen to them on our walkman or cd player. Then that was replaced by MP3, and now that has been replaced with Spotify and Apple Music.

Dial-up Modems

Before broadband, Wi-fi, and 4G networks, we connect to the internet via dial-up modems. It requires a phone line, a lot of patience, and a prepaid card. It was very slow, and the connection was sometimes bad, but before this is all we had and we thought it was the best thing invented to connect us to the internet.

Yellowpages or Phonebooks

If you need to look up for any services, you have to look at the Yellowpages. If you are looking for someone’s number, you need to sort through the phone book. Now we have the internet for all of that, which made our lives easier.

Maps and GPS

Our smartphones are now capable of doing this. We don’t need that many devices anymore.

Video Games

Video games are forever changing, just like cellphones. We started with game boys and the old Nintendo, then it evolved into PlayStation 1, 2 and 3, Nintendo Wii, Xbox One, then it went to PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch, and Xbox 360. Now, rumor has it that PlayStation 5 will come next year.

Technology is ever-changing and always advancing. We never thought that we would have all this convenience in our hands. As time passes by, technology will only grow, and society will grow with it.