Mike Elgan: 10 obsolete technologies to kill in 2010

Make the world a better place. Just say no to dumb tech.




Special report: Looking back at 2009, ahead to 2010
Special report: Looking back at 2009, ahead to 2010

1. Fax Machines

The fax machine was obsolete 15 years ago. When someone says "fax it to me," I always feel like I'm being punk'd. A fax machine is nothing more than a printer, scanner and an obsolete analog modem that work together to waste time, money, paper and electricity.






2. 'Cigar lighter receptacle' plugs in cars




Almost nobody smokes in their cars. Almost everybody carries phones and gadgets that need power in the cars. Sheesh. How obsolete can you get?

3. WWW

The original idea with Internet addresses is that a prefix would identify the type of service provided. So, for example, www.apple.com identifies Apple's "World-Wide Web" servers, and ftp.apple.com points to the company's offerings available via the "File Transfer Protocol."

Network administrators get to choose whether an address technically requires a "www." But browsers fill it in for you even when you don't type it.

That's why saying "www" as part of an address, printing it on business cards or typing it into your browser address box is always unnecessary. We stopped using "http://" years ago, and it's time to stop using "www" as well.

4. Business cards

Speaking of business cards, why do we still carry around 19th-century "calling cards"? When someone gives you a business card, they're giving you a tedious data entry job, one that most people never complete.

There are several alternatives to business cards, all superior. If the meeting is arranged by e-mail, include contact information in the invitation and reply as e-mail signatures, attached vCards, links to contact Web pages or some other electronic form.

Besides, you should always learn in advance what you can about people you're going to meet, and that's a good time to enter their contact information. And if you just run into someone, and exchange contact information, it's best to do it by e-mail or some other means on the spot, with cell phones.

Adding someone to your contacts should involve double clicking or, at most, copying and pasting -- not data entry.

5. Movie rental stores

We're now two revolutions away from the heyday of driving to Blockbuster, standing in line, renting a video and driving home. Movies are nothing more than digital files. You can download them, or get them on disk by mail. Driving? Standing in line? For an electronic file? Come on!

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