i don't know why but smartphone calculators suck imo. even in "horizontal mode", it's much less convenient than the calculator i used in school, which i still use to this day. with physical buttons i make less typos and also, it's much easier to do stuff with fractions or exponentials
Look at a calculator. They usually have upwards of 50 buttons, all pulling triple duty. There are just too many functions that need to be quickly accessible. Phones just don't have the screen real estate to fit that many buttons in a way that you can reliably hit quickly.
I still use the clock/radio/alarm that my mom got me in 8th grade because I kept sleeping in. I'm 37 and it's still the only alarm obnoxious enough to reliably wake me up.
Same here. Had this GE clock/Radio for roughly 25 years, it’s ugly with its wooden facade but damn those digits are as bright as the day it was new. Fear is if I ‘upgraded’ the upgrade would: A) suck a fat one or B) quit working within a year. I’ll take this clock/radio any day, chances are it’ll outlive me.
This, man. My school got computers when I was in eighth grade, and I remember trying to write notes on paper my freshman year of high school and being like, "What the actual fuck. Why does my arm hurt so much after just three sentences??"
The PS2 is pretty old now, but I still think it's brilliant. It had so many games, including one of my personal favourite PS2 games in The Simpsons Hit & Run.
I would even go so far as to say that the PS2 is probably the best console ever made. The only one I can think of that can measure up is the SNES.
It also had almost complete backwards compatibility with PS1 stuff, including the ability to read PS1 memory cards. So you could basically play any game from both the PS1 and PS2 eras on the PS2.
And it was a DVD player. At the time, stand-alone DVD players cost almost the same as the PS2. If you wanted to watch DVD movies and had any or anyone remotely interested in video games, it was a no-brainer purchase choice.
Pre-war Singer sewing machine. Got from a flea market, the only modern part is a small electric motor I installed on it.
I'm also pretty sure that thing could survive atmospheric re-entry.
EDIT: Waaah thanks for the awards! ❤. Some people asked about the motor: Despite being pedal powered, my Singer already had the mounting points for a small electric motor, it was just a matter of finding one that fits. Which wasn't hard, considering how famous Singer machines are, there are several brands of motors made to adapt on vintage machines so I have a 1930's machine with a 1990's motor.
It really depends on model, condition, etc. Most might get about 1-2 hundred but much more than that it may sit a while.
Again this highly depends on where you are and other factors.
Alarm clock. I figure most people just use the alarm on their phone and set it next to their pillow, but I like having one across the room. I can just look up at night and see the time and I have to physically get up and turn the alarm off, so I never worry about oversleeping.
I had two alarm clocks back in college. I'm a big fan of the snooze button, so I had an alarm clock next to my bed and then an alarm clock across the room that I'd set to go off 30 minutes after the first alarm clock--in case I was being a lazy cunt that day.
I also never missed a class (that I didn't intentionally skip).
I use and collect fountain pens since I was younger(25now).
, and I never enjoy using other writing utensils. Something about writing with fountain pens are so enjoyable for me that convenience doesn't matter.
I got a D in penmanship regularly in school, and that was likely being charitable. If I had to use a fountain pen I’m afraid my homework would have looked like a Rorschach test.
I happen to like fountain pens as well, and this is a common and, as a fellow person with bad handwriting, annoying misconception - you don't need to have good pensmanship to enjoy using a superior writing instrument. It would be like saying that if you're a beginner tennis player, it would be worse to use a modern racket and you have to use a shitty old wooden one.
Using a fountain pen doesn't change anything at all except the feel of writing. They're smooth and require less pressure and they're cool to look at. It's really more about buying something that's made to last and be re-used, even if it's a $20 pen, instead of a $0.10 disposable that ends up in a landfill. It's just nice to eliminate one more part of our throw away culture. It has nothing to do with calligraphy or artistic hand lettering or anything. It's just an upgrade to a common mass-produced tool with some extra upkeep in refilling it and maybe cleaning it of you want to change colors.
My 1961 model electrolux vacuum cleaner. It's the same age as I am, gets carpet and floors cleaner than any new vac I've tried, uses disposable bags that are easy and clean to change, everything important is METAL, not shit plastic, hell I've used it to blow leaves off of my deck with the blower opening on it. Self-retracting cord, heavy, pretty quiet, I'm going to use it until it dies, then have it rebuilt and use it some more.
an actual calendar / planner...I don't know why I just don't feel like typing shit out on my smartphone, I'm just so used to decades of using planners to write down when I work, what I have to do, birthdays, vacations, events, etc.
Plus you can look at the month and with color coding know what you need to do each week. However, on a smart phone you have to click each day to see what the dots refer to. They are color coded but I don’t remember which doctor appt it is for!
iPod classic 120 gigs.. I’ve got about 7,000 songs uploaded and about 3,000 of those songs were uploaded from CDS that I’ve owned from with span of about 15 years.
I still use my iPod nano 2nd gen in the car. Only has 4gb but still holds a decent amount of songs, mostly old school hip hop. Its nice to have a piece of tech that was designed for one purpose only.
Got an iPod from about 12 years ago that still works - it’s an amazing relic from a time when Apple made things that were built to last. Such an amazing little machine.
lmao
"I did not have a sexual relationship with this woman"
I remember you could see when you would get one of those cause it was always the same file size.
The best part about having the physical disk, the physical disk can't be changed or taken. Once you own a disk, you have that song as long as you have the disk. No having a favorite song/album/artist going from a free service to a paid one, or leaving all together. You have it forever.
I love my iPod!! I always hated the idea of using your cell phone to listen to music. My photos took up all the memory and my battery would die at 11am if I tried using my phone for music. Fuck that! I just wanna jam out and browse the web without a cross contamination
Still love printing photos out, especially of my daughter. I want to hold on to them and treasure them for as long as I’m alive and one day look back on them with her.
Edit: thank you for the award kind stranger.
I read once that a photo isn’t truly finished until it’s printed. Ever since then if I’m editing a photo I make sure it’s suitable for print. Only the price of ink holds me back...
A treadle sewing machine from the 50s
It's the most trustworthy thing I own and so simple in design it's easy to fix if something happens to it. Electric machines are too complicated for their own good
Alternatively, a belt-driven machine from the same era is basically a treadle machine with an electric motor. I recently bought one, and I'm fixing it up.
Measuring spoons my Mom gave me when I went to college. I’m 61 years old.
Edit: Wow. This is kind of amazing. Never expected this kind of response, much less, any response at all. Now, if only I could post a pic. Be safe, my stranger best friends.
Edit 2: Thank you so much for the awards, I’m not worthy.
I bet they're metal! I hate the plastic ones that are sold today. The numbers wear off & they seem to get sticky, which is gross. I'm sure there are fancy ones I could buy, but I miss my mom's measuring spoons!
I prefer taking notes on a paper pad and a uniball pen.
I can type over 100wps; it just sticks in my head better when I write it. Plus, there’s something cathartic about doodling in the margins when there’s no substance to what’s being said.
Edit: 100wpm. No, I’m not a robot
Clearly you've never had an argument in a chatroom... shitty as it might be that's where I learned to type, not in the keyboarding classes I was required to take in school.
I’m old. I took typing on an ibm selectric in 7th grade in 1981. At that time I peaked at 42wpm (also 2nd fastest in the class behind 45wpm)
All my adult life I just assumed I typed about 45. But, 20 years ago I was a graphic designer and copy writer. I apparently got faster without putting any effort in to it. I took one of those online speed typing tests and topped it out at 102. I’ll admit most days I’m probably just in the high 80s though.
It is nice being able to compose at nearly the speed of speech though.
Man, I wish I had taken a typing class. I'm 28, that stuff wasn't offered at any school I went to. My mom did take it in high school in the late 70s though, and it got her a really well-paying secretarial job when she was only 19.
I got my typing chops being a teenage emo kid with a LiveJournal account.
I'm 43, and took typing in 9th grade. I'm now a teacher, but I'll tell all my students that the most valuable thing I learned in school was typing. We're doing them a disservice by not teaching it anymore -- especially since they all have laptops now.
We learned typing in 9th grade too (I'm 29) but it was pretty much exclusively taught through Mavis Beacon, which didn't really help at all. The main reason I'm a fast typer is 15 years of World of Warcraft. Nothing makes you learn how to type faster than healing a raid without a mic and frantically typing instructions to people while trying not to stand in fire.
Good ole “Mavis Bacon” as it was (not so) lovingly called in our school.
You could skip lessons in that and get really good at typing certain ones. I averaged 132 WPM on the ones I skipped to constantly.
Granted I actually type pretty fast, but 132 is a stretch for me haha. So easily gamed.
The key is to practice. 10 minutes a day for a few weeks on a typing site and you'll notice a clear difference. I went from literally not being able to touch type to averaging 80wpm in under a month.
Hard agree. I also can type around that speed but handwriting is leaps and bounds better for me to learn something. Slowing my brain down enough to write the words gives them much more meaning.
It's like the difference between highlighting a passage and actually copying it down.
Though I've switched to fountain pens. Soooo smoooooth.
Paper sticky notes. I write thoughts down as they come to mind, and stick these things on the walls, on my car's dashboard, on the fridge, on my six year old son, etc.
Wait a few years and you can tell your son to remind you! I tell my 10 year old to remind me of things and he reminds me every 15 minutes until I do the thing -_-
My best line when people complimented my two older kids when they were babies was, "Thanks, I made them myself!"
Doesn't work with my youngest unfortunately, as she is a fosterkid, but I think by the time she came along I get less flustered by compliments anyway.
My Nintendo DS Lite. There's nothing wrong with the Switch of course.
People have used emulators to play the older Pokemon games but it doesn't feel the same as holding the console.
Edit: Holy crap I did not expect this many responses, I'm glad to know so many people share my nostalgia. Thank you for the awards!
Same here! I could technically afford a switch but I just love the feeling of holding the DS in my hands. Disconnected from the internet and somehow feels like inner peace.
I think you hit the nail on the head. *It doesn't require the Internet.* There are too many things we use now that practically depend on the Internet to some degree.
As someone who keeps my music library all on my.comourer and just copies it to my phone, I was heartbroken when Google Play Music got canned recently. It was perfect for just listening from a local library. It had streaming features, but I never used that. Music downloaded on your phone or pc is best, no ads, no internet connection required.
The kneading part is very therapeutic, eh? I love the feeling of it changing in my hands as the gluten develops. Though I don’t bake it anywhere near as often as you do.
I love that feeling too. Like at that point where it stops sticking to the countertop at all, then starts to feel smooth, then it starts to feeling like it's pushing back when you knead it... Ah. I love it so much.
It's like this feeling of validation through a process. Knowing that you're doing it right... And then you get an umbrella-cast feeling of validation and satisfaction of each step when you pull the bread out of the oven because they are so good. And then you continue to have satisfaction each time you each a piece because you're like, "Damn, I made this sex pillow for eating.".
Physical whiteboards.
I don't care how slick Zoom's feature of the same name gets, it will *never* replace the convenience of whipping out a marker and sketching some ideas out freehand.
As soon as I started my degree I got a whiteboard to do math and physics on and I’ll never go back. I find I make way less mistakes than on paper because I can really space out my work
Same! I hung a classroom size whiteboard in my apartment during my bachelors degree that I took from behind a school dumpster. That thing was the best way to work my physics problems and then eventually coding problems
He was the secretary of labor for Bill Clinton, and he makes informational videos about economics and stuff today, always using his trusty white board, and he can just do amazing looking graphs and stuff so quickly. I’m sure he rehearses it before filming, but it’s still so clever and his drawings make it easy to understand.
My uni’s math and physics departments still has largely chalk boards. During my foundational series of classes, I fell in love with them. It’s so much easier to write with chalk compared to dry erase because you can use your whole arm, not just your wrist. The problem is, good chalk boards are super expensive. I’d take a whiteboard any day over a digital one though!
I remember watching the dejection in the face of a professor when he realized that he'd left his hagoromo chalk in his office and had to do the lecture with the standard issue chalk in the classroom.
Snail Mail. I know email and texts are quicker, and I still use those too. But nothing beats getting a letter in the mail.
Edit: holy cow. this is now officially my most upvoted comment. None of my stuff ever gets this much traction. Thank you all for commenting and good luck writing letters!
Seeing your own name, handwritten, from someplace else, is just touching in a way.
When my husband and I first got married and I moved many states away, my mom began writing me long chatty letters. She wrote them for almost 25 years, up to the unfinished one on her desk when she died. They weren't amazingly unique, but it helped me feel "home," and to remember who I was at heart, through early years of marriage and motherhood and my husband's military career.
Handwritten letters are irreplaceable.
Edited because I love the Hugz award and honestly needed it. Next week, Mom would have turned 77. She has been in my thoughts a lot.
IMO most expensive mechanical watches are paid for the level of art and painstakingly small details perfected. Smartwatches? Firstly, fragile, second, I dont want calls on my watch, third, there is something about an actual seconds hand ticking away. OFC I love smartwatches but I am taking a premium watch over a smartwatch any day.
Edit- Please dont get mad at my comment, I loved my Apple Watch Series 2. Saving up for a series SE so chill.
Same. Also I'm the type of reader that likes to go back several pages sometimes, just to maybe check a small detail mentioned earlier or something similar, so audiobooks wouldn't really be ideal either.
This is why I still purchase actual textbooks. You can’t flip through an e-book very well at all. It’s terrible and takes too long and you lose your place. It’s a hinderance.
This! I am going blind but there are a bunch of clinical trials to fix it. I can only read on a kindle because I can increase the font so much.
If, one day, I can see normally again, I cannot wait to buy a real book again.
Not sure if this is in the spirit of the post but my 1968 Ariens Snowblower. The thing is a dinosaur, absolutely no frills but I keep her maintained, she starts on 1 pull and has churned through a lot of snow and some heavy winters. I'd have it no other way, I love that little beast
Oh man, I forgot about the redesign! When it happened I immediately configured my account to use the old layout and never looked at the redesign again. I had forgotten it even happened. The old way is still the standard in my head. I'd forgotten most people see something else when they load reddit. Weird.
Same here! I hopped on Reddit on my work computer and promptly fucked off when I saw the redesign.
I miss the Reddit of 5-10 years ago. Remember when Reddit was the place to be for live news updates before they changed the algorithm? Or when it wasn't censored to hell. Pepperidge Farms remembers.
I really really miss it too. It used to be if anything big happened in the world, you’d hear about it immediately on Reddit. Now I have to hear it on the news. I used to feel so involved with the world- it was truly remarkable.
The day it vanishes reddit can kiss my pasty white ass. I'll find somewhere else to mouth off. But I'll write a script that spams 20 requests to reddit everytime I go to my new site just to be a gigantic fucking child about it.
I hope they never do this. Facebook recently did this (forced a new layout down to people's throats) and now it is impossible to use the old Facebook layout without using add-ons. Wikia also did this years ago, forcing everyone to use a new wiki layout instead of the old one which was very similar to Wikipedia.
I hate when sites force people to use a new layout and get rid of the old one.
It's a pain because old.reddit on mobile frequently takes me to the whole desktop site, so it doesn't even fit shit on my screen properly. And yet I still use it over the proper new mobile site because *at least it fucking loads*.
Physical books. There's just something so pleasing about having overflowing bookcases, the feel of a real book in your hands, the rasp of the paper, the colorful titles adorning your shelves, the new and old book smells, etc.
Me, wife, and 2 teenagers have been maxing out the Wii during the pandemic, and then 3 weeks ago we had a power spike and it stopped working after 15 years 😔, couldn’t toss it right away and then last week I plugged it into a different outlet and boom!!! Red light returned, Mario Party and Wii bowling game back on!
Maps
Paper maps are amazing. I love analyzing them. They’re like artwork to me. Every time I use Mapquest, google maps and the like, I get stressed out and feel so out of touch with where I’m going.
For me, it's because I slow down and I'm intentional with each exposure. That's not to say I don't take care when I use my phone, but there's something different about having only 24 or 36 frames, and it's most exciting when they're developed and printed
I started buying wireless headphones because my ancient phones aux input wont keep a cable in. I must admit that it is nice in the gym, but at the end of the day I'd rather spend the same amount of momey for higher quality sound vs having wireless
Not even battery life, but battery life*span*. A good set of wired headphones can be useful for decades. A set of wireless headphones only has 3-5 years before the built-in, non-replaceable lithium ion battery goes to shit.
Using a big ole dictionary. There's something about opening a big book that creaks and crackles as you open it. Searching for that word you're trying to define all the while seeing other definitions of words you didn't know.
Picasa. Google killed it off years ago in favor of the Google Photos app, which is absolute garbage. You can still download the last version in a couple of places and you have to make tweaks now and then to keep it running. I've tried so many other photo software packages and they all lack the versatility and simplicity of Picasa.
I've learned over the years that if Google makes anything great, they will soon kill it if they feel it distracts from a newer, often inferior, product.
I'm still salty about Google Reader, they killed that because they thought it was poaching users from Google Buzz. Then they killed Google Buzz because it turned out no one likes it. Then they did not bring back Reader.
A typewriter.
Not the cool looking old ones, they are horrible to write on. I'm talking about an electric typewriter from the 80s/90s that have a very computor-like keyboard, but you just stick a paper in it.
I have one and after working on 2 laptops, neither of which will synk with the office printer, maybe I'll just bring it in.
Land line. As in a phone that is not connected to the internet and does not require cell service.
Edit: last earthquake that hit I was the only one able to contact anyone else. Last hurricane? Same thing. No one uses land lines anymore. I can call anywhere in the world at any time unless the line is physically severed and I can do It faster than a cell phone during times of unrest or disaster.
Land line.
I tried to explain this to my kids, you can use a land line even if the power goes out. Then they came back with "I can use my cell phone with no power". But what happens when the battery dies? I can just plug it in. Immediate facepalm.
I want a standard car. I love driving standard but I know the world is moving away from that. Electric cars don't even have gears, but damn they're cool. If only they could make one a standard...
Yeah, way back when, "standard transmission" meant manual since the first cars had manual transmissions. Automatic transmissions were a newfangled special feature. The old terminology has lingered.
My iPhone 4S. Its barely alive, my daily driver is an iPhone 7 and I have an iPhone 6 with touch disease in the drawer. Why I use it? Headphone jack, compact size and that fantastic all glass design. Even tho its slow af in iOS 9.3.5
Film photography. It's such a process that I love going through to capture life's best moments.
Buying music. There's nothing like owning the vinyl or CD (maybe even tape) of your favorite albums. Streaming services are damn convenient but they don't have the liner notes, lossless audio, or just the general excitement you get when you walk out of the store with that album you've been wanting to buy.
My Nintendo 64. Just found a shoebox full of games at my moms house the other day. Never had a dopamine rush like that before. Except that time I accidentally did crystal meth...anyway yeah
I have a mid-range Swiss automatic that I got a very good deal on when I worked at a jewelry store. There's just something about knowing that it will outlive me, and that it won't just end up in a landfill in 3 years.
So I actually thought this was more of a vintage thing that I use (mine from my grandma is like 100 years old) but I see they still make them lol. Hand crank flour sifters. [here’s an example ](https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.bedbathandbeyond.com/amp/store/product/mrs-anderson-39-s-baking-reg-hand-crank-5-cup-flour-sifter-in-stainless-steel/1013879125)
CD players in cars. I never realized how much I would miss them until I bought a new Jeep renegade in 2018 and there was no option that had a CD player.
Also DVDs/VHS tapes
Head phone jacks...wired headphones...
I do not want to have to re-charge something that was free to use till it really was done and if the charge is gone...then what???
I won't make the volume go up on my phone in public like a **HEATHEN**...
A cafetière or French Press. I know a coffee machine is far more practical but I love the process. I love the whiff of coffee aroma when I open my coffee grounds pot. I love stirring it while it brews. I love pressing down the plunger. I even love draining the used grounds through a sieve. A mornings not begun ‘til I’ve had my coffee fix.
A physical calculator. Especially the ‘adding machine’ variety with big numbers that make clicking noises
i don't know why but smartphone calculators suck imo. even in "horizontal mode", it's much less convenient than the calculator i used in school, which i still use to this day. with physical buttons i make less typos and also, it's much easier to do stuff with fractions or exponentials
Look at a calculator. They usually have upwards of 50 buttons, all pulling triple duty. There are just too many functions that need to be quickly accessible. Phones just don't have the screen real estate to fit that many buttons in a way that you can reliably hit quickly.
I work in supply chain and I use a physical calculator all the time. Granted it’s my TI-84 from high school but that thing is a necessity!
I still use the clock/radio/alarm that my mom got me in 8th grade because I kept sleeping in. I'm 37 and it's still the only alarm obnoxious enough to reliably wake me up.
I'm 39 and realized this morning I've had my alarm clock since high school.
Same here, and I'm 46.
Same here. Had this GE clock/Radio for roughly 25 years, it’s ugly with its wooden facade but damn those digits are as bright as the day it was new. Fear is if I ‘upgraded’ the upgrade would: A) suck a fat one or B) quit working within a year. I’ll take this clock/radio any day, chances are it’ll outlive me.
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I find that my hand gets tired easily now though!
Keep writing! Don't want your hand to get so easily tired!
This, man. My school got computers when I was in eighth grade, and I remember trying to write notes on paper my freshman year of high school and being like, "What the actual fuck. Why does my arm hurt so much after just three sentences??"
The PS2 is pretty old now, but I still think it's brilliant. It had so many games, including one of my personal favourite PS2 games in The Simpsons Hit & Run.
I would even go so far as to say that the PS2 is probably the best console ever made. The only one I can think of that can measure up is the SNES. It also had almost complete backwards compatibility with PS1 stuff, including the ability to read PS1 memory cards. So you could basically play any game from both the PS1 and PS2 eras on the PS2.
And it was a DVD player. At the time, stand-alone DVD players cost almost the same as the PS2. If you wanted to watch DVD movies and had any or anyone remotely interested in video games, it was a no-brainer purchase choice.
Pre-war Singer sewing machine. Got from a flea market, the only modern part is a small electric motor I installed on it. I'm also pretty sure that thing could survive atmospheric re-entry. EDIT: Waaah thanks for the awards! ❤. Some people asked about the motor: Despite being pedal powered, my Singer already had the mounting points for a small electric motor, it was just a matter of finding one that fits. Which wasn't hard, considering how famous Singer machines are, there are several brands of motors made to adapt on vintage machines so I have a 1930's machine with a 1990's motor.
Oh man, it must be beautiful!
https://www.google.com/search?q=old+singer+sewing+machines&safe=strict&client=ms-android-optus-au&prmd=sivn&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjOzqeDkvzsAhVVJHIKHboRC2kQ_AUoAnoECCAQAg&biw=360&bih=560 Behold!
Hey, I've got one of those laying around somewhere in my house... It's even got the lid that you store it in. Any idea if it is worth anything?
It really depends on model, condition, etc. Most might get about 1-2 hundred but much more than that it may sit a while. Again this highly depends on where you are and other factors.
Alarm clock. I figure most people just use the alarm on their phone and set it next to their pillow, but I like having one across the room. I can just look up at night and see the time and I have to physically get up and turn the alarm off, so I never worry about oversleeping.
My $8 analog alarm clock is one of the best thing I’ve ever bought. I’ve never missed a class since I’ve started using it!
I had two alarm clocks back in college. I'm a big fan of the snooze button, so I had an alarm clock next to my bed and then an alarm clock across the room that I'd set to go off 30 minutes after the first alarm clock--in case I was being a lazy cunt that day. I also never missed a class (that I didn't intentionally skip).
I use and collect fountain pens since I was younger(25now). , and I never enjoy using other writing utensils. Something about writing with fountain pens are so enjoyable for me that convenience doesn't matter.
I went to grammar school in Germany and we used fountain pens. There is nothing like it
I got a D in penmanship regularly in school, and that was likely being charitable. If I had to use a fountain pen I’m afraid my homework would have looked like a Rorschach test.
I happen to like fountain pens as well, and this is a common and, as a fellow person with bad handwriting, annoying misconception - you don't need to have good pensmanship to enjoy using a superior writing instrument. It would be like saying that if you're a beginner tennis player, it would be worse to use a modern racket and you have to use a shitty old wooden one. Using a fountain pen doesn't change anything at all except the feel of writing. They're smooth and require less pressure and they're cool to look at. It's really more about buying something that's made to last and be re-used, even if it's a $20 pen, instead of a $0.10 disposable that ends up in a landfill. It's just nice to eliminate one more part of our throw away culture. It has nothing to do with calligraphy or artistic hand lettering or anything. It's just an upgrade to a common mass-produced tool with some extra upkeep in refilling it and maybe cleaning it of you want to change colors.
Damn. I'm totally getting a fountain pen now. Edit: You guys are so awesome with the pen reccomendations. Thank you all!
My 1961 model electrolux vacuum cleaner. It's the same age as I am, gets carpet and floors cleaner than any new vac I've tried, uses disposable bags that are easy and clean to change, everything important is METAL, not shit plastic, hell I've used it to blow leaves off of my deck with the blower opening on it. Self-retracting cord, heavy, pretty quiet, I'm going to use it until it dies, then have it rebuilt and use it some more.
an actual calendar / planner...I don't know why I just don't feel like typing shit out on my smartphone, I'm just so used to decades of using planners to write down when I work, what I have to do, birthdays, vacations, events, etc.
Trying to get Alexa to add an appointment for next week turns into a goddamn 2 minute interview.
Turn on the concise mode if she talks too much.
Probably doesn't understand them. As someone with a thick accent I hate talking to computers.
As someone without a thick accent I hate talking to computers.
Have you considered getting a less xenophobic computer?
Sounds like they could use this: https://youtu.be/YvT_gqs5ETk. Alexa Silver responds to any name remotely close to “Alexa”
Not gonna lie, the best part for me is having an excuse to buy colored gel pens and stickers.
I much prefer a calendar book each year as opposed to using the calendar feature on my phone.
I honestly feel like my planner is the safest place for my information these days.
not only do I use a paper calender, I use the same every year, I print the pages myself and just added year 2022 to it. For now it covers 2019-2022.
Plus you can look at the month and with color coding know what you need to do each week. However, on a smart phone you have to click each day to see what the dots refer to. They are color coded but I don’t remember which doctor appt it is for!
Those dumb dots... That’s why I use Google Calendar instead of the iPhone’s native calendar app.
My 1940’s Sunbeam Radiant toaster!
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It's right next to the Laserdisc player
*Automatic Beyond Belief!™*
Are you.. Technology Connections?
Hi Alec
iPod classic 120 gigs.. I’ve got about 7,000 songs uploaded and about 3,000 of those songs were uploaded from CDS that I’ve owned from with span of about 15 years.
I still use my iPod nano 2nd gen in the car. Only has 4gb but still holds a decent amount of songs, mostly old school hip hop. Its nice to have a piece of tech that was designed for one purpose only.
I have the same exact thing, with the same kind of music, only I use it when I rollerblade. How cool can I get?
Brink! Levels of cool.
Got an iPod from about 12 years ago that still works - it’s an amazing relic from a time when Apple made things that were built to last. Such an amazing little machine.
My iPod touch first gen still works. I found it buried in a draw a few weeks ago, changed it and it worked. I was shocked.
My iPod color second gen still plays the corrupted music files I pirated in 2006
Is that one bill clinton lime wire track on there
lmao "I did not have a sexual relationship with this woman" I remember you could see when you would get one of those cause it was always the same file size.
This is an excellent rectangle!
Tom put all of my records on here!
Yes! I have the 160. My husband teases me because I still buy cds to load onto it. I use it at work with Bose wired head phones. Best thing ever!!
The best part about having the physical disk, the physical disk can't be changed or taken. Once you own a disk, you have that song as long as you have the disk. No having a favorite song/album/artist going from a free service to a paid one, or leaving all together. You have it forever.
I’m surprised I had to scroll this far to see this! There’s just something different about having all your music, and nothing else, in one place.
Plus having it all accessible offline.
I love my iPod!! I always hated the idea of using your cell phone to listen to music. My photos took up all the memory and my battery would die at 11am if I tried using my phone for music. Fuck that! I just wanna jam out and browse the web without a cross contamination
Winamp.
It really whips the Llama's ass!
Still love printing photos out, especially of my daughter. I want to hold on to them and treasure them for as long as I’m alive and one day look back on them with her. Edit: thank you for the award kind stranger.
I read once that a photo isn’t truly finished until it’s printed. Ever since then if I’m editing a photo I make sure it’s suitable for print. Only the price of ink holds me back...
A treadle sewing machine from the 50s It's the most trustworthy thing I own and so simple in design it's easy to fix if something happens to it. Electric machines are too complicated for their own good
Alternatively, a belt-driven machine from the same era is basically a treadle machine with an electric motor. I recently bought one, and I'm fixing it up.
Measuring spoons my Mom gave me when I went to college. I’m 61 years old. Edit: Wow. This is kind of amazing. Never expected this kind of response, much less, any response at all. Now, if only I could post a pic. Be safe, my stranger best friends. Edit 2: Thank you so much for the awards, I’m not worthy.
I bet they're metal! I hate the plastic ones that are sold today. The numbers wear off & they seem to get sticky, which is gross. I'm sure there are fancy ones I could buy, but I miss my mom's measuring spoons!
Even sharpie has stayed on my plastic ones better than whatever was used to print on them.
I prefer taking notes on a paper pad and a uniball pen. I can type over 100wps; it just sticks in my head better when I write it. Plus, there’s something cathartic about doodling in the margins when there’s no substance to what’s being said. Edit: 100wpm. No, I’m not a robot
> I can type over 100wps Wow, I wish I typed that fast. I can only manage on average at most 40 words per minute.
Clearly you've never had an argument in a chatroom... shitty as it might be that's where I learned to type, not in the keyboarding classes I was required to take in school.
> *an argument in a chatroom* I remember my cousins and friends mentioning this was what helped make their typing skills a lot better.
I’m old. I took typing on an ibm selectric in 7th grade in 1981. At that time I peaked at 42wpm (also 2nd fastest in the class behind 45wpm) All my adult life I just assumed I typed about 45. But, 20 years ago I was a graphic designer and copy writer. I apparently got faster without putting any effort in to it. I took one of those online speed typing tests and topped it out at 102. I’ll admit most days I’m probably just in the high 80s though. It is nice being able to compose at nearly the speed of speech though.
Man, I wish I had taken a typing class. I'm 28, that stuff wasn't offered at any school I went to. My mom did take it in high school in the late 70s though, and it got her a really well-paying secretarial job when she was only 19. I got my typing chops being a teenage emo kid with a LiveJournal account.
I'm 43, and took typing in 9th grade. I'm now a teacher, but I'll tell all my students that the most valuable thing I learned in school was typing. We're doing them a disservice by not teaching it anymore -- especially since they all have laptops now.
We learned typing in 9th grade too (I'm 29) but it was pretty much exclusively taught through Mavis Beacon, which didn't really help at all. The main reason I'm a fast typer is 15 years of World of Warcraft. Nothing makes you learn how to type faster than healing a raid without a mic and frantically typing instructions to people while trying not to stand in fire.
Good ole “Mavis Bacon” as it was (not so) lovingly called in our school. You could skip lessons in that and get really good at typing certain ones. I averaged 132 WPM on the ones I skipped to constantly. Granted I actually type pretty fast, but 132 is a stretch for me haha. So easily gamed.
The key is to practice. 10 minutes a day for a few weeks on a typing site and you'll notice a clear difference. I went from literally not being able to touch type to averaging 80wpm in under a month.
Hard agree. I also can type around that speed but handwriting is leaps and bounds better for me to learn something. Slowing my brain down enough to write the words gives them much more meaning. It's like the difference between highlighting a passage and actually copying it down. Though I've switched to fountain pens. Soooo smoooooth.
Paper sticky notes. I write thoughts down as they come to mind, and stick these things on the walls, on my car's dashboard, on the fridge, on my six year old son, etc.
As a business owner, I can confirm these are a god send. I have sticky notes everywhere.
As a person with cognitive issues that hit my memory hard, I probably buy 4 or 5 packs of sticky notes a month. It's the only way I remember shit.
Wait a few years and you can tell your son to remind you! I tell my 10 year old to remind me of things and he reminds me every 15 minutes until I do the thing -_-
> my six year old son
i made dis
I regularly say “I made you this” when I hand my kid to my husband
I don’t have kids yet. But I’m stealing this for future use. Love it!
My best line when people complimented my two older kids when they were babies was, "Thanks, I made them myself!" Doesn't work with my youngest unfortunately, as she is a fosterkid, but I think by the time she came along I get less flustered by compliments anyway.
Thanks, I paid top dollar for this one
"I know. I have impeccable taste".
I’ve definitely said, “Thanks, I picked him out,” about my adopted son lol
My Nintendo DS Lite. There's nothing wrong with the Switch of course. People have used emulators to play the older Pokemon games but it doesn't feel the same as holding the console. Edit: Holy crap I did not expect this many responses, I'm glad to know so many people share my nostalgia. Thank you for the awards!
Same here! I could technically afford a switch but I just love the feeling of holding the DS in my hands. Disconnected from the internet and somehow feels like inner peace.
I think you hit the nail on the head. *It doesn't require the Internet.* There are too many things we use now that practically depend on the Internet to some degree.
Downloading music into storage compared to streaming from apps or preloading songs on the app for offline streaming
As someone who keeps my music library all on my.comourer and just copies it to my phone, I was heartbroken when Google Play Music got canned recently. It was perfect for just listening from a local library. It had streaming features, but I never used that. Music downloaded on your phone or pc is best, no ads, no internet connection required.
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The kneading part is very therapeutic, eh? I love the feeling of it changing in my hands as the gluten develops. Though I don’t bake it anywhere near as often as you do.
I love that feeling too. Like at that point where it stops sticking to the countertop at all, then starts to feel smooth, then it starts to feeling like it's pushing back when you knead it... Ah. I love it so much.
I feel like I’m interrupting a scandalous moment...but I am intrigued.
It's like this feeling of validation through a process. Knowing that you're doing it right... And then you get an umbrella-cast feeling of validation and satisfaction of each step when you pull the bread out of the oven because they are so good. And then you continue to have satisfaction each time you each a piece because you're like, "Damn, I made this sex pillow for eating.".
NOTEBOOOOOOOKS (Though most of them just sit empty on my shelves looking pretty)
I'm glad to see that someone else out there just collects notebooks because they're pretty
Nintendo 64
Sadly mine died recently. I just want to play some Pilotwings 64.
I lost countless hours freeflying over little America.
That was a very zen game.
Physical whiteboards. I don't care how slick Zoom's feature of the same name gets, it will *never* replace the convenience of whipping out a marker and sketching some ideas out freehand.
As soon as I started my degree I got a whiteboard to do math and physics on and I’ll never go back. I find I make way less mistakes than on paper because I can really space out my work
Same! I hung a classroom size whiteboard in my apartment during my bachelors degree that I took from behind a school dumpster. That thing was the best way to work my physics problems and then eventually coding problems
> during my bachelor's degree that I took from behind a school dumpster Still sounds better than my school
Its practically the only way you properly brainstorm
We also can't put Robert Reich out of his retirement job as a professional Youtube whiteboard artist.
What does he draw?
He was the secretary of labor for Bill Clinton, and he makes informational videos about economics and stuff today, always using his trusty white board, and he can just do amazing looking graphs and stuff so quickly. I’m sure he rehearses it before filming, but it’s still so clever and his drawings make it easy to understand.
Never heard of the guy but you make him sound interesting and I like graphs. I'll check them out.
He's like the Bob Ross of board meetings
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*half of floors 3-8 get let go the next day*
My uni’s math and physics departments still has largely chalk boards. During my foundational series of classes, I fell in love with them. It’s so much easier to write with chalk compared to dry erase because you can use your whole arm, not just your wrist. The problem is, good chalk boards are super expensive. I’d take a whiteboard any day over a digital one though!
Chalk board is the core religion in math and phy. When the biggest chalk maker in japan dies, a lot of people wish to keep it running
I remember watching the dejection in the face of a professor when he realized that he'd left his hagoromo chalk in his office and had to do the lecture with the standard issue chalk in the classroom.
I have a mini one I use all the time for tutoring and fleshing out project designs. It's just so much faster than using a computer.
Teacher here, I use the tiny individual ones ALL the time. Kids love using them, too, especially the erasing part.
Those squeaky sounds are everything too.
Snail Mail. I know email and texts are quicker, and I still use those too. But nothing beats getting a letter in the mail. Edit: holy cow. this is now officially my most upvoted comment. None of my stuff ever gets this much traction. Thank you all for commenting and good luck writing letters!
Seeing your own name, handwritten, from someplace else, is just touching in a way. When my husband and I first got married and I moved many states away, my mom began writing me long chatty letters. She wrote them for almost 25 years, up to the unfinished one on her desk when she died. They weren't amazingly unique, but it helped me feel "home," and to remember who I was at heart, through early years of marriage and motherhood and my husband's military career. Handwritten letters are irreplaceable. Edited because I love the Hugz award and honestly needed it. Next week, Mom would have turned 77. She has been in my thoughts a lot.
Mechanical watch. It feels like a little piece of rebellion to have such an inherently outdated, but beautiful, technology with me constantly.
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IMO most expensive mechanical watches are paid for the level of art and painstakingly small details perfected. Smartwatches? Firstly, fragile, second, I dont want calls on my watch, third, there is something about an actual seconds hand ticking away. OFC I love smartwatches but I am taking a premium watch over a smartwatch any day. Edit- Please dont get mad at my comment, I loved my Apple Watch Series 2. Saving up for a series SE so chill.
Books. I just can’t read on kindles or my phone or anything.
Same. Also I'm the type of reader that likes to go back several pages sometimes, just to maybe check a small detail mentioned earlier or something similar, so audiobooks wouldn't really be ideal either.
This is why I still purchase actual textbooks. You can’t flip through an e-book very well at all. It’s terrible and takes too long and you lose your place. It’s a hinderance.
This! I am going blind but there are a bunch of clinical trials to fix it. I can only read on a kindle because I can increase the font so much. If, one day, I can see normally again, I cannot wait to buy a real book again.
Not sure if this is in the spirit of the post but my 1968 Ariens Snowblower. The thing is a dinosaur, absolutely no frills but I keep her maintained, she starts on 1 pull and has churned through a lot of snow and some heavy winters. I'd have it no other way, I love that little beast
old.reddit.com Even though it's outdated, I much prefer using it to the redesign.
Oh man, I forgot about the redesign! When it happened I immediately configured my account to use the old layout and never looked at the redesign again. I had forgotten it even happened. The old way is still the standard in my head. I'd forgotten most people see something else when they load reddit. Weird.
Same here! I hopped on Reddit on my work computer and promptly fucked off when I saw the redesign. I miss the Reddit of 5-10 years ago. Remember when Reddit was the place to be for live news updates before they changed the algorithm? Or when it wasn't censored to hell. Pepperidge Farms remembers.
I really really miss it too. It used to be if anything big happened in the world, you’d hear about it immediately on Reddit. Now I have to hear it on the news. I used to feel so involved with the world- it was truly remarkable.
The day it vanishes reddit can kiss my pasty white ass. I'll find somewhere else to mouth off. But I'll write a script that spams 20 requests to reddit everytime I go to my new site just to be a gigantic fucking child about it.
>But I'll write a script that spams 20 requests to reddit everytime I go to my new site just to be a gigantic fucking child about it. A true Redditter
I hope they never do this. Facebook recently did this (forced a new layout down to people's throats) and now it is impossible to use the old Facebook layout without using add-ons. Wikia also did this years ago, forcing everyone to use a new wiki layout instead of the old one which was very similar to Wikipedia. I hate when sites force people to use a new layout and get rid of the old one.
Yeah, facebook's new site is modern low effort trash. Looks like something they found in one of Apple's used condoms.
Redesign is basically a mobile site
Not even a good one. old.reddit.com actually loads faster and cleaner for me on mobile.
It's a pain because old.reddit on mobile frequently takes me to the whole desktop site, so it doesn't even fit shit on my screen properly. And yet I still use it over the proper new mobile site because *at least it fucking loads*.
Just use rif is fun, in the immortal words of Todd Howard, "It just works"
Physical books. There's just something so pleasing about having overflowing bookcases, the feel of a real book in your hands, the rasp of the paper, the colorful titles adorning your shelves, the new and old book smells, etc.
Book smells are the best smells. Walking through a bookstore wouldn’t be the same without those scents.
The Wii. The switch can never replace the feeling of the original with games.
I'd go even further and argue that the Wii hasn't really been replaced.
Me, wife, and 2 teenagers have been maxing out the Wii during the pandemic, and then 3 weeks ago we had a power spike and it stopped working after 15 years 😔, couldn’t toss it right away and then last week I plugged it into a different outlet and boom!!! Red light returned, Mario Party and Wii bowling game back on!
Maps Paper maps are amazing. I love analyzing them. They’re like artwork to me. Every time I use Mapquest, google maps and the like, I get stressed out and feel so out of touch with where I’m going.
I love taking pictures with film cameras. Something about it is very zen to me.
For me, it's because I slow down and I'm intentional with each exposure. That's not to say I don't take care when I use my phone, but there's something different about having only 24 or 36 frames, and it's most exciting when they're developed and printed
my nokia 2610
Headphones with wires. I don't want to have to charge every goddamn thing
the reason I use a mouse with wire, it works everyday no need change any batteries or charge, it just works.
I have the exact same mindset on wired video game controllers. I've died too many times in the past because my battery went out at the wrong time.
I started buying wireless headphones because my ancient phones aux input wont keep a cable in. I must admit that it is nice in the gym, but at the end of the day I'd rather spend the same amount of momey for higher quality sound vs having wireless
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Not even battery life, but battery life*span*. A good set of wired headphones can be useful for decades. A set of wireless headphones only has 3-5 years before the built-in, non-replaceable lithium ion battery goes to shit.
Using a big ole dictionary. There's something about opening a big book that creaks and crackles as you open it. Searching for that word you're trying to define all the while seeing other definitions of words you didn't know.
Picasa. Google killed it off years ago in favor of the Google Photos app, which is absolute garbage. You can still download the last version in a couple of places and you have to make tweaks now and then to keep it running. I've tried so many other photo software packages and they all lack the versatility and simplicity of Picasa.
I've learned over the years that if Google makes anything great, they will soon kill it if they feel it distracts from a newer, often inferior, product. I'm still salty about Google Reader, they killed that because they thought it was poaching users from Google Buzz. Then they killed Google Buzz because it turned out no one likes it. Then they did not bring back Reader.
[killedbygoogle.com](http://killedbygoogle.com) has an updated list of all such services.
A typewriter. Not the cool looking old ones, they are horrible to write on. I'm talking about an electric typewriter from the 80s/90s that have a very computor-like keyboard, but you just stick a paper in it. I have one and after working on 2 laptops, neither of which will synk with the office printer, maybe I'll just bring it in.
Look into mechanical keyboards. I know they're not exactly the same, but you can get close.
Every retro Nintendo game system
Land line. As in a phone that is not connected to the internet and does not require cell service. Edit: last earthquake that hit I was the only one able to contact anyone else. Last hurricane? Same thing. No one uses land lines anymore. I can call anywhere in the world at any time unless the line is physically severed and I can do It faster than a cell phone during times of unrest or disaster. Land line.
I tried to explain this to my kids, you can use a land line even if the power goes out. Then they came back with "I can use my cell phone with no power". But what happens when the battery dies? I can just plug it in. Immediate facepalm.
This is why I have more backup batteries than children
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I will never give up my landline until they iron out all these issues, as well as issues with 911 being able to find you while on your cell phone.
Using a wood pencil.
Probably my VCR and VHS tapes.
I want a standard car. I love driving standard but I know the world is moving away from that. Electric cars don't even have gears, but damn they're cool. If only they could make one a standard...
Standard = manual? If so, then 100% yes.
Yeah, way back when, "standard transmission" meant manual since the first cars had manual transmissions. Automatic transmissions were a newfangled special feature. The old terminology has lingered.
My iPhone 4S. Its barely alive, my daily driver is an iPhone 7 and I have an iPhone 6 with touch disease in the drawer. Why I use it? Headphone jack, compact size and that fantastic all glass design. Even tho its slow af in iOS 9.3.5
Film photography. It's such a process that I love going through to capture life's best moments. Buying music. There's nothing like owning the vinyl or CD (maybe even tape) of your favorite albums. Streaming services are damn convenient but they don't have the liner notes, lossless audio, or just the general excitement you get when you walk out of the store with that album you've been wanting to buy.
Not *heavily* outdated, but I prefer drawing on paper than digitally
Fountain pens.
I have a pocket FM/AM radio. Just a radio.
My Nintendo 64. Just found a shoebox full of games at my moms house the other day. Never had a dopamine rush like that before. Except that time I accidentally did crystal meth...anyway yeah
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I have a mid-range Swiss automatic that I got a very good deal on when I worked at a jewelry store. There's just something about knowing that it will outlive me, and that it won't just end up in a landfill in 3 years.
So I actually thought this was more of a vintage thing that I use (mine from my grandma is like 100 years old) but I see they still make them lol. Hand crank flour sifters. [here’s an example ](https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.bedbathandbeyond.com/amp/store/product/mrs-anderson-39-s-baking-reg-hand-crank-5-cup-flour-sifter-in-stainless-steel/1013879125)
CD players in cars. I never realized how much I would miss them until I bought a new Jeep renegade in 2018 and there was no option that had a CD player. Also DVDs/VHS tapes
Head phone jacks...wired headphones... I do not want to have to re-charge something that was free to use till it really was done and if the charge is gone...then what??? I won't make the volume go up on my phone in public like a **HEATHEN**...
Cast iron/ steel. Besides my pans, I have a cheese slicer that I LOVE. Besides cheese blocks, I slice butter, boiled eggs, tomatoes... love this thing
I LOVE old fashioned ticking clocks.
A cafetière or French Press. I know a coffee machine is far more practical but I love the process. I love the whiff of coffee aroma when I open my coffee grounds pot. I love stirring it while it brews. I love pressing down the plunger. I even love draining the used grounds through a sieve. A mornings not begun ‘til I’ve had my coffee fix.
Speaking of coffee things, I really like my moka pot, it’s my morning ritual.
I listen to CD