A New York Times opinion piece today suggested you can toss your iPod because it’s been replaced by the Smart Phone. A desktop PC is a cumbersome, archaic machine easily replaced by a laptop, iPad or 4G Kindle. The GPS device in my Subaru is less portable than an Android already equipped with turn-by-turn navigation. A digital point-and-shoot camera is only a tad better than a Smart Phone, as is a camcorder. Cable TV and a DVD player can be replaced by the cheaper WiFi that plays Netflix downloads on demand. And the landline phone is a relic Verizon and AT&T don’t like any more than they do phone booths.
This bothers me. I have an attic full of dot matrix printers, software to load MultiMate, 3-1/2-inch floppies of games, and loads of cassette tapes. Do I really have to trash them all? I know my grandmother’s stereopticon is an antique, and sold it. But I love the memories of a device I’d hold up to a phone and push one of 10 buttons to dial a number. And the little flash chip on a key chain that scrolls through photo downloads. What about the slide rule that confounds my accountant friend? Or the Rolodex with business cards from suppliers now collecting Social Security?
I have to dig around flea markets every decade or so to replace my turntable to play LPs and 45s, but it’s getting hard to find one that plays 78s. Reluctantly, I also passed my Argus C3 rangefinder camera and my Voightländer 120 bellows camera on to my daughter.
I think the alternative to junking my archaic small electronics is to open a museum in my attic. A very small museum full of memories. These are my sleds named “Rosebud.”
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