Ahead of their time: Nine technologies that came early

baBy Anonymous on November 17, 2009, 2:19 pmba

LiveJournalBy Anonymous on November 20, 2009, 10:07 amUnlike the other social networking sites, Livejournal is not about socializing - as in show me your pictures and lets hang and play gamges etc; It is about creativity and writing. Who's on Livejournal? Writers, both published and unpublished. GRR Martin is on LiveJournal. Who else? LOL, many authors. Many of these people write fiction that they wouldn't dare publish as themselves. But on LiveJournal, they can indulge their muse and get the feedback that drives writers to create in the first place. Much supposed "fan" fiction is suspiciously excellent. Ease of use is a big factor. A writer wants to write, not spend time messing with moveable type or other blogging software. And community wise, it gathers around passions which inspire art and writing vs. politics (Blogger), your family & friends (facebook) or music (myspace). The closest community analogy to Livejournal would be Deviant Art. Deviant Art is able to sell Art, so it has more possibilities for revenue. I would not know how to turn LiveJournal into a money machine, but I know Iwould pay more to keep this service then they charge. It's that important.

Newton Legacy ProductsBy Anonymous on November 18, 2009, 11:35 amIronically the newton lead to a revamping for snail mail systems. Similiar handwritting recognition systems are still in most mail sorting facilities. Not to mention that UPS and other delivery based companies now use it for at the door signatures.

DAT made perfect sense, even when you thought about itBy Anonymous on November 18, 2009, 5:14 amThe problem with CDs for a long time was that there was no (re)recordable CD. When they did eventually become available in the early '90s, the equipment to burn them was horrendously expensive, and often required expensive computers to feed them (early Philips CD burners had no buffering, so unless you had equipment that could guarantee constant data rates to it - which many PCs at the time couldn't - you produced lots of coasters). DAT however, was digital like CD, yet recordable and re-recordable. It made perfect sense. It still wasn't cheap, but it was significantly cheaper than CD burners at the time, and generally more convenient. Small walkman-like DAT "field recorders" were great too! DAT equipment was also able to use 48kHz sample rates, which is/was common in broadcast.

nopeBy Anonymous on November 17, 2009, 6:10 pmconcord?

aBy Anonymous on November 17, 2009, 10:11 pma

aBy Anonymous on November 17, 2009, 4:44 pma

Um DAT?By Anonymous on November 17, 2009, 9:35 pmDAT was ubiquitous in most recording studios for over a decade. Using ADAT for multitracking and then mixing down and mastering to DAT was the way almost all of the classic 90's albums were made. It's still widely used today though decline with the advent of direct to harddisk and pro-tools systems.

SidekickBy Anonymous on November 17, 2009, 9:22 pmThe sidekick was amazing - its interesting to know that Andy Rubin, who founded Danger Inc. (who made the sidekick), went on to start the Android mobile OS project and now works at Google.

Crap ListBy Anonymous on November 17, 2009, 3:26 pmWhat an American list (that is NOT a compliment!). No Amiga? Like the car, it was the home computer that brought multitasking to the masses a decade before the competition even considered it. Not to mention one hundred other features that Apple & Microsoft are still trying and failing to copy today. One good example is "Plug & Play". Ever notice Plug & Play isn't very Plug & Play? Well the Amiga had Autogonfig in 1985 which was truely plug and play... no drivers, just shove a card in the slot and turn the machine on. Apple is to this day still badly applying Amiga features in OSX... from the Core system to Automator. Not one of these features is a shadow of the original Amiga tool. Oh, and Phillips CDI... crap on a stick! It beat the Amiga CDTV to the store shelves by literally weeks, and the CDTV outsold the CDI easily, because unlike the CDI, the CDTV did not have a thumbnail view for video, did not have video clips limited to mere seconds, had better colour support, and also included the full suite of Amiga software. Applications and games. The first digital Encyclopedia was released on the Amigas CDTV, in fact the second digital encyclopedia... even the first digital version of trivial pursuit was released on CDTV, while CDI got ignored by the world for damn good reason. The CDTV also included the worlds first wireless mouse, the worlds first wireless keyboard, the worlds first wireless game control pad, probably the worlds first open format memory card slot and many other features including being technically the first computer that could be controlled by remote control. What original features did the CDI have? None.