Same same but new
jasonleow • 4 Feb 2021 •
Was chatting with a friend on Facebook, about what’s same but new. It seems like tech is similar to fashion. Everything comes back round every 50 years. Mid riffs, mini skirts, round-rimmed glasses. All you mum’s and dad’s clothes back when they were young.
And in tech, what’s same but new:
IRC > Slack
SMS > Whatsapp
Sell-a-vision > Youtube ads
Dial-in conference call > Clubhouse
Tetris game console > Nintendo Switch
Segway > hoverboards
RC helicopters > drones
Pagers > smartphones
Made me think: What was super fashionable and popular 20-30 years ago in tech, or when you were growing up? Is there a digital or smartphone equivalent right now? If not, that’s a business opportunity right there!
I can think of some interesting ones that were fashionable in the 80s when I was growing up:
Answering machines – would it be great if we had a virtual assistant to screen calls these days? No more telemarketing bs and late night calls from your ex haha.
Neon everything – that’s a colour palette I can get behind! Perhaps our digital products can take the bold step and go wild with neon. And spandex. Definitely more spandex on our superheroes.
Tamagotchi – a game on a super small handheld device with a screen where you have to feed , bathe, care for this digital pet.
Swatch watches – these were cool back in the day. And affordable at that. I wish we had the crazy AND cheap equivalent for our smart watches today!
Printers – is it me or have printers not changed much over the last decade? Still the same old clunky, beige, hard to use fossils?
All these ideas makes the entrepreneur in me salivate! I wonder if there’s a market in any of them…
So what 80s tech would you bring back today?
Comments
@andrewtsao haha lets use neon for our next nocode project. Oooh gamifying the task mgt process…sounds like a good idea. In a way, Makerlog with it’s badges, streaks and all are also gamified. Don’t see why not we take it further with a pocket monster lol
@jasonleow I could get behind neon everything. Also, I’ve also thought about Tamagotchi! I even wanted to base one of my no-code projects last year around the idea of building a mobile app of combining a task-management system + feeding a little pocket moster to grow it. Didn’t really pan out though.