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> Floppies were ubiquitous in the 90s, but try reading one now - it's not impossible, but you'll probably have to find some service to help you do that since it

> Floppies were ubiquitous in the 90s, but try reading one now - it's not impossible, but you'll probably have to find some service to help you do that since it's not likely that you've had a floppy drive for close to 20 years. This is a bit rose-tinted. You can pick from a huge variety of floppy drive readers available on amazon, most for less than 20 bucks. Additionally - >As an example, I'd like to get an e-reader that would be usable in 20+ years. But that doesn't seem likely. I have a kindle gen 2, purchased basically as soon as that model was released in jan 2009 (I actually ordered a gen 1 and amazon bumped me to gen 2 when it was announced). It's still going strong. My guess is that basically any kindle will go about 20 years as long as you take care of it. Battery life degrades a good bit, but even at only 20% of the original capacity, the thing still goes 3 days without a charge - used to be a month, but three days is enough.

mlyle 4y ago
> This is a bit rose-tinted. You can pick from a huge variety of floppy drive readers available on amazon, most for less than 20 bucks. Back to 3.5" / 1440kb is not too bad. Though the new drives are kinda crap compared to old ones in reading many disks. But going back a little further-- reading Mac 800k disks, or 5.25" floppies, or things that are not DOS formatted--- gets harder and harder.
- codazoda 4y ago
  Just a little farther back, however, and things ease again to audio tape technology. I’m still able to use my TRS-80 CoCo today because it used audio. I’ve adapted a cable to my digital audio recorder. It was built in about 1984 and it still works. It’s rather difficult to use compared to modern computers though.
  - UncleOxidant 4y ago
    Your 1984 self had nothing else to compare it to - your current self has had several computers since to compare it to to make the determination that "It’s rather difficult to use compared to modern computers though." This is part of Berry's argument as well: once you jump on the tech treadmill it's hard to get off.
themadturk 4y ago
My two year old Kindle Paperwhite died last fall for no apparent reason. It certainly didn't meet Berry's criteria of being easily repairable by the local shop where I purchased it, though in its time it was an absolute beast for great battery life.

mlyle 4y ago

> This is a bit rose-tinted. You can pick from a huge variety of floppy drive readers available on amazon, most for less than 20 bucks. Back to 3.5" / 1440kb is not too bad. Though the new drives are kinda crap compared to old ones in reading many disks. But going back a little further-- reading Mac 800k disks, or 5.25" floppies, or things that are not DOS formatted--- gets harder and harder.

codazoda 4y ago
Just a little farther back, however, and things ease again to audio tape technology. I’m still able to use my TRS-80 CoCo today because it used audio. I’ve adapted a cable to my digital audio recorder. It was built in about 1984 and it still works. It’s rather difficult to use compared to modern computers though.
- UncleOxidant 4y ago
  Your 1984 self had nothing else to compare it to - your current self has had several computers since to compare it to to make the determination that "It’s rather difficult to use compared to modern computers though." This is part of Berry's argument as well: once you jump on the tech treadmill it's hard to get off.

themadturk 4y ago

My two year old Kindle Paperwhite died last fall for no apparent reason. It certainly didn't meet Berry's criteria of being easily repairable by the local shop where I purchased it, though in its time it was an absolute beast for great battery life.