lindsmuse
Whether these changes are good or bad depends in part on how we adapt to them. But, ready or not, here they come.
1. The Post Office
Get ready to imagine a world without the post office. They are so deeply in financial trouble that there is probably no way to sustain it long term. Email, Fed Ex, and UPS have just about wiped out the minimum revenue needed to keep the post office alive. Most of your mail every day is junk mail and bills.
2. The Cheque
Britain is already laying the groundwork to do away with cheque by 2018. It costs the financial system billions of dollars a year to process cheques. Plastic cards and online transactions will lead to the eventual demise of the cheque. This plays right into the death of the post office. If you never paid your bills by mail and never received them by mail, the post office would absolutely go out of business.
3. The Newspaper
The younger generation simply doesn't read the newspaper. They certainly don't subscribe to a daily delivered print edition. That may go the way of the milkman and the laundry man. As for reading the paper online, get ready to pay for it. The rise in mobile Internet devices and e-readers has caused all the newspaper and magazine publishers to form an alliance. They have met with Apple, Amazon, and the major cell phone companies to develop a model for paid subscription services.
4. The Book
You say you will never give up the physical book that you hold in your hand and turn the literal pages. I said the same thing about downloading music from iTunes. I wanted my hard copy CD. But I quickly changed my mind when I discovered that I could get albums for half the price without ever leaving home to get the latest music. The same thing will happen with books. You can browse a bookstore online and even read a preview chapter before you buy. And the price is less than half that of a real book. And think of the convenience! Once you start flicking your fingers on the screen instead of the book, you find that you are lost in the story, can't wait to see what happens next, and you forget that you're holding a gadget instead of a book.
5. The Land Line Telephone
Unless you have a large family and make a lot of local calls, you don't need it anymore. Most people keep it simply because they've always had it. But you are paying double charges for that extra service. All the cell phone companies will let you call customers using the same cell provider for no charge against your minutes
6. Music
This is one of the saddest parts of the change story. The music industry is dying a slow death. Not just because of illegal downloading. It's the lack of innovative new music being given a chance to get to the people who would like to hear it. Greed and corruption is the problem. The record labels and the radio conglomerates are simply self-destructing. Over 40% of the music purchased today is "catalogue items," meaning traditional music that the public is familiar with. Older established artists. This is also true on the live concert circuit. To explore this fascinating and disturbing topic further, check out the book, "Appetite for Self-Destruction" by Steve Knopper, and the video documentary, "Before the Music Dies."
7. Television
Revenues to the networks are down dramatically. Not just because of the economy. People are watching TV and movies streamed from their computers. And they're playing games and doing lots of other things that take up the time that used to be spent watching TV. Prime time shows have degenerated down to lower than the lowest common denominator. Cable rates are skyrocketing and commercials run about every 4 minutes and 30 seconds. I say good riddance to most of it. It's time for the cable companies to be put out of our misery. Let the people choose what they want to watch online and through Netflix.
8. The "Things" That You Own
Many of the very possessions that we used to own are still in our lives, but we may not actually own them in the future. They may simply reside in "the cloud." Today your computer has a hard drive and you store your pictures, music, movies, and documents. Your software is on a CD or DVD, and you can always re-install it if need be. But all of that is changing. Apple, Microsoft, and Google are all finishing up their latest "cloud services." That means that when you turn on a computer, the Internet will be built into the operating system. So, Windows, Google, and the Mac OS will be tied straight into the Internet. If you click an icon, it will open something in the Internet cloud. If you save something, it will be saved to the cloud. And you may pay a monthly subscription fee to the cloud provider. In this virtual world, you can access your music or your books, or your whatever from any laptop or handheld device. That's the good news. But, will you actually own any of this "stuff" or will it all be able to disappear at any moment in a big "Poof?" Will most of the things in our lives be disposable and whimsical? It makes you want to run to the closet and pull out that photo album, grab a book from the shelf, or open up a CD case and pull out the insert.
9. Privacy
If there ever was a concept that we can look back on nostalgically, it would be privacy. That's gone. It's been gone for a long time anyway. There are cameras on the street, in most of the buildings, and even built into your computer and cell phone. But you can be sure that 24/7, "They" know who you are and where you are, right down to the GPS coordinates, and the Google Street View. If you buy something, your habit is put into a zillion profiles, and your ads will change to reflect those habits. "They" will try to get you to buy something else. Again and again.
All we will have left that can't be changed are "Memories".
And then probably Alzheimers will take that away from you too !
Malkav
None of it really seems that bad, and to me it seems like record companies kinda deserve what they're getting. In all the interviews I've read with my favourite artists they've said that this huge shift has been really good for them, and that the record companies being brought down to their knees has allowed them to renegotiate contracts and basically not get continually screwed. In fact a large deal of them now get to keep the rights to their own music while the record labels act more as a distribution partner.
Jack-Flash-Jr
I'm all for the above INCLUDING 6.
(8. is misleading - there's plenty of things that people will always "own" physical versions of, as for 9. clv)
The best thing that could happen to the music industry is its "death" but the argument is off kilter anyway... over 40% of music purchased is catalogue? I say, ONLY 40%? Wow, that's good... and given the increase in music sales that means that new artists and indie (the textbook definition, not the style of music) are on the rise. Nah, it'll be fine.
Bob-Dubery
lindsmuse wrote:
8. The "Things" That You Own
Many of the very possessions that we used to own are still in our lives, but we may not actually own them in the future. They may simply reside in "the cloud." Today your computer has a hard drive and you store your pictures, music, movies, and documents. Your software is on a CD or DVD, and you can always re-install it if need be. But all of that is changing. Apple, Microsoft, and Google are all finishing up their latest "cloud services." That means that when you turn on a computer, the Internet will be built into the operating system. So, Windows, Google, and the Mac OS will be tied straight into the Internet. If you click an icon, it will open something in the Internet cloud. If you save something, it will be saved to the cloud. And you may pay a monthly subscription fee to the cloud provider. In this virtual world, you can access your music or your books, or your whatever from any laptop or handheld device. That's the good news. But, will you actually own any of this "stuff" or will it all be able to disappear at any moment in a big "Poof?" Will most of the things in our lives be disposable and whimsical? It makes you want to run to the closet and pull out that photo album, grab a book from the shelf, or open up a CD case and pull out the insert.
1) If you're worried about your music disappearing in a puff then buy CDs
2) This is only really going to apply to media type things. There are plenty of physical things that will persist - houses, cars, cameras (to take pictures to store on the cloud), hamburgers, beer, guitars....
I don't see the music biz disappearing either. It will change, that's for sure, but musicians are still going to be looking for ways to earn a living as musicians - so there will be a business element.
I think mostly things will change, but they won't just disappear. TheTV business will change but it won't go away - because people will still want to watch rugby and Wimbledon and so on.
IceCreamMan
i wrote a cheque on saturday for the first time in 2 years and 10 months .... my dentist of 25 years accepted it as he knows me he reckons ?
funny enough the last cheque i wrote was to him too ?
makepeace
Music will never "disappear" or "die". Music as we know it might change, yes - maybe. Although from the 30's through to the 10's, music has become seriously impregnated into our lives. This current spell of piracy and "lack of innovative new music" (which personally is BS to me, there's more "new" music floating about that there ever was before) might cause music to go into a temporary lull, like all things do when they reach their peak, but it won't disappear unless there is no one left to listen to it or create it.
deefstes
lindsmuse wrote:6. Music
This is one of the saddest parts of the change story. The music industry is dying a slow death. Not just because of illegal downloading. It's the lack of innovative new music being given a chance to get to the people who would like to hear it. Greed and corruption is the problem. The record labels and the radio conglomerates are simply self-destructing. Over 40% of the music purchased today is "catalogue items," meaning traditional music that the public is familiar with. Older established artists. This is also true on the live concert circuit. To explore this fascinating and disturbing topic further, check out the book, "Appetite for Self-Destruction" by Steve Knopper, and the video documentary, "Before the Music Dies."
Sounds very dramatic but we all know that
music won't disappear in our lifetime, if indeed ever. What might disappear is the music industry as we know it and that might be a good thing. The music industry has been very slow to move with the times so if their death certificate has been signed it was only by themselves.
One thing is for sure though, music is bigger than the music industry and it will outlive the current music industry and it will outlive all of us. There's just too much music for it to die.
DonovanB
They said TV would wipe out radio. It didn't. You might also find it changing the way it works, the sooner the better.
As for Paying for newspapers online, I seriously doubt that will happen. if people can find and download anything for free, they can find and get news for niks as well. the sooner the media moguls see the Internet as a medium of communication, just like radio, print and TV, the better. Advertising paid for TV and radio it can pay for web content as well.
Like the ads on GFSA, are not intrusive at all. If more marketers realised the potential and started advertising relevant products on relevant sites we wouldn't mind ads as much as we do. I'm sure even those here with ad-blockers would be ok with seeing guitar related ads. I'm just tired of watching Friday Action Night on E and seeing tampon ads? Relevancy is out the window on TV.
Malkav
makepeace wrote:
(which personally is BS to me, there's more "new" music floating about that there ever was before)
This!
deefstes wrote:
Sounds very dramatic but we all know that music won't disappear in our lifetime, if indeed ever. What might disappear is the music industry as we know it and that might be a good thing. The music industry has been very slow to move with the times so if their death certificate has been signed it was only by themselves.
One thing is for sure though, music is bigger than the music industry and it will outlive the current music industry and it will outlive all of us. There's just too much music for it to die.
This!
Bob-Dubery
Donovan Banks wrote:
They said TV would wipe out radio. It didn't. You might also find it changing the way it works, the sooner the better.
As for Paying for newspapers online, I seriously doubt that will happen. if people can find and download anything for free, they can find and get news for niks as well. the sooner the media moguls see the Internet as a medium of communication, just like radio, print and TV, the better. Advertising paid for TV and radio it can pay for web content as well.
The media can be a very profitable business. Ask Rupert Murdoch.
BTW The Times now charges for web access. So does the magazine Autosport. People pay. It kind of goes to a sort of intermediate, evolutionary position where people still pay for their copy of whatever but they get it on paper and read it on their PCs or their handheld devices AND get access to archived articles.
What will come under pressure (what are coming under pressure) are the national, free-to-air broadcasters. That model is probably unsustainable. TV isn't going broke nor is it going away.
doc-phil
Donovan Banks wrote:
I'm just tired of watching Friday Action Night on E and seeing tampon ads? Relevancy is out the window on TV.
That's not the only place relevance has gone out the window. In the Musgrave centre MENS TOILET there was an advert directly above the urinal for WOMEN'S ONLY insurance. Now that is dumb.
I can see number 3 happening to a degree... I can buy international newspapers on my kindle (not that I do).
lindsmuse
The thing is what about the millions of people who don't have access to all these modern developments. I think of Cuba with the old motorcars driving around - still going strong. I'm sure that as long as we have poor people , we will always have the old goods in circulation. Unfortunately poverty isn't on that list ...
Bob-Dubery
lindsmuse wrote:
The thing is what about the millions of people who don't have access to all these modern developments. I think of Cuba with the old motorcars driving around - still going strong. I'm sure that as long as we have poor people , we will always have the old goods in circulation. Unfortunately poverty isn't on that list ...
50 years ago there were lots of people all over the place - not just in the 3rd world - that didn't have TV sets. I lived in England until I was 13. We never had a telephone in our house (lots of people didn't). We had a TV but not colour - I don't think there was much point to having a colour TV in the UK back then. There's always a lag - some markets get the new stuff before others. It's always been that way.
Look at how pervasive cell phones are now. I can remember a time when they weren't that common and, in fact, I swore I'd never have one.
Squonk
lindsmuse wrote:
The thing is what about the millions of people who don't have access to all these modern developments. I think of Cuba with the old motorcars driving around - still going strong. I'm sure that as long as we have poor people , we will always have the old goods in circulation. Unfortunately poverty isn't on that list ...
What about Africa?
lindsmuse
Sorry I forgot Africa. ? Just using Cuba to illustrate as for me it is such a strong image of using the old stuff (maybe more positive)
deefstes
Huh! Are you saying Africa will disappear in our lifetime? ???
? ? ?
Jack-Flash-Jr
Chad Adam Browne wrote:
makepeace wrote:
(which personally is BS to me, there's more "new" music floating about that there ever was before)
This!
deefstes wrote:
Sounds very dramatic but we all know that music won't disappear in our lifetime, if indeed ever. What might disappear is the music industry as we know it and that might be a good thing. The music industry has been very slow to move with the times so if their death certificate has been signed it was only by themselves.
One thing is for sure though, music is bigger than the music industry and it will outlive the current music industry and it will outlive all of us. There's just too much music for it to die.
This!
+1
makepeace
deefstes wrote:
Huh! Are you saying Africa will disappear in our lifetime? ???
? ? ?
Wouldn't be surprising :?
strataxe
the music industry yes, but music. Ha , 50 years from now on, if I make it, I'll still listen to the Rolling Stones, on ... ... ... CD ?
I doubt that older tech will ever die out, especially with teh economic situation all over the world, nobody can afford to buy the new stuff.
MIKA-the-better-one
The Music Industry is not dying, or disapearing.... thats nonsense.
Its changing, for the better (but I have talked on this before)
I actually dont know why you are worried about this one?
Privacy, that only goes if you are careless.... like myself.... you could take my email and find me all over the net.
But there are people who I know who stay almost completly anonymous.
and for the other things... so what
