[SIGCIS-Members] Telegram service ending soon - have any other info technologies actually died?

[Rob MacDougall]

This was the subject, wasn't it, of Bruce Sterling's Dead Media List, which
has itself met a similar fate?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_Media_Project
http://web.archive.org/web/20071019055700/http://www.deadmedia.org/notes/index.html
http://www.conceptlab.com/problems/

Though I guess Tom didn't stipulate media specifically.

Rob MacDougall
Associate Professor & Graduate Chair, Department of History
Lawson Hall 2237
Western University
London, Ontario, Canada N6A 3K7
519-661-2111 +85305

On Tue, Jun 18, 2013 at 11:39 AM, Thomas Haigh <thaigh at computer.org> wrote:

> Hello everyone,****
>
> ** **
>
> Slate has an little interesting story, framed with the idea that “dead”
> technologies take a very long time to actually depart. Apparently the last
> telegram will soon be sent, as India is discontinuing the service as a
> result of widening losses.
> http://www.slate.com/blogs/future_tense/2013/06/17/death_of_the_telegraph_world_s_last_telegram_to_be_sent_in_india_on_july.html.
> According to the original story
> http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Asia-South-Central/2013/0614/India-to-send-world-s-last-telegram.-Stopthe system was down to its last 998 workers and was handling only about
> 5,000 messages a day.****
>
> ** **
>
> Of course, it’s only really with a service based technology that an actual
> date of death can be established. Something like a PC can just go into the
> attic and might one day come out again in working order. Even pneumatic
> tubes, a retro technology favorite, are still in use in some settings.
> Punched cards are still used in voting machines. Vacuum tubes are still
> used in expensive amplifiers. According to Wikipedia even semaphore flags
> are still “used during underway replenishment at sea.”****
>
> ** **
>
> So, can anyone come up with another information technology that has
> definitively and verifiably vanished completely from use? Specific products
> don’t count.****
>
> ** **
>
> Tom****
>
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