Netflix Killing DVDs Like Apple Killed Floppies? 345
cheezitmike writes "While there has been lots of outcry about Netflix separating their DVD service from their streaming service, media expert Eric Garland says they're just doing to the DVD what Apple did to the floppy disk. 'I was reminded of so many precedents: Facebook revamping its user interface, the introduction of the first Blueberry iMac, the one with the conspicuously missing 3.5-inch floppy drive on the front. All of these were moments when there was a paradigm shift that led to an immediate public outcry. People made a lot of noise and had a lot of complaints. People were very upset about these shifts...until they weren't. In the news cycle, the outcry is significant and it is problematic, but it's also important to note how quickly these things are forgotten.'"
Apple (Score:2, Insightful)
What did apple do to floppies?
ha (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:ha (Score:5, Insightful)
That and cheap USB keys which were faster, considerably more reliable and many times the capacity.
Re:ha (Score:4, Insightful)
E-mail killed floppies (Score:4, Insightful)
I would say that the wide-adoption of corporate/small-business e-mail systems in the mid-late 90s killed the floppy disk. Up until then, legal assistants, secretaries, financial analysts, and other workers on the lower-rungs would truck a floppy disk from desk to desk to collaborate with colleagues, present work to the boss, or deliver documents to clients. With e-mail, the small files that could go on floppy disks could more easily be sent more easily with even the slower LAN and shared-internet connections.
Re:ha (Score:4, Insightful)
Older hardware has it uses. I mean, you don't need a brand new, screaming i7 multi-core box with SLI graphics cards to run a home firewall with iptables, etc....you don't need it to make a nice little audio server for the home stereo to host your music collection ripped to flac, etc.
I am by NO stretch of the imagination a 'green' person, tree hugger or someone who has ever bothered with recycling anything...BUT, hey, if something is still useful, why spend money on something new if the old will keep working reliably for awhile longer?
Re:ha (Score:4, Insightful)
Actually, if it's supposed to run 24/7 for some months or even years, it might be 'greener' to get a new device like a router that runs Linux or a Sheevaplug, since they'll probably use much less energy than older machines (the Sheeva uses about 7W or so).
Re:ha (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:ha (Score:5, Insightful)
Both of which took a couple years to become affordable after Apple prematurely killed floppies.
I was still using floppies long after Apple "killed" them. And when a worthy replacement came along... I switched.
Re:ha (Score:3, Insightful)
We have several planes, jets I might add, that use floppies to update nav databases. That's a lot of floppies every 2 weeks.
We could get the CD upgrade but Honeywell wants 12 grand for each aircraft.