Slashdot Mirror
Top 25 Innovations of the Past 25 Years
HarvardAce writes "CNN has just released a list of 24 of the top 25 innovations of the past 25 years. Most of them are things we use every day in life, such as cell phones (#2), PCs (#3), and e-mail (#5). CNN won't release the #1 innovation until Sunday, January 18 at 8pm EST (Monday, Jan 19 @ 1AM GMT), so I wanted to see if Slashdot users could come up with what they think the #1 innovation is and comment on the rest of the list."
#1 will be The World Wide Web/The Internet.
The first post.
The internet? (No, I didn't RTFA)
The Internet?
of course! Books! Who would've thought of that before the 70s?
i have a strong feeling #1 is 'www', i guess it could be internet , but then email wouldn't be on the list
Marge, get me your address book, 4 beers, and my conversation hat.
Internet Porn
Yeah Plasma TVs and HDTV is a real super innovation. Give me a break, this list is just a big ad.
Occam's razor is the blind faith in the natural selection of least resistance and in universal oversimplification. -- EF
The Fleshlight makes women obsolete. Once we perfect cloning, there will be no need for them.
Um, the web?
Agreed, it has to be the WWW.
Electronic Voting!
Digital music has changed the way the world thinks about property.
;)
Digital music has caused riots in lofty Record companys....
but i guess the net wins
- http://www.milkme.co.uk
If so...the answer is simple: Internet Pr0n :-)
-JT
or instant news world....
it's gotta be the segway. afterall wasn't "it" supposed to revolutize our lives? :)
I thought next Sunday was the 16th....I guess I need a new calendar to match the new rotation of the planet :D
The top invention has do be news networks, just to pad themselves on the back :)
Seriously "The World Wide Web" is a pretty good bet, the have only listed email so far.
Come on! The Web isn't that important. We could all live without the web for a month, right????
First Post doesn't count as innovation IMHO ;-)
see a Text Widget
It's the World Wide Web.
For example, many people turn off their PCs (No. 3) and their HDTV (No. 19) or plasma screen TVs (No. 18) as they leave their homes.
Excuse me? PCs are VERY important and probably deserving of #3 but to say that HDTV and Plasma are in the top 100 is pushing it.
I have only seen HDTV at stores and on display at the state fair (I'm relatively unimpressed). I know one single person that has it and he uses it through DirecTV. I don't know a single person that owns a Plasma screen and I really don't think that they are terribly important.
HDTV is a bunch of tax-funded bullshit that's going to bring down the right to record as you choose. Media conglomorates aren't going to want you to have digitized recordings of high-def format because then you can compete with their DRMd discs.
Boo on this list.
so I am expecting CNN to be listed as the greatest innovation in the past 25 years.
Monstar L
It's obviously the iPod, we can stop speculating now.
I am suprised that RFID is at #10 on the list.
From the article: In creating the list, the group hoped to single out "25 non-medically related technological innovations that have become widely used since 1980, are readily recognizable by most Americans, have had a direct and perceptible impact on our everyday lives, and/or could dramatically affect our lives in the future
Is RFID really recognisable by most Americans?
My guess is either the web, as previously guessed, or maybe Online Commerce. The web's great, but I think shopping online is what made it what it is.
Being able to take your entire music collection back and forth from work, on trips, long car trips, vacations etc.
Oh, it doubles as a voice recorder and a mass storage device.
NOT!
U can use em for anything!!
(like scaring the hell out of whiteChristianAmerikans so'll they'll keep U in power, or illegally invade other countries, or...etc..)
Since they put "commercialized GPS" on there, I guess "commercialized Internet" might be a valid option - it would certainly cover the sub-applications like web, voip, email, etc.
see a Text Widget
The lightbulb!
MABASPLOOM!
Have OLED displays or RFID tags affected anyone yet? Are either of them even in widespread use?
The Internet.
Linus Tordvals innovation strategy:
1. See what Microsoft did (i.e. Start Menu)
2. Copy
Yeah, it's a little known fact that Linus Torvalds is adding a start menu to the next version of the Linux kernel. I can see you really know what you're talking about. Must have inside information.
CNN is going to have to come up with something pretty spectacular for me to NOT think they're retarded on this one. If Internet does NOT turn out to be #1, then that means they forgot to put the Internet among the top 25 innovations. In which case, they're just wrong. If it IS #1, well, duh! As we can see, not much of a cliffhanger...
Segway. (not so serious)
No "Microsoft Bob" on the list?
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet
BAWLS!!!!
...until the companies finish the secret bidding with CNN to see who gets the top advertisement spot on the list.
Got to be flying cars!!! Oh, wait...
DVD anyone? ;)
When HTML and HTTP came out, the internet exploded. Home computers started coming out with internet connectivity built-in. (Remember the days of Winsock?)
I also noted that Magnetic Resonance Imaging wasn't in the article. That technology changed surgery.
HOT POCKETS
I mean after all the Dean Kamen hype for like two years before he came out with that thing how could it not be?
Remember, these are journalists they don't admit mistakes.
the major advances in civilization are processes which all but wreck the societies in which they occur - A.N. White
The number one innovation is...
The Fleshlight! Super-tight, just like prom night.
The DMCA and the Patriot act??
It's a no brainer. The Internet proper
Help fight continental drift.
I would have expected RDS Radio to have featured somewhere in the list. Do you have RDS Radio available in the states? Basically as you drive around your car radio looks for a stronger signal from the same station and then switches to it if it finds one. Also you can search for stations based upon criteria like News or Pop Music. And, the radios can display text, like phone numbers for a competion or the name of the track that is playing.
Other inovations I would have expected, would be Digital Radio and Digital TV. But they aren't as common as RDS because they are newer.
Arrrgggghhhh! How could I have so foolishly said The World Wide Web? It's nothing compared to the tasty wholesome lean goodness of a George Foreman Grilling Machine grilled burger!
EASY CHEESE !
It's Instant Messaging :P
No seriously, It has to be the commercializtion of the internet.
Blacker than my baby girl's stare. Black like the veil that the muslimina wear. Black like the planet that they fear...
...what else?
...I would have to say DNS (around 1981), which brought the internet to what it is today.
I think Hypertextlinks. Rest is after that.
Hrmm, wonder why CDs made the list but DVD's did not. Meanwhile HDTV and Plasma tvs are on the list but still no DVD ? Don't understand that one really.
I have only seen HDTV at stores and on display at the state fair (I'm relatively unimpressed). I know one single person that has it and he uses it through DirecTV.
:)
I own two HDTVs, an Hitachi rear projection CRT set and a Sony HS-20 front project or for my living room. Combined with a decent DD 5.1 sound and a home theater really does compete with commercial movie theaters. In Boston every broadcast station is now digital; that's ABC, CBS, NBC, PBS, FOX, UPN, and WC. I actually get more HD content from broadcast than DirecTV (I have DirectTV too). HBO and Showtime in HD is pretty damn nice. Widescreen aspect ration is very damn nice! Uhhh... whether HDTV is the greatest consumer invention since sliced bread, I don't know. But... I like it!
HDTV is a bunch of tax-funded bullshit that's going to bring down the right to record as you choose. Media conglomorates aren't going to want you to have digitized recordings of high-def format because then you can compete with their DRMd discs.
Uhhh... just so we're clear: HDTV display technology and broadcast standards are different from the political policies being pursued by media conglomerates in their attempt to limit consumer freedom. Right? HDTV deployment does not mandate the consumer limitation by politcial fiat. --M
...the Interweb! Yes I invented it!
They make the web, newgroups, etc useful.
"Google it" :-)
NetBSD - www.NetBSD.org
Hm, in 1978 I remember using a Commodore PET PC. I believe Apple IIs also existed in 1978... BSD was there also with uuget and uuput and we bundled mail for nightly transmission. 2005 - 1978 == 27 years.
How can PCs be #3 when they are the requirement for #1 (if #1 is indeed teh intarweb) - perhaps a hierarchy could be ordered - perhaps assessed on their own merits, anyway, I Agree With The Parent? Is this reflex journalism another excuse to fill the time and earn some $$$?
Or is this another excuse for hypnotic television:
#1 Rule of profitable television - do not offend the advertised
#2 Rule of profitable television - do not challenge the viewer
#3 Rule of profitable television - pander to the viewer's preconceptions, opinions and biases
#4 Rule of profitable television - make the viewer have a self assured, warm-inside feeling (see #2)
#5 Rule of profitable television - make the viewer feel they have been challenged and have additional insight, even though they do now
'Top 25 innovations', 'Top 100 80s music shows', 'Evening News', etc, fit so so so easily into this convention. It troubles me.
There is a hint about the #1 spot in the picture of the cellphone. The screen reads "Calling...INTERNET". I think it's obvious that this is going to be #1.
Well it could be HTML/Web Pages, but it should be Open Source Software and the Wonder Bra.
If there were any justice in the world it would be:
Unless, of course, you are using the word "innovated" in its modern sense, i.e. "has been turned into a monopoly by Microsoft", in which case there are several other things which don't yet belong on their list of "innovations of the past 25 years".
Cherry flavored douche should be #1
The internet is more than 25 years old. So they can't do it.
I could see them doing something like "commercialized internet" like they did for GPS.
The thermos bottle!
Or are they up to 4-blade by now?
the #1 innovation in the last 25 years was......
Windows.
After all, Microsoft does nothing but innovate, right?
...spike
Ewwwwww, coconut...
They don't say that these innovations were created in the last 25 years, just that they "have become widely used since 1980".
The net most certainly falls into that category.
-deane
I know! Must be Clippy (TM)(C)
"The day Microsoft makes a product that doesn't suck is the day they make a vacuum cleaner."
the flush toilet.
The DVD isn't on the list.
As HDTV made it and DVDs were invented in the past 25 years (and this is CNN, not Nature) it'll be #1.
It's obviously going to be WWW (they may even put the internet, they were wrong about airbags and email which are both older then 25 years).
But my vote is the console gaming system! I've certainly wasted my whole life playing everything from Atari to GabeCube.
No. 1: It is the hook they throw to make you talk about it, wait in anticipation and come back. Is it older than 25 years?
"The oldest profession" etc.
It would be a historical cop-out, but CNN could claim something amorphous like "consumer-friendly cable television", which became big around the mid-late 80s, or digital/fiber cable, from the 90s. Either would allow that "and CNN was there from the beginning" self-congratulating angle. It would require some rather convoluted constraints of what is an "invention", since "cable" has been around as long as TV, and in-home cable television is over 25 years old.
I know the answer!!! Windows!! *gag*.... It's always said that failure is very important to science, and Windows is a perfect demonstration of how to do some things very well, while failing in the ways that normal users have no idea how to deal with. =P
It is pitch black. You are likely to be eaten by a grue.
#1 TV
what?
I'd say: Number one is the IBM PC
Why isn't Google on the list ?
Search engines will be #1. Without them, the signal-to-noise ratio of the net would be higher than here on slashdot.
Pr0n, any /.er will agree.
Dear aunt, let's set so double the killer delete select all
Credit card readers built into the side of gas pumps.
jeff
"have become widely used since 1980". Always look for the weasel words.
Schick Quattro Razor
yea can't help but fix the nastyness!
microwave oven
Once the personal computer came in at #3, the list was pretty much over for me.
Cell phones are more important than the personal computer?
At that point, I half expect the Clapper to be #1.
Philip Sandifer's academic website
...The Internet did not become a commercial entity until 1992, the year that the US military moved their servers off the Internet (more or less).
But you have to admit one thing though: the real explosion of Internet use started in the fall of 1995, when Windows 95 with its built-in SLIP/PPP networking stack gave PC compatible users easy access to the Internet for the first time (Windows 3.1 could access the Internet using third-party addons, but given the nature of computer users that was still relatively rare).
Is the VCR. Granted, I'm pretty sure it was developed for home use before 1979, but it certainly didn't become widespread until the 1980s.
That's got to be it!
My computer is an IMSAI. Don't you love those paddle switches! Who can get by without blinking LEDs?
Nothing comes close.
Ok, I have to call bullshit here. The space shuttle does not have much of an impact on our lives. Other than being a drain of tax money, of course.
It's old and obsolete technology, so it won't have much of an effect on our future either. These days, it doesn't inspire anyone anymore either. I can get excited about SpaceShip one, but about the next shuttle mission? Give me a break!
Did anybody else notice that January 18th is actually a Tuesday?
One thing I noticed is that despite all the flak it has been receiving lately, the space shuttle still comes in at number 20.
I think number one will have something to do with either transportation or recycling. What exactly I do not know though.
It took many other ideas such as "Page Rank" (compare to the Science Citations Index, which ranks papers by times cited) and "Search Engine" and made into a tool that is universally used by people with access to the Internet.
The tinfoil helmet. So much less cumbersome than the old helmets made from lead sheet(although they did give you big strong neck muscles).
They whose government reduces their essential liberties for temporary security, receive neither liberty nor security.
Airbags were invented in the 70s or 60s defently not the 80s or 90s. Same thing with cell phones, they were made in the late early to mid 70s.
That's easy. Since the World Wide Web is not in places 2-25, it must be ranked number 1. They might as well call it "The Internet", even though the Internet includes e-mail (#5).
Keeping women from going mental has been the best invention of the century.
or the DVD. But I think cells are used enough that they would warrant being in the top 25.
was born in the early 90's.
the past 25 years have been so full of new technological advances that it's impossible to objectively determine what the top innovation has been, much less what a 3rd party that is the brainchild of ted turner would choose.
of course, they'll pick the web. but what about military applications, that are missing from the list? the american military has driven technology in to nearly incomprehensible realms, and they seem only to get recognition for doing so once the products are mainstreamed.
go get it
If you're a football fan, HDTV is better than potable water. I mean holy crap, it's magnificent. Finally, I understand why we stopped displaying our dead people in parlors so we could turn them into living rooms.
I hadn't realised that li-ion and NiMH rechargable batteries were invented for cellphones and that cellphones would be useless without them. My first cellphone had 6 x aa nicads and worked just fine. and i could recharge it.
Also, digital cameras are possible only because of the development of flash memory (a miniturised hard disk) and OLED. Wow!
They whose government reduces their essential liberties for temporary security, receive neither liberty nor security.
CNN's #1 innovation in the past 25 years will be the establishment of a 24-hour, 7-day a week cable news network. This has changed the way we get our news, the way we look at the world, and our expectations for results right now (e.g., election).
For example, how could they include 'Commercialised GPS'(6)? The innovation is GPS alone, or is making something 'commercial' innovative these days?
Also, portable computers (3) have not been 'innovative' in the usual sense of the word - its been a long slow evolution over decades, from small-screened 'luggables' in the early 1980s.
I hope there is a poll with the best suggestions, could be fun to see what slashdotters guess :)
gg...
OK, the JDAM is clever and everybody wants a GPS in their car, but we're observing right now that urban warfare technology hasn't meaningfully advanced since 1961.
Suing everyone around you for money instead of working for it.
You can't handle the truth.
Another interesting article from Wired titled "Love Machines" can be found here.
Since no one else seems to have said it yet, I'm going to say Email.
Sure, it's been around for more than 25 years, but as others have pointed out, that wasn't the criteria.
Last I checked, it was still the top Internet application.
If #1 is not an Internet application, then my guess will be microwave burritos.
Some people have a way with words, and some people, um, thingy.
It's the ban on gay Marriage.
(Anyone who says CNN is the "liberal media" never watched it during the Clinton administration.)
Nuff said.
Sigs are for Terrorists.
you're a consumerist whore!
I think the CNN list is a bit lame, and some of the timings to make it within the 25 years are questionable.
Also to lump in Flash memory with CD technology is ... well wrong !
regards
dbcad7
waiting for ad.doubleclick.net
Thanks Hubert! You and the rest of the NetBSD team rock.
I'm not sure that NetBSD is the #1 technical innovation in the last 25 years, but it's pretty damn nice.
I'm happily running NetBSD 2.0 with my Netgear WG311T wireless card, and I was pleasantly surprised at how seemless the whole process was. (Finding the right card was the trick).
In any case, NetBSD never fails to impress me with its professional polish.
-Peter
. Penguins Surely Ca
The iPod really has defined modern society the same way the cell phone has. There is a slight lean toward portable devices on their list and I think that the iPod has been a very important invention.
...or Windows XP...
That or Google...
I think its a tough call!
#1 Rule of Slashdot -if using a numbered list include #.???? and #+1. Profit!!!!! but seriously: How can PCs be #3 and the internet #1? Because the internet was established, and could exist, with only mainframes and "non-personal type" computers. I think home computers would have become obsolete and replaced with more specialized devices (as many people had predicted) if they did not evolve into useful (although not the only) device for accessing the internet.
Isn't it obvious? Microsoft's WindowsXP is a breakthrough in security, stability and speed, and is now used on some of the U.S. Navy's ships! Er, maybe that's why we're in such hot water in Iraq...
Or they haven't decided on #1 yet, and are generating enough discussion to come up with a #1 that is not already in this list.
No, it's not. It's an accelerometer made in an IC fab. That's not atomic-level engineering. Not even close. By IC standards, it's huge.
The "nanotechnology" label is getting out of hand. It used to apply to concepts for elaborate structures made atom by atom. Now that funding is available, it's used to refer to finely ground particles.
How is that a "non-medically related technological innovation" ???
:-)
Now, what about affordable roadsters? My Miata certainly has a "direct and perceptible impact on my everyday live"
Some of their choices were obvious. Others were poor. Here are my complaints:
10) RFID tags. Given that RFID is still mostly smoke and mirrors, is it reasonable to call it a major innovation of the past 25 years? Maybe 10 years from now we'll think so, but it doesn't belong on this year's list.
11) MEMS. What? No! VLSI is vastly more important than MEMS, and it didn't even make the list. Besides, MEMS is little more than a pit stop on the road to nanotech.
19) HDTV. HDTV is not a top innovation of any year, let alone a top innovation of the past 25. It was a committee-designed system haphazardly thrown together that has yet to make any meaningful impact on everyday life.
21) Nanotech. Nanotech will be an amazing innovation if it ever gets here, but is it fair to call something that's still mostly science fiction a top innovation of the past 25 years?
24) Modern hearing aids. Yes, they're better, but its evolutionary not revolutionary.
25) Short Range, High Frequency Radio. Uh yeah. This is not an innovation. Its a category of innovations like digital radio, spread spectrum, 802.11 and cordless phones.
And of course, #1 will be the World Wide Web. Since they've seperated email from the Internet, they'll seperate that as well.
But, having split out the Internet into its components the panel has failed badly in missing TCP/IP v4 from 1981, clearly a critical innovation of the past 25 years. Vastly more important than HDTV.
Moderating "-1, Disagree" is simple censorship. Have the guts to post your opinion.
Ummm....pr0n on .mpg?
Millions of people use microwaves everyday when preparing food. Makes life much easier.
... is number one.
My supper is being cooked right now. I'm a single, living-by-myself slashdot reader. I wouldn't be able to feed myself if it wasn't for the microwave.
Food beats the internet any day.
CowboyNeal, we can blame, er, credit! you with for doing so much for society. Thank You! sniff, sniff :...{
The shuttle, wasn't that designed and built in the 70's?
The PC is a product of the late 70's too. The Apple II, Atari and Commodore PET all were released in 78-79.
So # 3 & 20 are 70's
Air bags date to the 60's but is the footdragging by and reluctance of goverments to make the car makers use them innovation? NO
Strike number 13 too.
So it down to 22.
I'm not sure what the #1 will be, althought according to CNN's website, if we all watch on Jan 18th like listed in the /. article, we'll be 2 days late
"TOP INNOVATIONS The number one innovation will be announced on Sunday, January 16, at 8 p.m. ET."
I'm thinking that the top invention will be somethign like Compact Disks or DVD's.
But hey, let's not let facts get in the way of Apple fanboiness, huh?
Donald Trump's hair do what it does.
photosMy Photostream
CNN
Fake breasts ....
Think about it for a minute. Without fake breasts we would never have had Bay Watch. Without Bay Watch, David Hasselhoff would have been a has-been alcoholic actor rather than an alcoholic actor in the twilight of a mediocre career in television. What a crying shame that would have been.
It seems they may be consfusing innovations in the last 25 years with adoption in the last 25 years. For instance ATM was introduced in 1967 and EMail was already used in 1965. But they just started becoming popular among the masses in the last 25 years.
More specific Number 1 will be:
Slashdot!
G
I'm not saying it's the number 1 invention, but the Sony Walkman was a huge deal over much of the last 25 years. Of course, it hasn't been a big deal for the last 5 - 10 years, and these sorts of surveys are always heavily weighted to more recent times. I would rank the Sony Walkman as either equal, or one notch below cell phones. (Or as we used to call them back in the prehistoric Walkman days, "Car Phones.")
Mike van Lammeren
It will challenge your head, your brain, and your mind.
That giant robot that crushes cars at monster truck shows.
Few devices have has as far-reaching social consequences as the affordable VCR -- specifically, by making porn widely available to mainstream America.
:-D
Think about it. Prior to VCRs, if you wanted to watch adult movies, you basically had one option: the XXX movie theater (unless you were incredibly wealthy and had the resources to build your own at your residence). Social stigma effectively ensured that few Americans ever saw a real XXX movie, other than maybe a once-in-a-lifetime trip to a seedy XXX theater in some distant city. Once VCRs became widely available, the adult film industry's entire focus shifted away from actual theaters (do they even EXIST anymore?) to home viewers, and in less than a decade it became normal and acceptable to proudly list production experience (videography, editing, promotion, etc) in adult films on one's resume.
Make no mistake... it was the VCR that gave birth to the entire adult video industry as we know it today. The internet obviously took it to a new level, but VCRs established adult movies as mass market consumer items.
Ask yourself: had videotaped porn not emerged 20 years ago, how many average housewives, schoolteachers, accountants, or even presidents of the United States would have the slightest idea what "DV/DA" is?
According to sources like Wikipedia so are cell phones (#2), personal computers (#3), Memory storage discs (#8) or ATMs (#14) (if ATM=cash machine). CNN probably means "inventions which became popular during the last 25 years, even if they where invented 70 years ago". So it cound very well be "the internet" (developed late 60s), not only "the www" (http + html, early 80s).
I have to disagree with this statement in the article. HDTV is not yet common place. 90 percent of homes in my neighborhood have regular TV's. I don't see Hotels putting a plasma HDTV in thier room. When hotels start adding HDTV in form of a plasma screen, ONLY THEN will I consider them to be common place.
Gorkman
The implantable defibrillator. Has saved over 80,000 lives so far, after what is now an outpatient surgery. Has been found to be more effective than drugs in patients who are at risk for sudden cardiac death.
See, my big problem with that is there is almost nothing I watch on any of the 'big' networks. IMO, they produce crap content for the masses, but nothing interesting. Who the hell wants to watch "Everybody Loves Raymond" or "Fear Factor" in HD?
"Sports"
Well that depends on how you look at it. I remember WebTV commercials used to advertise "The internet on your TV!" when all it was, was a web browser. So according to that analogy, they're the same thing, hence, both #1!!! For real, ask WebTV.
It's obviously the Segway.
Generally, I get bored with my replies and give up on making sense halfway through.
http://www.vbrad.com/pf.asp?p=source/src_top_10_fe atures_2004.htm
So many innovations, so little room for #1...
http://www.igrill.co.uk/
A lean, mean web-serving machine...
Would you bet?
42.
1980 would be 25 years ago and at least a few of these innovations were around before then. Maybe it should be the most popular technologies in the last 25 years
I have to think it will be something "feel goody", i.e. that extends life itself...and Twinkies are too old to qualify.
By my calendar Sunday January 18th is actually on Tuesday January 18th. Or is is Sunday January 16th?
Yeah, because having a shotgun blank fired into a plastic bag 18 inches from your face is *sooo* much safer than wearing a seatbelt.
The Simpsons!
Think about it: What's the one thing every guy should have in his living domain?
Not just the internet.
Is the article by a male or female reporter? This could make a difference.
I wonder about that one. WWW is kinda just a document type being transmitted on the 30 year old internet. Maybe it's barcode. Barcode seems to run the world right now and is going to be replaced with RFID (#10) someday when society allows.
The government which is strong enough to protect you from everything is strong enough to take everything from you.
Viagra ranks way above the Segway.
The Remote Control
Clearly it MUST be the Internet:
Granted the Internet itself has been around longer than 25 years, but so has email, fiber optics, cellphones, PCs and others in some form or another. Those older technologies have become important because of the explosive growth and evolution of the Internet in the last 25 years.
I firmly believe that without the Internet none of these innovations would be where they are now in terms of development and wide spread adoption.
Anyway here is their top 25, almost everything on this list has benifited from the Interent or the Internet has facilited the development of the innovation:
2. Cell phone - Not a direct link here, though phones have been offering internet access for years, as well as acted like modems for laptops and portable PCs for even longer. Also as WIFI becomes more ubiquitous, VOIP over the Internet may replace traditional cellphones.
The electronics that enabled the cellphone to shrink to a small size, and was arguably the driver for their ubiquity, was a benifit of the development going into electronics for the computers and communications infrastructure and by extension the Internet.
3. Personal computers - When was the last time you sat at a computer without at least Dialup access?
4. Fiber optics - Used in the physical backbone of the Internet.
5. E-mail - The original "Killer app" of the Internet.
6. Commercialized GPS - The logistics industry and other mapping industries have greatly benifited for the ability to track trucks, cargo, people in real time, over the Internet. GPS can stand alone as a useful tool, but combined with such a powerful means to transmit that information quickly, it is clear how important the Internet is to commercial GPS adoption.
7. Portable computers - Get the Internet where and when you need it.
8. Memory storage discs - This is an interim benifit, As computers got faster and the internet got better, more information was able to be transferred. So people naturally used the Internet to collect everything, from programs, photos (and now music and movies). As that collection out grew the computer memory disks were need to off load the stuff you got from the Internet. I say it is interim, because eventually broader broadband, and further refined searching (via google) and improved P2P (i.e. bit torrent) will make it so easy (and reliable) to get things of the Internet, that local copies will become less and less important - though they will probably never go away.
9. Consumer level digital camera - Now that taking pictures is cheap, what do you do with those pictures? Share them! Via email, websites, etc. The Internet has made it easy to get baby pictures to Grandma in Florida. Now we're also seeing Masss market use of the internet, for example you can have 4x5 prints done and waiting for you at Walmart via there web interface.
10. Radio frequency ID tags - What good would all that info they will collect if it could not easily be transmitted to remote locations? Sure private networks (both local and wide area) will make up a significant portion. But combined with the Internet (and things like GPS tracking) RFIDs have even more value.
11. MEMS - Also fiber optics grow, mems will be a critical component in new switching quipment.
12. DNA fingerprinting - Law enforcemnet can share results quickly and easily. Researchers can collaborate much more easily.
13. Air bags - Ok you got me on this one. Fall back on the Internet improved the logistics and development of the airbag. It has helped engineers co-operate, and helped consumers understand the advantages of having an airbag (with out having to experience it first hand).
14. ATM - Remote sites talking to a home network, I wonder how that can be done cost effectively? While they may not be on the Internet directly, they certainly make use of the same infrastructure the Internet does, some certainly use VPNs over the internet to get a connection.
15.
The ATM was invented more than 25 years ago, well actually so was the cell phone, but now im just getting picky - do they mean 'when these became widespread and viable'? #1 is obviously the web or internet or whatever they're gonna call it. how you can put that before PCs i don't know? Do we have nano-technology??
You could just shrink the list and say the most important innovation has been the mass production leading to the reduction of cost the and evolution to miniturisation of all electronic components, making possible affordable personal computers and communication networks.
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
In my opnion, it wasn't the real Internet until BITNET became part of the internet. Circa 1986. A quote:
"BITNET had people in universities all over the world; it had world-wide email; it had real-time, interactive chat, one-to-one or in "Relay" chatrooms in places like CERN; it had world-wide remote file archives you could grab files from by issuing commands; it had world-wide "Listserv" email discussion lists; you could query if people were logged on across the world; it had disconnected "answering machines"; it had email to and from all other networks.
The whole thing (BITNET plus connected networks) was the embryonic Internet. The protocol has simply migrated to IP since, that's all. If BITNET wasn't the Internet, then neither was Arpanet before it switched to IP in 1983.
- Condon, Chris; BITNET USERHELP; October, 1990."
-- Boycott Shell
Nothing beats the DMCA for the amount of money brought in for the mega corporations.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
That, or WWW. I think the FAX machine should be on the list somewhere anyway.
"Would it kill you to put down the toilet seat?" -- Maya Angelou
"innovations" minus "no", kill the 't' & rob their $ (oil) -> inva$ions...
Back then there were two kinds of computers: analog and digital. Now we have quantum computers. However I guess Intellectual Property will end up as #1.
...sliced bread.
Unpleasantries.
Barcode is recognized. It's everywhere. Try shopping without it. Alot of crap these days has up to 5 barcodes hidden on around and in it. RFID is trying to replace barcode. Remove the battery from your cell phone and count the number of barcodes hidden underneath. don't forget to count the one on the battery itself. I'm not positive, but i think barcode fits just within the 25 year mark.
The government which is strong enough to protect you from everything is strong enough to take everything from you.
VLSI is vastly more important than MEMS, and it didn't even make the list. Besides, MEMS is little more than a pit stop on the road to nanotech.
If you go down the list, more than half of the innovations listed wouldn't be possible without the unbelievable progress in microfab due to improvements in materials and processes for VLSI and its spinoffs.
1) That interweb thingy that they'll list as #1
2) cell phone
3) personal computer
4) commercial gps
5) portable computer
6) consumer digital cam
7) rfid
8) mems
9) atm
10) oleds (might have come about with VLSI infrastructure, but probably much later)
11) display panels
12) nanotech (most nanotech is actually microtech, but if you put in "nano" you get more money
13) flash memory
14) modern hearing aids
There are even a few more that are arguable-- storage disks, email, and voicemail.
*From a free society to the Panopticon
*The fall of the Soviet Union
*The death of the family farm, which had been the main way of life since the dawn of civilization.
*GPS
Number 1 will be 24 hour cable news.
I will bet my left testicle on the Integrated Circuit. Without it there would be no internet, personal computers, calculators, modern home appliances, cell phones, satelite comunications...
Cheers,
Adolfo
How else would we get CNN, Spam, porn, surveys, Windows exploits and other goodies?
Besides, No PC; No Linux <g>
I am the unwilling control for my Origin.
Seriously. There's nothing that has changed people's habits on cooking, eating, and how they purchase foods than the microwave. It is absolutely ubiquitous and essential in today's life.
My entire music collection is contained on eDonkey, etc.
My entire legal collection could fit on a single iPod along with 10,000 other songs.
But I would vote for the Camelbak
CNN won't release the #1 innovation until Sunday, January 18 at 8pm EST (Monday, Jan 19 @ 1AM GMT),
Umm, Jan. 18 is a Tuesday, Jan. 19 is a Wednesday. In 2005, that is.
Is Capitalism Good for the Poor?
Am I being a smartass or do I have to ask "Why hasn't any smartass said any of those words, explained the whole history behind it, and most importantly mention 'free speech not beer' at least THRICE in the same paragraph for the sake of better karma"?
...came out in 1980, not-so-coincidentally 25 years ago. So it's probably #1.
There are two kinds of people: 1) those who start arrays with one and 1) those who start them with zero.
Answer me this.. Would you take this call?
I googled #1 Innovation of the Past 25 Years, hit I'm Feeling Lucky, and discovered that the #1 innovation is... wood flooring.
Is there any better? :-)
It couldn't be the Internet, since that is obviously older than 25 years.
They included email, and that's older than 25 years. I guess they are using the "average person has heard of it" rule to decide when something was invented.
Scanning the list - the majority of the items were available before 1980 - in which case the it should be really called the best "mass market technological products".
Some are products "HDTV", which are improvements of what came before, and others are categories of research "Nanotechnology".
What about anti-cancer, HIV treatments, Fertilization, gene therapy?
1. Pay at the pump. Who actually goes into the gas station to pay for their gas?
2. That magical first down line they draw during the football games.
These are real innovations. Who gives a shit about things like RFID, and HDTV?
not only "the www" (http + html, early 80s).
HTTP and HTML are the early 90s, not 80s. In any case, 'the WWW' is supposed to include things like FTP and Usenet, according to the person who coined the term, Tim Berners-Lee. Basically, anything that is addressable by a URI is part of the WWW, it doesn't have to be part of a website.
Reagan's Star Wars, which we will be paying for forever.
Bush & Rice's Missile Defense, which we will be paying for forever.
Al Gore's Global Disaster Information Network, which save 75,000 lives during the Christmas tsunami, except it didn't because the Republican Congress in 1998 wouldn't consider funding anything that came from Gore.
Miniature spare tires and
Car jacks that let you jack your car up but not down.
Cupholders
600-Watt stereos for cars
Cars where you open the hood and you can't figure out WTH anything does
Stereos where you open them up and you can't figure out WTH anything does
The Swiss Army Knife
Those impenetrable plastic packages that make it impossible to use anything that you buy unless you carry a Swiss Army knife.
Improved technology for growing marijuana indoors
Improved technology for finding people who grow marijuana indoors. (This one nets out to a zero with the one preceding, but each produced a big change, albeit in opposite directions.)
Improved technology (Roundup, satellite recon, and arial spraying) for eliminating cocaine production in Columbia
Development of Roundup-impervious coca plants, permitting continued cocaine production in Columbia. Same situation as with marijuana above; it's a net zero. But each one individually has a big impact.
The theory of intelligent design, which now significantly prolongs the careers of thousands of brain-dead politicians.
Printer ink cartridges that are smart enough to refuse to print any more when the manufacturer needs more money. This has made possible very inexpensive printers.
Chemtrails
Tinfoil hats
After reading the first half of all the posts I'm surprised someone has mentioned...
*Drum Roll*
Viagra!!!
The Gift that keeps on giving.
I think it's more important than all the 'pr0n' recomendations... I mean... what good is that without the ability to keep the motor running?
just my 2c
#1 software innovation - Mozilla Firefox - Find as you type.
.. I keep pressing C-s in FireFox, so yes, it feels natural, I'll give them that. But it isn't excatly "innovation", is it?
Jesus Harold Christ! I mean, progressive search has been a part of emacs forever! Granted, you have to press C-s to activate it but it's the same thing
Genetically Modified Organisms (GMO).
Or, perhaps, a related technology like gene therapy.
---anactofgod---
"Equal opportunity swindling - *that* is the true test of a sustainable democracy."
After all he took the initiative to invent/create the Damn thing.
While I would probably disagree that urban warfare hasn't advanced since the pre-Vietnam era, He didn't limit it to urban warfare technology. In my opinion advances in sonar, deep sea diving, space exploration, radar tracking, and many others are all advancements that filter down to commercial applications.
If you blog it...
I just realized now that the article said last 25 years !!! Oh well, there goes 1/3 of my manhood.
Cheers,
Adolfo
.....unless there are non-medical uses for hearing aids that I'm unaware of.
It may be an older invention, but I would like to suggest the Calendar.
January 18 falls on Tuesday, not Sunday.
But they don't specify North or South Americans - presume they must mean both continents, which could affect the choices ;-)
No, really - the clipboard.
My use of computers has always involved the clipboard. I'm not old enough to have done a significant amount of work on machines that didn't have it in some form but it's always struck me as intriguing because it's the only part of most WIMP interfaces that gets heavily used yet doesn't feed back at all. It's invisible, and using it is more like using a *NIX CLUI, where commands only feed back when something goes wrong. That's the first thing I like about it.
When I use the clipboard a special part of my brain kicks in and starts working with the system. When I hit CTRL+C I remember not only the fact that there is something in the clipboard, but that it's relevant to the task I'm performing. Once that task has finished, or my use of the UI moves to something else, my mind marks the clipboard as "stale." Sometimes I suddenly recall that the thing I've currently got in the clipboard will help me. That same part of my mind marks it as "fresh" even if I didn't predict that it would when I made the clip. This is real "usability verses learnability" territory. But there's more.
That we owe a huge debt to the clipboard is apparent when you consider that just about all major content management projects depend on it. Despite the marketing mumbo about automating imports from "legacy formats," at some point in such projects a team of people will sit down with content in one format and copy/paste all or part of it into the format desired by the new CMS. I've been involved in too many CMS builds to think this doesn't happen. That it is usually cheaper to use a team of copy/paste monkeys than to design and test a transformation and load routine means that the practice isn't going to die out very soon. By that indication alone, the clipboard is probably the single most important piece of software for our "information age."
But there are problems. The clipboard would be top of my list of perfect OS utilities along with drag-and-drop and ALT+TAB. If only it wasn't for one thing: text formatting inheritance.
Perhaps my acute sensitivity to the utility of the clipboard has made me hyper-sensitive to the abomnible pain in the arse that is text formatting inheritance. Take a common example. I have a Word document in which there is a paragraph I want to copy to a PowerPoint slide I am writing. My Word document's text is in Arial Bold 12-point. I want to paste it into my PPT, which just happens to be using Futura Light 18-point at the point I want to insert the text. So I copy the text to the clipboard from Word, and paste it in. Only it goes in AS ARIAL BOLD 12-POINT.
Who in their right mind would want this to happen by default? Not only can you not turn this behaviours off in most applications, but there's not even a keystroke for "paste special" either. If you copy from a web browser into Word or another MS app, it'll attempt to paste it in as some godforsaken HTML table! Why? What's the point? I find myself then having to seek out "paste special" on the menu bar (no keystroke, remember) or using the formatting clone tool or something. So that's suddenly about five mouse gestures when it could have been two keystrokes. And it's not just limited to MS applications either. It happens to varying degrees with others as well.
How can this be a good idea? What have we done to deserve such as carbuncle on the otherwise perfect face of the clipboard? It's as if somebody (well, Microsoft mostly) have it in for the thing. The difficulties with text formatting inheritance is compounded by the strange and inexplicable existence of the "multiple clipboard" in, of all applications, Outlook (and some others I've encountered). You can't tell me they got that out of user testing: "You know, I've often wished I had the ability to put lots of things in my clipboard, but I'm not interested in being able to tell the difference between each clip - just give me an application icon for each. Oh, and when its full, ask me a difficult question about what to do so as to utterly break my concentration. And I don't want the ability to turn this behaviour off either."
Hmmm. Maybe I'll update that Wikipeodia entry later...
"And the meaning of words; when they cease to function; when will it start worrying you?"
How about the consumer video recorder (VHS or Betamax...take you pick)? Never before could the consumer time shift television shows.
# 1 = /.
Details at eleven! (Do not feed the anchor.)
-FL
#2, #3, #7, #8, #9, #15, #16, #18, #19, #22, #24 are consumer electronics. What is it, a hidden advertisement? Makes me wonder who paid for space shuttle, nanotechnology, or DNA fingerprinting to be in this list. Why truely innovative things, like the MRI, Hubble, fuel cells, artificial transplants are not in the list?
In theory there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice there is. - Yogi Berra
..that they were invented much earlier and began to commercialise before the 80s.
# Hi story
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integrated_circuit
(Yes, yes, never believe the Wikipedia article, so follow the links and do some other research.)
Let's see, January 18 is on Tuesday this year, so I guess this means we have to wait until 2009 to find out that #1 is the World Wide Web?
The whole reason HDTV exists is that broadcasters didn't want to give up their frequency bandwidth. The gov't wanted to take back some of the UHF bandwith and auction it off to the telcos. The broadcasters said "But we need it?". The gov't said "For what?" and they said "Umm..... Hi Definition TV!" The gov't agreed, only if they give back the analog evenutally (suppposedly this year, ha ha).
# Un ited_States
HD is nice and all, but was anyone clamoring for better looking TV back in the 80s? Could the gov't have used the few billion in spectrum auctions in a better way?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_Definition_TV
The article cites GPS, and I have no doubt they're going to cite the Internet. The original comment was talking about military technology as a category that was excluded, which wouldn't make sense unless they meant stuff that is still mainly military.
As far as warfare goes: control (as opposed to mere genocide, which is so easy it's routine) requires controlling cities. Controlling cities appears to be impossible anymore if the other side has RPGs and AK-47s and local support, no matter how studly your tanks are.
Whizzy technology is great for winning big flashy battles, but so what? The US and Russia still lost Vietnam, Afghanistan, Chechnya, Somalia, and Iraq, and Israel is at a permanent standstill with Palestine, and never mind their tremendous technological advantages.
Good stuff. Thanks.
I've seen a lot of good calls so far. Namely the I-Pod and Search Engines. I would probably guess that wireless networking is what will take the cake. I-pod really belongs under the portable computer section. Search engines could be it, but searching in one form or another was a more natural/necessary progression. Wireless networking is truly an innovation.
since he invented most of the items on the list.
2 major things since 1980.
Microbreweries and those
Super efficient High Intensity LEDs that use only 10% of what incandescent uses(and they come in White these days)
That is, automatically sliced bread.
the infrared remote control. What has impacted our daily lives more than that? I cringe at the thought of pressing a button on my actual TV.
They're not on the list and you see them carrying mysteriously hidden information everywhere: on products in shops, but also on concert tickets, train cards, suitcases and ups packages.
I for one welcome our, uh, new overlords.... now, where is that "learn Chinese in 49 days book ..."
Give a man a fish and you have fed him for today. Teach a man to fish, and he'll say "WHERE'S MY FISH, YOU IDIOT?"
the 80186! I mean, the Z8000! no, the DEC Alpha! Wait, no, no, it's the Itanium!
So does that mean we're gonna get another dupe in a few days?
The best weapon of a dictatorship is secrecy, but the best weapon of a democracy should be the weapon of openness.
Top Innovations of the Past Years
Couldn't be communications satellites as they are more than 25 years old (even in reality, not just Arthur C. Clarke's article in Wireless World - that is more than 50 years ago). Remember Telstar?
Praised and adored by lonely and dateless geeks everywhere, the "Real Doll" was voted to be the most important invention of the last 25 years.
Biggest flop maybe.
word.
Since the list contains a number of innovations that I don't see lying around or cavorting in my apartment like the space shuttle (No. 25), plasma TV (No. 18) and my personal nanobot floor cleaner (No. 21), the technology experts consulted by CNN should have included even more gee-whiz conceptware such as space elevators (demonstrated to be plausible by the inventor of the communication satellite), air-breathing rockets and Matrix-style (jack me in, Scotty) virtual reality? Hmm, why is virtual reality -- even in its tepid VR glasses form -- not in the list? My choice for No. 1 is a toss-up between the AIBO and the Honda robot.
I'm a sci-fi vegan: I don't want the aliens to think we have as much right to live as the fried chickens we eat.
The best weapon of a dictatorship is secrecy, but the best weapon of a democracy should be the weapon of openness.
Just imagine trying to live withough them.
But it will probably be the Internet.
I watch Brit Hume on Fox News
Now I can watch my porn in different angles! Woohooo!!!
This is better than Jolt!
#2 Cell phones
#3 PCs
#4 Fiber Optics
#5 Email
#6 GPS
#7 Laptops
#8 CDs
#9 Digital Cameras
#10 RFID (radio frequency id tags)
#11 MEMS (microelectromechanical system)
#12 DNA fingerprinting
#13 Airbags
#14 ATM
#15 Lithium-ion batteries
#16 Hybrid cars
#17 Organic light-emitting diodes
#18 Plasma Screen TVs
#19 HDTV
#20 Space Shuttle
#21 Nanotechnology
#22 Flash memory
#23 Voicemail
#24 Modern hearing aids
#25 High Frequency Radio (WIFI)
"(Innovation is) an idea, practice, or object that is perceived as new by an individual or other unit of adoption." - Everett M. Rogers, 1995
..
I had written a harsh retort to this trite list before I stopped to think what the article meant by innovation. Certainly half this is list not new, but new to the masses and not just the elite few. Because that is what innovation is in a capitalist economy is not it's invention but how to bring it to market for the masses. Also, I doubt OLEDs, MEMs, RFID and Memory storage discs are readily recognizable unless you tell people how they are used. (TV/displays, Air Bags, Gov't conspiracies and CD/DVDs)
The space shuttle program was signed into law by Nixon, but wasn't used till the 80's. E-mail has been around since the 60's but not used by everyone until the early 90's. The military has been using GPS since '78 (just missed it) but hikers couldn't get it in a handheld till the mid 90s. etc etc
Just another "look how clever we are compared to the rest of history" feel good piece.
Innovations I think not. CNN again misunderstands the concept of innovations, or really, are they trying to sell something (typical of corporate media)?. I felt like I just read a Fox News article. This list is really the top 25 [electronic] consumer products in the last 20-odd years, only 2-3 (fiber, MEMs, DNA) of them are really innovations.
Top innovation? Object oriented programming. Duh.
Then again we are the consumer society.
I wonder if its the internet (which CNN could also call the WWW)?
V1A%GRA
SIG: TAKE OFF EVERY 'CAPTAIN'!!
It is CNN. Obviously it is going to be cable TV.
My guess for for the #1 innovation in the past 25 years is so-called "Reaganomics" (really just economics as understood since at least the 18th century). Sorry Slashdot, it won't be you.
Slashdot: Playing Favorites Since 1997
"And digital cameras would not exist without flash memory (No. 22) and OLEDs (organic light-emitting diodes, No. 17)." Digital cameras with OLEDs aren't even commercially available yet so how could they be an integral part of digital cameras? Sure there is one to be released but from what he is saying suggests that without OLED's that digital cameras woulden't exist.
411 Y0UR 8453 4R3 8310NG 70 U5!! -NSA
...will be the Cable News Network, I presume.
SIG: TAKE OFF EVERY 'CAPTAIN'!!
OK, I didn't read the article yet, but how can they claim PCs and email were innovations from the past 25 years? That only goes back to 1980, and both PCs and email were around years before then. In email's case, long before then. Re-writing history, are we? Or does it only count as a PC when IBM came out with their version? That would ignore the Commodore, Tandy, Apple, and others. All were PCs, in the sense that they were Personal Computers.
It may not be the most cutting edge, but I bless the inventor of the gas pump that takes ATM/credit cards. I won't go to stations without them.
Read teh subject.
From my limited perspective of life, Litium-Polymer batteries is an extraordinary invention that is currently starting to be used in more expensive appliances, but as time progresses will bring entirely new levels of performance from battery powered equipment of any kind.
Who could live without Post-Its(tm)?!!
The description at the beginning of the article specifies "25 non-medically related technological innovations that have become widely used since 1980". As far as I know gene therapy is distinctly medical.
While GM in general may not be, it has been in use in agriculture (where it has most substantially advanced) since the dawn of human society, so I'd hardly call it an innovation of the past 25 years.
I can't say that I know when these items first hit it big, but they are definately a part of modern life and they were certainly innovative at the time.
Marques Johansson
The Byte
----------
"Duffman says a lot of things, OH YEAH!" - Duffman
"Smaller then me."
actually this keyboard is made up of atoms, therefore it's nanotech.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
or Gene Simons.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
systems were being connected in the 70s. It was not the internet.
To call it the internet would be like calling my Lan the internet. OR like calling the foundation to my house my home.
The internet as we know it wouldn't exist without tdp/ip* It's like calling the first wheel a car.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
I WWWonder WWWhat it WWWill be.
Steve Magruder, Metro Foodist
ADvertising would be a lot more difficult, as would selling a product. thus less people on the net.
Fewer ways to get someons email address. less spam.
People who say shit for the sole purpose of gaing attention would be less.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
I'm betting on the Pet Foil Hat Technology. After all, CNN featured it on their Headline News channel in October of 2003.
Saskboy's blog is good. 9 out of 10 dentists agree.
If you take a look at the cell phone, it says calling... internet. case closed.
Slashdot maybe? ;-)
I don't believe all of these are worthy of being considered #1 but they all should have been on the the list:
Internet (TCP/IP). Unquestionably #1. Almost everything else on the list depends on this 85 page agreement.
World Wide Web/HTTP. Comparable to the invention of the printing press in historical importance. Not #1 only because it is up against TCP/IP.
Anti-lock Brakes. Aside from saving lives and money, this is a huge step towards the acceptance of drive-by-wire and fully automated driving.
The Mars Rovers. Not so much for what they are but for what they have accomplished. Proof of concept that unmanned, self-propelled robots are the way to go for most current extraplanetary needs.
Prediction: The MD robots will successfully fix the Hubble and go on to a long and underappreciated career as an orbital version of the AAA.
One suggested sub:
#8 Commercial Optical Media (memory storage disks have been around a while)
Interesting point, but be careful not to overrate this. GMOs pose a really big opportunity - but their potential is only rudimentarily tapped. I would have chosen the method of gene manipulation as such - the technique itself is the big concept, its applications are somewhat lacking up to now. Especially if you look at gene therapy, which simply does not work at the moment.
This comment does not exist.
Microsoft windows, you insensitive CLOD!!! oh wait... i thought it was a poll
My Aurora : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o91ZsGwJYyg
FB : https://www.facebook.com/TanveersPhotography
"the www" (http + html, early 80s).
I didn't realize 1991 was in the "early 80s".
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum sonatur.
Rigged voting machines. oh wait. that'd be fox news' pick.
so very, very, very lame ...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Widget
I take issue with the list:
6. Commercialized GPS
yes, because anything commercialized automatically makes it a great innovation...now GPS in general, THAT would be an innovation...Why did they specify 'commercialized' GPS? To differentiate it from military GPS?
9. Consumer level digital camera
Why is this an innovation? It doesn't bring any great things to consumers. Sure, it's convenient. But it doesn't change the world like the computer and internet (which will be #1) have done. Plus, why is it innovative when DIGITAL CAMERAS don't even make the list!
19. HDTV
Umm...isn't HDTV just TV with more scanlines? Why is this an innovation? I know, I'll innovate right now! How about 10000p instead of the 1080p? WOOHOO I JUST INNOVATED! It wouldn't take a genius to make a higher-scanlines TV, and as we've all just seen, it doesn't take a genius to come up with the idea of higher scanlines.
The IR Remote Control
Only time I ever needed them the damn things didn't work.. some innovation that was!
From an old slashdot post:
what a stupid list. Sure they got some of the things that should be there (like cell phones, PCs, etc), even still a lot of those things are really just things that got popular in the last 25 years, not invented... almost half that list!
HDTV? I dont know anybody that has one. Sure hasnt effected the lives of anybody I know. Change this one to TIVO.
Space Shuttle? A pile of crap! A representation of inovations that result from wasting lots of money on a bad design. Change this to Space Ship One.
OLEDs? OK yeah they were invented, but havent yet had a real impact... Change this to high-power LEDs, IE laser diodes, blue and white leds, etc.
My favorit is the idiot at MIT: "Flash memory is a tiny version of the disk drive that's in your computer," said Gene Fitzgerald, MIT professor of material science and engineering"
What? Flash memory is not even remotely like a disk drive other than that it stores things. I hope he was just misqouted or taken out of context..
And what's number 1? Gotta be the World Wide Web, right?
What about the GUI that made computers so usable for everybody?
-- Senior Software Engineer, Attorney appearance services, locallawyerapp.com.
HDTV is also up there. Apparently, the ability to watch television at %50 higher resolution trumps things like desktop publishing / personal printers. 6,000 dollar flat-panel plasma displays are also a great innovation, trumping MP3's in terms of consumer awareness and usage. And while MEMS is a great technology, I did have to google it to know what the heck they were talking about. VCR's didn't make the list, neither did CDs/optical media. e-ticketing. Anti-Lock breaks. They list "display panels," but that's such a broad category that it includes the oscilloscope as well as several of the other things on their list.
Now, it is arguable that older technologys would be unfairly represented because they have had the largest time to make the biggest impact, but Plasma-screens? That's one of dozens of competing technologies, one with major shortcomings, and whose claim to fame is that it makes a slightly better television watching experience. If anything TIVO deserves that slot.
In other words, yes, the list is broken. It's CNN. What do you expect, a thorough investigation?
The ______ Agenda
* non-medically related technological innovations
check (it's definitly technological, think of all the research that has gone into avoiding anti-spam technology!)
* that have become widely used since 1980
check
* are readily recognizable by most Americans
check
* have had a direct and perceptible impact on our everyday lives
check
* and/or could dramatically affect our lives in the future
double check (how else are we going to find p0rn, vi@gra, or r0llex watches?)
Remember, "TOP" innovation could be evil ones too!
Warning: Sig Fault. Dumping warp core.
Um, correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't e-mail invented more than 25 years ago?
Personally I think spreadsheets should be somewhere on that list if we're talking about computer innovations in particular (this being Slashdot and all)...
Probably not #1, but two of my favorites.
Apart from possible debate about being an innovation of the last 25 years, (the program started on january 5, 1972, yet the first launch was on april 12, 1981) I would like to argue that it belongs on this list. /.ers, but I wouldn't speak of the space shuttle as being widely used.
It's on the list because of the fact that it has 'brought to life concepts formerly reserved for science-fiction writers', but if - *if* - that would be true, the space shuttle didn't do that, but Yuri Gagarin did.
Even more so the space shuttle doesn't follow the criteria set by CNN for this list: 'non-medically related technological innovations that have become widely used since 1980'
I don't know for you
Bill Gates, for his contribution to Internet Explorer viruses!
(APPLAUSE)
The new George Foreman Web Browser - knocks out the FAT from your web-surfing experience!
:)
Don't you rather mean the Computer Cookery 5000? It lets the Intel Pentium Prescott (TM) do the cooking for you!
The sound of a "consumerist whore" switching HDTV channels.
No TV has to be fitted with HDTV receivers, because there is no such thing. There ARE ATSC receivers
-1 Pedantic. The media and manufacturers label ATSC receivers as "HDTV tuners". So let's return to the point of the argument: With the continued jobless growth of the U.S. economy, how will the lower 30 percent of wage earners, who can't afford cable or satellite TV, afford to purchase an $250 ATSC receiver for their $100 TV?
Dean Kamen, Steve Jobs, Warren Buffet and Bill Gates all can't be wrong.
"Microsoft has made computing accessible to a population who would otherwise not be able to use computers" - B. Kernigha
Etc, etc
And BTW, e-mail is older than 25 years.
C'mon !! They are everywhere !!
Three words: Clumping Cat Litter
I'm happily running NetBSD 2.0 with my Netgear WG311T wireless card, and I was pleasantly surprised at how seemless the whole process was. (Finding the right card was the trick).
Yes, it is often a trick to find compatible hardware for a minority OS. There are more Freegear, Opengear, Macgear, Linuxgear, and especially Wingear wireless cards.
But, if [Gillette] can bring out a vibrating razor ... I wonder how the [marketing] meeting went? Did the guy hold out a normal razor with his wifes pink passion super bunny duct-taped to the side of it?
I saw more connection to Norelco's "Lift and Cut" battery-powered rotating-blade razors than to any sex toy.
I would say, the #1 is microprocessor. ...
but, it's more than 25 years ago.
hmm
The list is missing innovations from other areas than computer technology. So I miss biology (e.g. genetic engineering) and medicine. Also we made interesting discoveries in social, political and economic science.
Get a bunch of unknown people or C-rate actors together, get them to do unmentionable things for dirt cheap, point some cameras at them, and make billions. Friggin Brilliant!
Definitely Auto-Suck!
http://www.ehsports.com/ Basketball Broadcast
How else would geeks get laid!
If GPS were not mentioned, I would put geostationery satellites at the top. So if high content broadcasting is not in need of mention, I would guess No. 1 is the internet (as seems to be the consensus).
K.
Of course the #1 Innovation will be CNN.
This was the favourite once, being useful to the poor in stricken areas as an invaluable informaion source.
K.
The Web Browser changed the internet from data to information.
Of course, that's what's missing!
K.
They will most certainly say it is the Internet, although the Internet was created more than 25 years ago. They did put "commercialized GPS" on the list, so I imagine that's a clue that they'll say "commercialized DARPAnet"
Also, the list is supposed to be non-medical, so why are Hearing Aids and DNA Fingerprinting on the list?
c'mon: it's revolutionized the way we think. people now have the power.
Al Gore !NEVER! claimed to have designed a city around the Segway!! Will you people stop saying that!!!
I have to stop wasting so much time reading Slashdot. It's interfering with my crystal meth addiction.
MP3s anyone?
It'd has to be the yellow line representing the first down marker on televised football games. Anybody who watches sports will agree it is the best sports innovation in the past 20 years!!!!!!!
CNN's choice for greatest innovation will be "24 hour news coverage."
He who reflects on another man`s want of breeding, shows he wants it as much himself --Julius Caesar, per Plutarch
Send all jobs to India/China and claim that it is good for the country.
Electronic Voting machine to rig the elections. The Bush Sr has done this all over the third world when he was CIA chief. Now He has helped his son to win the election.
It's going to be the toilet, of course. Technology historians -love- the toilet.
[insert witty quote here]
According to Wikipedia, the first barcode was on a 10 pack of Wrigley's Juicy Fruit in 1974, although it was deleveloped about 20 years before that. Given some of the other examples in this list, hoewver, I woiuld not be surprised to see them put it on there.
Skeptical Limericks
is what my gf would say...if I had one that is...
I think when people look back from the future, peer to peer as a generic information distribution methodology rather than just a file sharing system could possibly become worthy of #1, although of course I'm certain that it's not the #1 for CNN right now.
When considering the implications this model could have applied to industries where it has not yet the potential is interesting. For example, people have been talking about a peer to peer energy grid which allows every consumer to also be a producer which combined with hydrogen cells (why aren't these on the list btw???) could cause lots of microproducers to solve the coming energy crisis. You could change communication networks to peer to peer. You could have automated cars running on peer to peer for traffic handling.
I think it has the potential to be one of those fundamentally new interdisciplinary ways of approaching all kinds of problems that has a massive impact on the way we live our lives.
Just like ecommerce wouldn't be where it is today without the porn business pioneering the whole thing, peer to peer born on the back of copyright infringement could become an industry shaker too.
There's a type of fabric that's been invented recently that breathes but only transfers moisture in a single direction - outwards. I understand police have hailed this as a revolution in law enforcement as they can now walk the beat under pretty much any circumstances. I don't know what it's called, but this is just one area where it's had an effect. I'd think this a lot more significant in the long term than something as vague as "voice mail" which isn't even a technology.
Believe with me, my saplings.
While all of the innovations in the article were good innovations (i.e., used mostly for good purposes), I think that bad innovations (innovations used mostly for immoral purposes) should also be considered.
In that vein, I would say that truck bombs, using passenger planes as cruise missiles, mailing anthrax, and other new methods of terrorism could be considered among the top 25 innovations, if you consider the effects that they have had on our society.
Look at how much such terrorist acts have changed the world, in terms of making many governments more authoritarian (and some more militarily aggressive), and making average people even more sheep-like, than ever before.
Those who sacrifice security to condemn liberty deserve to repeat history or something. - Benjamin Santayana
Those high tech Japanese Toilets...
now that is innovation.
-metric
Fifth Element levitation vehicles will need most of those items. Interesting, how sometimes an invention is preceded by the stuff it needs. It's almost like watching an invention coming backwards. I presently have the system for levitation. It produces an overabundance of upward thrust that will overcome gravity. I'm still trying to figure out How To Get Paid because it's so simple. Once I release it every 5th grader will know how it works. So right now I just have to sit on it, post anonymously as a way to start the idea rolling that it's no longer wishful thinking. I look forward to SlashDot pursuing the money solution for inventors so we can go forward.
#1 has to be the little blue pill! Just ask Bob Dole!
Saving the lives of people too stupid to wear setbelts since 1980.
NBC remade "Coupling" in the US last year. It lasted about 4 episodes. It was OK, but I'm sure they failed to include any of the feel/humor from the original UK series.
Software sucks. Open Source sucks less.
My vote would be for the microwave... home-made fast food! I never would have survived without it.
electing anyone called 'U'.
oh - maybe it didn't come about in the last 25 years, but unless you're all living in a different year, the 18th is a Tuesday. Who proofreads these things?
The internet as we know it grew from the arpanet backbone.
Arpanet officialy adopted TCP/IP in 1982. In 1985 NSFNET was concieved. The National Science Foundation provided funding to extend networking for academic environments as long as all qualified users on campus had access. This was intended to promote its uses outside of the computer science and hard science departments where arpanet access had previously been isolated. Commercial traffic on the backbone was excluded until 1991.
Prior to 1991 purely commercial enterprises relied on leased lines, or on uucp based networking which provided a hiearchical store and forward architecture for email, file transfer, and remote command execution based on periodic telephone calls among interconnected sets of nodes each of which would typically call or accept calls from only a handful of nodes (a few lower in the tree and typically 1 closer to the root).
Only after 1991 did companies and individuals have unfettered access to the global TCP/IP backbone.
Thus, the internet as we know it is less than 25.