PS/2 keyboards and mice could be added to the list of disappearing products. I needed to buy a new computer keyboard the other night. Since it was late at night and I didn’t want to wait until the next day or drive halfway across town to get it I went to Wal-Mart for the keyboard. I wanted to get a PS/2 keyboard since I like to keep my USB ports open for use with other devices (I even have an expansion hub). All they had were USB keyboards, as it turned out, so that’s what I got. I have a feeling the availability would have been much the same at Best Buy or Circuit City.
These are all over the place! I could buy them by the truck load just taking a walk up Yonge Street in Toronto or the Annex.
During our home renos I got to see a lot of different counter tops. Formica is alive and doing very, very well with a few hundred patterns currently on the market.
They also used to be right next to the powdered soap dispenser thingy. You’d turn a crank that would, I assume, grind you some soap from a block. Kind of like a white, square pepper mill that had soap instead of pepper inside.
Hey, they still make the cloth towel dispensers! And here’s a much more aerodynamic looking soap grinder/dispenser than the ones I remember.
I have to get one of those.
Er… sorry about the um, triple post. (I got all excited when I found the towel dispenser.)
Most bottle brushes are in the baby section, but you can also find them in outdoor equipment or bike shops.
As for things that are slowly disappearing: PDAs. Smartphones and iPods have almost completely taken over the market.
Jonathan
I’ve never seen the soap grinders before! That’s actually a neat idea.
Not my stuff, I’m not a photographer, but that’s what I’ve heard. Gee, I always thought it must have been sent to Japan or somewhere; didn’t realize it was going that far.
Oops! I was thinking of Bacon Bits. My bad. :o
But come on over anyway … as long as our airports aren’t shut down by protesters.
No one’s mentioned incandescent light bulbs? Barring a technological breakthrough, they will be forced off the market over the next few years.
I have a manual transmission in my 2004 Ford Focus - and I didn’t even have to ask for it, I was able to drive it off the lot same day I bought it. I was in the market for the cheapest new car I could get, and an automatic would’ve cost more. So, at least at that point, they were/are still standard in inexpensive cars.
They gave us those nice bright colors, they gave us the greens of summers…
pours a shot on the ground for the homies
Straight alpine recreational skis and narrow telemark racing skis are both close to extinct. I am not aware of any recent births in either species.
The local Walmart here has men’s handkerchiefs.
Put me down as another Kodachrome fan.
Why on Earth should Thermoses go extinct? What has replaced them? 
Re manual transmission on cars, I’d be utterly amazed if that dies out. The vast majority of cars sold in Europe are manual. From the NYT in 2001:
I was trying to find some more up-to-date figures, and Wikipedia says that as of 2008, over 75% of cars built in western Europe have manual transmission. I don’t think I know anyone that owns an automatic, and the only time I’ve ever driven one was when I rented a car in California and they didn’t have any manual options.
Actually, not only are men’s handkerchiefs available here, they’re a common gift at funerals. At many funerals, people attending get some sort of dorky little gift, and handkerchiefs are high up on the list. I try to avoid funerals, but the wife has brought me a few handkerchiefs back. Towels are a big item, too, and we still have a couple of thin low-quality towels that were left over from my father-in-law or mother-in-law’s funeral.
I’ve wondered for a long time about something. Is there somewhere that keeps track of the last game made for each console?
I heard that Madden '08 was the last Gamecube game, but is there somewhere that lists the final game released for each system?
These would count as dying products. For example, what was the final PSOne game? NES? SNES? Genesis? N64?
Damn. In the clinic/hospital where my dad worked for most of his career, one of those was still in the lobby about 20 years ago.
You kinda had me freaked out for a minute until I realized where you were from. Those are still all over the place in the rural US. My grandparents had one of those in their driveway, and I still feel all warm and fuzzy with nostalgia when I see that white-green beacon from some distant farm piercing the darkness when I’m driving through the sticks at night.
I remember how cool I thought it was how a 56.6k modem was free (standard) in the Dell my parents bought me when I went to college. How many computers these days even have THAT anymore?
During summers in high school in college, I worked in medical records in my dad’s hospital system. In 2002, that system bought out their rival facility in the area, and I helped them clean out old equipment and stuff when I was home that summer. They tossed out a bunch of obsolete and/or broken computer equipment, including a variety of external modems from US Robotics. I rescued a 14.4, 28.8, 33.6, and a 56.6k from the trash, albeit without their power cords. That was 6 years ago, and I still have them in my parents’ basement back home. I wonder if they’ll ever be worth anything?
Modems? Gandalf, R.I.P.
All of these are licensed US releases; unlicensed titles may come out years later (such as Beggar Prince for Genesis in 2006), and other regions may see later releases as well, sometimes well past when the console itself has been discontinued (like licensed Japanese Dreamcast releases in 2007).
SMS: Sonic the Hedgehog, 1991
NES: Wario’s Woods, 1994
SNES: Frogger, 1998
Genesis: Frogger, 1998
Saturn: Magic Knight Rayearth, 1998
Dreamcast: NFL 2K2, 2002
N64: Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3, 2002
PS1: FIFA Soccer 2005, 2004
I don’t think there’s a FAQ out there or anything that specifically lists last games for various systems, but most of the above was relatively easy to find.
That one boggle my mind too. Thermos has a pretty vast array of products and we recently bought a few of the “food jars” so I can take a small one of yogurt and a large one of soup to work and keep the one cool and the other warm. We also have several that we take with us camping when we want to be able to have hot coffee with our snacks.
Given the way some local governments are adding surcharges for bottles and the huge popularity of travel mugs and Nalgene sports bottles, I can’t imagine Thermoses will be going anywhere for generations.
Wiki says the last 1st-party (ie., published by Nintendo) release for the SNES was Kirby’s Dream Land 3 in November '97, and the last licensed release was Metal Slader Glory Director’s Cut in December '00, but that was Japan-only.
Remember beepers? You dialed the number and put in your number and the # sign and the person called you back?
Cell phones destroyed that industry.
ETA: Remember when car phones were a big deal? I don’t know anyone who has a stationary phone in their car anymore.