I still get the yellow pages phone books and I find them invaluable. since the Pennysaver was shitcanned some years ago, I don’t know where else I would find plumbers, lawn cutters, handymen, snow plowers, etc. Craigslist is USELESS. Craigslist is for hooking up with whores and sugar daddies, and band gigs. A bunch of phone numbers, to call, out into the void. I want to know where and what a business is, what it does, a contact number, maybe a review.
I don’t suppose they are as noisy as they used to be. When I was a kid and needed an alarm clock for the first time, I was given a hand-me-down clock radio with the split-flap numbers (cool name!). The grinding & flipping noises (not LOUD, but very noticeable, especially when trying to fall asleep) it made took some weeks to get used to sleeping with.
Almost all computers produced in the last ten years have shipped without floppy disk drives. Ten years ago, it required a special order to get them. Today, I would wager it might not even be an option.
You can still get them though very easily. The most common choices are USB connected floppy drives but they are cheap and easy to get. Even integrated floppy drives are still possible even for 5 1/4" models. Much of my job in IT is keeping ‘legacy systems’ up and running because the company I work for is only slightly less resistant to change than the federal government (who still run nuclear silos plus many other things on 1960’s and 1970’s technology with 8" floppy drives and defunct systems in all other contexts).
The interfaces you need to support such things get updated but the core technology is still very much the same. You would be surprised with how far back you can go if you are willing to connect a few parts and pieces of software together even for completely new systems that have to talk to older ones. I still have to support a whole slew of serial connections that were first developed in the 1950’s.
Here is a video of someone getting a modem from 1964 (with a wooden case no less) to work with a new computer. It will still work if you really need it to.
Pinball is a unique situation: it could quadruple in popularity as a pastime while only increasing the market demand for new machines by the single digits. My local spot has a dozen or so machines and i don’t get bored as long as they switch out one a month. So there’s a lot of back catalog and it’s hard to run out. Compare this to LPs as a niche market, which requires constant new pressings to satisfy buyers.
Umm… You obviously have a computer, and an internet connection. At least IMHO, all the info you described is much easier to find online.
You find reviews in the Yellow Pages?
(I’ve never used Craigslist, no point in it IMHO)
Actually, I find businesses listed in the Yellow Pages (yes, I can also look them up on the computer) and check them out online. Sometimes there are places to read reviews like Angie’s List. It’s Craigslist I have a problem with, the couple of times I’ve tried looking there. All I found were names and cell phone numbers, often not any addresses - I didn’t know where the businesses I was looking at were located. I guess I’m doing it wrong.
It is inconvenient for me to use any business that doesn’t have at least a basic working website with some sort of contact function, if not a complete online ordering/reservation system w/ live chat and active social media profiles. Even my elderly relatives read online reviews and use search engines and well known sites where most reputable businesses are easily found.
I read a post on a credit forum recently from someone who owed 20 grand on their Yellow Pages advertising and were sent to collections. So I guess they still do a good job selling them. My Grandfather paid for a business listing in the phone book until his death a few years ago, even though he hadn’t worked much in 17 years and not at all for a decade.
My Birkenstocks are on their third set of footbeds. It costs $60. High quality hiking boots are also resoled.