11 Modern Technologies That Are Way Older Than You Think

By Juan Arteaga, Danny Harkins, from Cracked.com

For a long time, we’ve been able to pride ourselves on the fact that we’re smarter than our primitive ancestors. Sure, they made fire and the wheel and invented language, or whatever, but we brought technology.

Turns out a lot of our most technologically sophisticated inventions were already invented, which does nothing but remind us how useless we are.
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#11.           iPod

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Believed to have been invented in…

In 2001, if you are a die hard Mac fan. Or 1997, if you are aware cheaper MP3 players existed before Steve Jobs figured out people would pay twice as much to hear their pirated songs on the bus if the MP3 player looked like the bastard son of Eve from Wall-E and a pocket calculator.

Actually Invented in…

In 1979, Kane Kramer and his friend, James Campbell, came up with the idea of a portable music player the size of a cigarette box. The music player baptized as the IXI System stored music digitally in a chip and had a display screen and buttons to navigate it.

They even built five prototypes they showed potential investors. Wow! That sounds amazing! So they sold it, became gazillionaires and everybody listened to ABBA songs they downloaded with their Ataris, right? Well, no, obviously not.

The IXI had one big problem: It only had enough memory for three and a half minutes of music, which does screw you up if you had your heart set on carrying “In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida” anywhere you went. And how were you supposed to get your music files back in the decades before Napster?

Since almost nobody had computers in those days, Kramer suggested putting terminals in music stores, connected via telephone with a central music server so users could buy and download their music at the store. Keep in mind we’re talking about 1979 phone modems, which means Kramer’s idea also involved people bringing their own tent and enough food for camping for two months while they downloaded “Funky Town.”

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33 Things Women Need To Stop Doing. Immediately.

34. Innately assuming this list will be sexist.

Terrifying Two-Sentence Horror Stories

The normally comforting faint glow in the corner of the room now meant nothing against the pain and anguish that greeting me on the screen. “Cannot find wireless network”.

The Nine Greatest Nerd Fears of 2011

The Avengers Being Shitty

First of all– let’s realize how crazy it is that The Avengers is a real thing in the first place. Marvel had to launch 4 individual characters in 4 films (5 if you count the Eric Bana Hulk, which no one ever would for any reason), weave SHIELD into the story (even if they didn’t do too great of a job), and make sure all of the films felt as though they could exist in the same universe. That’s a hell of a lot of groundwork to lay – and given how much trouble WB’s had launching non-Batman films (Green Lantern, Superman Returns), we know how easily it could’ve been messed up.

That being said…I’m terrified, and we all should be terrified. Trying to take 4 characters that have only been used as leads and forcing them to be supporting actors in a larger story is not an easy thing to do (especially since they also need to share screen-time with Hawkeye, Black Widow, and Samuel L. Fury). Trying to find the right epic, satisfying story is not an easy thing to do (luckily Joss Whedon is pretty great at taking large groups and working them into teams with great stories). And even though Joss Whedon is helming this thing, he’s going to be hamstrung at every point by studio executives. Especially because this is the only movie Joss Whedon’s ever done that wasn’t a movie based on his own canceled TV show. But most importantly, the hype around this thing will be almost impossible to live up to at this point. Then again, all it needs to really be is The Single Greatest Movie Of All-Time, how hard should that be?
ANDREW BRIDGMAN
@pubegoldberg
December 6, 2011

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20 Things I Should Have Known at 20

By Julien Smith, original posted on inoveryourhead.net

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1. The world is trying to keep you stupid. From bank fees to interest rates to miracle diets,people who are not educated are easier to get money from and easier to lead. Educate yourself as much as possible for wealth, independence, and happiness.

2. Do not have faith in institutions to educate you. By the time they build the curriculum, it’s likely that the system is outdated– sometimes utterly broken. You both learn and get respect from people worth getting it from by leading and doing, not by following.

3. Read as much as you can. Learn to speed read with high retention.Emerson Spartz taught me this while I was at a Summit Series event. If he reads 2-3 books a week, you can read one.

4. Connect with everyone, all the time. Be genuine about it. Learn to find something you like in each person, and then speak to that thing.

5. Don’t waste time being shy. Shyness is the belief that your emotions should be the arbitrators of your decision making process when the opposite is actually true.

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