And what do you do when carbonite or mozy go out of business next week?
I was saying you should not use carbonite or mozy. So...nothing?
Also I really doubt your data on their servers is private, so if you work at home or have personal account information, you don't want that information sitting on a stranger's computer.
If you back up local to an external HD no-one knows whats on your computer but you...and that drives them insane.
The list is pretty stupid if you take the headline seriously. It's a much better list if you take it as a list of things you should consider why you are buying them.
DVD - sure, it costs the same as two tickets to the movies or less, and you have it indefinitely in theory, but if you only watch it once, why didn't you just rent it?
home telephone will probably be around for at least another decade, if not longer. It might be VOIP then, but even that switchover will probably take some time. but if you pay for a cell phone already, why do you bother?
External hard drives - Need to back up gigs and gigs fast? Sure. Need to backup a couple hundred megs of important stuff, there are cheaper options.
smartphone also rans? - backing a loser? why pay for it. NOt really anything to do with any particular year or tech development, but yeah, sure, why not.
compact digital cameras? - is there a reason to not stick with your cell phone or step up to a DSLR? (the answer is probably yes). Honestly the cell phone is the bigger competitor for most people.
Newspaper sub? - Hey, i don't want the paper piling up for recycling, and now that I CAN get an electronic subscription, their content sucks and is less relevant than ever. But there's still a TON of information we consume for free that originates with the aging system of news and reporting, and we have no real replacement for it.
CDs? - Totally disagree with this one. For the most part I can get them at a price that matches the $1 a song download. Even cheaper if I buy used. I can rip it, and I don't have to deal with idiotic DRM and can get good sound in the format i want on the device I want. It's still the best quality, least encumbered format. ANd if you are less honest, you can rip them to lossless and sell it used to bring the price per song WAY under $1 a pop.
College textbooks - Face it you will buy what they make you buy, just like the last 30 years. It's a paradigm waiting to be shifted, but that game changing move hasn't hit the scene yet.
Gas guzzling cars - you won't dodge increasing efficiency, but they'll be around a while. You probably SHOULD buy the more sensible car, but heck that's been true since the first car rolled off the production line.
Energy inefficient homes and appliances - Some "efficient" appliances aren't if you look at the increased initial cost and lifetime. But more people will be looking at efficiency in deciding should I buy it. Efficient homes however, you really aren't going to have as big a choice. Heck when you ahve 100 year old homes on the market, you have a long way to go to have energy sensible design be a big issue in the purchasing of most homes. most sales aren't new construction.
logikal_x
External hard drives made the list which i find ridiculous. Backing up to the internet is slow and tedious, and if you do lose data, restoring from the internet is even more slow and tedious. External disks are far better for personal backup than carbonite or mozy, and will continue to be unless internet speeds somehow exceed external drive speeds (never going to happen) GFL