SentFrom.Us/Extinct
Research has shown that there are
24 things about to become extinct in the USA:
24. Yellow Pages
This year
will be pivotal for the global Yellow Pages industry. Much
like newspapers, print Yellow Pages will continue to bleed dollars
to their various digital counterparts, from Internet Yellow
Pages (IYPs), to local search engines and combination
search/listing services like Reach Local
and Yodle Factors like an acceleration of the print 'fade rate'
and the looming recession will contribute to the onslaught. One
research firm predicts the falloff in usage of newspapers and
print Yellow Pages could even reach 10% this year -- much higher
than the 2-3% fade rate seen in past years.
23.
Classified Ads
The Internet
has made so many things obsolete that newspaper classified ads
might sound like just another trivial item on a long list. But
this is one of those harbingers of the future that could signal
the end of civilization as we know it. The
argument is that if newspaper classifieds are replaced by free
online listings at sites like Craigslist.org and Google Base,
then newspapers are not far behind them.
22. Movie
Rental Stores
While
Netflix is looking up at the moment, Blockbuster keeps closing
store locations by the hundreds. It
still has about 6,000 left across the world, but those keep
dwindling, and the stock is down considerably in 2008,
especially since the company gave up a quest of Circuit City. Movie
Gallery, which owned the Hollywood Video brand, closed up shop
earlier this year. Countless small video chains and
mom-and-pop stores have given up the ghost already.
21. Dial-up
Internet Access
Dial-up
connections have fallen from 40% in 2001 to 10% in 2008. Just
ask NetZero. The
combination of an infrastructure to accommodate affordable
high speed Internet connections and the disappearing 20 home
phone have all but pounded the final nail in the coffin of
dial-up Internet access.
20. Phone
Landlines
According to
a survey from the National Center for Health Statistics, at the end
of 2007, nearly one in six homes was cell-only and, of those
homes that had landlines, one in eight only received calls on
their cells.
19. Chesapeake Bay Blue Crabs
Maryland's
icon, the blue crab, has been fading away in Chesapeake
Bay. Last
year Maryland saw the lowest
harvest (22 million pounds) since 1945. Just
four decades ago the bay produced 96 million pounds. The
population is down 70% since 1990, when they first d id a
formal count. There are only about 120 million crabs in the bay
and they think they need 200 million for a sustainable
population. Over-fishing,
pollution, invasive species and global warming get the blame.
18. VCRs
For the
better part of three decades, the VCR was a best-seller and
staple in every American household until being
completely decimated by the DVD, and now the Digital Video
Recorder (DVR). In
fact, the only remnants of the VHS age at your local Wal-Mart or
Radio Shack are blank VHS tapes these days. Pre-recorded
VHS tapes are largely gone and VHS decks are practically nowhere
to be found. They
served us so well.
17. Ash
Trees
In the late
1990s, a pretty, iridescent green species of beetle, now known
as the emerald ash borer, hitched a ride to North America with
ash wood products imported from eastern
Asia. In
less than a decade, its larvae have killed millions of trees in
the Midwest, and continue
to spread. They've
killed more than 30 million ash trees in southeastern Michigan
alone, with tens of millions more lost in
Ohio and
Indiana. More than
7.5 billion ash trees are currently at risk.
16. Ham
Radio
Amateur
radio operators enjoy personal (and often worldwide) wireless
communications with each other and are able to support
their communities with emergency and disaster communications if
necessary, while increasing their personal knowledge of
electronics and radio theory. However,
proliferation of the Internet and its popularity among youth
has caused the decline of amateur radio. In
the past five years alone, the number of people holding active
ham radio licenses has dropped by 50,000, even though Morse Code
is no longer a requirement.
15. The Swimming Hole
Thanks to
our litigious society, swimming holes are becoming a thing of
the past. '20/20' reports that swimming hole owners, like Robert Every
in High Falls, NY, are shutting them down out of worry that if
someone gets hurt they'll sue. And
that's exactly what happened in Seattle. The
city of Bellingham
was sued by Katie Hofstetter who was paralyzed in a fall at a
popular swimming hole in
Whatcom
Falls Park. As
injuries occur and
lawsuits follow, expect more swimming holes to post 'Keep out!'
signs.
14.
Answering Machines
The
increasing disappearance of answering machines is directly tied
to # 20 our list -- the decline of landlines. According
to USA Today, the number of homes that only use cell phones
jumped 159% between 2004 and 2007. It
has been particularly bad in New York; since
2000, landline usage has dropped 55%. It's
logical that as cell phones rise, many of them replacing
traditional landlines, that there will be fewer answering
machines.
13. Cameras
That Use Film
It doesn't
require a statistician to prove the rapid disappearance of the
film camera in America. Just
look to companies like Nikon, the professional's choice for
quality camera equip ment. In
2006, it announced that it would stop making film cameras,
pointing to the shrinking market -- only 3% of its sales in
2005, compared to 75% of sales from digital cameras and
equipment.
12. Incandescent Bulbs
Before a few
years ago, the standard 60-watt (or, yikes, 100-watt) bulb was
the mainstay of every U.S.
home. With
the green movement and
all-things-sustainable-energy crowd, the Compact Fluorescent
Light bulb (CFL) is largely replacing the older, Edison-era
incandescent bulb. The EPA
reports that 2007 sales for Energy Star CFLs nearly doubled from
2006, and these sales accounted for approximately 20 percent of
the U.S. light bulb market. And
according to USA Today, a new energy bill plans to phase
out incandescent bulbs in the next four to 12 years.
11.
Stand-Alone Bowling Alleys
Bowling
Balls.US claims there are still 60 million Americans wh o bowl
at least once a year, but many are not bowling in
stand-alone bowling alleys. Today
most new bowling alleys are part of facilities for all types or
recreation including laser tag, go-karts, bumper cars, video
game arcades, climbing walls and glow miniature golf. Bowling
lanes also have been added to many non-traditional venues such
as adult communities, hotels and resorts, and gambling casinos.
10. The
Milkman
According to
the U.S. Department of Agriculture, in 1950, over half of the
milk delivered was to the home in quart bottles. By 1963, it
was about a third, and, by 2001, it represented only 0.4%
percent. Nowadays most milk is sold through supermarkets in
gallon jugs. The
steady decline in home-delivered milk is blamed, of course, on
the rise of the supermarket, better home refrigeration and
longer-lasting milk. Although
some milkmen still make the rounds in pockets of the U.S., they are certainly a dying
breed.
9.
Hand-Written Letters
In 2006, the Radicati Group estimated that, worldwide,
183 billion e-mails were sent each day. Two
million each second. By
November of 2007, an estimated 3.3 billion Earthlings owned cell
phones, and 80% of the world's population had access to cell
phone coverage. In
2004, half-a-trillion text messages were sent, and the number
has no doubt increased exponentially since then. So
where amongst this gorge of gabble is there room for the
elegant, polite hand-written letter?
8. Wild
Horses
It is
estimated that, 100 years ago, as many as two million horses
were roaming free within the
United States. In
2001, National Geographic News estimated that the wild horse
population had decreased to about 50,000 head. Currently,
the National Wild Horse and Burro Advisory board states that
there are 32,000 free roaming horses in 20ten
Western states, with half of them residing in Nevada. The
Bureau of Land Management is seeking to reduce the total number
of free range horses to 27,000, possibly by selective
euthanasia.
7. Personal
Checks
According to
an American Bankers Assoc. report, a net 23% of consumers plan
to decrease their use of checks over the next two years, while a
net 14% plan to increase their use of PIN debit. Bill
payment remains the last stronghold of paper-based payments --
for the time being. Checks
continue to be the most commonly used bill payment method, with
71% of consumers paying at least one recurring bill per month by
writing a check. However,
on a bill-by-bill basis, checks account for only 49%
of consumers' recurring bill payments (down from 72% in 2001 and
60% in 2003).
6. Drive-in Theaters
During the peak
in 1958, there were more than 4,000 drive-in theaters in this
country, but in 2007 only 405 drive-ins were still operating. Exactly
zero new drive-ins have been built since 2005. Only
one reopened in 2005 and five reopened in 2006, so there isn't much
of a movement toward reviving the closed ones.
5. Mumps &
Measles
Despite what's
been in the news lately, the measles and mumps actually, truly are
disappearing from the United States. In
1964, 212,000 cases of mumps were reported in the
U.S. By 1983, this figure had
dropped to 3,000, thanks to a vigorous vaccination program. Prior
to the introduction of the measles vaccine, approximately half a
million cases of measles were reported in the
U.S. annually, resulting in 450
deaths. In
2005, only 66 cases were recorded.
4. Honey Bees
Perhaps nothing
on our list of disappearing
America is so dire ; plummeting so
enormously; and so necessary to the survival of our food supply as
the honey bee. Very
scary. 'Colony Collapse Disorder,' or CCD, has spread throughout the U.S. and Europe
over the past few years, wiping out 50% to 90% of the colonies of
many beekeepers -- and along with it, their livelihood.
3. News Magazines and TV News
While the TV
evening newscasts haven't gone anywhere over the last several
decades, their audiences have. In
1984, in a story about the diminishing returns of the evening news,
the New York Times reported that all three network evening-news
programs combined had only 40.9 million viewers. Fast
forward to 2008, and what they have today is half that.
2. Analog TV
According to the
Consumer Electronics Association, 85% of homes in the U.S. get their television programming
through cable or satellite providers. For
the remaining 15% -- or 13 million individuals -- who are using
rabbit ears or a large outdoor antenna to get their local stations,
change is in the air. If
you are one of these people you'll need to get a new TV or a
converter box in order to get the new stations which will only be
broadcast in digital.
1. The Family
Farm
Since the 1930s,
the number of family farms has been declining rapidly. According
to the USDA, 5.3 million farms dotted the nation in 1950, but this
number had declined to 2.1 million by the 2003 farm census
(data from the 2007 census hasn't yet been published). Ninety-one percent
of the U.S. farms are
small family farms.
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