Old gadgets that now make us look like dickheads

Everyone knows one person who has to have the latest electronic marvel, and once he has it, needs everyone to be aware he has it. There is a technical name for this person – a giant bastard.

But normal people continue to have the last laugh when the bastard's status symbols invariably drop out of favour with the world. The following are examples of pioneering gizmos that once upon a time made you the envy of those around you, only for you to realise that soon enough the thing you just paid hundreds of pounds for will be absolutely no use to you.

1. Personal organiser

Kind of a cheat since these are these are still available today, but come on – how many people do you know who own one? Back in the day these pocket-sized super computers were a marvel of streamlining, life changing technology, and all the really hip young go getters had one, because their lives were so busy and hectic that there was no way their own brain could process all the invites to parties they received. Instead, they let the combined address book, calendar and reminder function do the memory work for them.

With the advent of smart phones, the hip young go getter can no longer use his pocket bulge to project an image of success. This is because A) everyone has an organiser built in to their phone, B) everyone has a phone, and C) the people who bought organisers just to look popular are immediately shown up by acquiring a smart phone, as it will emerge that no one ever calls them or texts them, and that they only ever used their organiser to see what the time was in Japan.

2. Walkman (and accompanying bag of cassettes)

When I was five I threatened to run away from home, and my parents let me open one of my Christmas presents early so I wouldn't become a child of the streets. My present was a Walkman, complete with massive orange foam headphones. I didn't have any cassettes to go with it yet, but I felt like the coolest kid in the world.

Even I was a poser with a Walkman, and I was only an amateur. Professional posers with Walkmans (walkmen?) were the ones who strutted around, preferably on roller skates, wearing cycling shorts or knee socks or, for maximum points, both.

But what really marked these trend setters out as being truly cool dudes was the bewildering array of cassettes they were forced to carry round with them at all times; you were no one unless you had the entire back catalogue of Five Star and Bros on your person at all times.

In the future I'm sure people will have music injected directly into their heads, or perhaps take it in pill form. Those people will laugh at us with our MP3s and earphones, just as we reserve the right to laugh at the weirdos on roller skates, carrying round the contents of HMV in a rucksack.

3. Word processor

 

In the days before laptops were issued at birth, people had word processors for one of four reasons. Either they were a novelist, or they were a journalist, or they were a secretary, or they just wanted to look important. Everyone knows that a good way to look important is to have lots of stuff to write, but this only really works if A) you do all your writing on a clipboard while tutting, or B) you sit in a coffee shop somewhere, scribbling into your horrible little notebook while sighing and looking all tortured. Neither of these things could be achieved with a word processor, and anyway you might have spilled your coffee on it.

4. Ghetto blaster

You know those teenagers that sit on the bus on a Saturday afternoon, blaring out tinny dance music from their mobile phones, and nobody wants to cause a scene so everyone just tuts a bit? Those kids used to have to carry round great hulking metal boxes on their shoulders in order to achieve this effect. However, at least that showed dedication to your cause – teenagers now only have to carry something that weighs the same as a feather.

Also, why do they never play classical music on those things? It's always crappy dance music, as if the constant thumping rhythm can somehow hypnotise them into forgetting the fact that they're going to fail all their exams and end up working in Burger King. Well let me tell you, that does not work.

I take it back – ghetto blasters were cooler than today's urban general public botherers. At least back then there was a chance that all the kids would break into an impromptu breakdance battle on the street, while wearing neon jackets.