25. U.S. Post Office - They are pricing
themselves out of existence. With e-mail, and on-line se
rvices they are a relic of the past. (refer to #9)
Packages are also sent faster and cheaper with UPS.
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 Yodel
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 classifies are replaced by
free on-line 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. The
combination of an infras tructure to accommodate
affordable
high speed Internet connections and the
disappearing home phone have all but pounded the final
nail in the coffin of dial-up Internet access.
20. Phone Land Lines - 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 land
lines, 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 did 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. 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 1990's, 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 No 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 equipment. 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 Lightbulb (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 who 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 has
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 ten 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, 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 repor ted 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 c ombined 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 1930's, 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.
Good with
Coffee... 
is fab.
