Posted 10/06/2003 12:06:00 PM by Douglas

This may be the only blog in the world that hasn't done a list of some sort, so in response to last week's 10 technologies that need to die, I've come up with my own list of my own. Here they are, in no particular order. Things that need to disappear:

• Skate Boards. Say you're the parent of a teenaged boy. What is worse news? He got a skateboard, or he started smoking? I don't think smoking is as much of a waste of time as skateboarding, and it's certainly less annoying to the general public.
  
• Portable DVD players. Do you really need to watch movies all the damn time? I know, most people justify these things by using them in their cars, usually for kids. Yet another opportunity to get your kids to mindlessly stare at a screen, rather than the world that is going on around them. They don't get enough TV at home?
  
• Blogging. Ok, there are some decent ones out there, but the majority of them are overwrought high school girls or wannabe politicos [sometimes both] that think they can do a better job than The New York Times if they'd just get a chance. News Flash: Nobody gives a shit what you think about fuel cell cars. Just think of all the bandwidth blogging is robbing from legitimate porn.
  
• Sports commentators. They're everywhere; on TV, radio, newspapers, magazines. Everywhere you look someone's getting paid to internalize the actions of athletes. It's time we left the children's games to the children and opened a dialog about things that really matter: Entertainment news.
  
• Humans with wild animals. You've got the guy getting killed by the bull at the rodeo, you've got this story about they guy in NYC that had tigers and gators as pets, and of course, you have Roy mauled on stage in Vegas. What part of wild in wild animal is ambiguous?
  
• Grocery store discount cards. Why on earth do people carry around different bar-coded cards on their key rings just so they can save 17¢ on a box of Grape-Nuts? I know the stores do this for marketing reasons, but there's got to be a less intrusive way for them to figure out how much cheese I eat a month. Yet another reason HEB is the promised land of grocery stores.
  
• Insurance. All of it. They love to point out the fact that they're always there after a disaster picking up the pieces in your time of need. The truth is they're in it for the money. You pay into the system your whole life and they have mountains of data that shows that statistically, you won't ever need them. Because if you did, they'd have to raise your premium. What if you saved that money and took care of your own crisis?
  
• Car Alarms. Every time I hear a car alarm go off, I think to myself: Oh no! That's the sound of an automobile in peril! It needs help! If only there was some caped superhero that would rescuse all the cars that are so desparately crying out for help. Seriously, does anyone even notice these things anymore? They're the annoying background noise, the hot poker in the auditory canal, of modern living.

Ok, enough of that. I'm sure I could get more than eight items, but really, who cares?