Because sometimes I like to let other people drive my car?

All you would have to do is program them in.

Or number-lock-access, which already exists.

i don't think an rfid chip or similar should count as a "key" for the purposes of this poll. the definition of "key" has changed over time but i think we should go with the traditional definition here: "A notched and grooved, usually metal implement that is turned to open or close a lock."

but if you're going to be nitty like that, then digitized news downloaded to a computer or other viewing device should be considered a newspaper too.

Think it's hard to say overall, but you're making important points regarding the level of reporting (say NYT reporter vs. a blogger on the same topic).

Pretty good read in the New Yorker discussing the future of the medium:

"Out of Print: The Death and Life of the American Newspaper"

(from the article) there are numbers that underscore a seriously diminishing print newspaper readership:

-Al

Newspapers have a 0% chance of disappearing in the next 100 years.

I would say newspapers will last the longest of anything you listed.

But I don't want him to have access to my car at all times, and I don't feel like programming him in and out. What a pain in the ass that would be.

I really don't think any of these things are going to disappear in the next 50 years, for what its worth. Well, as long as we accept pvn's definition of a key.

If its voice recognition activated? Wow, that's laziness.

I disagree. Will there be some print news 100 years from now? That is very possible. But the newspaper as it exists today will effectively be dead fifty years from now.

Newspapers will die as the generations of newspaper readers dies.

Wiki claims that the NYT has a daily circulation a bit over 1.1 million copies, but the online site has 13 million unique visitors a month. I think there's little doubt that the hardcopy circulation will continue to drop; the only question is when the economies of scale make it too expensive to publish a paper version any more.

I do think that day is coming.

I voted for movie theatres, by the way. When I was growing up, there were routinely lines outside of major movie openings. When's the last time you saw that? Online distribution will kill theaters in the not-too-distant future IMO.

Why is it that car key technology has moved much much faster than house key technology? Most of us have remote unlocking for our cars but I don't think I've ever seen that for a house.

Good post idea, Joe.

My intuition is that car keys will be first to go by a mile

I should have added Cancer to the list, perhaps.

I'm still not really sure I get the keyboards one. Even if we had technology good enough to accurately put a voice into text, I'm not sure people want to have to yammer at their computers all day at work. Plus stuff like spreadsheets and coding would be a pain in the ass to do that way.

Anyway, I voted car keys. Second is newspapers. EDF gets it right.

Oh, and pvnit: Obviously by "car keys" he meant those metal things you stick into a hole in your door/ignition.

"I voted for movie theatres, by the way. When I was growing up, there were routinely lines outside of major movie openings. When's the last time you saw that?"

movie theaters seem to do very well in Asia. I didnt realize they were doing so bad in America. Its kind of ****ed up that something as awesome as going to the movies is such a horrible experience in America.

The only thing on that list that I would miss in the least would be a newspaper. It depresses the hell out of me when I read that so few people younger than me (35) read a paper. You can't skim the news online, or at least I can't. Flipping through the NYTimes, I read articles similar to ones I would be able to find online, but I also end up reading about topics that wouldn't grab me as a headline on a web page. Everything else on the list could be replaced with a similar but better version (except for commercials, which do me no good). Newspapers still beat all the alternatives by a mile.

Of course, by newspapers, I mean the NY Times (yes, I'm a newspaper snob). I've lived in 4 different cities in the US, plus 4 years in Israel, and I've read the Times (OK, the International Herald-Tribune while overseas) almost every day. It has been just about the only constant in my life since I was 2 years old.

-People can't learn to shut the **** up.
-I can download the DVD Rip like 2 weeks after it's theatre run.
-Not enough awesome movies worthy of the theatre experience.

Car keys

I havent been to the theater in years. It's loud, rude and ruined for me usually. I grew up going to the movies every week and used to love it.

A lot more theaters now, with a lot more screens, with varying amounts of seating... makes it much easier to accommodate everyone efficiently. And although I'm too young to have experienced this, my parents have told me that it used to be that only a couple locations in each city would get the rights to show a film, whereas now it's pretty much unlimited distribution. So what you're seeing is the effects of increased supply more than diminished demand (although I say that with the disclaimer that I haven't done any research on the trends of movie attendance).

Danny, was this meant to be a level?

Car keys, not close. Newspapers aren't going anywhere in a while, even if it's just for something to do on a daily commute and/or because crosswords/sudoku/etc don't work well on computer screens imo, plus with a paper I'll read things that I don't really have interest in because it's there, something that doesn't really happen with internet rss feeds etc. TV ads will be about in some in some format for quite some time. Same with cinema, especially in developing foreign markets if not so much in the US. wtf at keyboards. As long as we have gas, there'll be gas powered cars, and it's just a best guess of how much we have left.

How are you going to handle valet? You don't know who's going to be retrieving your car.

That's more nitty. My definition of key is still restricted to physical tokens, which function basically the same way. The implementation is different, but the end result is 95% the same.

Your expanded newspaper defintion includes non-tangible things that don't function anything like the current newspaper.