Things I Like
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There are a number of things that I like, either because I find them useful, they embody a principle I believe in, they're fascinating to learn about, I'm nostalgic about them, or I just find them cool. A few years ago I created a text file that listed some of those things, and the list has grown pretty long since then.
- 35 mm film
- 1950s-style technical documents
- 1950s middle class boom
- 1980s entertainment
- 1980s technology aesthetics
- 1990s educational media
- 1990s kids' rooms
- Ad-free software
- Adobe Flash cartoons
- Aérospatiale / BAC Concordes
- Affordable college tuitions
- Airbus A300Bs
- Airbus A340-300s
- Airbus A380s
- Aircraft with knobby radomes
- Airline liveries before 1997 (the retirement of British Airways' "Landor" livery)
- Airlines that focus on service
- "Airport" (1970 movie)
- Airports with simple security
- Airshows that fly over crowds
- AM / FM radios
- Americana
- Analog telecommunications
- Arcades
- "Artemis Fowl" before 2005 (the release of "The Opal Deception")
- Attic fans
- Avro Vulcans
- Badminton
- "Beauty and the Beast" (1991 movie)
- Betamax cassettes
- Bicycles
- Big cars
- BlackBerry KEY2s
- Blockbusters
- Boeing 377 "Stratocruisers"
- Boeing 707s
- Boeing 727s
- Boeing 737s with JT8D engines
- Boeing 747s
- Boeing B-52 "Stratofortresses"
- Boomboxes
- Braniff
- Brick-and-mortar stores
- Calendars with weeks that start on Mondays
- Cars that are beaters
- Cars with front benches
- Cars with hand-crank windows
- CDs
- Chequebooks
- Chicago, IL
- Chicago O'Hare International Airport light tunnel
- "Chip's Challenge" (1989 video game)
- Clicking pens with clips
- Cold War-era stuff
- Command lines
- Compact cassettes
- Companies that don't force compliance with recalls
- Company logos before 2007 (the emergence of the "flat" trend)
- Convair 880s
- Convair 990 "Coronados"
- Convair B-36 "Peacemakers"
- Convair B-58 "Hustlers"
- Convair CV-440 "Metropolitans"
- Convair F2Y "Sea Darts"
- Convair F-106 "Delta Darts"
- CRT televisions
- Cruising (driving culture)
- Custom firmware
- Data hoarding
- Descriptive error messages
- Devices that use open standards
- Devices with many physical ports
- Devices with root / administrator access
- Devices with unencrypted output
- Devices with user-serviceable parts
- Disney Stores
- Dot matrix printers
- Douglas DC-8s
- Douglas X-3 "Stilettos"
- Drive-in movie theaters
- DRM-free content
- Dumb devices
- E ink displays
- Earth sciences
- East Asian interior design
- Efficient programming
- Encyclopedias
- English Electric Lightnings
- EPCOT (Walt Disney World)
- Ethernet
- Everyday carry
- External-frame backpacks
- FAO Schwarzs
- Fax machines
- Fight sticks
- Figure skating
- Flashcarts
- Floppy disks
- FLOSS software
- Fountain pens
- FTP
- F(x)tec Pro1 Xs
- Games without storylines
- Gaming consoles with backwards compatibility
- Gaming consoles with memory cards
- General Dynamics F-16 "Fighting Falcons"
- General Electric CF-6 turbofans
- Globes
- Golden-age airline stewardesses
- Good franchises without sequels
- Governments without ubiquitous surveillance
- Graphing calculators
- Gravis PC GamePads
- Grumman X-29s
- Grunge style
- Hacking for its own sake
- Handguns
- Handley Page Victors
- Hand-made technical drawings
- Hawker Siddeley Harriers
- High-quality kids' toys
- "The History Boys" (2006 movie)
- Homebrew
- Hong Kong Kai Tak Airport
- Hookahs
- HOTAS controllers
- Ilyushin Il-62 "Classics"
- Ilyushin Il-76 "Candids"
- Ilyushin Il-86 "Cambers"
- Incandescent light bulbs
- Internet forums
- "Jazz Jackrabbit" (1994 video game)
- Keyboard-driven interfaces
- Landline telephones
- LaTeX
- Leather products
- Legacy keyboard keys
- "Legend of the Neverbeast"-era Fawn (character from "Disney Fairies")
- Lenovo ThinkPads before 2016
- Libertarianism
- Libraries
- Linux
- "The Lion King" (1994 movie)
- "The Little Mermaid" (1989 movie)
- Lockheed C-130 "Hercules"
- Lockheed Constellations
- Lockheed F-104 "Starfighters"
- Lockheed F-117 "Nighthawks"
- Lockheed L-1011 "Tristars"
- Lockheed P-80 "Shooting Stars"
- Lockheed S-3 "Vikings"
- Lockheed SR-71 "Blackbirds"
- Manual transmissions
- Markdown
- Markets with lots of choices
- Matchbooks
- Mathematical compasses
- McDonnell-Douglas DC-10s
- McDonnell-Douglas F-4 "Phantom IIs"
- McDonnell-Douglas F-15 "Eagles"
- McDonnell-Douglas MD-11s
- Mechanical car keys
- Mechanical keyboards
- Mechanical wristwatches
- Mercury-Redstone rockets
- Metric units
- Microsoft Encarta
- Microsoft Office before 2010 (the implementation of "Ribbon")
- Minimum wages commensurate with the cost of living
- Modernism
- Modular hardware
- Motherboards without Secure Boot
- "Mulan" (1998 movie)
- Multi-faceted family entertainment
- Music players that support RockBox
- NASA stuff
- Newspapers
- NFO files
- Nintendo DS Lites
- Nintendo Game Boy Advance SPs
- Nintendo Gamecube controllers
- North American X-15s
- North American XB-70 "Valkyries"
- Northrop T-38 "Talons"
- Notebooks
- Off-color school playground rhymes
- Offline storage
- Open firmware
- Owning two of everything
- Pan American World Airways
- Paper letters
- Paper maps
- Paper records (receipts, tickets, etc.)
- Payment cards without RFID chips
- PDFs that are ISO 19005 compliant
- Peer-to-peer protocols
- PGP
- Phonograph turntables
- Physical cash
- Pirateboxes
- Pirated stuff
- "Pitfall: The Mayan Adventure" (1994 video game)
- Planespotting
- Planet Computers Gemini PDAs
- PlayStation Portabless
- Pocketknives
- Point Loma, San Diego, CA
- Pokémon stuff before 2002 (the release of "Pokémon Ruby / Sapphire")
- Politically incorrect discourse
- Politics that aren't ubiquitous
- Portable programs
- Postscript (page description language)
- Princess Juliana International Airport
- Processors without speculative execution
- Products whose package sizes don't change over time
- Products with easy-to-open packaging
- Products with fair prices
- Products with learning curves
- Products without logos
- Products without planned obsolescence
- Products without restrictive EULAs
- Products without safety labels
- Projects that support liberty and privacy
- PS/2 connections
- Public discourse without identity politics
- Public transit systems
- RadioShacks
- Rareware before 2002 (purchase by Microsoft)
- Realpolitik
- Record stores
- Region-free content
- "Rocky and Bullwinkle" (1959 TV show)
- RSS
- Rubik's Cubes
- Samsung Galaxy Note 4s
- Samsung Galaxy Note 7s
- Saturn V rockets
- Scandinavia-style social structures
- Sears
- SeaWorld before 1998 (start of most controversy)
- "Secret of the Wings" (2012 movie)
- Services that aren't bundled
- Services that respect privacy
- Shoot 'em ups
- "The Sifl & Olly Show" (1998 TV show)
- Single-player offline games
- Siskel and Ebert
- Slide rules
- Small towns
- Small utilitarian laptops
- Smartphones with 3
- Smartphones with FM receivers
- Smartphones with IR blasters
- Smartphones with off-screen buttons
- Smartphones with removable batteries
- Smartphones with SD card slots
- Smartphones with styluses
- Smartphones with tough bodies
- Snooker
- Software that doesn't limit itself due to copyrights
- Software with command line support
- Software with granular configurations
- Software with legacy compatibility
- Software with open format support
- Sony Xperia Z5 Compacts
- "Sound Voltex" (2012 video game)
- Space exploration
- Space Shuttles
- "SpongeBob SquarePants" before 2005 (the release of season 4)
- Star Wars stuff before 2012
- Steam locomotives
- Steel cars
- Sud Aviation Caravelles
- "Super Monkey Ball" before 2006 (the release of "Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz")
- Swimming
- Television before 2002
- Text files
- "Thomas the Tank Engine" stuff before 1996 (the relase of season 5)
- Tinker Bell before 2008 (the release of the first "Disney Fairies" movie)
- Tinychat before 2011
- TOTP
- Tough-love parenting
- Train watching
- Truly-anonymous cryptocurrency
- Tupolev Tu-95 "Bears"
- Tupolev Tu-144 "Chargers"
- TWA
- Typewriters
- Ultralight camping equipment
- UMPCs
- UNIX philosophy
- Urban exploration
- US Air Force roundels
- US quarter-dollar coins before 1999 (the introduction of US state quarters)
- Usenet
- Vapes
- VCRs
- VHS cassettes
- Vickers Valiant B2 "Pathfinders"
- Video games with dedicated controllers
- Video games with simple mechanics
- Video games with steep difficulty curves
- Video games without updates or DLC
- Video stores
- Vinyl phonograph records
- Wallets
- Web 1
- Western values
- Wiis with DVD-compatible drive chips
- Winamp
- Windows 95
- Windows XP
- Windows 7
- YouTube before 2010 (purchase by Google)
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[Last updated: 2022-06-06]