Status Symbols: devices that transcend time – The Verge

Status Symbols: Tivoli PAL Radio

2014-01-23T10:46:00-05:00

tivoli pal

Status Symbols are devices that transcend their specs and features, and become something beautiful and luxurious in their own right. They're things that live on after the megapixel and megahertz wars move past them, beacons of timeless design and innovation.

There was a time when every portable speaker was a status symbol. As commercial AM receivers grew popular in the early 1920s, many were opulent tabletop units brimming with vacuum tubes and brass dials - the kind of stuff that makes steampunks salivate. Almost a century later we live in a world overflowing with cheap, underpowered Bluetooth units as small as golf balls that you can buy …

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Status Symbols: Nintendo Power Glove

2014-01-14T12:16:02-05:00

status symbol power glove

In December of 1989 Roger Ebert ended his review of Nintendo-produced Fred Savage film The Wizard thusly:

The studio may have targeted kids who are Nintendo fans. But here the problem is that the movie doesn't have much Nintendo in it, and some of that is wrong (when it's announced, for example, that the third level of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles has been reached, the movie screen cle …

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Status Symbols: Motorola RAZR

2013-10-03T13:30:02-04:00

Motorola RAZR V3

Status Symbols are devices that transcend their specs and features, and become something beautiful and luxurious in their own right. They're things that live on after the megapixel and megahertz wars move past them, beacons of timeless design and innovation.

In 2003, Nokia made the world's three most popular phones. They were all short, stubby candy bars, with nine buttons and a tiny monochrome screen. All three looked and worked like every other cellphone on the market, but they were $50, or $20, or free. So they sold like like crazy.

But early the next year, underneath a glass case inside the Arken Museum of Modern Art in Copenhagen, a sel …

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Status Symbols: Toshiba Libretto

2013-08-02T12:30:03-04:00

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The late '90s were a wild transitional period for computing. Laptops were finally entering the mainstream, but the wild days of the internet bubble, ubiquitous connectivity, and smartphones were but glimmers in Silicon Valley's collective eye. Toshiba dropped a crazy, ambitious computer into that protean world of technology: the original Libretto. The idea was simple: pack a complete comp …

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Status Symbols: Porsche 959

2013-04-25T10:40:04-04:00

Porsche 959 lead

Run-flat tires equipped with a pressure monitoring system. All-wheel drive. Adjustable, electronically-controlled ride height. A top speed brushing up against the magical 200 mph mark. These thoroughly modern specifications could easily describe an exotic car from the world's most exclusive automakers that you might buy today, if were you lucky enough to have a few hundred thousand doll …

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Status Symbols: MiniDisc

2013-02-15T11:20:05-05:00

md lead

The MiniDisc represents Sony at the height of its 1990s arrogance. In 1992, when the MiniDisc was introduced, Sony could do no wrong in consumer electronics: the best TVs were Trinitrons, the Walkman was still booming and the Discman was a hit, and Sony's legendary hardware design was at the peak of its powers before software changed the world. It's no wonder the company thought it coul …

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Status Symbols: Samsung BlackJack

2012-12-21T17:07:03-05:00

BlackJack stock

The Samsung BlackJack was my first "smartphone," and my first introduction to a phone with a full keyboard. Before that was a long line of Nokias, which I was fairly happy with. I didn't buy the BlackJack, but inherited it in brand new condition, figuring I'd give it a shot.

The BlackJack was a Windows Mobile 5 phone with a 2.25-inch color screen (320 x 240 resolution), which at the time …

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Status Symbols: Neo Geo Pocket Color

2012-11-23T13:00:06-05:00

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The handheld video game market has gone through a number of changes, but the basic formula has remained the same for some time: Nintendo dominates, while a company with more powerful hardware fights for what's left. This hasn't lead to a lot of room for companies that aren't Nintendo, Sega, or Sony. And that's something that SNK learned with its ill-fated Neo Geo Pocket line. Much like …

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Status Symbols: Game Boy Micro

2012-10-26T14:00:03-04:00

2005 was a good year for Nintendo handhelds. The original DS was on its way to becoming the most successful portable device of all time, while the Game Boy Advance SP let you play your entire Game Boy library - dating back to the monochromatic original - on one, handy machine. So it was a bit curious, then, when the company decided to release the $99 Game Boy Micro, a small, streamlined …

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Status Symbols: Palm V

2012-10-02T12:00:02-04:00

Palm V

This might come as a surprise to younger readers, but there existed an age before smartphones. The 1990s and early 2000s bore witness to dozens upon dozens of so-called PDAs - personal digital assistants, a term famously coined by ex-Apple CEO John Sculley upon the introduction of the ill-fated Newton - and Palm Computing was one of the PDA Age's superstars.

Today, of course, Palm is l …

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