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The 10 Best/Worst Inventions of the 21st Century – So Far

Obviously this is my list, while most of these are on a lot of people's lists there are many others not included. We each have our favorites.


1. The Keurig Coffee maker (K-Cup) – while technically from the latter part of the 1990s, this appliance caught on in the after being wholly acquired by Keurig Green Mountain Coffee and revolutionized the coffee industry as much as Starbucks changed coffee drinking. Starting in 2008, innumerable brands of coffee, soup, tea, became available at the local supermarket for the machine. I love the thing, and don’t start with all the baloney about the throw away cups. I ask you, how many wine and liquor bottles did you toss this week? And what about that countertop roll of paper towels that you replace each week? And at 5:00 a.m. who wants to make a full pot of coffee? 

2.  Apple iPad (2010) and the ensuing wave of personal tablets. If one item changed how we deal with everything from entertainment to logistics it was the invention of the iPad and its imitators. In your hand you can contain a library, access to patients records, maintain shipping records, managed inventories, display restaurant menus, and even waste innumerable hours playing WarCraft. I actually invented the original reader tablet (go here), I was just fifteen years too early.

3. The (now) ubiquitous Smartphone. While the successor to a number of late 20^th century PDAs and Blackberries, the iPhone (2007) set off the mad scramble to change how we entertain, interact, and access the world around us. While a lot like the tablet, the Smartphone’s advantage was its cellular connection, size/portability, and ever-expanding world of Applications (Apps). It has also lead to police citations for distracted driving, users injured after walking into poles, ponds, and crosswalks, and more selfies than the world should ever need or want. In fact the selfie might be considered a 21^st century sub-invention of the Smartphone.

4. Facebook (2004). This social media application took the world like Genghis Khan did in the 13^th century. No description is necessary – if you don’t know what this is you probably are in the 13^th century. I often believe that Facebook is like being forced to spend the rest of your life at your Aunt Milly’s with her cats being required to go through the photo albums of her bus trip to Bulgaria in 1973 with Trump driving and Hillary doing the tour guide thing.

5. Print On Demand – POD

Like most technologies, POD is a derivative of the high-speed reproduction systems developed during the last forty years (Xerox, Minolta, etc.). POD differs in that with one machine produces a professional book of fiction or non-fiction a in less than five minutes (often much less). The Espresso Book Machine (Xerox) was first installed in 2007. This is both a physical invention and a data system using interrelated tools for data storage (book files), sales access (book page at Amazon, etc.), and input (authors/publishers). It has dramatically changed and expanded the number of books (paper) available.

6. Amazon Kindle (2007) and the eBook. I ask you, does an ebook really exist? Without a reading device such as the Amazon Kindle and subsequent tablets, or iPad, or smartphone, or even you computer, the ability to read an ebook is impossible. Yet, this electronic collection of whatever it is has revolutionized – and I mean revolutionized – the world of writing and publishing. I would offer that more than 90% of those with a tablet device or a computer have downloaded at least one ebook—admit it. Jeff Bezos and Amazon not only changed how we buy books but how we read them as well.

7. The Collateralized Debt Obligation (CDOs). I didn’t say they would all be positive - go see the movie the Big Short Wikipedia Says : In the early 2000s, CDOs were generally diversified,^[5] but by 2006–2007—when the CDO market grew to hundreds of billions of dollars—this changed. CDO collateral became dominated not by loans, but by lower level (BBB or A) tranches recycled from other asset-backed securities, whose assets were usually non-prime mortgages, and are known as Synthetic CDO. These CDOs have been called "the engine that powered the mortgage supply chain" for nonprime mortgages,^[7] and are credited with giving lenders greater incentive to make non-prime loans^[8] leading up to the 2007-9 subprime mortgage crisis. And the world was given the Great Recession and the destruction of my company.

8. YouTube (2005). And yes, you can become a movie producer of cat and puppy videos all in the comfort of your own home. You too can put your wedding movies out there for everyone to see, and yes this simple company and its camp followers has led to the destruction of the traditional porn industry – is nothing sacred? YouTube Movie production is the direct result of the blending of softwares, cameras, phones, and creative genius (for some), and is now significantly responsible for how we store old memories (digitization) and create new ones.

9. Google Earth (2001). For armchair travelers, planners, geographic voyeurs, and vacation planners, Google Earth is just plain cool. With its 3D function you can get a feel for the land
 nd the structures of cities, with its street view walk or drive the cities and countries of much of the world. Combined with its ad features for hotels, businesses, restaurants, and almost everything else that pays to play, it can make a business. (also includes Google Maps here).

10. DNA Testing.

AncestryDNA, 23and Me, Family Tree, etc. are all companies that will test your DNA to try and place your genetic ancestry based on their huge pool of DNA tests. Like the commercial though, you may think you were German and discover that you are really Scottish, or Norwegian, or Dalmatian (the region, not the dog). Not done this myself, kind of spooky out their in my gene pool.


Also Rans:

• iPod (2001)
• Bluetooth (2000ish)
• Skype (2003)
• Robotics – ongoing for the wounded and injured
• Drones – I am so tired of them
• Tesla Electric Car – While cool, I think its financial success is still debatable
• Roomba Vacuum Cleaner (2002)
• Flat Screen TVs – Smart TV
• NetFlix (late 20^th century DVD – but took off in the digital world)
• Medical devices for the heart, pancreas and other organs
• Innumerable international political organizations – most corrupt and derivative