Looking Back at the Best Inventions of 2001

While looking down the back of the Internet for something or other, I stumbled across Time Magazine's Best Inventions of 2001.

It has been a quarter of a century since 2001 (!!) so that's a good excuse to look back at what stood the test of time. The article states:

Inventions come in all shapes and sizes. Some are as simple as purple catsup. Others push the limits of quantum physics. The real measure of an invention is not just how well it works or how impressively it is engineered, but how it changes our lives.

I don't think I've ever seen purple ketchup in the UK, but I'm prepared to believe it is life changing for some. What about the rest? Here's what people at the turn of the century thought would have an impact on our era.

Ginger

Ginger? The name tickled something at the back of my brain. Oh! Yeah! Project Ginger!

After the Harvard Business School Press advanced $250,000 for a book about It—a top-secret project under development by one of the most accomplished inventors in the U.S.—reams of newsprint were devoted to speculation about what It might be. The recipient of the advance, author Steve Kemper, gushed in his book proposal that It—code-named Ginger—would revolutionize personal transportation, urban design and our daily lives. Apple Computer ceo Steve Jobs said It could be bigger than the PC.

It was the Segway.

Now, look, I've enjoyed every time I've ridden a Segway. They're great for tourist exploration of a city (where licenced) and even for a bit of off-roading. But I've never seen a commuter on one. I remember seeing airport police using them to cruise round an airport. But other than that…

Ginger / Segway was the ultimate in hype exceeding reality. The Segway has had next to no impact on people's lives - other than the owner's ironic death. Electric bikes are everywhere - but none of them are self-balancing.

Nuvaring Birth Control

The Nuvaring is a hormonal birth control. Unlike the pill, it is used monthly. Unlike implants, it doesn't need to be inserted by a trained professional.

So, how did it do? Pretty well! It is still in use and regularly prescribed - there haven't been any major issues with it.

The UK produces lots of statistics about birth control methods. It seems that people are moving away from product like Nuvaring:

Over the last ten years, LARC [long acting reversible contraceptives] uptake has been increasing and uptake of user dependent methods has been decreasing.

Wind Up Cellphone / Disposable Cellphone

I indistinctively love both these ideas. There were a plethora of wind-up products back in the day. The wind-up radio was transformative and truly helped change the world. The wind-up cellphone flopped. Phones became more efficient and batteries became more powerful.

The disposable phone is also an idea out of place. Originally designed for travellers who could pick up a temporary phone on their holidays. Cheap travel SIMs almost immediately obsoleted it.

Digital Satellite Radio

AM and FM are so yesterday!

Two rival companies are betting that drivers are sufficiently fed up with bad reception, tired playlists and irritating ads to fork out around $10 a month (plus up to $1,000 for a receiver) for dozens of stations

Thus was launched XM and Sirius's Digital Satellite Radio. By 2008 the companies had merged. While still operating in North America, it is extinct everywhere else.

Terrestrial Digital Radio (via DAB) outlasted DSR.

Heat-Generating Jacket

What's this? Something which actually made it!

Designed for extreme cold, the North Face MET5 jacket can keep you warm all by itself, thanks to a network of microscopic, waterproof heating elements woven into the fabric.

You can pick these up from £30! They're USB rechargeable and, so I'm told, toasty warm.

Ford Think Car

Are tiny cars the future?

Slow, pricey and impractical, electric cars for years have had a bad rap. Ford could start to change all that with its bubble-shaped City car, which hit the streets of Los Angeles, New York City and London this year. Running on 18 NiCad batteries, the City tops out at 65 m.p.h. but can travel only 55 miles between charges. Ford thinks it's the perfect commuter car—as long as you don't miss your exit.

Availability: Leases for $199 a month

Ford is comically absent from the future it created. But there are now a dozen different "city cars" which run on batteries. Some are little more than glorified quadricycles, others are full cars - albeit with limited ranges.

The $200 monthly lease is about £250 in today's money. And, yes, you can get a cheap lease for that. The market is still dominated by fossil-fuel cars, of course, and electrics tend to be large and expensive. But the Think Car's legacy lives on!

And the rest

OK, some of the inventions made a real difference - most notably the artificial heart and liver. While they might seem mundane now, natural colour light bulbs were a big deal back in the day.

And, of course, we all use an automatic mashed potato machine as part of our daily lives. Right?

But most of the inventions are the sort of nonsense like jetpacks, office robots, and fuel cells.

There are glimmers of almost in there. The aforementioned fuel cell was attached to a bike - nowadays battery-powered bikes are ubiquitous. Similarly, the hydrogen scooter is now electrically powered.

Some of the inventions, like the Gateshead Millennium Bridge are still around, although there don't appear to be many bridges like it. Sadly, most metropolises are still waiting for their self guided buses.

Inventing the future is difficult. Working out which inventions will stand the test of time is close to impossible.