CDs haven’t aged well. I personally haven’t used one in 3 years, nor have I seen one in an office since 2014.
Which is why I was surprised to find the paper shredder at work, which is less than 2 years old, with a built in CD shredder.
This odd feature, in a relatively new appliance, got me thinking about product design and the risks we take when we ship to market.
Despite our best efforts, sometimes the thing we make will become obsolete earlier than we expected.
We may have a theory about which technologies will persist, and which will fade, but we’ll never get it right all the time.
Regardless, the important thing is to keep creating.
Our only obligation should be to produce the best that we can, with the information we have, put it out into the world, and react graciously when the world changes and proves us right or wrong.