Places where I was late

Generally speaking, I’m an early adopter of new media and technology. I like to try out new toys, mostly as entertainment under the guise of productivity.

Looking back, though, I see a few times when I was shockingly late to the game.

Podcasts

Two of my favorite new podcasts these days are The Office Ladies and Adam Grant’s WorkLife. I had listened to one episode of WorkLife a while ago and somehow it didn’t click, so I didn’t subscribe. That was a mistake. With The Office Ladies, I didn’t bother to understand how they were approaching it (a recap of one show per episode, in order) and now I love it! Both are podcasts that I don’t miss, and I feel silly for having missed them for so long.

Gaming

I got an Oculus Quest 2 (VR Headset) earlier this year, and feel like I’ve missed out a bit. Granted, the technology is just now getting to the point of being practical and affordable, but I still feel a bit late and wish I could have been playing games like Supernatural a whole lot earlier!

Related is the game Fortnite, which I jokingly call “the new golf course”, as I’m finding it a great place to hang out with my tech buddies and chat. 25% of the chat is tactical (“get your sniper rifle ready!”), but about 75% is just chatting about life and business during the slow parts of the game — pretty similar to a round of golf with a friend. I was certainly very late to trying out Fortnite.

Technology

While I’ve used a Kindle for years now, I certainly wasn’t an early adopter. I had some weak reasons for avoiding it, but it’s indispensable now. I still love a real book from time to time, but the convenience of the Kindle is tough to beat (and I really love my new Paperwhite).

Lastly is cell phones. While we all have them now, 25 years ago we didn’t. Among my peers, I was probably the last to get one in 2001 (my wife and many others were more in the ~1998 range). I just didn’t see the need, and I still don’t really use the cell phone to actually make calls, so that tracks pretty well.

Racing

Racing to the front of the line isn’t always a way to win, as you can waste a lot of money buying HD DVD players or putting many hours into Google+ (like I did), but it’s often fun to play those games to a degree.

What is something that you were slow to adopt and wish you had looked into earlier?