Consider the zip. Probably one of the most useful inventions ever, and it holds together everything from our modesty on clothes, to our valuables in bags, to stuffings inside mattresses and beddings. It has been a 100 years since this remarkable piece of simple engineering was launched, and it is still going strong.
The team at Gadget Show Live have just commissioned a survey of 3900 gadget fans, and they have picked the most influential inventions, year by year, of the last century. Quite a few remarkable items appear on the list, from your Polaroids to Dysons, from the Internet to Twitter, from the biro to the lie detector! The full list of the most influential gadget launches over the last century is as follows:
1913 The zip invented by Gideon Sundback
1914 Motorised movie cameras
1915 Pyrex
1916 Electric power drill
1917 Radio tuners
1918 The superheterodyne radio circuit (used in all TVs and radios today)
1919 The pop up toaster
1920 The hairdryer
1921 The modern lie detector
1922 Electric kettle
1923 Self-winding watch
1924 Loudspeaker
1925 Modern day can opener
1926 Tevelox robot
1927 Aerosol can
1928 Baird Television Department Company television
1929 Car radio
1930 Jet engine
1931 Electric razor
1932 Electric can opener
1933 The Teasmade
1934 Zippo lighter
1935 Radar
1936 First voice recognition machine
1937 Dirt Devil
1938 The biro
1939 Helicopter
1940 Modern colour television
1941 Artificial heart
1942 The turboprop engine
1943 The slinky
1944 Kidney dialysis machine
1945 Clock radio
1946 Disposable nappy
1947 Kenwood food mixer
1948 First pager
1949 Photo-Pac disposable camera
1950 Alkaline batteries
1951 Power steering
1952 SAGE modem
1953 Black box flight recorder
1954 Regency pocket radio
1955 Breathalyser
1956 Behind the air hearing aid
1957 Casio digital watch
1958 Pacemaker
1959 Black and Decker cordless drill
1960 Stereos/hi-fis
1961 Kodak Instamatic
1962 LED
1963 The Telefunken ‘mouse’
1964 Plasma television – University of Illinois
1965 Y. Hatano’s pedmoter
1966 El-Gi 1:12 Ferrari radio controlled car
1967 Polaroid
1968 Smoke detector
1969 The Internet
1970 Digital thermometer
1971 Busicom LE-120A Handy pocket calculator
1972 Multi socket power plug
1973 The Ethernet
1974 Breville sandwich maker
1975 Kodak digital camera
1976 Lithium batteries
1977 Mattel Electronic Football
1978 Victor HR-3300REK – first UK VHS video recorder
1979 Texas Instruments Speak and Spell
1980 Sony Walkman
1981 Epson HX-20 – the world’s first laptop
1982 Sony Watchman – CD player
1983 Commodore 64
1984 Sony Discman
1985 The Leatherman
1986 Bose noise cancelling headphones
1987 Sony super VHS camcorder
1988 Digital mobile phones
1989 World Wide Web
1990 Nintendo Game Boy
1991 Nintendo SNES
1992 Palm Pilot
1993 Dyson vacuum cleaner
1994 Digital cordless telephone /Mega Drive
1995 PlayStation 1
1996 Audio Highway – world’s first MP3 player
1997 Motorola StarTac
1998 Panasonic portable DVD player
1999 DVR by TiVo
2000 The Trek Tech/IBM – flash drive
2001 Apple iPod
2002 PlayStation 2
2003 Blackberry 6210
2004 Samsung OLED TV
2005 Xbox 360
2006 SanDisk Micro SD
2007 Apple iPhone
2008 Beats by Dre
2009 Twitter
2010 Apple iPad
2011 Kindle Fire
2012 Nexus 7
2013 PlayStation 4
Quite a few interesting ones there. We tend to forget that the likes of internet or Ethernet were invented in the 60s, and services like Twitter, which seem to have lasted an eternity are only about 4 years old.
“When we talk about gadgets, we often talk in terms of the 80s onwards – of phones, laptops and music systems,” said Gadget Show Live @Christmas event manager Katie Tozer. “But gadgets have been around for hundreds of years. This list, which takes us right back to 1913 with the invention of the zip, a gadget that was so influential it’s still in daily use today – is just the tip of the iceberg and it shows just how integral and essential they have become to the way we live, work and enjoy life today.”
How many of these have you owned, or wanted to own? How many of these would you say failed to impress you?