We Spoke With the Last Person Standing in the Floppy Disk Business

Started by taxed, September 17, 2022, 02:02:43 PM

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taxed

Interesting story on this guy who still sells floppies...

https://eyeondesign.aiga.org/we-spoke-with-the-last-person-standing-in-the-floppy-disk-business/

QuoteTurns out the obsolete floppy is way more in demand than you'd think

Tom Persky is the self-proclaimed "last man standing in the floppy disk business." He is the time-honored founder of floppydisk.com, a US-based company dedicated to the selling and recycling of floppy disks. Other services include disk transfers, a recycling program, and selling used and/or broken floppy disks to artists around the world. All of this makes floppydisk.com a key player in the small yet profitable contemporary floppy scene.

While putting together the manuscript for our new book, Floppy Disk Fever: The Curious Afterlives of a Flexible Medium, we met with Tom to discuss the current state of the floppy disk industry and the perks and challenges of running a business like his in the 2020s. What has changed in this era, and what remains the same?
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Snuffy

I have several boxes of floppy discs yet. Last I knew they all worked still.  My problem is, I gave up all my drives.
My current computer build doesn't even have a floppy drive. It does have a dvd/cd drive though, and plenty of USB ports.
Signature to come!

dee

The floppies did a great job for many years.

I still have an eight inch floppy.

Solar

Quote from: dee on September 29, 2022, 04:21:56 PMThe floppies did a great job for many years.

I still have an eight inch floppy.
At my age, everything is a 5" floppy. :yikes  :biggrin:

Welcome to the forum Dee. :thumbup:
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supsalemgr

My company's first agent computer was an AS-400 and it required the original "floppy" disk before the plastic discs. It was state of the art in 1986.
"If you can't run with the big dawgs, stay on the porch!"

Sick Of Silence

With all these lawyers with cameras on the street i'm shocked we have so much crime in the world.

There is constitutional law and there is law and order. This challenge to law and order is always the start to loosing our constitutional rights.

Frauditors are a waste of life.

Snuffy

AND .... before floppies, there was magnetic tape. Can you say tape recorders?   :bigl
My TI-994A, (That's Texas Instrument 994A,) had tape recorder access for stroage.
Signature to come!

dee

Quote from: Solar on September 29, 2022, 05:40:37 PMAt my age, everything is a 5" floppy. :yikes  :biggrin:

Welcome to the forum Dee. :thumbup:
<chuckle> I know where you are coming from.

taxed

The 8" floppy was just a little before my time...  My first floppies were the 5 1/4"...  I thought those were so cool.  Before that we were using the cassette tapes.
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Solar

Quote from: taxed on October 20, 2022, 08:53:20 AMThe 8" floppy was just a little before my time...  My first floppies were the 5 1/4"...  I thought those were so cool.  Before that we were using the cassette tapes.
How about a two' disk? :lol:
I had a business owner next to me in 1984 doing computer storage for the industry, he had a few of these from his dads day in computers.
But all of his storage was on reel to reel tapes.

The IBM 305 RAMAC and 650 RAMAC machines are launched. The 305 is the first magnetic hard disk for data storage, and the RAMAC (Random Access Method of Accounting and Control) technology soon becomes the industry standard. The storage capacity of the 305's 50 two-foot diameter disks was 5 megabytes of data.
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supsalemgr

In 1986 my company placed the old AS-400 computers in agent's offices. They would receive a new 8" floppy each week with updated customer info. They could also quote electronically instead of manually. It was obviously not on line, but considered state of the art at the time.
"If you can't run with the big dawgs, stay on the porch!"

Solar

Quote from: supsalemgr on October 20, 2022, 10:56:39 AMIn 1986 my company placed the old AS-400 computers in agent's offices. They would receive a new 8" floppy each week with updated customer info. They could also quote electronically instead of manually. It was obviously not on line, but considered state of the art at the time.
I had a dial up modem before the Internet existed, (set your phone on the cradle type) as long as you had someone's number and they were connected, you could transfer files.
Problem back then was long distance charges, because modems were snail slow, but the novelty of it was pretty cool.
I think that was 1984.
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