12 Things We’ll Be Saying Goodbye To Soon

7. The Incandescent Lightbulb

No, government energy cops are not coming for your bulbs. But the traditional incandescent light bulb that traces its roots back to Thomas Edison is definitely on its way out. As of January 1, 2014, the manufacture and importation of 40- to 100-watt incandescent bulbs became illegal in the U.S., part of a much broader effort to get Americans to use less electricity.

Stores can still sell whatever inventory they have left, but once the hoarders have had their run, that’s it. And with incandescent bulbs burning for only about 1,000 hours each, eventually, they’ll flicker out.

The lighting industry has moved forward with compact fluorescents, halogen bulbs, and most recently and successfully, bulbs that use light-emitting diodes (LEDs), and General Electric (GE) and Sylvania have found themselves sharing shelf space with newer firms like Cree (CREE) and Feit.

Soon, the only places you’ll still see the telltale glow of a tungsten filament in a glass vacuum will be in heavy-duty and appliance bulbs, and some decorative items — and even for those, LEDs may ultimately take over.

8. Parking Meters

Along with the pay phone and a cup of coffee, the parking meter was once one of the main reasons people carried around coins. The pay phone is gone, and a regular coffee now costs two bucks a cup, but meters are still standing on their stanchions, awaiting your quarters, in cities and towns across America.

New technologies are nibbling at the meter base: Many municipalities have installed machines (usually one per block) that let parkers buy a slip of paper to display on their windshield. Systems such as MobileNOW and Pango, which allow parkers to pay for parking by cell phone, are being enabled all over the country. Some experts see a future where the GPS in your car will link up with a municipal parking network, let you know where a spot is available nearby, and allow you to pay for it, all at once.

But don’t wave goodbye to Rita the meter maid yet; parking meters still have decades left on many streets and lots. For one thing, meter makers have introduced innovations of their own, such as new tops that accept credit cards, are powered by the sun and can relay through wireless connections to parking authorities how often spots are being used.

Plus, there’s a familiarity factor, says Casey Jones, a former chairman of the International Parking Institute. A city that has used meters in one place is likely to stick with that technology even when adding new metered spaces.

9. The Cassette Tape

In the beginning, there was the LP record. When the compact disc arrived, many forecast the LP’s demise. It never happened; there’s still a vigorous niche market for vinyl, even in the era of streamed downloads.

In between those two technologies came the cassette. Remember those rattly little plastic boxes full of tape? They were designed for dictation but pressed into service to deliver music to millions, particularly during the 1980s, when they were the only way to take tunes with you, whether with a Walkman, boombox or in your car’s tape deck.

They’re still around, actually. And not just as a last-gasp way to hear music when borrowing Granny’s Buick Century. New music is being released on cassettes, kept alive by punk rockers, lo-fi artists, and their labels. Sale numbers are generally small — a few hundred here and there for many promoters, although Burger Records, a Fullerton, Calif.-based label, estimates that it has sold upward of 300,000 tapes over the last eight years.

Cassette culture today thrives on the medium’s low production cost—at least compared with vinyl records. And being able to hold music right in your hand can also be a revelation to younger generations, for whom music is something you get online. “It’s just something great to walk away from a show with,” says Matt Stuttler, a St. Louis musician, publisher, and producer who puts out cassettes under the label Eat Tapes. “A stack of cassettes is a reminder of specific shows, and they’re a whole lot cooler to look at than a few loose scraps of download cards.”