People born before 2000 have been sharing the trivial skills they know that nobody uses anymore – 17 talents lost to time

The year 2000 may not feel like that long ago, but the world has changed a lot since then.

Technological advances mean that skills people used to take for granted have now been consigned to the history books. To get a taste of what Millennials and other generations still have a knack for, passiano put this question to r/AskReddit:

‘People born before 2000, what trivial skill do you have that no one uses anymore?’

Here are the top replies…

1.

‘My brain still has about a dozen landline numbers from 1998 locked and loaded. completely useless information taking up the space where I’m supposed to remember why I walked into this room.’
-Embarrassed_Year4720

2.

‘I can make a book cover out of a brown paper bag to protect a text book.’
-could_use_a_snack

3.

‘Cleaning mouse balls when the mouse gets slow and sticky.’
-StarlightWizard

4.

‘Everyone talking about reading a map is correct, but folding the map back is the real talent.’
-graptemys

5.

‘TV slappin. Percussive troubleshooting in general.’
-Confident_Insect_919

6.

‘T9 texting. I could do it while looking away from the phone, talking to you.’
-FatCopsRunning

7.

‘I can sit alone with my thoughts for hours.’
-Accurate-Pilot-5666

8.

‘We used to take classes on using Word and Excel and all its features. We learned ALL the formatting stuff, like how to place a picture without ruining everything.

‘When I was tutoring, my Gen Z students didn’t even know things like centering text for a title.’
-heidismiles

9.

‘Writing in cursive & programming a VCR.’
-TuxAndrew