A decade is quite a long time – especially in the world of technology. Think of this: a decade has passed since Apple presented its iPhone, a device that has over time changed the way we look at the mobile phone. Over the years, smartphones have become the entertainment device of choice for a generation, replacing portable music players, “soap box” cameras, pocket-sized gaming consoles, and many other entertainment devices we looked at as amazing achievements in the past. Yet there are several entertainment options that have seemingly stood the test of time, surviving even the amazing spread of smartphones. Here are three of them smartphones are seemingly having trouble pushing out of business.

Casinos

A little over two decades ago, an ingenious British firm has successfully launched the first real-money online gambling venue. As you might expect, it was followed by myriads of others, and experts were quick to predict the downfall of land-based gambling as a whole. Yet this effect has failed to come: even after the advent of mobile casinos, land-based gambling is still thriving not only in the US but all over the world.

Even in the countries where online gambling is completely liberalized, land-based casinos are still visited by thousands of people each year.

Books

Reading is becoming increasingly unpopular in our digital world. The youngsters of our times have seemingly lost the respect for the printed word, preferring audio or video versions of the stories told. Not all of them, of course – there are still enough readers who find the smell of a new book and the touch of paper to be an integral part of reading a story.

We’ve come a long way from hand-written copies to electronic paper, yet printed books are still among the preferred mediums of those seeking to read – even if downloading an e-book or an audiobook is much more convenient for them.

Vinyl

The supremacy of vinyl records has been under attack repeatedly over the years. First, it was the magnetic tape, then came the CD, the DVD, and various digital formats, each one with a better compression of the data and higher fidelity of the sound. Yet many people still prefer the vintage sound of vinyl records because – as they claim – it is far closer to the “real thing” than any digital recording can ever be.

Although vinyl is not fit for listening while away from home, it has made a comeback recently as the “next big thing”, finding its way not only into the DJs’ record collections but the living rooms of perhaps millions of audiophiles all over the world. It seems that, despite the digital music revolution, vinyl is here to stay.