How long does it take for something to become a true antique? For the bold explorers who form the Raiders of the Lost Walmart, any obsolete technology for sale at an inappropriate price is precious and in need of documentation. There are some electronic relics that are older and more precious than others, though, and reader/Raider Lathi recently excavated some digital camera accessories from the late Mavica era.

Back in the day, you see, people customarily stored their files on plastic floppy disks, and digital cameras that saved files directly on floppy disks did exist. Later, Sony realized that this was bulky and silly, and switched to the smaller memory stick format. This was a device used to move files from the memory stick to your computer, if your computer lacked a USB drive, or to take pictures on an older floppy-drive-using Mavica and save the files on a higher-capacity memory stick.

Curiously, this Mavica accessory is one of the rare cases where the Walmart price is inappropriate because it’s low. The adapter is enough of a niche product that it’s quite pricey on Amazon, with the cheapest ones a bit more expensive than Walmart’s once you consider shipping.

Anyway, Amazon added the item to its inventory in 2001, but it was probably on the market before that. Memory sticks debuted in 1998. How long has this item been sitting on the shelf? Let’s zoom in and check.

July 27, 2010? This may represent eternal optimism on Walmart’s part: they sincerely believe that someday, someone will come along who desperately needs this accessory. Maybe they’d be better off buying it and flipping it on Amazon., though Lathi notes that there are some available at a better price on eBay.

What else is on the shelf?

What happened to the price tag on this poor item? Lathi reports that it rang up at $10, which is great news for anyone who needs to share files between these three formats on their obsolete hardware. That person is unlikely to come along for a long time, though.

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