I haven't thought about Blockbuster at all for ages, but Kevin Carey's screed against the company brought back a whole lot of bad memories. These days, the company's only useful to me as a place where I can buy cheaply movies I want to have but am embarrassed to spend serious money on, or movies I'm curious about but don't want to make major investments in. A couple of years ago, I tried their mail-order service, which had the distinct disadvantage when compared to Netflix of having a queue system that didn't remotely work. It's always amazing to me how quickly companies can drive themselves into obselesence, but I'm reading a book by Frederick Hess on education reform right now that's a valuable reminder of how fast institutions in all industries, not simply entertainment where trends shift unusually fast, burn out: the average Fortune 500 company lasts, apparently, only 50 years.