Online Museum Is Preserving 'Endangered' Sounds for Future Generations

The plunk of typewriter keys. The buzz of a vintage intercom. The whir of a rotary-dial phone. Your familiarity with these sounds probably depends on your age.

One by one, a project spotted by Fast Company is cataloguing the sounds made by outdated objects that have faded from our collective memory. Called Conserve the Sound, it's “an online museum for vanishing and endangered sounds,” according to a description on the project's website. Most of them are vintage pieces of technology, but a foldable city map and a window crank handle for a car have also been included.

The project is the brainchild of Germans Daniel Chun and Jan Derksen, who own a media agency and argue that “sound branding” will play a larger role in the future.

Included in this museum of soon-to-be-forgotten sounds are items from the early 1900s up through the 2000s. You’ll hear the sounds made by a GAF View-Master from the ‘60s, the oddly shaped Weltron cassette recorder from the ‘70s, a Sony Walkman from the ‘80s, and a Leica Pradovit slide projector from the ‘90s.

Among the more recent items are two cameras: a Polaroid and a Canon EOS 3000N, both from the early 2000s. In other words, there’s something to make just about everyone feel old.

To hear these sounds and more, visit Conserve the Sound’s website.