Topps released a new line of baseball cards earlier this week that include new technology compatible with a PC. When I think of baseball cards I always think of zzzzzzzzzzz…

Beginning Monday, collectors who hold a special Topps 3D Live baseball card in front of a webcam will see a three-dimensional avatar of the player on the computer screen. Rotate the card, and the figure rotates in full perspective. It’s called “augmented reality,” a combination of a real image with a virtual one.[...]

Topps needs to augment reality because baseball cards are struggling in the Internet age. Today’s collectors, most of whom are still boys, can just as easily and less expensively find the sports facts they want online.

Seriously, Topps might as well be selling tiny newspapers at this point. If their days were any more numbered, the German army would be marching them into the showers. But I think we can all agree that baseball cards were just a gateway to stealing adult magazines. And hey, that stuff’s online now, too. I love the internet as much as I hate baseball cards. Which is a lot.

|NY Times, via Deuce of Davenport|