Why were these even invented?

Here is a picture of my dining/front room area.  Now the question I would like to ask is who and why would someone ever invent vertical blinds?  They are ugly and noisy and I just don't like them.  (No offense to anyone who loves them-to each his own right).  We have lived here for over a year now and every time I see those ugly blinds I want to rip them down, but I have just never had the time to really deal with them.  Well enough is enough!  For some reason the other day I remembered that I have a tote somewhere full of plain white panels from pottery barn.  I bought them for our last house that had tons of windows.  I don't know why I hadn't thought of them before, but they would be a definite improvement over the vertical swingers.  Good-bye ugly blinds......

......Hello better lighting and a softer glow.  

Much better!  Probably not a long term solution, but it is so much nicer during the day in there. 

 Even at night it looks better, but really it couldn't look worse, right!?!