They don't make 'em the way they used to. You can say that about about a lot of things. A cathode-ray television set from the 1960s will not accept an HDMI cable, and it's too heavy to move, but darn it, it still works, while a flat screen TV falls apart if you touch it wrong. But that's just my personal experience. In the case of satellites, the first one ever was Sputnik 1, launched on October 4, 1957. It relayed radio signals for three weeks until its battery ran down, and fell to earth in 1958. But it served its intended purpose, and wasn't expected to last long. In the years that followed, both the US and USSR launched multiple satellites and discovered how useful they are for a wide variety of applications beyond showing up rival nations.
On May 6, 1965, the Lincoln Calibration Sphere 1 was inserted into orbit. This satellite, a 3-feet, 8-inch metal ball, is still in orbit and still carrying out its original job 58 years later! The LCS's mission is to serve as a reference point to calibrate ground-based instruments. Its ace-in-the-hole is that it needs no power source at all, so there are no batteries to run down. Solar-powered satellites are used now, but that technology was not available in miniaturized form in 1965. It's still amazing that the LCS stays in its orbit perfectly even after all these years, and so still works as a reference target. The LCS1 is expected to outlive us all. Read about the world's oldest functioning satellite at Amusing Planet.