How the Cool Stuff At CES Will Ruin Your Life 171
jfruh writes "Another CES has come and gone, and as usual the press has presented rather uncritically a list of super-cool gadgets that were unveiled at the show and that will make our world better. Let's leave aside the fact that many products shown at CES never make it to market; Paul Roberts provides the pessimistic case on the big CES news, explaining how all these gewgaws will strip away privacy, unleash an army of Clippys onto the world, and maybe even change human brains for the worse."
Only maybe?? Understatement of the century. (Score:5, Insightful)
Just attending CES will change your brain for the worse.
Simple solution (Score:5, Insightful)
Don't feel forced to use gadgetry. There's something called "life" that doesn't require much of it to be enjoyed.
When I was younger, I used to enjoy immersing myself in the latest and greatest toys, back in the 80s and 90s. Many things were new and fun. Nowadays the things of the future presented at shows like CES seem more like evolutions of existing concepts. Nothing really earth-shatteringly new.
As a result, I must admit I've pretty much lost interest, and the fog of high-tech addiction has cleared so to speak. I've realized that a simpler life is more enjoyable and less stressful. Not to mention, non-early-adopters tend to waste a lot less money than those who can't wait to buy the latest semi-working banana product doodah.
Maybe? (Score:2, Insightful)
What is this maybe crap? Oh sure like THIS is the year we'll all wise up suddenly and stop dumping our money on people who make cheap plastic badly made crap.
The pursuit of profit above all else... Excessive greed.. Is really fucking up humanity.
Re:Simple solution (Score:5, Insightful)
Don't feel forced to use gadgetry. There's something called "life" that doesn't require much of it to be enjoyed.
The problem is that 'life' is full of people who buy all those gadgets. Second-hand gadgetry is almost as bad as the real thing.
Thanks! (Score:5, Insightful)
For doing the decent thing and linking to the print-preview version of the article.
New tools always change society (Score:1, Insightful)
Every tool man has created has had some level of social impact. Embrace change and react to it. Don't fear it.
Re:New tools always change society (Score:5, Insightful)
Every tool man has created has had some level of social impact.
But not necessarily for the better. Agriculture brought drugs and alcohol. The bronze age brought weapons and armor, and the iron age brought even more weapons. The car has brought massive polution. The iPhone brought us iMaps. And so on and so on.
Embrace change and react to it.
We don't need to embrace change and pretend it's progress. Our needs are being met. We can decide if new technologies are worth the price, in actual dollars and in the effort in switching to something new.
Re:Simple solution (Score:5, Insightful)
Like you, I grew up in the 80's with Commodore64, Atari, Amiga, BBC, Dragon32 (and yuck, ugly green PC and overpriced Apple), the toys where battling like crazy to set the standard for the future, rarely anyone did - but they did SOMETHING important, they made everything we have today - possible, faster processors made digital home video editing and cable-by-internet possible, it also made it possible for us to toss away the entire laptop, and carry the entire world in our pockets, Smartphones aren't THAT old, but very practical. I wouldn't want to be without one. It releases me from sitting in front of the computer, and I can basically do what I need - right in the middle of the forest if that need be.
But you're right, most of todays "revolutionary" gadgets, doesn't have the same feel of "revolution", because most toys can do what the other toys already does. And we usually end up paying for ALL THE TOYS, since each toy have their OWN LICENSE for different games, videos, net-services, functions etc. Which sucks.
I just bought the Nintendo Wii U (against my better judgement), But I was REALLY hungry for something new. Sure...it's a touch screen king size play-doh fisher-price remote control, I guess thats new...but it's nothing new as a whole...everything has been done before, and in a few days...I just got bored again.
I have far more fun inventing my own gadgets in my electronics lab, here I have millions of Discretes (components from the 80-90s and even today), and can hack together really weird stuff.
When I grew up, this was normal for kids, they too went to the local electronics store - modded their Commodore 64 to get faster loading times etc. Built their own modems to communicate digitally via HAM radio (or just a cheapo CB radio) with some simple components, cheap off the shelves.
This world really needs something *new*
Re:You can decide to ..... (Score:5, Insightful)
For example, I refuse to buy PC games or programs that use online activation - I disagree with the philosophy of allowing other people to dictate when I may use something I have bought. I would not accept it for a car, I would not accept it for a toaster. Why should I accept it for software? That it greatly reduces my choices in the market place is besides the point - I vote with my feet and will continue doing so. And yet, my friends think I'm nuts because - omg - I'm not up to date with whatever hot title just came out. How can I live?? Really, I don't feel like entertainment is worth compromising my principles for
Likewise, if you really prefer your printer from the 1990s, spend the money it's worth to you to get it fixed or retrofitted to keep operating with modern ink, or be prepared to do without. Don't accept substandard. Don't accept exploitative business practices. But the increasingly common refrain is that "One person won't change anything", much like saying that voting for a third party is wasting your vote. If people were prepared to stand up for their principles instead of falling over for the shiney gadget, we would all be better off.
Re:Simple solution (Score:5, Insightful)
But then, who would want a fridge that lets your food go bad just because your internet connection failed?
A supermarket, obviously. So they'll hire some politicians to pass a law to make it illegal for any retailer except a supermarket to sell fridges... This is how America does business.
Re:You can decide to ..... (Score:3, Insightful)
- electric starters
- automatic transmissions
- power steering
- power breaks
- anti-lock breaks
- heating/defrosters
- air conditioning
- do I really need to list more?
Operating an automobile has become much, much easier. So easy in fact that almost all adults and many teenagers can do it properly. Imagine that. A large, dangerous piece of machinery that travels at high speed was dumbed down so even the the most "watered down" among us can use it. What's next, TVs or maybe even computers?
The idea is to make information and entertainment as easily accessible as possible to the most people as possible (while still being able to make a profit). Tablets are easier for a lot of people and they like that so they are buying them. You don't get to decide the level of intelligence required to suck at the teet of the internet.
Re:You can decide to ..... (Score:4, Insightful)
not buy it. The good ideas/products will stay, the bad ones will die away. That's how evolution works.
Spoken like a true "free market" fan-boy. Alas, the real world does not work the way it does in the fictional novels of Rand et al. A truly free market requires fully informed consumers. If you believe that the average iPhone user is fully informed about all the issues arising from his/her use of that particular technology, you are truly a fool. As TFA points out, the market is about to explode with this kind of complex technology which contains features and functionality that are deliberately hidden from the consumer. Consumers will, in blissful ignorance, buy this shit, not understanding how their privacy has been sold. I don't give a damn about analogues of Clippy on my refrigerator's GUI, but I damn well want to be able to muzzle his ass when he tries to phone home about what I'm eating. No, I want him muzzled by default unless/until I choose to let him phone home to Kroger/Safeway/Albertson's or whichever giant grocer has paid to have him keep tabs on my pickle supply.
Re:You can decide to ..... (Score:2, Insightful)
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:You can decide to ..... (Score:3, Insightful)
The GGP's claim was that "market forces" will result in survival of the best products. GP's claim was that software seems to be getting worse, not because new products come out and win over old products, but that sole-source vendors change their product for the worse and eliminate the old product (possibly with the goal of forcing the market to buy the new product).
Parent's solutions are a) write your own million man-hour software or b) go open source. Both of these amount to stepping outside of the wonderful free market, and a frank admission that the free market fails to produce software alternatives and therefore fails to identify "good value" in software. Or possibly tech-products in general. With a market dominated by a handful of megacorps, Adam Smith's economics of a hundred-competing-bakers just doesn't work.
Re:You can decide to ..... (Score:4, Insightful)