CES gives great consumer advice
Of what NOT to buy, of course.
Tech companies could make useful, private, repairable products.
Instead, they make pearls like "$200 travel mugs with location-sharing capabilities and irreplaceable batteries". And that’s just one example from the iFixit list of CES 2023 worst products.
The reasons why this happens are painfully obvious, but never repeated enough:
- most people (from way too many regulators to the overwhelming majority of “digital natives”) are deeply ignorant when it comes to anything digital, no matter how often they buy a new smartphone
- therefore, tech companies are not just let free, but practically encouraged to focus only on cost, speed to market and often pointless “performances”, resulting in too many products with “giant safety and privacy flaws”.
That’s why the iFixit CEO told the Washington Post that CES 2023 theme seems nothing more than “throwing everything at a wall and seeing what sticks”, which also contributes to “rapidly rising cost and danger of cybercrime.
And that’s why people fall into scams like the one in the screenshot, that iFixit calls “a Toilet Seat that Could Get You Arrested”.
And sometimes privacy isn’t even the bigger issue. Stuff like robots that keep kids engaged by facial recognition and analyses of their mood may also contribute to “long-term impacts on empathy, compassion and critical thinking skills”.
So, do check out CES reviews for shopping suggestions! Most of the stuff you really want to NOT buy will be there.
ADDED 2023/01/13: then again, after seeing crap like this, maybe it’s time for CES to shut down…
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I am Marco Fioretti, tech writer and aspiring polymath doing human-digital research and popularization.
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