Best anti-tech/anti-progress thing I read all week... or just best thing altogether. #1599758, #1601320
Not all "progress" is progress. Just because you can, doesn't mean you should
Quite a lot of innovations ("Innovations") these days fail the basic... well, what for? test. Everything on blockchains in ~2017 had that same problem; it was hot and techy and a new, cool, fad-y thing you could do -- so everyone and their uncle did it, never mind whether it made any sense. Similarly: Tokenization is pretty retarded (#1601805)
I’m not sure it is entirely down to the recent cyber attack that ruined the food in the smart fridges of around 700 French supermarkets by raising their temperature until the contents started to cook. But suddenly there seems a lot to be said for dumb devices.
In general, I am all for embracing new technology. But even before the hack I felt a certain cynicism about so-called smart devices, especially when it comes to household appliances.
WHY does my fridge need a connection to the internet??
Yeah, cool. I can check the content from my phone on the go; and it can automatically add stuff to the grocery store app shopping list etc. But, like, why? Typical case of trading off fragility for a microscopic amount of convenience.
Internet of Things (IoT), or "smart" whatever-the-fuck, is all the rage. Amazon spyware home facilitation devices. I laughed hard at this sentence:
Often these gadgets are not really that smart, but the general notion of the IoT is that they are connected, so all kinds of devices talk to each other. Your fridge can talk to your online shopping list, you can talk to your central heating, your oven can open an account on Bet365.
I’ve never exactly considered myself a military objective but I don’t want the fridge ordering new filters, emailing the editor, phoning in to LBC or buying Bitcoin.
OK, obviously the fridge should buy bitcoin.
"And do we really need the oven connected to the laptop, or phone, or fridge? Aside from the opportunity for hackers to turn them on while we’re sleeping, the benefits seem minimal."
or this:
And then there’s that built-in obsolescence in smart devices. A kitchen appliance might last 20 years; an app or operating system may not. What happens when your new phone no longer supports your cooker’s software? How is your air fryer going to function when the US decides to throttle back Starlink and suddenly it takes twice as long to roast a chicken?
Fantastic read. Stay frosty; stay dumb.
Ironic that these modern innovations exacerbate our stress instead of simplifying our lives. No shame in going old school!
May I add have a dumb kitchen faucet as well. My Moen Motionsense died after 5 years and had no manual override.
Appliances are a nightmare now.
We bought a new washer/dryer, 4 years ago, and the washer (it could have been connected to the internet, we didn't) BROKE, apparently a problem with the controller board that couldn't be economically fixed.
I searched hard for something that was a simple device, fixable. It's impossible to find, except I think there were some very expensive commercial versions that were fixable.
Maddening. The washer we had when I was a kid, as far as I know, ran for at least 30 years.
The primary reason for this as far as I can see if advertising: fridge makers want to connect the fridge so that they can offer some big retailer a mega pipeline to consumers, lightbulb makers want WiFi lightbulbs for the data: when are users awake? and so on.
Strangely, though, there doesn't seem to be a strong no-wifi, no Bluetooth manufacturer -- like where's the appliances company that niches down into dumb devices?
I had to buy a new oven recently, and I'm pretty sure it is not able to connect to the internet, but now I'm starting to wonder.
but none of those things are benefits for consumers... what am I missing...?
but can it stack sats, tho??
while none of it is beneficial to customers, I think the hope of major new lines of revenue is so exciting to appliance manufacturers that they are motivated to make it sound good to customers.
And there are a lot of people who seemingly have bought into the idea of a "smart" home.
I've been surprised by how many people willingly embraced spyware in their homes, for what seems like pretty marginal benefits
Yes, and presumably they can actually sell these things at slightly lower price points because of the extra benefits to the producers.
I really hate the IOT trend that I actively look for non-smart devices whenever I can. I had a bad experience with a smart watering control unit where the city provided us the unit for free, but the company itself went bankrupt and it stopped working after a few years
Pathetic!! The world's most predictable error