Forget Smart Appliances and Buy Dumb Ones
In 1988, the New York Times published an article about “smart” appliances. They weren’t called “smart” back then – in fact, they didn’t exist yet – but the writer was predicting they would make life easier for us in the not-so-distant future.
The article said that someday we’d be able to use our car phones to tell our home appliances to do things that would then be ready by the time we arrived home.
Things like defrosting a steak, heating up a pie, filling the bathtub with hot water, turning on the air conditioner, etc.
About 30 years later, very few homeowners have that type of technology. But we do have smart microwave ovens and smart phones and smart TVs… all of which are expensive and are out of date in a couple of years. Or they break and it’s too costly to fix them, so you have to buy another one.
The question is, do we really need “smart” products that can think for us? Or at least do things we think of and tell them to do?
Do we really need a smart meter that can tell us exactly how much electricity we used yesterday compared to the day before? Or do we just need one that can tell the utility company how much to bill us for?
Do we really need a smart oven that can suggest how many spices to add to a pot roast, or do we just need one that can cook the darned thing?
Do we really need clocks with 15,000 features on them for giving us reminders to call our mothers, telling us what the temperature is outside and advising us which clothes to wear that day? How about one that just tells you the only thing you really need to know – the time?
Does anybody really know what time it is? (Sorry, I had to throw that in there, and if you’re 55 or older, you’ll know what I mean.)
Do we really need a vacuum cleaner that can move around the house by itself, or a microwave oven with 300 different settings or a car that can parallel park itself? (Actually, that last one is pretty cool. I wouldn’t mind having that.)
But the point is, all of these new bells and whistles that are supposed to simplify our lives end up costing us more time and money. And it’s always too expensive to fix them.
By the time you figure out everything it can do, it’s obsolete or it breaks. Then you have to add it to what must be an enormous “smart landfill” that has probably overwhelmed an entire Pacific island by now.
Just give me the dumb appliances. Give me a clock that tells me what time it is, an oven that cooks my food and a phone that allows me to make and receive phone calls. And, oh yeah… that car that parks itself. Then I’ll be happy.
I do not even own a “dumb’ or “smart” dishwasher!..I think some of the technology is too tempting for people to hack into it and spy on you..and I think there have been cases where it has happened (web cams on computers and who know about your “smart” tv/fridge etc…could they be hacked -I bet they could! I will stick to the most basic stuff I can still find and be happy :-)
Washing machine. Freezer. Both have been ruined with “improvements”. Buy older good used and they actually work and can be fixed. Bty, remember when you could live through the extremely dangerous experience of ….lifting the lid of a running washer….
I am with you but shame on you … I have Chicago songs stuck in my head now
There are worse things to have stuck in your head than songs by Chicago, right? :)
With all this “Smart Technology” available and more to come, I am very concerned for future generations. Are they going to know how to survive if all that technology disappeared one day? Would they be able to start a fire, cook a meal, grow food, or at the very least know how to find or filter water? Some catastrophe happens somewhere in the world a couple times a month. Will future generations know how to deal with them? My children know how to live off the grid. Very few of their friends know what that means.
Ah, the good ol’ days !
Amen to that, Hunter. I asked my grandkids if they knew what what “tugs” were as pertaining to a team of work horses. Not one of 12 knew the answer. Makes me feel old, but maybe wise?