the future is built stupider
So I came across this video from Jaiden Animations and it really hammered home what I've been saying for about a year at this point. Technology today is dumb, and it's probably only going to get dumber.
why tf does my car need a tablet in it?
So, my wife has a nice car, it's a 2024 Ford Edge. I hate that car.
Okay, maybe 'hate' is a bit hyperbolic, but I strongly dislike much of that car's design. For starters, the iPad dashboard. This thing can go straight to hell and so can the guy who pushed for it to be put into cars. To turn on the air conditioning, on you have to navigate this obtuse menu with input delay to turn it on. You have to tap arrows or drag the meter up and down. Same thing temperature controls. It's so unintuitive and annoying it makes me wonder what brainlet advocated for this.
My car is a 2018 Nissan Sentra, it's a boring commuter, but do I far and away prefer THIS car's dash board over my wife's. Everything is buttons and knobs. No finagling through menus, when I turn on AC it's 1 press of a big button. To increase/decrease air temp, I turn down a big knob. I don't even have to look at it to know what I'm doing. It's all muscle memory and quick glances.
The carPad completely defenestrates (there's a new word for you) both the intuitiveness and the muscle memory. Who tf is this even made for? Gen Alpha? Half that generation isn't even old enough to wipe their ass let alone drive.
Not only that, this feels like a safety hazard. Trying to navigate traffic whilst trying to mess around with buttons. It's like we went from "don't text and drive" to "use this tablet while you drive, hope it doesn't crash!"
That's the other thing... the fucking thing can crash... MY DASHBOARD WITH THE ONLY MEANS TO KEY FEATURES OF MY CAR SHOULDN'T BLUESCREEN!
Also, why does a dashboard need updates?? This should be set it and forget it. Sometimes, like in Jaiden's case, the thing will just lock down your car... what??
The problem you have is too many moving parts inevitably crashing out or becoming out of sync. And when it does work, it doesn't always work correctly.
My wife is having an issue with her car right now where it won't connect to her phone, it'll connect to her dad's phone, but not hers. Car Play cuts out at random spots when you drive through them (dunno how bluetooth has deadzones). Bluetooth on this thing is basically unusable. And the radio antenna sucks a cock, and get this... THEY GOT RID OF MY AUX CABLE AGAIN!! Like, I get it, most people use bluetooth, but Jesus Herman Christ on a bicycle at least let me use a dongle to connect my iPod/Phone into it! You got stupid games on the tablet, you could have at least added support for a fucking AUX cable.
My car, which is 5+ years older and much cheaper than my wife's, handles all these things like a champ. I have a CD player, AUX, Bluetooth, iPod support, the radio is solid, no cutting out. All this in a 2018! Yeah, it doesn't have CarPlay, but that shit is more trouble than it's worth. Hell, I don't even have a smartphone anymore, so carplay is completely useless anyway... Oh that's the other thing I forgot to mention, if you don't have a phone or your phone won't connect for whatever reason then Carplay is useless, you can either listen to the shitty radio, or you can sit in silence. With no other forms of audio interface, it is so limited.
Okay, so our cars suck now... what else?
why is my toaster connected to wifi?
I'm so tired of Internet of Things... Why does everything need a god. damn. app. My cat's litterbox uses an app. My washing machine uses an app. There are more and more things requiring apps now, and I think I know why they all do... it's easier to collect your data. Think about it.
If you have a litter robot, the app can send data to the company which can then be sold to a data broker. How many cats you have. How much they weigh. How frequently you change your litter. All of this is useful information which can be weaponized against you.
The engineering on these tech products is dumb as hell too. Like, why do I need a window that I can knock on to peer into my fridge... half of my fridge. I can just open the fucking door. Why does my fridge NEED A GOD DAMN TABLET IN IT!!! I don't need to watch TV on my fucking fridge. You know what would be an actual useful feature for a fridge? Being able to input an item and then an expiration date, and have your fridge tell you "hey, your carrots are gonna expire in 3 days, should probably use them". That would actually be helpful for people like me who will put fruit in the bottom tray and then forget they are there.
The product itself doesn't just suck, even the act of buying said things fucking sucks.
fuck you, your subscription service, your free shipping, and your emails
Just let me buy the thing, I don't need it once a month, I don't need it regularly at all. Just lemme buy the thing once! I feel like this practice just promotes unnecessary waste.
We also really sold our soul for free shipping. Companies and other people like myself have found that people will pay more if you show "free shipping". The shipping isn't free, it's just factored into the cost.
The tariffs don't help either, I wanted to buy a shirt from this Australian graphic tee shop that I really like, and the tariffs DOUBLED the cost. A $30 shirt just got hiked up to $60. I coulda bought 2 shirts for that much!
The other problem I have is EVERYONE wants me to sign up for email listings... now I don't check my emails very often (except my personal one me@absurdpirate.com), but when I do I get flashbang'd with hundreds of unread emails. I've mostly cleared this out, but I swear I get emails from companies that I am certain I clicked "I no longer wish to see emails".
remember this device you cunt!
Microsoft, Microsoft, Microcock, when I tell you "don't ask me again"... I really mean DON'T. ASK. ME. AGAIN! It seems I have installed Microsoft Dory, because this shit has short-term memory loss.
What's even funnier is it seems to actually remember me on Linux, but not Windows... I got nothing.
It makes it even worse when everything is 2-factor hell. So every time this shit logs me out, when I told it to remember me, it tells me "can I text you?"... sigh
why do only 2 companies run most of the internet?
I feel like the privatizing and centralizing of critical infrastructure is just a bad idea. The fact that Cloudflare is in charge of DNS when it shits the bed multiple times per year. Why is so much of the web beholden to AWS?
If either of these things go wrong, half the internet is fucked. And god forbid you have a smart mattress that uses AWS, otherwise your bed may be locked into a position you didn't want.
pirate yells at cloud
All that being said, I do hope the pendulum swings the other way. With more people going "retro" or going for older/alternative technology, I hope we can swing the other way. However, I'm not super optimistic because for these share holders until "line go down" they don't care how much the consumer suffers so long as "line go up".
Pirate is wearing all-black converse, pink tie dye Linkin Park tee, khaki-green pants
Pirate is feeling happy
Pirate is listening to 2010s pop music (Party Rock is in the HOOOOUSE TONIIIIGHT)
Pirate is playing Halo 3.
Reply via email: me@absurdpirate.com