Let me tell you why it’s all counter-intuitive
350 HP and from 0 to 100km/h in 6.7 seconds. That’s your daily drive. And you’re just shy of $2,000 USD per month weighting on your family’s budget. Then, of course, a retina-display phone, double or triple, or -why not- 4-cameras asset, with 440 PPI screen because HD is so 2014: 4k is a must if you want to be up-to-date.
Did I hear fast charging? State-of-the-art surround system? Kopi Luwak Coffee, because fecal extract
When do we stop wanking on specs and realize that emotional marketing is not here to make our lives better but to trigger our internal impulse to get more, buy more and want more of what we never needed?
Are you aware of your habits and sorrounding?
The roads from home to anywhere have a speed limit of 50km/h. If you are lucky and work far enough, then you can extend that to 110. And throw some more cash into fueling that SUV. We are making bigger great again. After all, didn’t you buy her just to hear the roar at the tunnel’s entrance, heading to that frustrating meeting at 7.30 in the morning? In all honesty, you just bought an excuse to be late. Finding parking is as rare as seeing two Popes in the same decade, so everything works out.
Then, the sad part. Your eyes can’t distinguish HD from 4K. Now what?
Well, bigger screens justify the pixels-per-inch. So the 65″ comes only with 3840 x 2160 pixel or above.
Still not, unless you are sitting within 80cm from the screen. Which then lead my question: “Wouldn’t a new pair of glasses (200$ budget) solve it without changing TV?”
GLASSES! How could I forget that?
Never hide, especially if we are talking about brands. The choice is so vast: colors, shapes, lenses, style (we were talking about? Glasses, right?), lense’s colors and design.
Except, the money goes all in one’s pocket. And Luxottica is not the only one capitalizing on the “choice” for its beloved customers.
Why are we obsessed with specs?
I remember just past the year 2000, I was entering the world of forums. That was a place for nerds only, with a connection above 128k and internet flat rate. Because the nerds approach to technology was and always will be “the maximum result with the minimum effort (especially financial effort)”. Do you remember those signatures in the user’s posts?
Well it didn’t really change, it just got more fashionable and overall more affordable.
We really need to step our game up. My opinion is that we can’t take a decision or shape our opinion only on price in today’s world. We need to identify functions and values, smarten up and get a bit deeper before making a purchase. You won’t see any company building or buying a nuclear fusion reactor that can produce the same amount of energy of the sun: 4 million tons of hydrogen translated power per second seems unnecessary for any production line, right?
That doesn’t mean we can’t produce or get the whole energy the sun produces.
What really amuses me is how we think that this applies only to a general level, not when it touches our personal beliefs or our relationship with brands.
If Huawei comes up with a 4-lens camera phone, we have more incentive to spend on that phone, rather than a cheaper model that delivers exactly what we need.
I am trying to stress my point: human eyes can’t distinguish anything above 1-minute degree from over 1 meter and 4k is still a thing in most households and purchase decision processes. Car’s top-speed 180 mp/h and we suddenly became the next Dale Earnhardt on a monthly payment.
Isn’t it frustrating when we go over the specs’ masturbation and forget what we need or what’s the most affordable solution we have?
I’m not saying that 4K or supercar don’t have a market, but it shouldn’t be the mass one. And the fault is yours, stop blaming it on China.
I’ve reached my yearly quota in 2018 after seeing tons of reviews of the new iPhone Xr criticizing its display as “not retina” since it’s only 326ppi compared to the 300$-extra-worth iPhone Xs Max and its 458ppi OLED screen. Now, tell me honestly where do you see the difference:
I’ll tell you were the difference is: put it within 4cm from your nose. The common distance use, huh?
Oh, and of course there is no 3D touch. What is 3d touch, you ask? It’s only the most useless feature ever implemented on a mobile OS. Consumers typically recall using it… 3 times: when first got the phone, when first showing it to a friend and when grandmother heard it on television and needed them to show her.
The same speculation done on screens and resolutions is found in cameras and picture’s enthusiast (A.K.A. Instagrammers). The average success rate of capturing the beauty and that once-in-a-lifetime frame is not correlated to the megapixels of the camera you hold but in the subject, the framing, the composition and your creativity. A professional camera won’t get you the cover on National Geographic. I can relate to this concept coming from the other end, since I have the creativity of the Kopi’s excrements: I’ve been trying to dig into photography, videos, Instagram’s filters… I just don’t have it, in the same, sad way I can’t play the guitar while singing the lyrics.
Is it possible for us to stop getting caught up in the hype? I dream of a world where we don’t need the anti-trust authority to tell us that something is overpriced or not standardized, where laborers are fairly paid and not mistreated, where kids are let play games and not employed and products are not counterfeited. I dream of a future where the 4K screens sell thousands, not millions, pieces a year to fat and bald pro-gamers only and not to families.
Am I going to witness a market full of decent products and the consequent fall of fraud?