The International Consumer Electronics Show – usually called CES, unless you're a member of the Coalition for Eggplant Socks and want to avoid confusion – is held every year in Las Vegas, and is the most exciting thing to happen in January among people who are unconcerned with sports playoffs, Australia Day or bare hand-to-mouth survival.
This year's CES ended Friday, and as usual it presented an amazing array of incredibly exciting gadgets designed to imitate whatever amazing, incredibly exciting gadget actually made money last year. Such is the way of innovation; if this year's surprise consumer hit is a purple robotic weasel that uses GPS coordinates to automatically point toward the nearest brewpub, then in 2013 expect to see CES jam-packed with violet stoats, indigo ferrets and mulberry honey badgers.
While choosing among dozens of barely differentiated luxury goods is our right as well-fed, over-entertained Americans, I can't help but think that life might be a little more exciting if, instead of churning out yet another damned ultrabook, tech companies tried to invent something a little more, well, inventive.
However, given that R&D apparently stands for "ripoffs and duplicates" these days, it falls to someone else – someone like me – to sow the seeds of creativity that may someday grow into a beautiful garden of battery-powered money-sucks that nobody needs. So here we have my list, compiled over endless minutes, of Things Someone Should Invent.
Electric Razor Smartphone
I have a device that I often hold up to the side of my face, that vibrates and recharges. Why doesn't it shave my face already? Are people who invent phones extremely stupid? If for some reason they can't get it together, I would settle for genetically modified bees you could put inside a clamshell to shave like Fred Flintstone.
Flying Tablet
With all the top-notch engineering that went into the iPad, I am disturbed to discover that it is still extremely fragile, and breakable if you fling it across the room or parking lot like a Frisbee. I think even a little market research would have shown that the natural, intuitive thing to do with a flat, handheld device is to throw it and see how far it can fly. Apple – or a competitor – should develop a tablet that can not only be thrown safely, but which actually flies pretty far. And it should also not break a golden retriever's teeth when caught.
The People's E-Reader
While Kindles and Nooks are selling well, they still face a major hurdle in mass acceptance: You must actually want to read books. We all know that 85 percent of Americans won't read a book unless it's by, about or made from a celebrity. The Kindle Fire is a step in the right direction, because you can watch movies and play games on it, but what we need is a more intuitive UI.
Here's how the People's E-Reader would work. You type in a title, and if it's a movie, it shows you the movie. If there's no movie by that name, but there is a TV series, it shows you the TV series. If there's no TV series, it looks for a musical, videogame, soundtrack or YouTube video where someone tells you most of the plot. Only if none of those exist does it actually deliver the book. It will revolutionize the way we consume media by catering to our worst instincts.
Milk Wi-Fi Boots
I just have this kind of scribbled in my notebook. I'm not sure what it is, but I'm sure it's something awesome. Make it so!
Certified Angry Birds-Free Devices
I admit that Angry Birds is a great game. Not as good as Cut the Rope or Plants vs. Zombies or FatBooth, but, you know, good. (I got three stars on all the levels about 15 updates ago, so you know I was into it.)
But for Baal's sake, I am tired of seeing those birds' little irate polygonal faces everywhere. Yesterday I saw them on fruit snacks. Fruit snacks, I tell you! If the blue fruit snacks had split into three identical fruit snacks, I might have been impressed, but as it is I'm tired of the whole thing. I want someone to sell me a full-featured electronic device that is guaranteed to not download, run or even display Angry Birds. And if nobody does, I will get into a giant slingshot and hurl myself at Rovio headquarters.
Photo: LungCookie/Flickr
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Born helpless, naked and unable to provide for himself, Lore Sjöberg overcame these handicaps to found the Coalition for Eggplant Socks.
