Back in January, 2005, I posted a column asking if the speed of new technology was outstripping consumers' abilities to absorb its implications. Thanks to the magic of Google, that old column is now getting new comments, one of which spurred me to revisit the issue.
The complaints are numerous: nothing works with anything else, it all gets outdated too quickly, and retail salespeople don't understand what they're selling, so there's no place to turn for advice. This reader's solution? Withdraw from technology altogether.
The question of when to buy/when to wait is a common one; nobody wants to buy a product that is immediately obsolete. David Pogue's readers (see the first 20 comments or so) advise finding the right device, and just being happy with it. Aside from being preachy, this presumes that consumers already know exactly what their needs are. It also ignores the fact that computing and consumer electronics tend to plateau - when new devices will just have minor feature updates - but also make major shifts from time to time. If you buy just before a dramatically new device comes out, buyer's remorse is completely understandable. Ergo, the fear of buyer's remorse is completely understandable. Generally speaking, everything gets cheaper the longer you wait, but pricing trends are not always constant, either. Knowing when it makes sense to invest in an expensive TV/cameraphone/PC/etc. could genuinely require an understanding of the market, the technology landscape, channel constraints (the world's greatest cameraphone still needs to go through 3 - 6 months of testing at a carrier before it sees the light of day in this country), and product launch cycles.
You could get some of this information by reading engadget every day, putting together charts of upcoming products, reading reviews... and driving yourself insane. (Actually, some people do this as a hobby/addiction, and for some lucky/insane people, it's part of the job). But there is no way a typical hourly retail employee can be expected to track and master this much information. (Even if you run into a peculiar breed of retail employee called The Geek Enthusiast, invariably he - it's always a "he" - has trouble matching the right gadget/technology to your specific needs. And he'll soon be off to a career in product management anyway, so the next time you return he'll be gone.)
In other industries - construction, healthcare, real estate - we hire professionals to overcome design and choice complexity. Of course, experts demand payment for their expertise, and the dollar amounts and margins on most consumer electronics simply do not lend themselves to a workable business model. I cannot imagine a sustainable business where consumers pay $250 in consulting fees to help them choose a $250 device. Aggregated opinions on the web (such as Amazon.com reviews) are a big help, but are not personalized, cannot ensure everything works well together, can't help you learn how to use your new technology, and there's a lot of chaff to sort through to get to the wheat.
Where the total dollar amounts are higher, a professional services model can work. The custom home theater installation market is probably the only consumer electronics area where many of these issues are addressed - for a price. But the majority of consumers buy by brand name (Bose, Apple, Kodak, and Sony all benefit from long brand associations), buy based on simplicity rather than an extended understanding of potential uses (Apple's iPod fits this category nicely), or hold off buying altogether until a category leader has been established (TiVo, iPod).
But going full-on Luddite is not necessarily practical - or even desirable - for most people. For example, in my day job I focus on mobile devices. The data on mobile phones is clear: the things are way too hard to use. The data is also clear: many people consider their cell phones indispensable. One survey declared them the winner of the technology people most love to hate. So people sort of make their peace with technology and use it for a limited set of functions that they can mentally wrap their heads around. They don't know how to silence the phone, so it rings when it shouldn't. They don't know how to lock/unlock the phone (because no manufacturer will install a simple lock/unlock switch as found on every iPod) so it calls their mother by itself. But they won't leave the house without it.
Similarly, consumers may not have a complete grasp of HDTV and even less understanding of whether to choose plasma, LCD, DLP, an LCOS variant, or wait for laser or SED, but at some point, it's football season...
-avi
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