Two User-Unfriendly things in most homes

Everyone has things around their house that they find useful but still very frustrating.

For me, the worst offender is the horrible mess that is the modern day audio-video system. You have this eclectic pile of black and silver boxes that are each designed by a different guy which, when wired together generate a regular stream of 4 letter words by every member of the family. In the old days when it was just an audio system, things were fine once you got it wired up. But now that we have hooked it all together with the TV, VCR, satellite box (or cable), TIVO, and DVD player, well, you already know the problem. “Why can’t I get the VCR to record HBO from satellite, and why are the rear speakers not working?” or “I turned it on like I always do and now I just get snow!!” or finally, “I just want to watch the #$%! TV.”

The second offender, the home PC is sometimes cited as the answer to the above problem. I disagree. About two years ago, I ran ethernet wiring to five rooms in my house from a central wiring closet; this works great for sharing high-speed internet and printers. But until my entire AV system gets integrated down into a couple of boxes that are digital and converse with each other intelligently, I’m not even going to consider tying it into my network.

The problem is that computers don’t yet fix themselves. In my opinion, every night your Mac or PC should run a complete self-diagnostic, connect with the mother ship somewhere and automatically clean up all the little glitches that accumulate during daily use. Of course that would put a lot of technical service people in India out of work, but hey, that’s the price of progress. Then you would have something that maintains itself and is finally reliable.

My only hope is the fact that frustration fosters innovation and creativity and new business models. Change is good.