I think we all agree that one of the best parts of a CES is seeing all the weird, wacky, and borderline wacky products that pop up at the show. You know what I’m talking about: It’s the suitcase with ears, the cuddly robots and all the other things that scratch your head and wonder how someone got the drive and the determination to pull off such a strange idea. To celebrate all of the wonderfully weird things that make it to the Consumer Electronic Show despite the odds, we’ve put together a humble collection of the strangest technologies we’ve discovered this year.
You can find more interesting products in our Top Tech of CES 2022 Award winners!
Table of Contents
Cyclophone 2.0
I’m pretty sure there are a total of six people on earth who want a circular smartphone in 2022, and luckily a company called Dtoor answered their prayers at CES this year. I like this thing because it’s a glorious endorsement of the consumption dream: no matter how impractical or niche your desires may be, you can be sure that someone somewhere has created a product that will scratch your itch exactly. What a time to be alive
Samsung’s NFT-enabled TV
I’ll take “shameless trend hunt” for 200, Alex! And why didn’t they call it NFTV? Huge missed opportunity there. If you dive headfirst into the NFT zeitgeist and build the low-hanging fruit of trendy technology, at least give it the low-effort pun name it deserves. This ain’t rocket science folks.
Airvida air purifier headphones
Don’t get me wrong – I’m a fan of pretty much anything that has 2-in-1 functionality, but that’s just weird. Even in a world where airborne viruses and year-round forest fires have made everyone painfully aware of air quality, this still seems like an odd mashup. It’s like a snorkel with a built-in duck call; just because you can do it doesn’t mean you should.
Victrola’s newest portable record player
Serious?! Who would actually unanimously take a record player and a selection of records to listen to on the go? This is absolute madness. And before I hear the whole “it’s more about nostalgia than convenience”, I would like to point out that by using this device as intended and connecting it to a Bluetooth speaker, you completely negate the advantages of the analog audio source that you lug around.
If you are reading this, Victrola, I would like to tell you, as a proud member of the Millennial Hipster community and a statistically perfect example for your target audience, that we are all too busy putting third-generation Touchwheel iPods on Ebay to do this Thing more than to give a glance.
Sengleds heart rate monitor light bulb
So I totally understand that this thing has some legitimate use cases and could potentially be helpful in certain settings like hospitals or assisted living – but it’s also extremely creepy. The fact that a humble little lightbulb can monitor my heart rate remotely without my permission just makes me feel like the world is slowly turning into a boring cyberpunk dystopia and we will soon find ourselves in a neo-Orwellian surveillance hellish landscape of ours own designs.
The smart TP holder from Homeplenish
Shubham Agarwal of DT put it so aptly: “Smart home gadgets tend to be limited to solutions to non-existent problems,” and this gadget is definitely one of them. It tracks your TP usage to predict when you will run out of TP and then orders more so your replacement rolls arrive on time and you never run out of TP. The idea is that it will eliminate the need to hoard toilet paper, but at what price? See comment above about imprisonment in a neo-Orwellian surveillance hellscape.
Ham amagami ham
Ham amagami ham is the best kind of weirdness. It serves absolutely no practical purpose – and that’s the great thing about it. There is no half-way promise that this thing will make your life better or provide a dubious mental health benefit. The creators offer no justification for its existence. It’s just a cute little thing nibbling on your finger and that’s all it has to be.
Now shut up and buy yourself a finger-sucking robo plush toy. You want it too.
Editor’s recommendations
-
What is QD OLED? The latest (and greatest) TV technology explained in full
-
Satechi just released a crazy 165 watt 4-port USB-C charger
-
The 5 biggest computer announcements from CES 2022
-
Why we can’t be too excited about the discrete Intel Arc Alchemist GPUs just yet
-
GoPro Hero 10 Black: 7 things I love and 2 things I don’t like
This article was previously published on Source link
