What part of home computing feels stuck in the 90s?

[Dani]

What part of home computing has literally received no innovation over the past handful of decades (or backwards innovation!) and still feels like it's still stuck in the 1990s? Inkjet printers? Computer speakers? Keyboards and mice? iPhone text messages on Microsoft Windows? (OK, so iPhones didn't even exist back then, but there should still definitely be an Apple Messages app for Windows.)

[Reverend Jim]

Home networking. I don't know what it's like setting up a home network with Macs but it's a pain in the ass under Windows. Now I'll sit back and wait for the linux fans to chime in.

[SCBWV]

I haven't seen anything that really wows me these lately. I guess if your last viewpoint was from decades ago (even beyond the 90s), today's software and hardware would be impressive. Most of it seems iterative to me. It would be awesome to have a gamechanger come along. The spying home voice were pretty cool at first, but I know more people abandoning the devices than using them.

[Dani]

You don't think AI has been a game changer? IMHO home computing has grown leaps and bounds from a consumer standpoint because laypeople can now ask what they want to know in their native language and get a direct answer, in most cases (whether it's correct or not is a different story), without having to wade through links and search results.

[Reverend Jim]

To be fair, even before AI there was no easy way to determine whether the answers you got were correct. If you ask ChatGPT directly you get answers without sources or references. At least the Google AI summaries give some of the sources for verification.

[SCBWV]

@Dani Before that there was home assistants that understood native languages. Do you consider AI to be revolutionary or an evolution of search engines?

[Dani]

Home assistants do not understand native languages in the way that AI does. IMHO, home assistants are the combination of speech-to-text and responding to specific keywords, which are both technologies that have been around for decades. I can tell Siri to "Turn on the lights" because Siri has been programmed to respond to that specific phrase. However, if I were to say, "It's dark in this room and I can't see anything. Please fix that." they would not be able to respond. AI, on the other hand, could make that inference.

I think that, as a result of AI, lots of industries have evolved and in all different ways. Search engines have evolved to make use of AI. Publishers have evolved to make use of LLM to generate AI-driven articles. Software developers are now generating code with Claude. Etc.

[SCBWV]

Both Google Gemini and MS Copilot said AI is both revolutionary and evolutionary. 🤷‍♂️ My car will adjust the temperature if I say I'm hot or cold. I wouldn't claim it to be AI. Interesting aside, this summer I told my car I was hot and it turned down the temperature. In my wife's car (different brand), it said "perhaps you'd like to go for a swim?"

[Dani]

My car will adjust the temperature if I say I'm hot or cold. I wouldn't claim it to be AI.

Has your car been pre-programmed to listen for the specific phrases "I'm hot" or "Set the temperature to X"? Or is your car able to understand different ways of you asking for it to adjust the temperature. If it's the latter, then I would say that is AI. May I ask what make, model, and year of cars you and your wife have? Are your cars connected to the cloud?

[Dani]

According to this article, cars use what is described as AI-powered temperature control.