The Verge reports back from CES, the yearly gathering where people usually get excited about shiny thing. This year, however, people are bit more wary…

And it’s not just privacy and security that people need to think about. There’s also lock-in. You can’t just buy a connected gadget, you have to choose an ecosystem to live in. Does it work with HomeKit? Will it work with Alexa? Will some tech company get into a spat with another tech company and pull its services from that hardware thing you just bought?
In other words, the kind of digital literacies required by the average consumer just went up a notch.

Here’s the thing: it’s unlikely that the connected toothpaste will go back in the tube at this point. Consumer products will be more connected, not less. Some day not long from now, the average person’s stroll down the aisle at Target or Best Buy will be just like our experiences at futuristic trade shows: everything is connected, and not all of it makes sense.

It won't be long before we'll be inviting techies around to debug our houses...

Source: The Verge