{"id":139043,"date":"2020-12-22T10:00:40","date_gmt":"2020-12-22T07:00:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/all-i-want-for-christmas-are-gadgets-with-regular-names\/"},"modified":"2020-12-22T10:00:40","modified_gmt":"2020-12-22T07:00:40","slug":"all-i-want-for-christmas-are-gadgets-with-regular-names","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/all-i-want-for-christmas-are-gadgets-with-regular-names\/","title":{"rendered":"#All I want for Christmas are gadgets with regular names"},"content":{"rendered":"

“#All I want for Christmas are gadgets with regular names<\/strong>”<\/p>\n

\n Santa, if you\u2019re reading this, please use your intense occult powers to do me a favor this festive season: stop companies naming their products incomprehensibly. Please? I\u2019ll leave you some weed-laced cookies? Just make sure I get gadgets with regular names.<\/p>\n

This trend of ridiculously named hardware irritated me before, but\u00a0hit fever pitch recently when I was trying to buy a wake-up light. This is, as it sounds, a light that wakes you up. Effectively, they simulate the sun rising, meaning you surface from your slumber in a way that feels natural.<\/p>\n

After a bit of research, it seemed that the best brand to go for was Philips. So, I browsed the company\u2019s website. And what was I confronted with? A series<\/a> of wake-up lights with the dumbest possible names, I\u2019m talking shit like\u00a0HF3520\/01,\u00a0HF3510\/01,\u00a0HF3505\/01, HF3500\/01, and HF3531\/01.<\/p>\n

And, believe me, that list continues \u2014 especially if you\u2019re on something like Amazon. It\u2019s nauseating.<\/p>\n

\"philips
<\/a>WHY AREN\u2019T WE ALLOWED GADGETS WITH REGULAR NAMES?<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The thing is\u2026 I just don\u2019t understand\u00a0why<\/em> companies do this. There are times when it seems like the whole tech world copies App<\/a>le (you know, like removing headphone jacks from phones), but at other moments the company appears to be out there by itself (like these naming conventions). Let\u2019s zoom in on this latter part.<\/p>\n

Apple isn\u2019t the only company selling gadgets with regular names, but it is one of the best at it. Let\u2019s just consider the latest iPhone line up. There are four models: the iPhone 12 mini, the iPhone 12, the iPhone 12 Pro, and the iPhone 12 Pro Max.<\/p>\n

It might take you a couple of reads to get your head around, but there\u2019s a clear logic at work here, something that makes sense on a fundamental level. You can guess that \u201cpro\u201d probably means it\u2019s good, \u201cmax\u201d suggests that it\u2019s bigger, and \u201cmini\u201d means it small. These are gadgets with regular names \u2014 and I love it.<\/p>\n

Compare that to another massive company which has the opposite approach and fully embraces awful naming conventions: Sony. Let\u2019s consider their headphones.<\/p>\n

Can you tell me anything<\/em> about what separates the\u00a0WH-1000XM4, the\u00a0WH-HN910N,\u00a0WH-XB700, or the\u00a0WH-CH710N? Hell, I\u2019m paid to write about gadgets and I can only tell you about one of those models because it\u2019s one of the best pair of headphones on the market.<\/p>\n

This whole approach is utterly bizarre.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s ignore the irritation element, and just look at the business side. If you\u2019re a company that makes gadgets, you want to do one thing: sell more of them. And one of the ways you do this is by building a brand, creating something that\u2019s recognizable and that people can tell each other about. That\u2019s why it\u2019s called a Big Mac rather than a BM-221GC.<\/p>\n

Surely,\u00a0surely,<\/em> giving a product a name that\u2019s just a collection of numbers and letters harms its ability to build a recognized brand and sell more? I can\u2019t imagine a world where this isn\u2019t the case.<\/p>\n

So, Santa, can you let all these CMOs know I\u2019m not happy? Tell those chumps to give me gadgets with regular names. Or else.<\/p>\n

Did you know we have a news<\/a>letter all about consumer tech? It\u2019s called Plugged In \u2013
\n and you can subscribe to it right here<\/a>.
\n <\/i><\/p>\n

\n Published December 22, 2020 \u2014 07:00 UTC\n <\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n