Table of Contents Table of Contents More than novelty Room for both?
When I attended my first Consumer Electronics Show in 2007, my friends reacted as if I were going to the World's Fair in 1933. What technological wonders would I see? What magic? What further proof of humanity's superiority?
The stories I brought rarely disappointed: TVs the size of bedroom walls! Flying cars! HD DVDs! OK, maybe that last one is a bad example.
But when I tell friends and family that I'm leaving now, in 2025, their reaction is more like me announcing that I'm attending a defense conference. What wasteful excess will I experience this year? What new tools to spy on us? What evidence of humanity's hubris?
I admit that some of this may have to do with life in Portland, Oregon, where young people are both retiring and living in a state of constant skepticism about the big things. This is a city with no fluoride in our water. But it's not just my crazy friends.
In 2021, YouGov conducted a survey to measure how trust in public institutions has changed since 2018. While there was a decline across the board, there were three companies that led the decline: Facebook, Amazon and Google. In comparison, Congress, the police and even the press fared relatively well.
American Institutional Trust Surveys
It's not even just the general public. Another survey of tech professionals found that 79% of them don't trust Big Tech when it comes to AI.
Can a trade show like CES help shake the tech industry's tarnished reputation? Perhaps more importantly, does it deserve it? I asked the woman who runs it.
More than novelty
Kinsey Fabrizio recently took over as president of the Consumer Technology Association, the group that runs CES, after her predecessor Gary Shapiro took over for decades. This makes this the first CES she has led and an opportunity to make a name for herself.
Fabrizio points out that in addition to robovacs and VR headsets, there are also numerous companies at CES dealing with larger issues. “I remember when the Source company presented their zero-mass water technology, which produced water from the air in the desert,” Fabrizio gives as an example. “I mean, this is a solution to a major technical problem.”
source
Quelle will be back this year. And another startup, AirFarm, is taking the same technology a step further by collecting water from the air and using it to irrigate crops in inflatable greenhouses called Food Arks. The company claims that due to their inflatable nature, deployment only takes half a day and uses 99% less water than conventional farming.
These companies' participation at CES is one thing, but the CTA also made an effort to shine a spotlight on them, Fabrizio says. “It's really important to us to bring the brightest, brightest and greatest minds on stage to talk about how technology solves challenges, big global challenges, and get them to really show what they do.”
The show floor tells the story: Digital Health Solutions, for example, will have 652 exhibitors this year, plus conference tracks with topics like “How technology can benefit 4.5 billion people without basic health care.”
“We have an awards program and different categories all centered around the theme of ‘Tech for Good’ and solving the world’s challenges through technology and creating solutions through technology,” says Fabrizio. Categories include sustainability, smart cities, animal welfare and human security for all, a grab bag of products that “show how technology is helping to address the world’s most pressing problems.”
The winners of this year's innovation prize include solutions for a wide range of issues. CalmiGo Plus is a handheld device that uses scent, vibration and breathing exercises to help people with anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder and panic attacks. MouthPad is a device for disabled users that allows them to control computers using only their tongue and gestures. DisMantleBot offers a new system to efficiently dismantle electric vehicle batteries for recycling.
Augmental
We love Tech For Change so much that we've put together an entire series highlighting it, and this year's CES offers no shortage of contenders.
Room for both?
So is CES a mall for big screen TVs or a trade show for solutions to 21st century problems?
“There is room for both,” says Fabrizio. “And the ability to have both at CES was, I think, a great development and something we want to continue.”
We are already seeing how it develops. At CES Unveiled, a press preview on Sunday evening, the Digital Trends editorial team marveled at AI glasses, digital windows and electric roller blades. But those weren't the products we were most excited about. An editor was excited about a pair of glasses for macular degeneration that could help his mother. Another was happy about a special exhibition for people with dyslexia that could help his son.
You know we will continue to report on flying cars. And big TVs. And a robot vacuum cleaner that climbs stairs.
But Fabrizio is right: beyond the carnival of excess and dubious practicality that has, not unfairly, defined technology over the last decade, numerous world-changing solutions are on display. You just have to stop rolling your eyes and look.
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