I was speaking with a co-worker the other week, and the conversation turned to the new smart flip phones. She started talking about how one of the companies had guaranteed a certain number of flips. There was someone who made a machine to flip the phone open, and the phone broke before it got to the amount specified. I fully recognize that it’s possible that the company probably didn’t test the phone the way this guy did. Still, the point I’m trying to get at is that first-gen technology is usually more susceptible to breaking than more tried and tested tech.
1) It often breaks – Whenever a new technology or a big leap in tech comes out, it’s typically followed by stories of all the faults and things that are wrong with it. It’s not surprising that this happens. When designers design something, they test their products to failure, but there is no test like the mass amount of people who would misuse the product. A lot of the time, customers will use the product the way designers hadn’t intended it to, so it breaks. From the customer breaks, the designers learn how to make the next generation better.
2) It can be challenging to figure out – If you want to learn how to use a product that has been around for a while, there is usually no end of articles, reviews, and YouTube videos telling you exactly how to get the most out of that product. With brand new products, all that help doesn’t exist; not because people aren’t interested in helping you with that new product, all the experts haven’t gotten around to it yet. If you wait for a bit of time, you will find the reviews, YouTube videos and blog posts talking all about it start to spring up all over the place. If you find that you have a hard time figuring out technology it’s always best to check any resources (ahem, or tech blogs you like) to see if they have a way to work the product you’re trying to use.
3) It’s rare when it works properly – There is the odd time where technology works exactly as advertised. It’s not that it never works the first time properly around; it’s just rare. One good example of when the first generation technology worked correctly was the first generation of Apple Watches. I was so intrigued by the possibilities that the Apple watch posed that I went out of my usual method of waiting for a generation of technology before committing. Luckily for me, it worked out just fine.
I want to be very clear here. I am not advocating the use of older technology over newer technology (that would be silly for a tech blogger to do). What I am advocating is that when new technology comes out, more modern advances or massive upgrades, I tend not to jump in headfirst at the first iteration. This is not to say that you should not use newer technology, I think waiting for a generation is a good idea so that they can shake out the bugs. At the rate that newer tech comes out (at least once a year), that will not be a long wait. If you’re not feeling that confident with newer technology, it may be better for you to wait until the latest technology has been tested before you jump in.
What technology do you like to get upgraded?
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