{"id":13629,"date":"2015-01-15T14:00:00","date_gmt":"2015-01-15T14:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/architizer.wpengine.com\/how-millennials-ruled-the-consumer-electronics-show\/"},"modified":"2022-05-31T11:59:12","modified_gmt":"2022-05-31T15:59:12","slug":"how-millennials-ruled-the-consumer-electronics-show","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/architizer.com\/blog\/practice\/details\/how-millennials-ruled-the-consumer-electronics-show\/","title":{"rendered":"Smart Homes, Dumb Kids: A Dispatch From the Consumer Electronics Show"},"content":{"rendered":"

Lazy<\/a>, coddled<\/a>, narcissistic<\/a>. Over-sensitive<\/a>. Smartphone-obsessed<\/a>. Popular media has relished branding millennials (the generation born roughly between the \u201980s and the early aughts) in such broad and scathing terms, a practice easily rejected as clickbait \u2014 that is, unless you attended the Consumer Electronics Show last week. That\u2019s where I watched a Whirlpool representative call her mother using her kitchen.<\/p>\n

\u201cHi Mom, I forgot your spaghetti sauce recipe!\u201d went the scripted dialogue. The mom character spoke as a digital apparition, emanating from the backsplash of the demonstration stove, next to a timer for the pretend-boiling gluten-free spaghetti. She got to oregano on her list of ingredients before I lost interest.<\/p>\n

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by Janelle Zara<\/i><\/p>\n

From smart appliances to wearables to dancing robots, the perennially hyperactive launchpad for high-tech sundries that took place in Las Vegas last week featured gadgets of every imaginable genre, all incestuously linked through the ever-expanding \u201cInternet of Things.\u201d Based on the gimmicks that unfolded there, one thing was clear: The vast array of major manufacturers and fledgling startups had been reading the news. In addition to being soft, millennials now make up 25 percent of the population and reportedly $200 billion<\/a> in annual buying power, with an estimated $1.3 trillion in current consumer spending.<\/p>\n

\u201cMillennials are a big target,\u201d Whirlpool principal engineer Wyndham Gary told me in the brand\u2019s sprawling booth. (His engineering career began in the early \u201980s, making it millennial-aged.) \u201cThey\u2019re just starting to buy [home appliances], and they\u2019re going to be looking for things that connect and that work with their phones.\u201d The latest advances in technology enabled the brand\u2019s smartest washer\/dryer system to date to do just that. The new Duet system<\/a> syncs with the Nest app<\/a> to actively communicate with the utility company, a function that tells the machines not to run during peak-cost energy periods. Because they know where you are, they can set themselves to quiet mode as to not disturb you while you\u2019re home. Most conveniently of all, Duet also features preset buttons marked \u201cTowels,\u201d so you never actually have to learn the care instructions that accompany various fabrics. It\u2019s great news, especially since it can\u2019t call your mom… yet.<\/p>\n

The lazy luxury of presets was similarly applied in the kitchen of the near future: German manufacturer Bosch\u2019s new Series 8 oven<\/a> (sadly only available to German and Austrian 20-somethings at the moment) comes with presets for \u201cPizza,\u201d \u201cFrozen Products,\u201d and more, calibrated to infinitesimally precise moisture and temperature settings for perfect results. Who needs to learn how to cook anymore? Your new kitchen is going to make you feel like a natural-born Julia Child. And you can skip the silver spoon when Panasonic\u2019s \u201cA Better Life, A Better World\u201d booth features an induction stove that stirs the contents of your saucepan itself, freeing your hands to update Vine. That is literally what is happening in the Dwell snapshot below.<\/p>\n