Open Thread Extra: Your Tech Holiday Wish List
It’s that time of year again, when countless workshops are hard at work making magical items that will stun, amaze and surprise everyone.
I’m talking, of course, about CES (the Consumer Electronics Show), where each year tech titans and wannabe titans, visionaries and inventors gather to showcase their tech visions made real.
Coming up January 6 – 9, the 2026 show promises more bells and whistles than ever before, from AI (naturally) to Vehicle Tech and everything in between.
Future Tech Wish List
As in other years, CES promises a tech-packed future touching nearly every aspect of life. Robotics, self driving cars, digital health and fitness, gaming, smart homes, smart communities, even sports….the list is endless.
Still, as in previous years, there are a few items on my CES wish list, some unchanged from last year:
- Hearing aids that automatically filter out background noise and use AI to fill in the clarity in speech that I’ve been losing every year. Just making things louder isn’t the answer, people!
- TVs that have T-coil technology built in or available as an app. Few things are as annoying as watching a movie with closed captions that don’t keep up with the action on the screen. In fact, movie theaters should have T-coil capability as well.
- Wearable fitness devices that spend as much money on the wristband as they do on the technology.
- A universal archive of drivers for vintage but still good and working laptops, towers and printers.
- A universal printer that will work with any operating system of any vintage. I’m getting tired of the upgrade race between laptops or towers and printers. It’s a printer – it prints your documents, it’s not something that has to land on the moon and return.
- For heaven’s sake, bring back instruction and owners’ manuals in tech devices.
YOUR TURN
But that’s me. What is on your tech wish list? What technology are you hoping to see at CES, now or in the future? Take our short survey below to share what general tech categories you are most interested in. Share your dreams and ideas in the comments, and we’ll ask our CES correspondent to look for them among the booths at CES in January!
Virge Randall is Senior Planet’s Managing Editor. She is also a freelance culture reporter who seeks out hidden gems and unsung (or undersung) treasures for Straus Newspapers; she writes frequently on Old School New York City and performs at open mic readings throughout New York City. Send Open Thread suggestions to editor@seniorplanet.org.
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Comments
First a question, Virge. Please expand re:
“Wearable fitness devices that spend as much money on the wristband as they do on the technology.”
As per your hearing aid comment: absolutely! My new aids have Bluetooth; changeable incoming sound field; and more. But background noise wins every time.
Sure, Malcolm. My Fitbit wristband wouldn’t stay fastened. I had to seal it with crazy glue. I had to do it a few more times. Because I had to fool with the mechanism face the watchface kept popping off, Now I must replace the watch (even though it still counts steps!) because the watchface is blank. Cheap plastic watchbands stink; our wrists don’t change size so the bands inevitably break by constant pressure at the same point. It ain’t rocket science.
I am so tired of planned obsolescence. Two decades of family photos are stored on CDs, but new computers can’t show them. Why can’t they have a player for CDs? Is that too hard?
Because then they couldn’t make bank by forcing you to buy a separate CD reader/player. I spent 3 large on a new laptop and still had to buy a separate CD drive!!
Not a tech question, but a subject that has generated significant interest from Senior Planet members!
SENIOR DANCING!
I have tried numerous ways to offer senior dancing to our members.
Unfortunately, because of the limitation of “Free” activities, none have been successful even at only $10.00 per participant. The low cost would be needed to pay for a disc jockey / dance instructor or for participation at a non-profit dance studio!
Too bad! There are so many members interested.
Bill Wells