My mp4 is better than your mp3

Do you know what a megapixel is? Of course you don't. Nobody knows! What you do know is that your new camera has to have more than 5 of them. And the more the better.

A similar thing happens with computers. The laptop from where I'm writing these lines was bought almost 3 years ago. I bought it because it had a very good specs (processor, graphics card etc.) and because it was relatively cheap, considering the fantastic processor it had. Well, as it turns out, the computer is shit. The processor is very fast and powerful, sure. But everything else is just a disaster: the materials are cheap, the webcam broke, the battery lasted 1 year, the paint is peeling off and worst of all the thing is noisy! The fan is constantly running and despite that, the computer feels hot on my hands, making me sweat when I type. I hate this computer!

This attempt to take objective things (e.g. speed of the processor) and associate them with subjective things (e.g. speed of the computer) must be a blessing for manufacturers, and not just computer makers. Take digital picture cameras, for instance. With this system where more megapixels = better photos all the manufacturer has to do is make a camera that takes pictures with 5 megapixels or more. No matter if the camera takes 5 megapixel photos of dull, out of focus scenes with no color, that's not advertised! Here is a picture, taken at 5 megapixels, from 75€ camera that belongs to a friend:

5 megapixel camera. On a bad ecstasy trip, apparently

The tech world is filled with this ridiculous oversimplification of complex devices, sometimes down to a single number. Here is a table illustrating what I mean:

Today I saw an advert for a machine that makes coffee, proudly stating it makes it's coffee at 19 bar (of pressure). The ad didn't say the coffee was good, it said it was made at 19 bar. Don't we care about coffee in a coffee machine?

Somewhere along the line we forgot that more is not better. Better is better.

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