Monday, October 03, 2005

Electric can openers

Word Spy, a site that tracks jargon and buzzwords, offers up this term and definition:
electric-can-opener question n. The recognition that some older, low-tech products are superior to the newer, high-tech products that are supposed to replace them.


Example Citation:

Ultimately, the question for potential Iridium buyers was what has sometimes been called the electric-can-opener question. Why pay a lot of money to buy something which you know to be inferior to an older, cheaper technology?
—Editorial, "The sky's not the limit," The Globe and Mail, August 23, 1999
Although I've never heard this term before, the electric can opener is a terrific example of technology overkill . I never liked electric can openers. We don't have one in our home. We have the little manual kind you turn. My cans open just find and I have a little more counter space.