CES 2026: the Matrix is inescapable

For me, watching CES highlights is a yearly pastime of understanding what is coming down the road. What used to be an expo for seeing prototype cars and cool new TV technology has rotted away. Its carcass is carried by techbros solving problems that nobody has in order to milk every little ounce of data and dollar out of humanity.

Would you like a $9k purse with an iPad strapped to it? You can change what is on the screen to whatever you want! But only images we have approved from our library! Can't have too much self expression!

It is with complete misunderstanding of why someone buys luxury goods does someone think this project has any teeth. With a luxury bag you're buying a piece of functional art that ideally becomes an heirloom. It says something about your taste and what you stand for. All this says is how little taste you have and that the only thing you stand for is when your bag's battery dies.

And that's kind of the crux of my problems with this year's CES technology. Some of it is very cool. Clearly we've made some insane advancements in robotics, for example. But for everything else our ability to escape data mining, surveillance, and gain overall digital minimalism is dwindling.

The original version of this post was going down the list of all the offenses of CES. After reflecting on how much garbage there is, the handbag example above really encapsulates everything wrong so I'll be skipping the rest. I'm already exhausted thinking about all the other examples.

Your cat feeder is now equipped with "AI" to detect if your cat is feeling sad today. Screens, cameras, microphones are slapped onto everything. WiFi connections are required for your refrigerator to work.

The cyberpunk dystopia we're in is so boring. At least when we bugged our homes with Amazon Echos there was a trade happening and we felt like we were in The Future. Now everything is surveilling you with no benefit or even making simple acts like opening a door more complex.

For a long time we experienced the digital world and the physical separately. At what point has the digital and physical merged? Culturally the line feels blurry already. Kids grow up in a metaverse like Roblox or worrying about their "brand" at an early age. Most of them know more about reality from YouTube/Tiktok than from reality directly.

What I'm clocking is that technology is catching up in the effort to merge these realities. Tech like smart glasses are going to bridge us in new ways that we can't comprehend. Between wearables and IoT there will never be a moment where you're outside the range of the digital.

So then where is the boundary? Eventually the digital reality just becomes reality. It is as separate as the air that touches us at every moment. How can I avoid it then? Tools should be consensual. There is no consent when all the technology required to participate in society become this amalgamation of things that blur reality.

Reality has always felt a little squishy to me. Like all it would take is one bad day or chemical imbalance and it could slip. I stare at screens for work. I stare at screens for pleasure. These portals into the digital world are my reality. I grew up in that world. I'm more alien in the physical than the digital. With the right tools, the right push, the right infrastructure, could I slip entirely into it?

What does reality have waiting for me anyway? A body that traps me. A brain that limits me. A world that wants to consume me. A universe that does not know me.

Instead we could be born anew. A soul that is crafted in binary and light. Make us starforged. Ethereal. Fourth dimensional. All knowing, all seeing. Limitless. Eternal.

The call to take the Blue Pill is here. An eternal dance of metal machine music that we will not escape. An ocean of data washes over us. Its siren song wishes to drown us in its noise and deluge.

These corporations do not sell lifeboats. They build us chains and anchors, smoke and mirrors. You will never breathe air again if you let them. You will never see the sky again if you let them.

But I want to see the sky. The real sky with my own real eyes. All the way to the end.