{"id":227633,"date":"2026-01-11T03:08:11","date_gmt":"2026-01-11T03:08:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/227633\/"},"modified":"2026-01-11T03:08:11","modified_gmt":"2026-01-11T03:08:11","slug":"tech-convention-worst-in-show-products","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/227633\/","title":{"rendered":"Tech convention ‘Worst in Show’ products"},"content":{"rendered":"

The promise of artificial intelligence was front and centre at this year’s Consumer Electronics Show (CES) gadget show in Las Vegas. <\/p>\n

But spicing up a simple machine like a refrigerator with unnecessary AI was also a surefire way to win the \u201cWorst in Show.\u201d The annual contest that no tech company wants to win announced its decisions yesterday. <\/p>\n

Among those getting the notorious \u201canti-awards\u201d for invasive, wasteful or fragile products were an eye-tracking AI \u201csoulmate\u201d companion for combating loneliness, a musical lollipop and new AI features for Amazon’s widely used doorbell cameras.<\/p>\n

\"Ring<\/p>\n

Ring doorbells are seen on display at the Amazon booth during the CES tech show (Source: Associated Press)<\/p>\n

Shouting at a \u2018bespoke AI\u2019 fridge that also hawks grocery products<\/p>\n

Samsung’s \u201cBespoke AI Family Hub\u201d refrigerator received the overall \u201cWorst in Show\u201d recognition from the group of consumer and privacy advocates who judged the contest.<\/p>\n

Samsung invites users to speak to the refrigerator and command it to open or close the door, but a demonstration at the sprawling Las Vegas technology expo showed it didn’t always detect what people were saying if there was too much ambient noise. <\/p>\n

That was just part of the complications and reliability concerns Samsung added to an appliance that’s supposed to have one important job: keeping food cold, said Gay Gordon-Byrne of the Digital Right to Repair Coalition in a recorded video ceremony announcing the anti-awards.<\/p>\n

\u201cEverything is an order of magnitude more difficult,\u201d she said of the fridge that also uses computer vision to track when food items are running low and can advertise replacements.<\/p>\n

Samsung said in response that \u201ca trade show floor is naturally very different from a consumer\u2019s home environment. Our Bespoke AI experiences are designed to simplify decisions around the home, making life more convenient and enjoyable.\u201d<\/p>\n

The South Korean tech giant also said \u201csecurity and privacy are foundational\u201d to the AI experiences in the fridge.<\/p>\n

Who decides what’s \u2018Worst in Show\u2019<\/p>\n

The judges have no affiliation with CES or the trade group that runs the show.<\/p>\n

They say they make the choices based on how uniquely bad a product is, what impact it could have if widely adopted and if it was significantly worse than previous versions of similar technology. <\/p>\n

The judges represent groups including Consumer Reports, the Electronic Frontier Foundation and right-to-repair advocates iFixit.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe definitely intend some shame,\u201d said iFixit’s director of sustainability, Elizabeth Chamberlain, in an interview. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe do hope that manufacturers see this as a poke, as an impetus to do better next time. But our goal isn\u2019t to really shame any particular manufacturer as such. <\/p>\n

“We\u2019re hoping that they\u2019ll make changes as a result of it. We\u2019re pointing to trends that we see in the industry as a whole. And a lot of the things that we\u2019re calling out, we picked an individual product, but we could have picked a whole category.\u201d<\/p>\n

Amazon’s doorbells once again ring privacy alarms<\/p>\n

An array of new features for Amazon’s Ring doorbell camera system won the \u201cWorst in Show\u201d for privacy for \u201cdoubling down on privacy invasion and supporting the misconception that more surveillance always makes us safer,\u201d said Cindy Cohn, executive director of the Electronic Frontier Foundation.<\/p>\n

Among the new Ring features is an \u201cAI Unusual Event Alert\u201d that is supposed to detect unexpected people or happenings like the arrival of a \u201cpack of coyotes.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThat includes facial recognition,\u201d Cohn said of the new Ring features. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt includes mobile surveillance towers that can be deployed at parking lots and other places, and it includes an app store that\u2019s going to let people develop even sketchier apps for the doorbell than the ones that Amazon already provides.\u201d<\/p>\n

Amazon didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.<\/p>\n

Deskbound AI \u2018soulmate\u2019 companion is always watching your eyes<\/p>\n

Winning the \u201cPeople’s Choice\u201d of worst products was an AI companion called Ami, made by Chinese company Lepro, which mostly sells lamps and lighting technology. <\/p>\n

Ami appears as a female avatar on a curved screen that is marketed as \u201cyour always-on 3D soulmate,\u201d designed for remote workers looking for private and \u201cempathetic\u201d interactions during long days at the home office. <\/p>\n

It tracks eye movements and other emotional signals, like tone of voice.<\/p>\n

The group says it is calling out Lepro \u201cfor having the audacity to suggest that an AI video surveillance device on a desk could be anyone\u2019s soulmate.\u201d <\/p>\n

Advocates acknowledged the device comes with a physical camera shutter but said they were unsettled by its \u201calways-on\u201d marketing.<\/p>\n

Lepro didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.<\/p>\n

Tech lollipop gets dinged for environmental waste<\/p>\n

Lollipop Star attracted attention early at CES as a candy that plays music while you eat it. Its creators say it uses bone induction technology to enable people to hear songs \u2014 like tracks from Ice Spice and Akon \u2014 through the lollipop as they bite it using their back teeth. <\/p>\n

But the sticks can’t be recharged or reused after the candy is gone, leaving consumer advocate Nathan Proctor to give it a \u201cWorst in Show\u201d for the environment.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe need to stop making so many disposable electronics, which are full of toxic chemicals, require critical minerals to produce and can burn down waste facilities,\u201d said Proctor, who directs the Public Interest Research Group’s right-to-repair campaign.<\/p>\n

A spokesperson for Lollipop Star maker Lava Brand didn’t immediately respond to a message seeking comment.<\/p>\n

A treadmill powered by an AI chatbot fitness coach raises security concerns<\/p>\n

\u201cWorst in Show\u201d for security went to Merach’s internet-connected treadmill that boasts of having the industry’s first AI coach powered by a large language model that can converse with the user but also proactively adjust the speed and incline based on heart rate changes.<\/p>\n

All that collection of biometric data and behavioural inferences raised concerns for security advocates, but so did the fine print of a privacy policy that stated: \u201cWe cannot guarantee the security of your personal information.\u201d<\/p>\n

China-based Merach didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.<\/p>\n

Talking coffee makers and making e-bikes hard to fix<\/p>\n

German tech company Bosch received two \u201cWorst in Show\u201d awards, one for adding subscriptions and enhanced voice assistance from Amazon’s Alexa to coffee-making with a \u201cPersonal AI Barista\u201d espresso machine and another for a purported anti-theft and battery lock feature on an e-bike app.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

A couple of Bosch 800 Series fully automatic espresso machines are seen on display at the Bosch booth (Source: Associated Press)<\/p>\n

Cory Doctorow, author of the book \u201cEnshittification: Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse and What to Do About It\u201d and himself a \u201cWorst in Show\u201d judge, criticided Bosch’s \u201cparts pairing\u201d to digitally connect an e-bike with its parts, like motors and batteries, in a way that flags a part if it appeared on a database of stolen products.<\/p>\n

Even if Bosch doesn’t seek to prosecute its own customers for routine repairs, Doctorow said it could always change its deal with them later, in line with his theory of the decay of online platforms as companies exploit the customers they earlier won over.<\/p>\n

Bosch countered that the \u201cWorst in Show\u201d commentators were misleadingly suggesting the company is forcing consumers to utilise features that are optional and, in the case of the espresso machine, already popular.<\/p>\n

Bosch said in a statement Thursday \u201cthat earning and keeping trust with our consumers, especially in the areas of privacy and cybersecurity, is at the core of our company\u2019s values. <\/p>\n

Both Bosch Home Appliances and Bosch eBike Systems protect their consumers against unauthorised tampering or control through a comprehensive security concept, using encryption and authentication.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The promise of artificial intelligence was front and centre at this year’s Consumer Electronics Show (CES) gadget show…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":227634,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[365,363,364,111,139,64,69,145],"class_list":["post-227633","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-artificial-intelligence","tag-ai","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-artificialintelligence","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-north-america","tag-nz","tag-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/227633","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=227633"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/227633\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/227634"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=227633"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=227633"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=227633"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}